Sympathy for the Devils...

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Wed Aug 04, 2021 2:29 pm

What Does Progressive Darling Nina Turner’s Loss in Ohio Say About the Democratic Party?
BY JIM NEWELL
AUG 03, 202110:57 PM

Image
Nina Turner Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

Shontel Brown won the Democratic primary for Ohio’s 11th District special election Tuesday night, according to the Associated Press, defeating her chief rival, Nina Turner. The race was a bitterly fought proxy war between the Democratic establishment and the left, between senior members of the Congressional Black Caucus and members of the Squad, and, most of all, between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders in what is now the sixth year of the 2016 Democratic presidential primary. Brown will almost certainly win the November special election in the safely Democratic district.

<snip>

Turner, perhaps even more than Sanders himself, became a vessel for the left’s rage over Sanders’ fate. She was one of the most assertive surrogates on Sanders’ behalf in both presidential races, pushing him to continue late into the 2016 nomination contest and protesting Clinton at the messy 2016 Democratic National Convention. In 2020, after Sanders had bowed out, she described choosing between Biden and Trump as, “like saying to somebody, ‘You have a bowl of shit in front of you, and all you’ve got to do is eat half of it instead of the whole thing.’ It’s still shit.” She would eat those words—the whole bowl of them—repeatedly during her primary campaign

Clinton, whose anger with Turner dates to 2015 when Turner, originally an early Clinton supporter, switched to Sanders’ team, is not known to let bygones be bygones. She endorsed Brown in June. Leaders of the CBC—including its current chair, Ohio Rep. Joyce Beatty—also endorsed Brown, making a rare decision to choose sides in a race between two Black candidates. Senior CBC members have seen too many of their incumbents earn primary challenges in recent cycles from further left, activist candidates in majority-minority districts. They wanted to make a stand. Earlier this week, Politico summed up the tenor of the CBC message:

Shontel Brown — the chosen candidate of the caucus — would honor “the rich history” of the group, not be someone who fights against it while “trying to make a name for themselves,” CBC Chairwoman Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) said while campaigning in the district Saturday with other top Black lawmakers. Brown wouldn’t be “a single solitary know-it-all,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.). She wouldn’t “come in and try to break up that unity,” Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) added.

The most senior CBC member in Congress—House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn—got personally involved, too. At a June event with Turner, rapper and activist Killer Mike suggested it was “stupid” for Clyburn to have endorsed Biden in the presidential primary when all he got out of it was making Juneteenth a federal holiday, a sentiment which Turner—who had been trying to show off how she could work with people she’s had harsh words for in the past—appeared to approve. Clyburn endorsed Brown shortly after, and didn’t hide that the remark set him off.

“I personally got involved … when I was invited by the Turner campaign,” Clyburn said in a recent interview with The State. They “talked about my stupidity for endorsing Joe Biden, and I just kind of decided if I’m going to be stupid, might as well be stupid.”

Clyburn also hasn’t appreciated some of the sloganeering the activist left has brought into Democratic politics. “What I try to do is demonstrate by precept and example how we are to proceed as a party,” Clyburn told the New York Times in a June interview about the Ohio race. “When I spoke out against sloganeering, like ‘Burn, baby, burn’ in the 1960s and ‘defund the police,’ which I think is cutting the throats of the party, I know exactly where my constituents are. They are against that, and I’m against that.”

<snip>

What does the narrow victory for Brown mean for the long-term intra-party struggle for power between the establishment and the left? We don’t want to over-extrapolate from one result, especially as other races in recent memory have gone progressives’ way. But messing with Jim Clyburn remains a bad idea.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/202 ... n-cbc.html
Ms Turner seems to be on the side of the angels and not shy about it. There ain't no room in the Big Tent for that sort of thing; might offend 'important people'. Her guest offended Jim Cylburn with his absolutely correct remarks. So Jim came down from the House to teach the upstart a lesson. Malcolm knew.

Nina Turner should turn her back on these bastards who subverted her, on a party which demands absolute allegiance to capitalism and it's ruling class. There is a crying need for leaders of a real, people-oriented Left, she should leave the Democratic Party to it's fate in the dust bin of history.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Thu Aug 05, 2021 1:49 pm

Image

Cuba and a Trumpist Named Joe Biden
August 5, 2021
By Iroel Sánchez – Jul 31, 2021

Novelist Mario Vargas Llosa has recently said in the pages of the Spanish newspaper El País that Cuba is a “military dictatorship,” and that he has reached that conclusion through information he received from “the chronicles of correspondents.” One can disagree with his opinion, but one must start from the understanding that for a writer of fiction, as he is, and one of the best, the truth is not the most important thing; and it is precisely the truth that has been scarce in the reports on Cuba by the mainstream media.

