Establishment Democrats have been flipping out about Susan Sarandon on Twitter. Again. In 2019.
I won’t re-hash the vapid origins of the drama here; if you want you can read about it here. Suffice to say that as usual it originated with Neera Tanden, the Center for American Progress think tank president who says populism undermines democracy. Sarandon’s name trended briefly on Twitter as shots were fired between progressives and establishment loyalists, things got wild over the next couple of days, and now you’ve got Daily Kos editor Armando Lloréns-Sar hastily deleting tweets after a deranged meltdown which culminated in the claim that Bernie Sanders is paying the progressive Our Revolution president Nina Turner to fuck him.
So that’s fun.
When the Bernie 2020 campaign first started I had little interest, partly because I dislike Sanders’ foreign policy and partly because up until fairly recently his campaign hasn’t drawn much pushback from establishment narrative managers. That has changed explosively in the last couple of weeks. Sometime after Sanders’ appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience, which as of this writing has more than nine million views on Youtube alone, all the usual beltway bootlickers suddenly got extremely shrill and aggressive in using their platforms to attack Sanders, reignite the bogus “Bernie Bro” smear, and tell progressives that they need to fall in line with the Democratic Party regardless of who ends up becoming the nominee. Now we’re seeing some very interesting glitches in the narrative control matrix like mass media pundits freaking out over Bernie’s suggestion that plutocratic ownership taints news reporting and veterans of the news media industry coming forward to say he’s right.
When I say the establishment narrative managers are coming forward to tell progressives to fall in line, I mean up to and including literally saying “fall in line” to them. Brian Fallon, executive director of the liberal advocacy group Demand Justice, recently tweeted, “Fall in love in the primary. Fall in line in the general.” This “fall in line” message is getting piped through all the liberal talking point distribution platforms currently, with Joe Biden’s wife Jill appearing on MSNBC to tell viewers that they must support her husband even if he’s terrible on important life-or-death issues like healthcare.
“So yes, you know, your candidate might be better on, I don’t know, health care, than Joe is, but you’ve got to look at who’s going to win this election, and maybe you have to swallow a little bit and say, ‘OK, I personally like so-and-so better,’ but your bottom line has to be that we have to beat Trump,” Jill Biden said.
This to me captures the spiritual agony that must haunt neoliberal Dems. You're smart enough to know that your policies hurt people, but you're driven to hide that by a sense of entitlement that your circle deserves power regardless. Sometimes that deeper, hidden truth comes out: https://t.co/0GPlk71WqR
— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) August 20, 2019
This new escalation in hyper-aggressive browbeating has been about as subtle as a brick, and leaders of America’s progressive movement have noticed.
“Folks on this website are so used to being able to personally vilify and bully anyone they disagree with, they’re now outraged that people like Brihana Joy Gray, Nina Turner, myself and others aren’t taking it silently anymore,” tweeted Sanders campaign speech writer David Sirota. “We are civil — but we respond. If that has you shook, too bad.”
Indeed, establishment liberals have been reacting with shock and indignation that anyone would dare to defend themselves from their appalling smears. Establishment pundit Soledad O’Brien is so unaccustomed to any challenge whatsoever that she thought it made sense to caption Nina Turner’s perfectly reasonable response to Tanden’s sleazeball remarks with the comment, “Ahhh the warm rhetoric of the Bernie team. Always a delightful tenor and encouraging for voters who are undecided.”
Only to the most entitled mindset could the idea of someone correcting a smear be construed as an attack. It’s the same kind of response authoritarian parents have to their children “talking back”.
[Ahhh the warm rhetoric of the Bernie team. Always a delightful tenor and encouraging for voters who are undecided.] https://t.co/K59v6aaUFT
— Soledad O'Brien (@soledadobrien) August 21, 2019
“The Beltway hostility to Bernie Sanders is about the power structure,” Sirota also said. “He’s the only candidate who makes the political elite’s connections and networks irrelevant. If you run a corporate think tank, you will be irrelevant under a Sanders presidency. That’s why he scares you so much. Let me add one thing: every single person in DC knows that this is true — they know that the Beltway hatred of Bernie is fundamentally based on a fear of total irrelevance and loss of insider influence. They will pretend it’s about something else, but it’s not. And they know that.”
I think it’s fair to say that the left-punching, bullying behavior of establishment Democrats in August of 2019 is now already around the level it was at in October of 2016. If it’s not at that level yet it will be soon. The 2020 election is still very far away, so we can bet that things are going to get much, much more hostile between the two factions in the future.
And that’s a good thing. For months the establishment narrative makers have been bleating the line that Democrats need to refrain from fighting each other because it’s helping Trump and/or Vladimir Putin, but in a media environment that is stacked in favor of more establishment-friendly candidates, not fighting would just be handing a win to the guardians of the status quo. If progressives want to have a chance they’re going to have to fight with extreme aggression; calls for politeness and civility are always anti-populist in nature and serve no one but the establishment.
If there is going to be class warfare in this country, it's about time the working class won that war.
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) August 21, 2019
The beltway pundits were able to choke down their rage and vitriol for a few months of the presidential race, hoping against hope that the Sanders campaign would be eclipsed by fauxgressives like Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg and kill his numbers in the polls. As soon as it became clear that this wasn’t going to happen, the friendly mask fell off and the claws came out.
That’s good. Now it’s a clean, fair, honest fight: toe-to-toe, gloves off, and no holds barred. Without the false container of civility and politeness, narratives are much harder to control, and populist narratives have an easier time emerging. Neera made a major miscalculation.
