Sympathy for the Devils...

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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Thu Mar 12, 2020 11:52 am

kidoftheblackhole wrote:
Wed Mar 11, 2020 5:22 pm
I'm not sure any of that rises to the level of analysis.

All "misleadership" talk (and note that it tends to be exclusively pointed at blacks in many/most cases) rings hollow when it is centered on workers picking the wrong bourgeoisie candidate (and no one should be kidding themselves about Bernie in that regard).

Malcolm X said that the system is incapable of liberating black folks and likened the idea to a chicken laying a duck egg. It won't happen because it can't happen.

We need a heavy dose of talk like that and far less race baiting that sows bitterness and division and inflames old gaping wounds. The (vastly white) establishment trotted out their worthless asshole candidates and black people -- along with everyone who participated -- chose one based on their own calculations of self preservation. Tell me how CLASS factors into it?

Trump's base is the capitalist class -- without whom he'd probably be going through more bankruptcy proceedings over his slumlord empire right about now. Biden's base is the capitalist class -- without whom he would've been laughed off the campaign trail just as he was in his previous runs. Bernie annoys them and perhaps even scares them but as an individual his fealty to the capitalist class is hardly in question. Latching on to a "movement" that is latched on to him without dissecting its class character and composition and direction is hardly materialist or scientific.
Well, I was thinking about the people around me, white, and totally ABT, my bad for not having a more expansive view of that.

Trump does have a voter base besides the basic class relationships. It is what keeps him politically alive, without the threat of being 'primaried' support from his party would be more conditional. (And they do scare the hell out of liberals, class, class, class. To me largely blowhards.) Partisan politics may be a reflection of the real power relationships but it does have a life of it's own.

Bernie is their buddy, no doubt, and it ain't no 'movement' no matter how many times he sez it. But even the most tattered, ephemeral hint of that old spectre alarms the fuck outta the bosses. Trump railing against socialism? Where the hell did that come from except the deepest existential fear of the capitalists? They expunged 'working class' from the American lexicon for decades & thought the same of 'socialism'. Whether some of these bros continue to call themselves socialist after Bernie sells them up the river again is what's interesting to me. A few might want to ask questions.
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Mon May 04, 2020 1:00 pm

WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR PARTY IS A SERIAL ABUSER?
Posted by MLToday | May 3, 2020 | Featured Stories

What to Do When Your Party is a Serial Abuser?
BY GREG GODELS
April 26, 2020

Image


A few weeks ago, the UK was rocked by a leaked report recounting the activities of top officials in the Labour Party. As Morning Star details (4-18-2020):


Pages upon pages of emails and texts expose in stark detail how some of the party’s most senior officials acted to sabotage the Jeremy Corbyn leadership, obstruct everything it tried to do, direct vile abuse at staff and activists perceived to be supportive of Corbyn and express contempt for the members whose fees paid their salaries.


Most shockingly of all for those who pounded the streets, knocked on doors and phone banked for Labour, the report exposes top staff working against election victory, running a secret campaign to protect rightwingers in safe seats at the expense of winnable marginals, voicing growing dismay as Labour in 2017 closed the gap with the Tories and reacting with fury when the party broke Theresa May’s majority.


The records of Labour officials expressing preference for a Tory victory to a Corbyn one show treachery to their party and its members, but loyalty to a capitalist system they are used to being part of running.


In an article in The Guardian (4-21-2020), John McDonnell, the shadow Chancellor under Corbyn’s leadership, denounced the racism found in the report and directed at some of Corbyn’s closest associates by some of Labour’s top officials:


The alleged abuse of Diane Abbott, Dawn Butler and Clive Lewis, three prominent black shadow ministers, was appalling and, as others have commented, betrayed a deeply worrying underlying strain of racism.


The leaked report, commissioned to report on alleged anti-Semitism inside the Labour Party, was unsurprisingly ignored by the US mainstream media.