The press that has been demanding plurality from the island for decades has once again constructed a narrative that excludes any voice that identifies itself with the Cuban Revolution. And this time it has gone even further. From The New York Times to CNN, they have appropriated images of revolutionaries in the streets of Havana to present them as anti-government demonstrations. It is essential for them to do so because to speak of “peaceful protests” one needs symbols, such as the Cuban and July 26 flags carried by the revolutionaries in images infinitely attributed to the counterrevolution by the corporate press, and also ideas, such as those expressed in the posters that Fox News was kind enough to erase while interviewing US Senator Ted Cruz.

It is astonishing that those who those media present only as overwhelmed with blackouts and lack of drinking water, which also overwhelmed those who came out to defend the Revolution, did not express it in posters or slogans. Chanting “freedom”—the single word that according to Francis Stonor Saunders, author of the book The CIA and the Cultural Cold War, heads almost all of Washington’s propaganda projects—or choruses of songs manufactured in Miami through blackmail and extortion of musicians, at a time when COVID-19 has left many musicians without income from live concerts, is not exactly spontaneous expression. “Spontaneity” that has been evidenced by the advisor for Latin America in Joe Biden’s National Security Council of the United States, Juan González, when he told a Trumpist youtuber that the new administration will “continue to support those artists, those journalists” that he calls independent, in an oxymoron that should be collected in literature as the universal anthology of cynicism.

But Joe Biden could compete with Mr. González for the same compilation. After his government’s use of platforms like Twitter and Facebook to instigate violence in Cuba was exposed, Biden told cnn that “disinformation on social media can kill people.”

Image
Trump and Biden, presidents from “opposing” political parties in the US, have the same policies.

On the Cuba issue, the Democrat president is the most loyal of Donald Trump’s followers, not only for keeping in place the 243 measures with which the latter took care of plugging every loophole through which the Cuban economy evaded the economic war, but also for his alliances with the most Trumpist sector in South Florida.

This is the same Biden who campaigned by criticizing without quarter Trump’s policies, including the ones directed against Cuba, and had advocated sending to jail the demonstrators who took over the Capitol in Washington, on January 6 of this year, and their instigator who preceded him in office; but now it seems that the Cuban Trumpists of the digital networks instigating the takeover of the Capitol in Havana appeal to him.

Today it is well known that there was no spontaneity in San Antonio de los Baños, that there were people from Miami, whose names have already been published, who instigated and called for the protests. For months now, a price has been put out for vandalism and people have been paying for it with quotes on digital networks to stone a shop window or set fire to a patrol car, although unfortunately the media through which Vargas Llosa “informs” himself, and a good part of the world, continue to speak only of “spontaneous protests” and “peaceful demonstrators” in Cuba. They speak not a word for the university professors injured by the “peaceful” demonstrators, nor for the mothers, doctors and nurses terrified by the stoning of the children’s ward of the hospital in Cardenas, nor for the women at the Cuban embassy in Paris whose lives and those of their children were endangered when the “peaceful” instigators of July 11 attacked the Cuban diplomatic headquarters in France with Molotov cocktails out of frustration. Having failed to impose terror in Cuba, as in the 70s of the last century, they are once again trying to wage “war on the roads of the world,” carried out by characters of poor memory at the service of the CIA, whose sinister work has cost lives of Cubans and foreigners.

Those who have been announcing for decades that, as in the USSR, Cuban socialism would fall without the revolutionaries defending it have been contradicted by the facts and, pretending to forget their predictions, blame the Cuban leadership for the violence in order to cover up the defeat of their long-standing aspirations disguised as analysis. They silence Roger Waters, international music legend, when he defends Cuba, and amplify those who, with none of the artistic stature of Waters, say the same as Biden. How much do they care about art, how much about freedom of expression? Who is now the “docile employee of official thinking,” Waters or Vargas Llosa?