Very interesting indeed.
______________________
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78 responses to “Establishment Dems Are Openly Bullying Progressives. Good.”
Great! let’s get the message out! Keep fighting and justice will prevail…. Green my favorite color…
Unless things change, I will be sitting this next election out as I did the last one.
The Democratic party is on its last legs. None of those running except maybe with Tulsi Gabard and even I have a couple problems with her, is worth supporting and comrade Bernie is not even up for consideration .
Voting is a joke and the elections are a hoax.
This country was bought and sold a long time ago and the shit they shuffle around every four years is like listening to ten thousands dog farts.
So in the spirit of the late great George Carlin, I ain’t voting. F*** ’em.
Besides I believe if you vote, you have no right to complain.
Bernie will say what he can to get your vote then throw you under the bus like he did last time around.
this time he even signed the loyalty oath to the dems, but i’m not sure it requires him to endorse joe biden if he loses the nomination to the dnc ‘s pick. nevertheless i think he will do so if joe is up against donald. his voters on the other hand will have signed no loyalty oath. they can still stay at home or vote green.
Did he sign the loyalty oath to Pissrahell?
The Democratic Party is where Progressives go to die… Progressive and Domocrat is an oxymoron…
The first comment below this wonderful article (infinite gratitude to Caitlin Johnstone) supports Ronald Drumpf with a “things must get worse before they get better” mentality. The unDemocratic party should be excised like the tumor upon humanity that it so clearly is. The only thing more excruciatingly torturous than the sound of Sneera Tandem’s voice is the content of her speech. Let’s rally behind her, Rachel Madcow, Priss Hayes, Wolf Blitzkrieg, Andervanderbiltson Pooper, Sam-pronounces-it-Seeder and his work wife Migraine Michael Brooks, Chink Wigger (TYT genocide, much?), Marcy Whaletaler, Eleanor please-jump-off-a-Clift, Ken DelanCIAn, Mara Liarsson, Christiane Amapoorexcuseforahuman, Don Lemon (no name tweak required), Fauxcahontas, Convictallya Harris, Bory Cooker, Hitlery Clinton, Joe Sidenuptoyourchild, Jim The Clapper, Con Brennan, Iraq I’llbombya, Tony Bliar, Max Bootlicker, Amy Badman, David Cum, Mehdical Waste, Laura Coitrus, Jeremy Payhill, Bob Mackeysuit, James Risible, Matthew Ahole, Whora Currier, Besty Read (basically all of Pierre Amidar’s soulless non-profit NGO sell-outs), and Billy Krystolmeth, so that the (MS)DNC goes the way of the Whigs as soon as possible. Lesser-of-two-evilsism is not a defensible position.
Is the Democratic Party the lesser of two evils? I have my doubts.
For me it’s a moral issue. Good people don’t vote for crooks and war criminals.
I knew Jill Stein didn’t have a chance but voting for her made it easier for me to sleep at night.
Great! let’s get the message out! Keep fighting and justice will prevail…. Green my favorite color…
If the Clinton dominated DNC with the full support of the entire Obama administration inclusive of the Justice Department, FBI and CIA together with perhaps most of the swamp critter GOP, all of this being underwritten and orchestrated by the status quo globalist plutocracy “New World Order” which happens to totally dominate the mainstream media could not and apparently still cannot defeat Donald J. Trump, there is something rotten in the State of Denmark besides their unwillingness to unload “Greenland” for a boatload of US taxpayer fiat Federal Reserve notes. Methinks the anti-Trump choir directors doth protest too much. That said, I’ll predict now that either Trump will not be the Republican nominee or he will “retire” shortly after winning re-election because (really) the man has already decided he has better things to do in his final remaining years. Clue: DJT took God’s name in vain twice during a recent rally (just in case anyone missed the first instance?) The Trump base cannot be happy with that nor ignore its significance and he knows that. I think it was a calculated move towards “exit, stage right”. IMHO
I do not see how Trump can leave the Presidency without serious legal risks. His corruption is chargeable at both state and federal levels the minute he leaves office. He will spend the rest of his life trying to avoid imprisonment.
And for all you Williamson lovers:
https://needtoknow.news/2019/08/marianne-williamson-a-2020-democrat-presidential-candidate-says-we-must-stay-in-afghanistan-to-advance-feminism/
Enjoy!
it’s a good day for humanity. i’m talking about any day when neo-liberal “feminists” open their mouth and make themselves known to the world as what they are: arrogant idiots.
America is the first country to ever elect a Mad King, and the way things are going, we may be dumb enough to do it twice—Trump 2020: Be Very Afraid By Matt Taibbi.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/taibbi-trump-2020-be-very-afraid-872299/
Is Glider your censor, Caitlin? he refuses to let me respond to his comment on my comment. oh well, not surprised at all. it doesn’t take much for the true ugly face of some Bernie bros to come out…
don’t get me wrong, Susan Sarandon is still my inspiration! but Bernie has earned all the scorn and distrust.
CUTTHECORD,
A disappointed HRC fan is paranoid? It so happens I am a Tulsi-bro by your semantic trope, which seems to be a bit of an oxy-moron. Bernie-bro, what disgusting DNC anti-people vomit that was. Hope your enjoying Trump. Yuck!
you’re no credit to Tulsi either. wait, Tulsi voted for the anti-BDS resolution that criminalize BDS-Israhell… and Tulsi also has been serving the Council on Foreign Relations…. and Tulsi also was a gungho military killer… you two are a match made in hell.
