Perhaps I am making some misguided assumptions.  I'll try to provide more evidence for my claims, or at least the reasons for my claims.  None of the Democratic candidates are fundamentally different on the questions of corporate power and US military aggressiveness; there the differences are minor, but given the impact of those two problems, minor differences can have huge effects.

I guess we do have some fundamental disagreements about at least two issues.

Not every corporation is evil, certainly not the individuals within them.  But the nature of the economic system is "grow or die" and squeezing labor is the most effective method of extracting profits, well, that and plundering the earth.  If you don't, particularly by the time one is managing a F500 corporation, you are fired.  On this score, if not much else, Marx was correct, in my opinion.  And the view is not that radical but was widely believed by many progressive forces in American history.  Jefferson warned about the pernicious influence of corporations.  The Populists were animated by similar concerns, as were those in the early labor movement.  There is a class war with, writ large at least, two counter-posed and ultimately irreconcilable forces.  Provisional or temporary cooperation is perhaps possible - see the Capital-Labor accord of the 1950s to late 1960s - but not permanent alignment of interests (guess which party walked away from the accord).  The greatest recent accomplishment of corporations has been to make it seem that their dominance is "natural" as opposed to the end product of deliberate policy.  Nope, our economic systems are human-created and they can be changed.  But their ability to frame the premises of respectable discussion - they own the media and dominate the intelligentsia and the chattering class - does not mean their dogma about the unfettered market being the most efficient economic form is correct.

I am not sure what you think I have in mind by "screw over business", so allow me to provide a few details about my beliefs.  Easing in many different ways the ability to form unions and in the power unions have in negotiations (think the social democracies of Europe).  No more "free trade" agreements of the sort we have had that are actually agreements to relieve capital of any regulations.  Larger increases in the minimum wage.  Single payer health care.  Subsidized child care.  Real pension security. Progressive taxation schemes that have the effect of impeding excessive concentrations of wealth.  Enforcement of anti-trust and collusion laws to prevent a handful of mega-corporations from exercising near monopoly power over the entire economy and key industries, such as the media and utilities.  Real regulation of food industries, drug industries, resources extraction industries.  Require significant returns to the public for our substantial public subsidies, of various types, for R&D.  Basically, all the aspects of the regulatory state from Teddy through at least Johnson, a trend only relatively recently reversed and blessed by both parties, in the main.  Way down the road, many generations, I see no reason why the corporate form need survive.  Indeed, if it does, we won't.  I'm not pretending you will agree, but you asked for more details.

We disagree even more strongly about the pernicious influence of US military abroad, though I wholeheartedly agree US, and European, ag protectionism is a major problem for the poor, particularly in Africa.  My core argument is if we were to identify the largest single cause, we would point to US military posture, doctrine, and policy.  There are other causes of global privation, to be sure, but none are as great.  Even more on point is that any time a nation attempts to deviate from the neo-liberal consensus they are attacked by the United States in one form or another.  The peoples of the world are unable to change their conditions because of the actual or threatened fist of US power.  So, when, say an African nation would like to direct their internal ag policy toward satisfying domestic needs, the US and its allies put on the screws via SAP and through other mechanisms, arming insurrectionary groups, or, if necessary, sending in the Marines to impose an export-oriented ag model with predictable mal-development consequences.  It's a classic mafia racket.  The key argument is that global order is enforced, at bottom, by US military power.

This really isn't arguable, in my opinion.  Read the declassified planning record, particularly from the years 1944-1950 and - this is key - it is consistent over decades regardless of party, right through the present day.  The details differ but the plot line is stable.

You have George Kennan, the most generous and perceptive of the post-war planners, writing in 1948:

"we have about 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population. This disparity is particularly great as between ourselves and the peoples of Asia. In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security.  To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world-benefaction...We should cease to talk about vague and--for the Far East--unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better."

Course they don't talk that way on TV or in the papers or when running for office.

Join me on an abbreviated tour of the foreign policy history of the United States.  I don't want to sound all preachy, so I will try to stick to what I believe are inarguable facts.  I can draw on a wealth of specific sources to substantiate each and every claim, many of the sources being from the declassified planning record or mainstream media.  

Do you realize that the US spends more on the military than the rest of the world combined and is the largest purveyor of weapons around the world?  Read the observations of General Smedley before Congress in the 1930s - at the time the only two-time Congressional Medal of Honor recipient.