The imperial aggression against Cuba is stronger than ever. Democrats and Republicans, all of them pro-Trump when it comes to crushing Cuba, have united around it. The tightened blockade and the induced violence provides the raw material for the scribes who are paid in dollars to translate what the empire wants as their own ideas. However, what will always be decisive will be what we do here, joining all patriots and all honest people in Cuba and the world.

(more)

https://orinocotribune.com/cuba-and-a-t ... joe-biden/

So then, if Trump is the Devil, evil incarnate, as Democrats, liberals and dim progressives would have it, what does that make Joe Biden? In domestic issues the Dems are often 'the lesser of two evils', though often the difference is minuscule. But in the big old wide world of imperialism even those faint difference fade in a wash of blood, suffering and greed. Because like a man said in other context, "There ain't a dime's worth of difference between them."

But so what? It seems pretty apparent that a whole lot of progressives highly prioritize domestic issues over the crimes of imperialism. Not so much in their rhetoric, which is often somewhat internationalist. But when the rubber meets the road they are willing to forget or distort those crimes in the hope("please, please!") that something like their domestic agenda will be addressed by the party that pretends to give a shit, sometimes. .
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Fri Aug 06, 2021 1:42 pm

Image

The Politics of Spectacle: On Eviction Moratorium, The Squad Talks the Walk
August 5, 2021
By Daniel Haiphong – Aug 3, 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated that not even the most “progressive” elected officials in the U.S. are willing to do what is necessary to meet the needs of the people.

Members of Congress departed for a seven-week vacation at the same time that the Center for Disease Control’s (CDC) national eviction moratorium expired on July 31. The Squad, a subset of members of the House of Representatives who espouse Bernie Sanders’ policy agenda, gathered at the Capitol building to demand that Congress come back to work and hold a vote to renew the moratorium. Cori Bush, Jamal Bowman, and other Squad members slept on the Capitol steps overnight as part of the ongoing protest. Critics on social media pointed out that the rally was too little, too late while others remarked that the low attendance of the rally, comprised mainly of political surrogates, rendered the action nothing more than a photo opportunity for the Squad.

Founder of Black Agenda Report (BAR) Glen Ford died three days before the protest. Ford strongly opposed the politics of diversity, which privilege political representation over substantive policy demands and the popular power required to achieve them. He closely monitored the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) to demonstrate that voting for elected officials who look and behave like their constituents does not necessarily equate to representation. Ford led BAR’s effort to expose how the CBC, for example, voted in large majorities to militarize U.S. police departments and enshrine their officers with protected class status under federal hate-crime legislation.

The Squad rose to prominence following Barack Obama’s two-term presidency. Obama represented the pinnacle of diversity. Obama was famously touted as a victory in the long, hard struggle of Black Americans for human rights, yet his administration greatly expanded the theater of the U.S. war machine and enacted a broad policy agenda friendly to the rich. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign emerged from the economic discontent once encapsulated by Occupy Wall Street — a protest movement that Obama’s DHS and FBI brutally repressed at the tail end of his first term. In a pivot away from protest, an increasingly left-leaning Democratic Party base placed their energy into electing “progressive” members of Congress.

Talking the walk

The Squad combines the politics of diversity with a politics of spectacle. Unlike Obama, who openly chastised Black Americans and separated himself from the Left, the Squad professes to stand with working people and “walk the walk.” U.S. Representatives Cori Bush and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (now better known as AOC) frequently identify themselves as organizers in a bid to relate to their young, left-leaning supporters. This was evident in their response to the expiration of the eviction moratorium, which has left more than 11 million Americans at risk of eviction. The Squad took to the streets as organizers in the hours before the policy ended despite offering little more than statements in the months leading up to July 31.

Even worse, the Squad has struggled just as much as the rest of the Democratic Party to articulate just who is to blame for the negligence surrounding the eviction moratorium. Members of the Squad have been hesitant to cast full blame for the crisis onto House Speaker Nancy Pelosi or President Joe Biden. AOC told journalist Chuck Modi that the Biden administration failed to respond to the Supreme Court order in June indicating the need for congressional involvement until just days before the moratorium expired.


Cori Bush explained to journalist Max Blumenthal that she didn’t know why Joe Biden had not issued an executive order to renew the eviction moratorium and said that the crisis “wasn’t about” Nancy Pelosi. AOC’s assertion that the Squad doesn’t subscribe to a theory of change that posits one must be nice to the powerful to get what you want is seemingly at odds with their unwillingness to directly challenge Democratic Party leadership in a moment of crisis.