Unsurprisingly, because it might conjure up memories of the Wikileaks revelations of Democratic Party leaders plotting against the Bernie Sanders primary campaign leading up to the 2016 election, the actions taken against Sanders caucus voters, the embarrassing resignation of the party leader in the wake of plotting, the leaking of debate questions to Sanders’ opponent in that primary season, and many other 2016 attempts to sabotage Sanders’ campaign.


Of course, reporting the Labour Party’s undermining of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership might also plant suspicions about Biden’s miraculous rising from the dead this year, the leaked misinformation about Sanders, the red-baiting, the slanders, and the seemingly orchestrated dog-and-pony show of a motley crew of candidates slicing and dicing the primary vote suddenly surrendering and endorsing Uncle Joe Biden.


In other words, the complicit US media doesn’t want to give any ammunition to the suspicion that there may be a significant parallel in the ways that established “center-left” parties suppress any real left movement within their orbits.


While the Labour Party has a claim to exist somewhat as a membership party, with its members or their organizations having some say in its leadership, the US Democratic Party can make no such claim; “membership” is simply a matter of registration, and party activism is largely limited to carrying out dictated electoral activity, fund raising, and voting. The days of visits from and discussions with ward or neighborhood leaders are long past. Today, the Democratic Party is more like a sports team than a political party: one can choose it, follow it, and support it, but only marginally influence it.


But like the Labour Party, the Democratic Party pretends to be democratic while its leaders do all they can to stifle any democratic stirrings. Where insurgencies energize the typically most active, progressive, and earnest members, the leadership finds a way to undercut, underfund, or even engage in dirty tricks to derail their efforts.


In the US, the McGovern, Jesse Jackson, and now Bernie Sanders campaigns are examples of serious, but failed attempts to inject left politics into a party determined to define itself through a brand of tepid social liberalism which is inoffensive to its corporate financial base. If there is a role for the Democratic Party to challenge corporate dominance, to reverse growing inequality, and to expand the social safety net, the leadership has yet to reveal it.


Much attention has been drawn to analyzing what Corbyn and Sanders did wrong, where their campaigns failed. The more important matter is how a candidate can overcome the barriers that are institutionally, systematically placed in front of her or him. How can a candidate ride a party to victory when the party’s leadership does not want the candidate to be successful?


As Roger D. Harris explained in a recent thoughtful wrap-up of the Sanders phenomena in Popular Resistance:


Sanders proved on one hand that a sizable potential constituency would support and fund a progressive agenda. On the other hand, the Democrats – who would rather risk four more years of Trump than back someone with a mild New Deal agenda – are the graveyard for such a movement. The Democratic Party is an instrument of class rule and not a democratic institution…
If your obsession in life is to defeat Trump, by all means hold your nose and vote for what you perceive as the lesser evil.


For the US left, the quadrennial question looms: do we put the Sanders campaign behind us and, paraphrasing Harris, hold our nose and vote for the candidate anointed by the Democratic Party and its corporate backers?


For some, it comes easy. They argue that Trump is such a repugnant figure that, should the Democrats offer a veteran of every corporate-friendly, socially reactionary current surfacing in the Democratic Party, one must still vote against Trump. As in the past, the revolutionary left, the Marxist-Leninist left, the socialist left could not make much of a difference, if it so desired. The serious anti-capitalist left lacks the influence to decisively affect the outcome of the US Presidential election in spite of Democratic operatives occasionally blaming their defeats on them. For the most part, the debate among Marxists over whether to support the pathetic Democratic Party candidate is a sterile one.


But leftists can begin to show the way from such an ugly option. The left can emphatically point to the futility of a lesser-of-two-evils strategy that stretches over the four decades since the election of Ronald Reagan (and before) that has only seen the political center move inexorably rightward.


They can insist that the defenders of the lesser-of-two-evils strategy explain how such a strategy could ever produce significant change.


The left can explain that demagoguery prevails precisely when the options available to people hungry for change are meager. The Trumps, Johnsons, and their ilk arise when traditional party loyalties are taken for granted and when supporters are desperate for new answers.