Indeed. Tulsi is a ringer. Wonder if she puts on her Satanyahu kneepads when she visits Pissrahell?
She would do a better job by standing on a street corner selling herself.
Another liar and fraud.
Traitor and thief.
Piss on her.
Politicians lie because if they told the truth you wouldn’t vote for them.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/08/16/uncle-sam-was-born-lethal/
Bernie Sanders is a charlatan, a pseudo-leftist. He betrayed his supporters in 2016 by telling them to vote for Hillary Clinton. He will betray them again. He is a nationalist, which no socialist is or ever was. If you want socialism, vote for a real socialist party, The Socialist Equality Party.
take a close look in his “universal health care” as well. last time i checked, it was a scheme in which the sick and the poor will be covered by the government while the rich and the healthy will be covered by private insurance. problem? 1) that guarantees profits for the healthcare industry including the doctors, big pharmas, and insurance, while bankrupting the government, and 2) creates two tier of health care, one for the poor and the other for the rich.
Bernie, nor anyone, should outlaw private insurance. More wealthy citizen’s in a free country should be able to buy it. There is no candidate that would disallow purchasing private insurance! You are being deceitful IMO.
The whole bit is that there should be fairly comprehensive properly regulated insurance available as a basic right. Trust me, corporations are run for a profit. They may offer supplemental insurance but they will take to such a plan in droves. Is that what scares you?
Regarding the absurdity of creating of Bernie creating a “2-teir system”, WTF do you think we have now?
If the DNC installs Biden as their candidate, I will be highly disappointed if Bernie does not run as an independent this time round. I will never vote for this Clintonesque MTF.
If the DNC or a fair vote chooses Warren, I think Bernie should endorse her. She is a decent person in my opinion, although she has somehow managed to not be rejected on the same level as has Sanders by the PTB. She is our best reasonable hope, and Bernie would be a lucky hitting of the jackpot, especially if either would select Tulsi as a running mate.
Agree. Bernie is our best hope for real change in the U.S.
If Bernie is cheated out of the Democratic Nomination AGAIN, if we are all already Organized under the Bernie Campaign, then we can begin organizing a Socialist 3rd Party.
Bernie wanted Tulsi as his VP last time, so I would think she would be his running mate again. They work well together.
I don’t trust Warren. She is no true Progressive.
war-lovers are fake socialists.
is jerry white running for president? what’s his position on healthcare, student debt, foreign policy, climate change and the economy?
—
So, after the 2020 Democratic National Convention (July 13-16, 2020)
people will be told to hold their noses and vote the party line.
—
Again.
—
Hillary Clinton was in full control of the DNC a full year before the 2016 Democratic National Convention.
—
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/the-amazing-true-story-of-how-hillary-clinton-secretly-cheated-bernie-sanders-out-of-a-fair-shot-at-the-democratic-nomination
—
“How in the world was Bernie Sanders supposed to have a fair chance if
Hillary was in full control of “the party’s finances, strategy, and all the money raised”? ”
—
[Side notes: six months after she lost the election Hillary Clinton founded Onward Together
a fund raising leech that was designed (we are wise to expect) to take over the fund raising
of emerging progressive groups.]
—
[Onward Together: “Onward Together is dedicated to advancing the vision that earned
nearly 66 million votes in the 2016 election. By supporting groups that encourage
people to organize, get involved, and run for office,
Onward Together will advance progressive values and work to build a brighter future for generations to come.”
https://www.onwardtogether.org/ ]
—
[Laughter is an escape route from our lizard brain:
https://imgur.com/LnUChXD ]
—
After the 2020 convention there will be much to hold our noses about.
You think 2016 was slimey? You ain’t seen nothin yet.
—
People were very upset about the super-delegate beast in 2016. To placate the outrage
the DNC offered a rule change – the super-delegates cannot be used in the first ballot.
This appeared like a huge concession as there hasn’t been a multiple-ballot convention since
1952.
—
“Suprise, surprise.” $They$ went out and found twenty candidates in order to assure a
contested convention and thus uncage the super-delegates.
You thought the plethora of candidates was merely a random clump? Feel the burn.
—
The 2016 Democratic National Convention caused outrage, thank goodness (snark) for Russiagate,
everyone could forget about the DNC treachery and blame Russia.
—
But if you think the stink from the 2016 Democratic National Convention was bad,
people are going to go absolutely ballistic after the 2020 Democratic National Convention.
—
Will people “fall in line”? Don’t give Democratic voters too much credit, I am betting
they will … fall in line.
—
Again.
—
(I am a Green Party voter)
I think it’s interesting that the Established-Order Democratic leaders seem to have lost their collective minds. If your party is split, and the Democratic Party is certainly split, you don’t antagonize the split faction(s), you try to reconcile them and at least paper over their differences, because you can’t win with a split party. The split seems to go back to the lead-up to the election of 2016 and the bad blood which came out of the leadership’s sabotage of the Sanders campaign. There followed the insanity of Russiagate, which the Democratic leadership pursued when it should have been trying to evolve programs which would bring the party together and appeal to others. Instead we got fables and McCarthyism. It seems too late now to do anything about it, and in any case the Democratic leadership and media mob are doubling down on their derangement.
Because I believe the transmission of this information to be extremely important, I am going to reprint an article that appeared the Information Clearing House in the spring of 2019.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51464.htm
What follows is the article.
..
Bernie Sanders and the Nuclear-capable F35s
..
By Renee Parsons
..