In truth, the Squad has been more than amenable to the establishment wing of the Democratic Party. Instead of participating in public protests over immigration policy, as was the case during the Trump administration, the Squad has limited itself to sharp statements now that Biden is deporting undocumented immigrants at a rate far higher than the prior administration. Last year, AOC called Nancy Pelosi the “Mama Bear” of the Democratic Party despite the fact that majorities support a third-party alternative to the current electoral duopoly. And not one member of the Squad was willing to force a vote for Medicare For All during a deadly pandemic in exchange for their support of Nancy Pelosi’s bid for speaker of the House.

The Squad’s politics of spectacle

Such stark contradictions speak to the differences between political spectacle and political substance. Political spectacle feigns support for the interests of working people (i.e., organizing a small protest of the eviction moratorium or tweeting daily about the ills facing the working class) while failing to take the necessary action to ensure that the interests of working people become a material reality. Millions are at risk of eviction in the middle of an economic recession and a pandemic. More than 500,000 people at any given moment are homeless in a country with 17 million vacant homes. If members of the Squad were interested in substantive political action, then they would use their leverage to force demands such as housing for all upon their colleagues and hold continuous rallies until these demands were met.

The Squad’s loyalty to the politics of spectacle is further underscored when imperialism enters the debate. Imperialism is a litmus test for anyone who claims the title of “left” or “radical.” While AOC and the Squad have cast votes against the U.S.’s bloated military budget, they have failed to make the issue of militarism a priority issue. On numerous occasions, members of the Squad have repeated the State Department’s racist narratives about Venezuela, Syria, and other countries targeted by U.S. sanctions and military interventions. AOC has even stood with the fascists responsible for the destructive coup in Bolivia in 2019.

Crises reveal the true character of social systems and the governments that manage them. The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated that not even the most “progressive” elected officials in the U.S. are willing to do what is necessary to meet the needs of the people. Millions are at risk of homelessness amid the spread of COVID-19’s Delta variant, yet not one member of the Squad has proposed freezing rent or seizing vacant housing stock from the banks to ensure everyone has a roof over their head. In the U.S. the politics of spectacle reign supreme. Mass movements must build alternatives to the Democratic Party to strengthen their base of popular power moving forward.

https://orinocotribune.com/the-politics ... -the-walk/

I feel quite sure that 'The Squad' would fit right in with the German Social Democratic Party leaders in 1914.

The contention that these sheepdogs dominate the Democratic Party and control Joe Biden is probably the most ridiculous of Republican talking points. The dog wags the tail, always.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:11 pm

Biden Admin Offers Hand Of Friendship To Bolsonaro

Latest U.S. government visit is further evidence that the Biden administration has no qualms about supporting Brazil’s far-right military-dominated regime.

By Nathália Urban

US President Joe Biden’s National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan visited Brazil on Thursday and gave a positive start of an agenda between the United States and Brazil, although in the past many believed in there must exist an animosity between Bolsonaro and Biden, because of the Bolsonaro clan’s explicit support for Donald Trump.

Regardless, the Americans arrived with good will toward Bolsonaro, and at the same time red flags have being raised due to their plans for several Latin American countries.

Useful idiots

A prominent theme at the lunch hosted by Chancellor Carlos França was the political situation in Latin America and the Caribbean. The representatives of both countries spoke not only about Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, but about each of the region’s neighbors and defended “the need to preserve and protect democracy in the hemisphere”. The current situation in the region was also discussed in a morning meeting with Generals Augusto Heleno and Defense Minister Braga Netto. It is the second time in a month that a top US government official has approached the Bolsonaro government to show concern for anti-imperialist popular movements in Latin America, during a visit by CIA Director William J. Burns in July, Bolsonaro himself admitted that this topic had been discussed.

After an increase in US aggression toward Latin America, it is not surprising that the Biden government seeks an alliance with Bolsonaro, who has already been implicated in the 2019 coup in Bolivia, the aggression against demonstrators in Chile and several gratuitous aggressions against the Argentine president Alberto Fernandez and the Venezuelan government.

In addition to regional interference, Biden’s envoy came to Brazil to try to undermine China’s advance in the telecommunications sector.