Leftists can stress the role of consistent, principled, and unbending independent politics and, most importantly, how that independence can be expressed broadly, electorally and otherwise. Independence can not be conditional upon the electoral fate of politicians and parties that are hostile to left politics.


For many of us, that means encouraging and supporting third-party breakaways, electoral formations where the left is welcome. Of course it is understood that not everyone will agree. Some will argue that this moment is different.


In the spirit of respecting differences, it was still disappointing to see the recent open letter addressed to the youthful supporters of Sanders — who the signatories called “the new new left.” Former leaders and members of the 1960s SDS– with a cringe-worthy, patronizing tone– warned ominously that failing to vote for Joseph Biden, the presumptive Democratic Party candidate, would be to hand the Presidency to a “protofascist.”


Most would agree that ridding the political stage of Donald Trump is a good thing. Probably many will even accept replacing him with a corrupt, corporately-compromised, and regressive substitute like Joseph Biden.


But it is disappointing that the retired SDSers make no demands on the Democrats, set no conditions for support, suggest no alternative actions in uncontested states, offer no program beyond the dismal electoral choice, and supply no vision for distraught Sanders backers.


This from the group advising the existing left movements in its founding statement in mid-1962 that: “An imperative task for these publicly disinherited groups… is to demand a Democratic Party responsible to their interests.” These then-young, idealistic radicals dared to make demands on the Democratic Party in the months before Barry Goldwater Jr. embarked on arguably the most right-wing, dangerous campaign for the US Presidency in modern history.


Then, it seemed important to challenge a Democratic Party deaf to poverty, racism, and inequality. SDS sought to force “peace, civil rights, and urban needs” onto the political agenda, even in the face of a Republican challenger who openly argued for the use of nuclear weapons.


Today’s self-described “veterans” of those long-past struggles now make a simple, unconditional demand: “we must work hard to elect [Biden].”


They ominously liken this moment to the late history of Weimar Germany immediately before Hitler’s ascension. Indeed, there are many parallels to today: a growing severe crisis of capitalism; a bankrupt political party with no answers to the crisis, yet commanding the allegiance of most workers; demagogues appealing to a disillusioned middle strata and a neglected working class.


In the Weimar Republic, many people sought a broad “democratic” coalition in 1932 to reelect the militarist conservative Paul von Hindenburg– a-lesser-of-two-evils– to defeat Hitler’s presidential candidacy. The Social Democrats, the counterpart of today’s Democratic Party, believed that their support of von Hindenburg would stop the greater-of-two-evils. Months later, von Hindenburg appointed Hitler Chancellor, giving him a grasp of power that he would never relinquish.


Trump is not Hitler, but a barren opposition– an opposition ill-equipped to respond to the despair engulfing most people’s lives– opens the door wide for the Trumps to walk through. As Weimar shows, a hollow appeal to unity at all costs may be insufficient, even ill-advised in the effort to close that door.


The old SDSers and the other Democratic Party loyalists need to ask themselves if Joseph Biden’s Democratic Party has the vision to give hope to those suffering what may prove to be capitalism’s greatest crisis. With millions experiencing hardships unknown before, they want to vote for something, not just against Trump.


One would have hoped that the “old new left” would have offered something more of substance in their lecture to those who understandably felt that the Sanders program was betrayed and derailed by the Democratic Party establishment.


As the Sanders supporters consider their choices going forward, they might heed the conclusion drawn in the Morning Star article. Noting the sabotage of Corbyn’s leadership by many of the Labour Party’s officials, the author warned that “much of the left engaged in a futile effort to bury real differences and appease an irreconcilable enemy.


As long as we keep making such mistakes, we will keep losing.