April 19, 2019
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Fresh off what the MSM is celebrating as a surprise victory for a Bernie Town Hall on Fox News, lurking in the background is his inexplicable support over the years for basing the highly controversial F35 at the Burlington International Airport. We now know, thanks to a conscientious citizen who bothered to read the fine print, that those F35’s will be nuclear-capable and of immense explosive power.
..
In September, as the fall colors begin to change in Vermont, City of Burlington residents may not be in the streets waving American flags as eighteen F35 Lightening II radar-evading stealth fighter jets land at the Burlington Airport. As part of a Pentagon plan to deploy 2,500 jets nationwide, the F35’s will join the 158th Fighter Wing, a unit of the Vermont Air National Guard, affectionately known as the Green Mountain Boys as its aging F-16 jets are replaced.
..
Not just known for its foliage, cheese and maple syrup, Vermont is also host to an active aerospace industry which already supplies 2,000 jobs. The jet’s bay door and GAU-22 gun system will both be produced in Vermont. With the Air Force spending $84 million per jet from Lockheed Martin, the DOD will spend $100 Million for infrastructure improvement and a new training center at Burlington where they will share one runway with commercial air traffic.
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Basing more than a dozen F35’s in Burlington will bring a totally new generation of aircraft to Vermont as new high tech jets, not yet fully mature with all of its kinks and safety issues worked out, normally experience more accidents and ‘incidents’ in a shake down – and the F35 has had more than its share.
..
The F35 was commissioned by the Pentagon in 1995 at a cost of $1.5 Trillion, becoming the most expensive weapon system in US history as well as providing significant technical challenges including a “catastrophic engine failure” with total damage estimated at $50 million, a “life threatening ejection seat malfunction” and a crash in South Carolina due to a faulty fuel tube. The new controversial bomber jet fighter planes will be located in a dense area surrounded by public schools, a college and residential neighborhoods.
..
While the seven year debate over the F35 has been an intense round of public hearings and debates and public meetings, at least one lawsuit, and three of the most affected communities all formally opposing the F35 and even a successful anti F35 voter referendum which was adopted by the public, the state’s elected political leadership chose to ignore the outcome.
..
But it wasn’t until retired Air Force Col. Rosanne Greco was reading through a 68,000 heavily redacted Air Force document related to the lawsuit that she discovered vague references about the F35 carrying nuclear bombs.
..
Researching further, Greco who has thirty years of intelligence experience with the highest security clearances, is a specialized expert in nuclear weapons and arms control and a member of the US START delegation, confirmed the stunning news that the F35 was designed from the outset and had always been intended to carry a nuclear payload as it was to become an integral part of the US nuclear strategy.
..
Throughout all the furor, the Air Force never informed Vermont residents that the F35 was designed as a dual-capable plane; that is, able to deliver either a conventional weapon or a nuclear weapon or that its new guided nuclear bomb, the B61-12 was being specially designed to fit into the F35’s bay.
..
As if that belated information were not reason enough for the entire State of Vermont to be explosively irate at being lied to by the Pentagon, the state’s elected political leadership has yet to feel the full wrath of a citizenry that has only just begun to realize the consequences of being consistently lied to by its favorite sons. During the entire seven year campaign, both Senators Bernie Sanders and Patrick Leahy refused to meet with citizens who opposed the F35. In a short, pithy joint statement in 2016, the state’s entire Congressional delegation echoed their support for the F35 being based in Vermont.
..
And the B61 is one hell of a bomb – its range can be adjusted from .03 kilotons up to 50 kilotons. The bomb that killed 150,000 people in Hiroshima was a 15 kiloton bomb. Greco makes the point that the Green Mountain Boys could now directly initiate on their own ala Dr. Strangelove or participate in a nuclear war as ordered by the President. In addition, Vermont now becomes a central target in any potential conflagration since it is the delivery system that is the target. With no aircraft to carry them, bombs per se are not the target. The Burlington International Airport will now become Ground Zero.
..
When Greco’s revelations regarding the jets nuclear capability became public, Sanders and Leahy were unwavering in their denials and refutations which have been in direct contradiction with Air Force and DOD statements in the public record.
..
..
“Consequently the United States will maintain and enhance as necessary, the capability to forward-deploy nuclear bombers…around the world. We are committed to upgrading the DCA with the nuclear-capable F35 aircraft.”
..
Department of Defense, 2018 Nuclear Posture Review, Chapter VII, “Current and Future US Nuclear Capabilities, page 54
..
..
Further, the MIC boasts of a nuclear loaded F35 for its “..combination of accuracy and low-yield make the B61-12 the most usable nuclear bomb in America’s arsenal. This makes using nuclear weapons thinkable for the first time since the 1940s” as if that is a good thing! Further military assessments suggest “Yet the most dangerous nuclear bomb in American’s arsenal may be the new B61-12.” And that “What makes the B61-12 bomb the most dangerous nuclear weapon in American’s arsenal is it usability. “
..
State political leaders have been so supportive that former Governor Peter Shumlin traveled to Eglin Air Force Base in Florida came away declaring that “Listening has been a real eye opener. It is surprising how quiet the F35 is.” Noise abatement is a major issue since the F35 is four times louder than the F16’s being replaced and required the destruction of 200 homes identified
..
as being within the zone that exceeded acceptable decibel level. How nearby public school students or at the nearby college will be expected to learn and concentrate in an environment unfit for residential habitation remains to be seen.
..
During a 2016 campaign debate in which F35 supporters cited the local Air Guard’s efforts after the 911 attack, Burlington Mayor Milo Weinberger, another politically elite F35 supporter responded that “They flew over an area already devastated by a terrorist action. I don’t believe they stopped a single thing from happening.” Without meaning to, his comments raise a valid question about why the Pentagon funds local Air National Guard unit other than as a glorified jobs program.