The US wants China to stay out of the 5G auction, which will take place later this year. The mission headed by Sullivan discussed the matter with Brazilian authorities, including ministers Fábio Faria, from Communications, and General Augusto Heleno, from the Institutional Security Office.

The US has been campaigning worldwide against the use of Chinese equipment. However, the Brazilian telecommunications sector is said to be against the barring of Chinese companies.

Sullivan’s delegation doubled down on a Trump-era pledge to make Brazil a NATO ‘global partner’ member, on condition that it rejects Chinese Huawei and adopts the US model for its 5G network.


Image
Brazil’s far-right president Jair Bolsonaro greets US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan

Delicate moment

Among the topics discussed, however, despite not having been predominant at the meeting, was the concern of the Americans with the tension between the Executive and the Judiciary powers, as a result of Bolsonaro’s attacks on the electronic ballot box, on the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) and members of the Federal Supreme Court (STF).

The US delegation sees a similarity between Bolsonaro’s campaign and that carried out by former US President Donald Trump, who was defeated in 2020 by Biden and encouraged a campaign to denounce an alleged electoral fraud, leading to the invasion, in January of this year, of the US Capitol.

Despite this, they reiterated the US support for the Brazilian candidacy to the OECD and signalled a partnership on the environment not only with the federal government, but also with state governors.

https://www.brasilwire.com/biden-admin- ... bolsonaro/

Thank Jesus Mary & Joseph that the US government is no longer supporting authoritarian despots like that bad man Trump. Oh, wait...

Get all that change you wanted? This fellow, who does his best to 'out-Trump', PT Barnum's greatest student, is much more practiced at dictatorship than the wanna-be he emulates. But this is OK with the Biden regime, because the US foreign policy barely changes, if at all, with succession of presidents. Because the economics don't change, the governments that don't kowtow to the US don't change, and the people who own our country don't change. So why should who is in the Oval Office make any difference, other than the 'optics'?

But these days optics are everything and seeing that amiable wretch stumbling thru another speech is good enough, he ain't Trump...

If you're not tired of hearing "At least he ain't Trump" you will be soon, because it's all the Democratic Party has got to distinguish themselves. Everything else is lies and posturing.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Fri Aug 13, 2021 2:04 pm

Are we sure he ain't Trump?
There Is No Will To Fight Climate Change

<snip>

The reasons are of course political. There is a lot of lobbying for policies which continue the output of GHG while there is little immediate interest in reducing them. A decade ago Peter Lee had already done the math. Looking back at what happened since he lays out a list of failures:

The United States under Joe Biden has doubled down on the absurd narrative that the United States has the national capacity and moral stature to lead the world’s response to climate change.

Let me dismiss this claim in a few words.

First, the doom of the climate change regime was sealed when the United States refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol in 1998.

It was double doomed when the United States under Barack Obama imposed a successor regime that eliminated legally binding caps for anyone.

It was triple doomed when Donald Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement.

It was quadruple doomed when the United States under Joe Biden decided that its highest priority and organizing principle of policy was to treat the People’s Republic of China as America’s prime geopolitical adversary.

Doom doom de doom doom doom. You get the picture.


It is not only the U.S. which is guilty here. All political system seem to prefer short term rewards over avoiding future pain., especially when others can be plausibly blamed for the outcome. The U.S. is just the most hypocritical actor here.

That Joe Biden is still playing nice with the fossil fuel industry demonstrates the mechanism:

The Biden administration is now on track to approve more oil and gas drilling on public lands—activity that accounts for a quarter of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions—than any administration since George W. Bush. Climate envoy John Kerry has balked at the idea of committing the U.S. to a coal phaseout. Politicians who call themselves climate hawks are still going out of their way to make clear that there’s a vibrant future ahead for the companies that funded climate denial, whose business model remains built around burning up and extracting as many fossil fuels as possible. Administration officials, meanwhile, have talked repeatedly about the need to cap warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius.
This is climate denial.


Just look at the recent infrastructure bill:

Many of the bill’s provisions are on the oil industry’s wish list. The proposed legislation has more than $10 billion for carbon capture, transport and storage — a suite of technologies fossil fuel companies hope will allow them to extend their license to operate for years, if not decades. There’s also $8 billion for hydrogen — with no stipulation that the energy used to produce it comes from clean sources. A new liquid natural gas plant in Alaska won billions in loan guarantees, while other waivers in the bill will weaken environmental reviews of new construction projects, experts say.
“This infrastructure proposal is not a down payment on real climate action,” said Mitch Jones, director of Food & Water Watch Policy, a Washington accountability organization. “It is doubling down on support for climate polluters.”