-Greg Godels
zzsblogml@gmail.com

https://mltoday.com/what-to-do-when-you ... al-abuser/

It's gonna get weird in November when ya gotta vote for whatever shithead the Dems front or face serious personal social repercussions. Of course we can lie to our loved ones, or we can just vote for the shithead to 'keep the peace' knowing that it doesn't mean anything at all. Of course being in SC means it's a foregone conclusion unless things get very, very weird, damned unlikely but that percentage is creeping up.
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Wed May 13, 2020 11:42 am

snip-

"We must think big, for the people, now," Pelosi said from the speaker's office at the U.S. Capitol, adding that "Not acting is the most expensive course."

The 1,815-page bill - titled the Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions (HEROES) Act - would provide US$1 trillion in additional funding for states and cities, prolong unemployment benefits through January of next year, allow an additional one-time US$1,200 stimulus payments for adults earning up to US$75,000 per year, expand federal nutrition benefits, provide US$25 billion for the U.S. Postal Service, create a hazard pay fund for frontline workers, and increase Covid-19 testing efforts.

While progressives support many of the proposals included in the Act, careful observers have noted several omissions or sections they consider "unacceptable," Common Dreams reported.

Key progressive proposals as direct cash payments, a paycheck guarantee, cancelation of rent and mortgage payments, or expansion of Medicare to cover the growing number of unemployed and uninsured citizens in the U.S. were overlooked.

The legislative text, however, proposes an expansion of Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) eligibility include corporate lobbying organizations - which aggressively pushed for the change - and a bailout for landlords.

"Democratic leadership has had plenty of input from progressive thinkers over the past couple of months. They just care more about the input from corporate lobbyists," tweeted HuffPost senior reporter Zach Carter. "There is just no excuse for this."

Instead of expanding Medicare, the HEROES Act "funds approximately nine months of full premium subsidies for the existing health insurance program COBRA, which allows laid-off or furloughed employees to stay on their health insurance plans," Vox's Ella Nilsen and Li Zhou said.

The COBRA proposal is a mere subsidy to the insurance industry that would not be nearly as beneficial or cost-effective as the emergency Medicare expansion proposed by Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Pramila Jayapal; progressives have been saying.

Jayapal urged for the inclusion of her Paycheck Guarantee Act, which would have provided companies with direct payroll grants to keep workers employed, but Pelosi rebuffed her.

As an alternative to her ambitious proposal, the new legislation offers an expansion of the Employee Retention Tax Credit.

The House is expected to vote Friday on the package. But the bill is likely to head straight into a Senate rejection.

Republicans are wary of another round of aid, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell described the Democratic proposal as a grab bag of "pet priorities."

Even as the HEROES Act does not meet demands that progressives say are essential steps toward economic security and public health, the House Democratic leadership announced they're willing to negotiate down even further.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/US- ... -0019.html
Can there be anything in all of politics more pathetic than these whipped curs called 'progressives'? Beaten, kicked, ignored, they always come back for more. We might call them 'suckeres for punishment', we can speculate on their neuroses, or we might just chalk it up to class interest. Nothing but crumbs and treachery from that crowd.
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Mon May 18, 2020 11:40 am

Matt Taibbi is confused and butt hurt:
I’ve written a lot about the Democrats’ record on civil liberties issues in the past. Working on I Can’t Breathe, a book about the Eric Garner case, I was stunned to learn the central role Mario Cuomo played in the mass incarceration problem, while Democrats also often embraced hyper-intrusive “stop and frisk” or “broken windows” enforcement strategies, usually by touting terms like “community policing” that sounded nice to white voters. Democrats strongly supported the PATRIOT Act in 2001, and Barack Obama continued or expanded Bush-Cheney programs like drone assassination, rendition, and warrantless surveillance, while also using the Espionage Act to bully reporters and whistleblowers.

snip

Has the Trump era really damaged our thinking to this degree?

snip

If this disease is going to be in our lives for the foreseeable future, that makes it more urgent that we talk about what these rules will be, not less — yet the party I grew up supporting seems to have lost the ability to do so, and I don’t understand why.