..
In justifying his support in 2016, Sanders said it was not the plane but the jobs and economic advantage of the F35 that he supports. “In the real world, if the plane is built … and if the choice is if that goes to Vermont … South Carolina or Florida. What is your choice as a United States Senator?” he asked. “And that’s what the Vermont National Guard wants, and that means hundreds of jobs in my city. That’s it.”
..
Sanders claim that the project will add 1,100 new jobs to the Airport is fraudulent, according to Greco who says that with departure of the F16s’, there will be a one for one swap with the previous F16 employees being trained on the F35s.
..
The question is when did Bernie and the doddering Sen. Leahy, who apparently was the prime mover and shaker to bring the F35 to Vermont, discover that the F35 would be nuclear capable? Greco says that public records shows that after Vermont was initially explored and dismissed by the Air Force as being an unsuitable location with South Carolina being the preferred location, Leahy personally intervened to bring the F35 to Vermont.
It is inconceivable that the Air Force would keep that level of pertinent information secret from two US Senators who had become its reliably pro- F35 allies while they opposed and deceived the best interests of their own constituents .
Bernie is yet to meet a war that he doesn’t like.
I was led to believe that the F-35’s do not work as advertised!
They don’t. They are the worst boondoggle ever foisted on American taxpayers.
Cost plus is a rip off of immense proportions and the so called defense industry, actually the war industry is robbing Americans blind.
The F-35 is a dismal failure if ever there was one.
This sounds very scary until you realize that a small suitcase is just as capable with regards to carrying a nuke these days.
While I really like Caitlin’s neologism “fauxgressives” (I had been referring to “sell-out Dems”), I dislike her applying her new term to Elizabeth Warren. Warren has spawned a great many plans that are progressive, including this week’s plan for national publicly-owned fast-speed internet service, and it is highly presumptive to suggest she will sell out ala Clinton and Obama. Her aggressiveness in trying to re-regulate unfettered banking practices has not been to any extent a sell-out—more like a determined pit bull.
//
In 2016, Bernie campaigned for Hillary against Trump, after she won the Dem nomination. I think this year Bernie should promise, resolutely, to campaign for a third party nominee should he or Warren not get the nomination. Progressives should also make known their plan to vote third party rather than support another sell-out type Dem nominee.
//
I will definitely vote third party rather than support Biden, Harris, or some other sell-out Dem nominee. Sure, my position probably insures that Trump or some other hard-right nominee will beat a sell-out Dem nominee. As Robert Graves had Claudius say, “Let all the evils that lurk in the mud hatch out.” That is, we need to hit bottom if we are ever going to start going in a healthy direction.
//
If Warren or Sanders can get the nomination and win the election, that will be a clincher for the view that we have hit bottom with the Trump first term and are finally headed toward progress and health as a nation
Hey!
“I, Claudius”, by Robert Graves – one of my all time favorite books!
The Democrats are an imperialist party. They are capitalists. There will be NO change until people stop supporting the capitalist duopoly.
correct. some capitalists are true believers, while others are deceptive and hypocritical. the latter are the real bad ones.
She singlehandedly stopped the Audit the Fed bill from being passed. She actively campaigned against it. The ‘anti-big bank’ lady stopped ten years of progress, and voted for central bankers to continue in secrecy. She’s got lots of little causes that sound good, but only accomplish more centralization of the industry, so the establishment ‘allows’ it. But when it came time for the real change, she advocated for the establishment and central bankers.
When was it Kos was an R? D & R’s, you will be right if you choose Kos as a Pig of both the Misleader Parties.. BDS Free Assange. Free Manning. Snowden is Free. Keep on fighting the Empire. Our Empire will strike back.
Bernie’s a card carrying member of the War Party who proved to everyone in 2016 that he’s just another phoney politician who doesn’t mean a single thing he says. This week he said: “If there is going to be class warfare in this country, it’s about time the working class won that war”, and the next day he attacks the vast majority of these working class voters and falls into line with the NYT, WaPo, CNN establishment strategy by labelling anyone who not support the demonization of white people as a white supremacist: “We will go to war against white nationalism and racism in every aspect of our country”, because Hitler…
The 1619 Project, the plan of the New York Times’ executive editor to falsify American history is explicitly aimed at undermining the confidence of white Americans. It is a project of cultural genocide and Bernie is fully on board. It is very difficult to see how Sanders expects to launch a class war against the corporate kakistocracy of the 0.001% while supporting the demonization of white working class people with 99% false accusations of racism.
But violent language against white people that justifies calls for their eradication is the only thing that progressives and establishment Democrats can agree upon. This hate is a powerful force, and we all know that Bernie is a gutless coward when it comes to standing the establishment. If he was serious about waging class war he’d be protesting the demonization of white people. As should authentic progressives that recognize the left has failed the working class white people for decades. Fat chance of that…
Racism is 100% real, it’s not 99% imaginary. Tell me the color of one’s skin makes no difference in America and that you’d perfectly happy living in America if you became black tomorrow. We can argue about whose fault it is and how best to deal with it, but you can’t pretend it doesn’t exist and isn’t a problem. Any discussion needs to be rooted in reality.
My view, and I think Bernie’s view, is that racism (the idea that one race has the right to rule over another) was invented by elites to justify slavery and that it has been used by them and is still used by them to divide the working class (which is, of course, made up of white people, black people, brown people, asian people, really the majority of every group).