A partial body count:

*    19th century Indian Wars, direct and indirect death toll incalculable, but not small.
*    1898-1900, crush the Filipino independence movement, at least 10s of thousands killed.  
*    Nicaragua, Honduras and various Carribbean nations in the 1910-1930s.  Who is Sandino?
*    We have Mossadegh in Iran, Arbenz in Guatemala
*    2-3 million killed in Indochina over our long war there.
*    The death squad states in Latin American during the 1970s and 1980s, the fruit of our rat-lining Nazis after the war and Kennedy's tragic Alliance for Progress reorientation of hemispheric military toward "internal defense", aka killing peasants
*    Contras in Nicaragua.  I was there; I saw what US policy did to crush the dreams of a people
*    Support during the 1970s and 1980s for the Apartheid government as it killed - I'm not making this stuff up - 1.5 million directly and indirectly in the Frontline states.
*    Suharto coup in 1965
*    East Timor genocide 1975-1980
*    Medical researchers about a decade ago wrote of the rise of new group of people in the Brazilian northeast, new because malnutrition from their earliest days left them with tiny brains and emaciated bodies.  Why?  Maybe it could be dated back the anti-Goulart coup in 1964, which installed a military junta that prevented a mild social democratic government from focusing on internal development.  The same military-corporate elite ran Brazil until Lula.
*    The US (and France, UK and Germany) armed and provided support to Saddam during his worst atrocities, the ones for which he was executed, and his barbarism gave our leaders no pause, until it looked like he was not longer willing to follow orders.
*    Then there is the 100s of thousands of Iraqis who died during the sanctions period which the US almost alone insisted on keeping in place and even at some points strengthening
*    Who sold the Bell-Huey helicopters to Mexico so they could mow down the Zapatistas in the Lacandon jungle?  That's right Uncle Sam.

I could go on but I believe I have made my point.  The collapse of the Soviet Union, obviously a good thing, has left the United States undeterred, or as George's daddy celebrated in Iraq War I, our leaders believe they have "killed the Vietnam Syndrome", i.e. the reluctance of the American population to engage in wars overseas.  I can only hope Junior has resurrected it.  It is the US foreign policy establishment, not you, not me, but those who act in our name under the cover of very deeply ingrained propaganda about the nobility of US policy that carry out these atrocities.  They are the World Dictators, not you.

The US is not the only bad actor in the world, far from it.  But it is:

a) the most powerful, and therefore the one in the position to do the most damage and it has done the most damage; and

b) the one I can do something about because it is my country where I have, thanks to popular struggles over many years, some ability to influence the policy of the nation, in concert with like minded Americans.  President Bush is hard at work trying to eliminate that ability, but he has not yet succeeded.

And please don't accuse me of slandering the troops.  While My Lai and Haditha are hardly one-off events, they are not the true crimes here, in my opinion.

Finally, consider what lately passes for the Iraq War debate.  After blockading the country for more than a decade, shattering their electrical, water, and transportation infrastructure, destroying their local institutions of government, ramming a sweetheart oil deal down their throats (sweet for Anglo-American oil interests), and effectively outlawing unions, the leading voices in our party, including my preferred candidate, have the audacity to blame this whole mess on the Iraqi government not willing to get its act together.

It is as if I busted into your house, ripped out the phone, burned the roof, flooded the basement, kicked out the kids, sprayed Round Up on the garden, and then threw up my hands in disgust because you couldn't get it together.

I hope I have filled out some of my assertions.  Thanks for reading.

Trond Jacobsen

George, how can you say that after the Clinton campaign produced a five minute ad with Bill Clinton telling us how wonderful Hillary has been throughout her life?  You applauded that video and so did I.  I thought it was a good one.

Elizabeth's video is a good one too.

And I think I saw Bill on the campaign trail with Hillary.  His is a little more sensitive position but Hillary certainly spoke up during Bill's election.  And he can overshadow Hillary so they have to be more careful.  But lots of people feel that many support Hillary to get Bill back in the Whitehouse.

Elizabeth is not overshadowing John but we appreciate your concern.  She like Hillary is a strong woman who is supportive of her partner in his bid for the presidency.  She is not going to sit this out.  If people don't like it and it changes their mind that should work in your favor.  However she is very much a part of this campaign and he obviously is fine with her speaking out.  

not have minds of their own?

I like Elizabeth Edwards.

Comparing the two couples is interesting.  No whisper of anything with John like Genifer Flowers or Lewinsky.  I think it may matter to some voters.  Bill is a double edge sword for Hillary.  It is unfortunate for her.