Just yesterday Biden confirmed his pro fossil fuel position by asking for cheaper pollution:

President Joe Biden on Wednesday afternoon added to the pressure on the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, after one of his top advisers said earlier in the day that OPEC and its allies “must do more” to support the economic recovery.
...
Oil futures recently traded higher, but they had retreated earlier Wednesday after U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan pressed OPEC and its allies to further boost output and described a recent agreement to increase production as “simply not enough.”


(more)

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2021/08/t ... .html#more
Which side is Biden on? The side of capitalism and the degradation of all life on Earth. The current regime continues to reveal it's true colors and wherever you look, on most matters of substance the continuity of US policy is unswerving. Other than his genuinely heinous race-baiting, the former prez's predilection for culture war and his general obnoxiousness are what most liberals objected to, matters superficial compared to the most important issues of survival.

Hey Greenpeace, ya happy now?

Lesser evil my ass.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Tue Aug 24, 2021 2:35 pm

Democrats struggling to find a path forward after impasse and anger at moderates boils over
By Clare Foran, Annie Grayer, Kristin Wilson and Daniella Diaz, CNN

Updated 9:10 AM ET, Tue August 24, 2021

(CNN)House Democrats are struggling to pass a budget framework that will unlock their ability to move forward on a sweeping $3.5 trillion economic package amid a standoff with moderates that has thrown a key agenda item for President Joe Biden into jeopardy.

The impasse forced House leadership into negotiations late into the evening on Monday attempting to reach a deal with the moderates that would allow them to move ahead with a vote to pass the resolution, but shortly after midnight members were notified that no further votes were expected in the House for the night.
Not only did Democrats not reach their initial goal of passing the budget resolution on Monday, they will return to the Capitol on Tuesday morning without a final vote scheduled or a firm plan on how to get there. A vote could take place as soon as Tuesday afternoon, but that would require the cohort of moderate Democrats or Democratic House leadership to make a concession that neither side has seemingly been willing to make up until this point.
The tension in the Democratic caucus came to a boiling point in a heated, expletive-laden meeting late on Monday. Multiple sources confirmed that lawmakers grew visibly angry when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was emphasizing lawmakers shouldn't "squander" the opportunity to pass these bills with their majority in the House.
"You all have to vote for the goddamn rule," House Rules Chair Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, also said, to cheers in the room, according to a source familiar. Moderates, who are refusing to vote on the rule, were not present in the room when McGovern made his comments, which Politico first reported.

<snip>

The demand from moderates comes as Pelosi has made clear for months that the House won't take up the bipartisan bill until the Senate passes the larger and more sweeping package through budget reconciliation. Progressives have said they won't support the infrastructure bill on its own without the larger economic package that would expand the social safety net.
Trying to find common ground, Democratic leadership attempted to put forward a vote that would pass the budget resolution using a special procedural move instead of requiring it to have its own vote. Pelosi also floated assurances to the group of moderates that the Senate's bipartisan infrastructure deal would get a vote in the House by October 1, but it was unclear as of early Tuesday whether a specific date had been written into the rule to satisfy moderates.

(more)

https://us.cnn.com/2021/08/24/politics/ ... index.html

Ain't no dog& pony show, the fix is in the structure of government and party. In this case the tent is so big that there is no common ground. There is no unifying ideology, only a vote getting mechanism, and to ask more of the arrangement is to invite embarrassment. And here it comes:
Image

The 'moderates'(ha!) will back down little, if any, and the leadership will have to do it their way because they gotta pass something and the defeat of the least progressive aspects of the big bill will be praised as a victory for 'bipartisanship', the ruling class consensus. And so Joe Biden will get his 'reach around' the aisle.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Fri Sep 03, 2021 3:10 pm

Supreme Court and Joe Manchin tighten Biden's political straitjacket
Stephen Collinson Profile
Analysis by Stephen Collinson, CNN

Updated 12:17 AM ET, Fri September 3, 2021

(CNN)Both the premise and promise of Joe Biden's presidency and a possibly brief Democratic grip on Washington are suddenly on the line, as the legacy of past electoral disappointments and harsh realities of power suddenly converge.