You are falling into the trap laid by the elites (some of whom are on the left). Recognising the undeniable history of racism against black, brown and asian people does not mean demonizing white people. It means eliminating race-based division and exploitation from our society by understanding how it has warped our humanity and how it has been used by the ruling elites to divide and control working class people based on race. Once that is understood the great majority of working Americans of all races can unite with each other and defeat the tiny minority of elites who have kept them more divided than the working class of any other modern nation.
Your talking 99% percent of accusations of white racism being “false” and about fantasies like “white cultural genocide” or “eradication” of white people is only playing into the hands of the elite which wants to keep us divided. You are right to accuse elements of the Democratic Party and the progressive left of failing the working class, including the “white working class,” but are you doing anything but driving the elite-created wedge even deeper. When you sabotage the working class this way, you are sabotaging the “white” working class.” Once you define the working class as the “white working class,” you have lost the class war. Stop doing the work of the elites.
The demonization of white people is hateful & divisive. The liberal-progressive Democratic media complex recently used the El Paso shootings of Hispanic immigrants to brand President Trump and all who voted for him “racist white supremacists.” One instance has been used to write off half of the white American population. The point is that an enormous edifice of hatred has been built on one instance. Suddenly, all mass shooters are racist white supremacists inspired by President Trump despite the factual data that shows mass shooters in 2019 are 51% black, 29% white, and 11% Latino and that few identify as supremacists of any hue. And you say, you haven’t heard about black and Latino mass shooters, only white ones.
If white people are actually supreme and think of themselves in this way, how can university professors call for the eradication of white people and not be denounced for advocating genocide? What do you think would happen to a professor who called for the eradication of blacks, Jews, Hispanics, or homosexuals? It would be hate speech, a hate crime. But calls for eradication of white people are not regarded as extreme. Such calls are not denounced as hate speech and a hate crime. So who is supreme?
And this is being done all out in the open. The Democrats are creating another hoax to take the place of the failed Russiagate hoax. The hatred that was directed at Trump and Russians is now directed at Trump and white people. The hatred is so powerful that it has cast aside integrity, facts, caution, evidence, and reason. In a country already fatally divided by Identity Politics, ALL of Trump’s supporters are declared “white nationalist terror supporters, and this evil, racist scourge must be eradicated from society.”
Don’t fool yourself. The hatred against white people is real. The New York Times has begun the “1619 Project” where everything in American history is explained by slavery and race. And of course, if Trump is a racist it means that the people who elected him are also racists. Racism against white people is now the official policy of the Democratic Party and the media, utterly regardless of the truth and the available evidence.
And while genocide is generally associated with physical elimination it can also happen by cultural elimination. What is occurring in the New York school system is also occurring in Cambridge University, and it again indicates that senior scholars have completely lost confidence in their civilization & agreed to hand over the explanation of Western civilization to blacks, Asians, and minority ethnics.
White Americans have no sense of cohesion or unity. Blacks can have black organizations. Jews can have Jewish organizations. Women can have organizations, but any form of White solidarity is immediately seen as pure Nazi evil.
And for over two decades white people have been undergoing economic genocide, and when these dispossessed Americans tried to fight back by electing Trump, who claimed he would bring the jobs home, they were demonized as racist white supremacists.The President cannot even enforce the country’s immigration laws without being demonized as a racist white supremacist.
As for physical genocides, if we can believe historians, there have been plenty. The Romans exterminated the Carthaginians, a powerful military people.The Soviet communist government exterminated the Cossacks, a warrior class. Mao’s government exterminated Chinese landowners and other “undesirable elements.” The Spanish had their way with the Aztecs & Incas, powerful warrior rulers who vastly outnumbered the Spanish colonialists. Lincoln’s Union army exterminated the American Indians. In Africa we have the Rwanda genocide. In South Africa black extremists are calling for the eradication of white South Africans.
So yes, white genocide is possible. Indeed, the preparations are already underway. Already in America a person can prove his or her moral superiority by demonizing white people. And when the white population has to turn against itself to survive, death is already upon them…
add some context (links), like this:
https://www.snopes.com/news/2017/06/02/texas-professor-white-people/
https://www.statista.com/statistics/476456/mass-shootings-in-the-us-by-shooter-s-race/
And this teenage food fight is how the US election will be decided? Another good reason for thinking folks to abandon the rigged and ridiculous process known as US faux- democracy.
I understand the frustration and desperation, but, and this is a sincere question to which I don’t have the answer, if and when we abandon the current dysfunctional faux-democracy, what’s the actual, plausible plan for how we do that and then get from there to something significantly better? It’s easy to get frustrated. The hard part is getting to a better place. Jumping off a cliff provides a bit of very brief relief but is not a solution. Everybody knows there’s a problem, which is progress, but so far there is very little agreement on what to do about it and how we get there. That’s the challenge we need to deal with now.
I’d understand abandoning it because it is rigged. The fact that people with opposing ideologies fight… well there’s nothing remotely strange about that.
And there is also nothing specifically american about corrupt systems of power.
At this point in time, the left has no message that is relevant to the majority of Americans, except Bernie’s statement; “If there’s going to be ‘class warfare in this country, it’s about time the working people win the war”.
I don’t believe Sander’s is capable of doing the job justice, but he certainly is no worse than any of the others on the left.
I voted for Trump solely because he was “anti-establishment”, and I’ve been fighting the ever encroaching “state” some fifty years or more.