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/democrats ... -liberties
Taibbi has been a Democratic suckfish since I don't know when, following them closely, and yet all he's got is 'it's Trump fault'. It's as though JFK, RFK, HH and other Cold Warriors never existed, the thousands of lives were never destroyed. But I guess it's different when it comes to commies...If Matt had been conversant with our previous incarnations he would know:"The Democratic Party is the piss which sets the Republican dye in the national fabric".
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Mon May 25, 2020 1:13 pm

blindpig wrote:
Sat Jan 18, 2020 2:26 pm
anaxarchos
08-19-2008, 05:00 PM
I am so naive, in 1980 I didn't believe it possible that Reagan could be elected, he was a doddering fool then and it was all downhill from there. In 2000 I didn't think it possible that junior could get elected, he was such a cypher. They were just so fucking lame, pretty much supports your 'hypothesis'.

Keep me away from the bookies.

That picture is the stuff, but I think it would give Mike conniptions.

When you think about the episodic but somehow well timed buffoonery, maybe start with the 'Eagleton Affair', the entire Dukakis campaign, Gore and Kerry's runs, and plenty else, the temptation to don the tin foil is great. But this one word creeps into my mind which might do as well, flaccid.
I have no idea what you are talking about.

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Electable....
"“If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump then you ain’t black!”

https://newsone.com/3946059/joe-biden-q ... edium=push
Deplorable.

Ya see? They're gonna do it again.
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Sat Jun 06, 2020 1:15 pm

Joe Biden
Joe Biden says '10-15%' of Americans 'are just not very good people'
Democrat also said ‘vast majority of the people are decent’ in online town hall while Trump campaign used footage to attack

Martin Pengelly in New York

@MartinPengelly
Fri 5 Jun 2020 16.53 BSTLast modified on Fri 5 Jun 2020 18.34 BST

Image
Joe Biden speaks in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, earlier this week. Photograph: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images

Former vice-president Joe Biden has said “probably anywhere from 10% to 15%” of Americans “are just not very good people”.

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, who is known for his verbal gaffes, also said the “vast majority of the people are decent”. But his political opponents and the media swiftly seized on his comments.

Biden was speaking on Thursday night, to the actor Don Cheadle during an online discussion of racial relations. The US is in the grip of the worst civil unrest since the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr in 1968, over the killing by police in Minneapolis of George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American man.

“The words a president says matter,” Biden said, as he criticized Donald Trump’s response to the crisis. “When a president stands up and divides people all the time you’re going to get the worst of us to come out.

He then added: “Do we really think this is as good as we can be as a nation? I don’t think the vast majority of people think that. There are probably anywhere from 10% to 15% of the people out there that are just not very good people, but that’s not who we are.

“The vast majority of the people are decent, and we have to appeal to that and we have to unite people – bring them together. Bring them together.”

Biden’s words echoed Hillary Clinton, the Democrat beaten by Trump in 2016, who famously said a “big basket” of the Republican’s supporters were “deplorables … the racists and the haters and the people who are drawn because they think he can somehow restore an America that no longer exists”.

Two weeks ago, the Trump campaign seized on a comment Biden made to an African American radio host. Biden said then that if black voters “have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t black”. He apologised.

On Friday morning, the Trump campaign Twitter account was using footage of the Cheadle conversation to attack Biden.

more....
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ople-claim

Jfc, this is the guy who's gonna save us from Trump..... Just a coincidence that blacks comprise 13% of US population...more than one pimple might come to a head before this year is over.
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Tue Jun 23, 2020 3:36 pm

Viva la difference!

Image

Biden Bashes Trump’s Willingness to Meet with Venezuela’s Maduro
June 23, 2020

The White House insisted that Trump “has not lost confidence” in opposition leader Guaido.

By Lucas Koerner – Jun 22, 2020

Santiago de Chile, June 22, 2020 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Presumptive Democratic Party nominee Joe Biden lashed out at Donald Trump after the US president said he would consider meeting his Venezuelan counterpart, Nicolas Maduro.

“Trump talks tough on Venezuela, but admires thugs and dictators like Nicolas Maduro. As President, I will stand with the Venezuelan people and for democracy,” Biden tweeted on Sunday evening.

The former vice president has consistently backed the Trump administration’s campaign to oust President Maduro, echoing Trump in recognizing opposition leader Juan Guaido as “interim president” of Venezuela. Biden has also supported the unilateral US embargo against Venezuela, which experts have criticized as “collective punishment” causing tens of thousands of deaths. Last year, he told the Council on Foreign Relations that he would “push for stronger multilateral sanctions” against the Caribbean country.

Biden launched the attack in response to Trump’s Oval Office interview with Axios on Friday, in which the president vowed to “maybe think about” a meeting with Maduro.

“I would maybe think about that. […] Maduro would like to meet. And I’m never opposed to meetings — you know, rarely opposed to meetings.”

The US leader also revealed that he “wasn’t necessarily in favor” of recognizing Guaido as Venezuela’s head of state in January 2019, which he said “was [not] very meaningful one way or the other.”

After proclaiming himself “interim president,” Guaido led several failed attempts to oust the Maduro government by force. The opposition leader has faced growing scrutiny amid a string of corruption scandals and, most recently, his alleged involvement in a botched paramilitary invasion on May 3 and 4.

The controversy over Venezuela comes in the wake of the release of former National Security Advisor John Bolton’s memoir on his time in the Trump White House.

In the book, Bolton said that Trump had become increasingly disillusioned with Guaido, whom he dismissed as “weak.”

“By spring, Trump was calling Guaidó the ‘Beto O’Rourke of Venezuela,’ hardly the sort of compliment an ally of the United States should expect,” he wrote.

Trump responded to the memoir dismissing Bolton as a “nutjob” and the “dumbest human being on Earth” for helping orchestrate the 2003 Iraq invasion as the Bush administration’s ambassador to the UN.

On Monday, the White House appeared to walk back the president’s remarks, insisting that “he has not lost confidence at all” in Guaido.

“Nothing has changed. He continues to recognize Juan Guaido as the leader of Venezuela,” White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a news briefing.

Trump, for his part, declared he “will always stand against socialism and with the people of Venezuela” and would “only meet with Maduro to discuss” the latter’s “peaceful exit from power.”

The US leader did not, however, comment on Guaido, whom he hosted at the White House in February.

Featured image: Joe Biden and President Maduro talking in Brazil in 2015. Courtesy Prensa Presidencial.

https://orinocotribune.com/biden-bashes ... as-maduro/

Google Translator

Bolding added.

Out with one murderous beast, in with another. All the libs care about is the optics of the uncouth scumbag, Joe will return 'normalcy' to imperialism.
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Thu Jun 25, 2020 1:56 pm

Freedom Rider: Democrats Move Right and Towards Defeat
Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist 24 Jun 2020

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Freedom Rider: Democrats Move Right and Towards Defeat

Besides not being Trump, the Democrats offer nothing, but think they can win with a candidate who has no constituency, charisma or any platform positions that would attract more voters.

“The purges from the rolls, closed polling places and other methods of disenfranchisement are continuing without comment from the Democrats.”

This presidential election season bears a striking resemblance to that of 2016. We were assured by pundits, pollsters, Democratic politicians, and million dollar consultants that Donald Trump couldn’t possibly win. Except he did win and the aforementioned experts should have been discredited and forgotten.

Four years later the same people who should have been ignored forever are again claiming that Trump is on the ropes. The endless and useless anti-Trump talking points have done their damage. People who ought to know better glean dubious evidence and think that wishing for Trump’s exit will get him out of the White House. At the same time, Joe Biden’s campaign is fully within the sphere of right wing neo-liberalism which lost in 2016.

The confused and misguided “resistance” focused on crowd size at Trump’s Tulsa, Oklahoma rally and happily concluded from this paltry evidence that he will lose. The nonsense is peddled by Democratic Party propagandists to keep voters in line and to prevent them from expressing righteous indignation after their failures in 2016.