I have no desire to see the U.S. get stronger, our government, and our own insouciance over its excesses, has bullied the world since “the Great War”, having received substantial amounts of Europe’s money, funding that war, and demanding gold for war materiel, as well as serving in the “peace process”, and with substantial imposition.
We essentially cleaned out Europe’s banks in WWII, again, not being bombed out of production, and the primary war materiel supplier for the allies, other than the Soviet Union, and they too, to a small degree.
We could have done it well and proper, above board, and been “partners in world peace”, but we would’ve had to live by profit earned, not “taken”, stolen by inflation, and bullying, but our government was fully established as fascist, post “war of Northern aggression”, as the northern states occupied the south, very much as “the five powers occupied China”, after the Brits broke in, and opened the way for all the empires to use it as a “trade zone”. We were among “the five powers”, and called it “the Boxer rebellion”, while China called it “their failed Boxer Uprising”, and lived in anger over it, for a century.
We are in “meltdown”, there is only one story line that ends with the possibility of “America’s survival”, and that requires we accept our status as “another State, among equals”, as the U.N. was written to accommodate, and work the way we worked, two centuries ago, to rebuild an economy deliberately inflated to explosive proportions, and restore real money.
If we can’t turn the other cheek, finally, we will see our “head slapped off” in the end, physically or fiscally, and we will only be accommodated, if our debt is sufficient cause to put up with our problems, we will carry with us into the future.
We no longer are States, America was always a country, never a Nation, and once, Nations resided in States, with common culture, principles, and morals. We utterly failed our duties as “sovereign citizens”, choosing instead, to continue the practice of choosing governors, or allowing them chosen for us, and pretending our “system” actually means we are self-governing, while we have no control over said government.
It is the nature of “the peaceable” to do everything possible, to keep the peace, even if it means allowing imposition to some degree, just as it is the nature of “rulers” to presume they are entitled to rule, they are better suited for the task, their skills fit, and “the peaceniks” will only attract war and attacks. When we finish with war, honorably, we often find strong, peaceful leadership, capable of ruling within principles, and holding freedom as a value, without the fear of invasion.
When we, anyone, finishes war by sheer power, without principle or virtue, it is inevitable, the leaders will be rulers, not governors, rule will be imposed, and liberty crushed, ruthlessly.
There can be no doubt, both the American effort, and the Soviet effort, together were necessary to win that last, chosen war, however we ended with our country intact, our production infrastructure intact, and most of the world’s gold.
The facts enabled a well established crony corporatist government, go full scale fascist, and openly choose empire over egalitarian future, for “even the recovering Europe and far east”. Lord Acton stated; “power corrupts, absolute power, corrupts absolutely”, we stood alone, with cash to spend, and in spending it on rebuilding Europe, we put them in our pockets.
Once one turns one’s self over to “a reprobate mind” one almost never can recover, the damage done initially must continue, or one will be killed off, assassinated. Choices have consequences, and we are living in consequence to allowing our government become fascist.
We will change our ways, only when we have no other choice, and then we will carry a chip, or be crushed, i don’t believe we are a people able to back down gracefully, and accept we no longer rule, but are mere peers.
Semper Fidelis,
John McClain
GySgt, USMC, ret.
Vanceboro, NC, USA
Well said, Mr. McClain.
..
Ever since the US’s invasion of Afghanistan, I’ve been more and more comparing the US of the 2000s as Germany of the 1930s. To me, the parallels are striking. There is nothing like the movies to elucidate those parallels.
And AFTER that inevitable “crushing”, if ciivilization still exists, here is a preview of the verdict of an international court of justice on the behavior of the “leaders” and VIPs of the US who, after giving up their morality at the alter of insatiable greed, went on to destroy nations and murder literally millions:
Exactly the same as here in UK with Jeremy Corbyn!!
The population of these United States are still in a coma. They will stay in that coma because they like it there.
If the real reality of the world ever seeps into their blissful trance it would destroy them. It would take an economic meltdown or some kind of disaster to shake them awake. Until that happens the ” Deep State ” will continue to plague all of humanity!
everyone around is wide awake. where do you live?
And we wonder why dementia rates are so high! You spend your life seeking oblivion and then you find it.
Of course the bullying won’t work. If by the end, the Clinton/DNC/big donor/beltway insider wing of the party will sit on its hands if Sanders, and maybe even Warren, is the candidate. (That’s what the Democratic establishment, including big labor, did in 1972 when McGovern was crushed by Nixon.)
They will do this because for them Trump is much less threatening than Bernie or even Warren and the populist/ anti Wall Street, single payer wave they would bring.
Their plan, already being prepared, is to pave the way for Trump to win another four years and then blame the loss on the Progressive wing of the party.
By discrediting the Progressives (“We told you only a centrist could win, that the country isn’t ready for a left-wing candidate! See, we were right!”) they hope they can take back “their” party from the great unwashed.
I don’t see that working. Instead, I see it wrecking the party. Either there will be another battle royal in 2024 that could well either cause another loss to the GOP or the Democratic Party will go the way of the Whigs and a new Progressive Party or Independent Party will arise with new leadership ready to take on a weakened and discredited GOP, now completely vulnerable to a true populist/progressive wave once Trump is out of the picture and can’t run interference for the greedy corporate cowards that have been hiding behind his antics while looting the nation.
But, of course, predictions like this so far in advance are probably worse than useless. All we can say for sure is that the pre-November 1916 world of American politics has as much chance of returning as the pre-August 1914 world of Europe just before World War I had of coming back or as pre-Civil War America had a chance of coming back once Lincoln was elected and Fort Sumter fell in April 1861.
“(That’s what the Democratic establishment, including big labor, did in 1972 when McGovern was crushed by Nixon.)”
Kinda, but a lot of blue-collar Democrats voted for Nixon, too, because McGovern was seen by many as somewhat effete, and not a suitable war President… at least that’s what Nixon’s pollster, Albert Sindlinger, told Nixon.
Populism is democracy in action. Beware of those who denigrate it.
Joe Biden will not be the candidate; at the last moment they’ll bring back Obomba as a “savior” (he was the Messiah last time) for another Obomba/Biden ticket.
Could the world suvive another term of the treacherous Obomba?
I think Biden is a stalking horse for somebody or something, but I doubt if it’s Obama or Clinton (as some have guessed). I suppose Harris is the leading Establishment candidate at the moment. Or maybe Biden just represents an as-yet empty slot, a role.
(I am a Green voter)
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Way back in 2015 (or before?) I was early in pegging
Bernie Sanders (B.S.) as a shill for Hillary Clinton.
—
I didn’t necessarily believe it was his intention, but
effectively he was a shill. I am still undecided on that.
I argued – imagine the Democratic primary race without the
excitement that Bernie brings, just corrupt and arrogant
dull Hillary by herself. And I argued, prophetically, that in the end
B.S. would graciously hand his voters over to Hillary.
I am not a prophet, that was easy to see coming.
—
Intentional shill or hapless shill?
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People bought into the excitement, and when they learned through leaked
emails how rigged it all had been, they **still** went ahead
and voted for the corrupt, arrogant puppet master.
—
Now, let us look at Bernie from a different angle.
We should consider how much Bernie had participated in the Russiagate psyop.
https://consortiumnews.com/2018/02/01/responding-to-bernies-promotion-of-the-new-cold-war/
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[Russiagate psyop: “designed to manipulate the public into consenting
to geopolitical agendas”]
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Has Bernie Sanders been a shill for the warmonger’s geopolitical agendas?
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All the while he is selling social programs that he will never ever get us
he is aiding/enabling a geopolitical agenda that we ARE getting.
You make a cogent argument …
I considered him the controlled opposition.
Very astute observations, Levi. Bernie showed his true colours on Russiagate – he’s either woefully uninformed on such a crucial aspect of foreign policy (ie a dupe) or he’s a willing propaganda mouthpiece. Either way, he’s not a suitable candidate.
there is that narrative out there that says hillary also lost because quite some of the bernie-people were staying home.
as a green voter do you think e.g. howie hawkins is pushing back hard enough on russiagate?
as a green voter you’d probably rather see a presidential race trump vs biden vs hawkins than a trump vs sanders vs hawkins race?
Martin, I would rather see figures from the Democratic Party
prosecuted in the courts for Russiagate followed by the
Democratic Party taking it’s rightful place in the ash heap
of history.
—
After that people can then be free to vote against, rather than
for – war, the banksters of Wall Street, the Stasi-like security apparatus,
Big Pharma and climate destruction.
will people still be free to vote for war, Wall Street, the security apparatus, big pharma and climate destruction when all dems are gone?
The monied elite hope so.
What party can they vote for then?
Great piece, Caitlin, but I cannot accept your assessment of Elizabeth Warren as a “fauxgressive.” Perhaps, if she had not declared herself a “capitalist,” your opinion would be different. Nevertheless, her detailed and expansive policy prescriptions are well to the left of what is considered acceptable by the Democratic Party establishment. In my book, that’s progressive.
ugh.
Fauxcohantas.
“The Environment must become our Priority”.
Bernie Sanders
Bernie understands that if we don’t stop the Industrial Environmental Destruction of our Planet, NOW, nothing else matters. It is game over.
12 years left, scientists are saying, before the destruction is irrecoverable.
GO BERNIE!
The US Military is the greatest polluter bar none.
Close down the US Military … planet … including the dwellers thereon …SAVED!!!
Anyone advocating this? No?
Not serious then …
exactly. the best option is whoever makes the US as the war mongerer weaker. people voted for Trump for reasons.
Thank you, HelenB, I agree totally.
Care about the environment? Oppose militarism and don’t have children — I don’t want to hear that you recycle your plastic and drive a Prius.
Bernie will never win anything, because his zionist-coddling war-support is his albatrose.
i personally do not want the US to get stronger as it will only make more wars. that’s why i will vote for Trump. again. the rest is just entertainment.
Suit yourself, but if “zionist-coddling” is your issue, you’ve got it exactly backwards.
nah, Trump is not making the zionists stronger. i couldn’t care less what his motive or intention is.
Don’t you think trump will begin the war with iran if he gets re-elected with your and the armageddon christians’ help?
Indeed. Just as Satanyahu has attacked Iraq, Syria and Lebanon in a bid for re-election. The orange buffoon will launch an attack on Iran. The only problem is that Iran has the military technology to fight back. Fraudi Arabia and Pissrael will be the first to get blown to hell and American aircraft carriers will lie in the bottom of the Persian Gulf.
Many Americans will die as will Pissraelis, and people in Fraudi Arabia. Iran will not go down as Iraq and Afghanistan did. They will take out those responsible for the chaos and terrorism in the middle east: Pisraell, Fraudi Arabioa, America and the rest of the western failures.
This of course will finally break America as its economy already crippled and bankrupt will simply crash and burn.
Rioting in urban centers, massive fires, roaming looters and death squads.
Hope y’all are prepared for what’s coming. It ain’t gonna be pretty. Make bug out plans and have long term food supplies and plenty of ammo.