“Joe Biden’s campaign is fully within the sphere of right wing neo-liberalism which lost in 2016.”

While millions of people whistle past the electoral graveyard, Joe Biden attacks Trump from the right. After Trump indicated a willingness to engage in talks with Venezuelan president Nicholas Maduro, Biden tweeted his displeasure. “Trump talks tough on Venezuela, but admires thugs and dictators like Nicolas Maduro. As President, I will stand with the Venezuelan people and for democracy.” It is Barack Obama who began the assault on the Venezuelan people. It is fitting that his former vice president is happy to continue Trump’s sanctions, which are war by other means resulting in over 40,000 deaths.

The “Trump loves thugs” trope is just a continuation of the Russiagate hoax obsession, which was a substitute for meaningful opposition. Now Democrats behave as though Biden’s choice of a running mate has some significance and read tea leaves based on Trump rally attendance.

The impotence of progressive Democrats is on full display. Biden is happy that COVID-19 prevents him from having large scale rallies. He is without a constituency, charisma or any platform positions that would attract more voters. It is open to question if he could attract a crowd of any size at this moment.

“While millions of people whistle past the electoral graveyard, Joe Biden attacks Trump from the right.”

Meanwhile, black voters are being misled once again and the running mate discussion is the tool of the moment. Amy Klobuchar’s consideration became a non-starter when her role in enabling cops like the ones who killed George Floyd became widely known. The former prosecutor never took any actions against police brutality in Minneapolis, Minnesota and her status as a possible running mate was dead in the water. She was no longer in contention but claimed that she bowed out voluntarily. “I think this is a moment to put a woman of color on that ticket.”

It is this kind of chicanery that could lead to another Trump victory. There is no reason to assume that his personal incompetence during the COVID-19 crisis will impact Trump’s appeal to the 60 million people who voted for him the first time. His supporters are like him, questioning the pandemic’s severity and even bringing along their guns to make the case for reopening the economy and risking their own lives.

Sneering at his supporters is no substitute for getting out the vote. Hillary Clinton and the Democrats lost the electoral college in 2016 because they didn’t heed the most basic campaign advice. Once again they hope to win by threading the needle and getting enough votes in swing states to drag Biden over the finish line. It must also be said that they are willing to live with Trump. The opposition to his administration is mostly phony with performances such as ripping up speeches, taking a knee, and wearing kente cloth. Democrats go along with defense spending, regime change and offering meager assistance for millions of people devastated by COVID-19.

“Black voters are being misled once again and the running mate discussion is the tool of the moment.”

Trump’s supporters have no reason to dislike him. He has done what they wanted him to do. The sight of children in cages and protesters under tear gas attack doesn’t diminish his appeal to them at all. Meanwhile the Democrats are not protecting black voters rights. The purges from the rolls, closed polling places and other methods of disenfranchisement are continuing without comment from the Democrats who ignore their most loyal and important cohort.

The sleight of hand shows the weakness of the left in general and of black people in particular. We are out of the loop in every sense possible. Millions of people took to the streets in response to police violence but their presence is sustained by the depth of suffering across the country. But the Democrats’ donor class demands that they do nothing except engage in pretense. Biden promised as much himself. “We can disagree in the margins but the truth of the matter is it’s all within our wheelhouse and nobody has to be punished. No one’s standard of living will change, nothing would fundamentally change.” For good measure he added, “I need you very badly.” On election day we will end up with Trump 2.0, even if Biden manages to win.

https://www.blackagendareport.com/freed ... rds-defeat

I've not been a great fan of Kimberly for a while now, she was always a little weak and since 2016....but this is basically good. The point I disagree with is her thoughts on the 'Trump voter'. It is though she missed last Saturday in Tulsa. I believe the attendance debacle very significant, though like an experiment it must be repeatable to be really significant. We'll see about that soon enough, but I don't think all of those 60M are with the prez anymore. Plenty time to November, time to conjure up false flags and whatever it takes to make 'Law&Order' more respectable in suburbia again. But this is definitely the Dem's election to lose, and nobody does it better.
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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Thu Jul 09, 2020 2:19 pm

Max Elbaum sez:
Leaving aside for a moment how it will affect vote tallies on November 3, which of the following messages is likely to build the strength of the socialist movement in this crucial constituency?

*”We will throw our organization strength into the electoral battle to defeat Trump and prevent a return to Jim Crow, and push from there for this country to become a genuine multi-racial democracy under the leadership of the working class.”

or

*There is not enough difference between the contenders for the presidency to make it worth our while to take part in electoral fight to beat Trump. Instead, we will focus on building our own strength on our own timetable and engage in presidential politics when we decide there is a socialist candidate more deserving of our time and energy.”

Those who send the second message may build a force which defends radical ideas and contributes to important fights.

But the left forces whose strategy translates into sending the first message have much better prospects to grow their ranks and expand their influence, power and coalition relationships.

Beyond that, they will be dealing a blow to the ‘permanent opposition’ mentality that has so often stunted the vision of U.S. radicals – embracing instead the revolutionary idea that our goal is to be part of, and then ultimately lead, a coalition that governs and transforms the whole country.

https://organizingupgrade.com/socialist ... en-debate/
What I get from this is we must be Social Democrats(in effect) or be irrelevant. I do not think that the case. People like Max keep holding out the promise that progressive forces can be effective within the Democratic Party when historically that had been the case for perhap 1-2 years in all of history, 1937-38, and that with a proletariat that might veer towards real socialism, not just Bernie dribble. We are far from that I think. But who knows what the near future brings? These are 'interesting times'.

Max goes on about 'neoliberals', I say all liberals are the enemy. Max talks about a coalition...with who exactly? 'Enlightened capitalists? Haven't we seen this movie? I think Max would kill Rosa Luxemburg all over again.

'I'll take door #2, Monty'. Max ain't talking to 'us' anyway.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Mon Jul 13, 2020 2:11 pm

Opinion > U.S.
Two Sides of the Same Coin: VenezolanosConBiden and MAGAzuela
By: Leonardo Flores

Image
The then U.S. Vice President Joe Biden meets Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro, Brasilia, Brazil, January 1, 2015. | Photo: Twitter/ @peoplesdispatch

Published 9 July 2020

Biden’s campaign says that sanctions against the Bolivarian nation will continue and intensify.

BThe Biden campaign held an online event on Wednesday, July 8 pitched as the former Vice President’s “vision for Venezuela and Venezuelans in the U.S.” Spoiler alert: his vision for Venezuela barely differs from President Trump.

This event, which didn’t merit an appearance from Biden himself, was aimed at getting Venezuelan-Americans to volunteer for “Uncle Joe”, as Representative Darren Soto (D-Fl) called him.

It was an hour and a half of shilling for votes and influence, and it demonstrated that when it comes to Venezuela, policies of regime change, sanctions and a refusal to engage in dialogue unite VenezolanosConBiden (the group hosting the event) with MAGAzuela (the term for Trump-supporting Venezuelans).

There are only two policy differences in the Biden and Trump approaches to Venezuela. One is about TPS, or temporary protected status, which is an immigration policy that allows people from ten specific countries affected by disasters to live and work in the United States. Biden supports TPS for Venezuelans, while Trump allies have blocked it in the Senate and Trump himself ended the program and has refused to issue it for Venezuelans.

According to one of Biden’s surrogates, there are 150 thousand Venezuelans in the U.S. who are either undocumented or are here on expired visas.

The other difference is the border wall, which is now being built in part using Venezuelan funds. The Trump administration has diverted US$601 million in assets stolen from the Venezuelan people to build the wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/opinion/ ... -0006.html

There is more, but isn't that quite enough?
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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