In the seven-month span of Biden's term, this is the worst of times for Democrats. A stroke-of-midnight eclipse of Constitutional abortion rights in Texas that shocked liberals, a new threat from moderate Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin to Biden's vast congressional agenda and the President's own stumbles in Afghanistan dragged this White House to its lowest moment yet.

Add in the Republican Party's expanding assault on voting rights and a looming fight over raising government borrowing levels, and Democrats face a struggle to repay the faith of their 2020 voters. And that's without horrendous tests from a pandemic that is again filling hospitals, targeting unvaccinated Americans -- including, increasingly, kids who have been left waiting on regulators -- and looking likely to dog the White House deep into midterm election year.

Each of these crises is putting Biden's leadership under extreme examination and in several cases exposing his inability to meaningfully shift prevailing dynamics because of divides in his own party and Republicans' obstructive power.
(more)

https://us.cnn.com/2021/09/03/politics/ ... index.html
************************************

Manchin upends Democrats' push to enact Biden's agenda this month, calling for 'pause' on $3.5 trillion bill
By Manu Raju and Daniella Diaz, CNN 15 hrs ago Comments

Image
Sen. Joe Manchin, pictured here on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on June 10, the most pivotal Democratic swing vote in the Senate, threw a major wrench in his party's crafted plans to pass a massive $3.5 trillion bill by month's end.

Sen. Joe Manchin, the most pivotal Democratic swing vote in the Senate, threw a major wrench in his party's carefully crafted plans to pass a massive $3.5 trillion bill by month's end, demanding they take a "strategic pause" before considering a sweeping bill to implement much of President Joe Biden's agenda.

Manchin, who has long been skeptical of the staggering price tag, made clear Thursday that he's also opposed to the timeframe Democratic leaders had been charting out for months, a position that now threatens both the larger Democratic-only proposal but also the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill that passed the Senate earlier this summer.

In a strongly worded op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal on Thursday, the moderate senator called on fellow Democrats to "hit a strategic pause on the budget-reconciliation legislation," referring to the bill that can be approved in the Senate by just a simple majority -- meaning all 50 members of the Senate Democratic Caucus have to support the bill or it will collapse since all 50 Republicans are expected to oppose it.

"Instead of rushing to spend trillions on new government programs and additional stimulus funding, Congress should hit a strategic pause on the budget-reconciliation legislation," he wrote in the op-ed. "A pause is warranted because it will provide more clarity on the trajectory of the pandemic, and it will allow us to determine whether inflation is transitory or not."

He added: "While some have suggested this reconciliation legislation must be passed now believe that making budgetary decisions under artificial political deadlines never leads to good policy or sound decisions. I have always said if I can't explain it, I can't vote for it, and I can't explain why my Democratic colleagues are rushing to spend $3.5 trillion."

Manchin says he cannot agree to the $3.5 trillion plan "or anywhere near that level of additional spending" without fully assessing the effects on the economy.

Democratic leaders have set September 15 for a deadline to put together their reconciliation bill, and already House committees have begun taking action on their individual pieces of the larger proposal. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has warned her colleagues she will not move on the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill -- which was approved 69-30 in the Senate last month -- until the Senate passes the larger Democratic deal first.
(more)

https://www.ktbs.com/news/national_poli ... a8a45.html
Well, if so many of his own party didn't preempt criticism of the party by dumping the blame for the inevitable bad optics on their prez instead of admitting that the debacle was the work of the previous six presidents perhaps that might take some heat off Joe. Likewise, the prob with the Supremes is a long and twisted tale of concessions to placate the bosses and political acts so naive they look like treachery but are the result of the 'Big Tent', which admits all including every sort wrecker and exercises no party discipline.

But the upcoming failure of his comprehensive spending plan is entirely a cleft stick of his own making. Insisting upon bipartisanship with an opposing party which has totally chucked the traditions which allowed the government to function is myopic at best and is a guarantee for failure. And everybody knew that's what Biden was all about, said so himself. Yet the bosses hustled him into first place in a race where any Dem should have won and even an uninspiring hack like Biden could win by 7M votes. And they got what they wanted: there will be no significant moves to the left domestically; even 'leftish' Dems are imperialists so no improvement could be expected there. The rich and the corps will not feel any but the lightest pinch, the most pressing issue of our times will barely get lip service, the people will continue to sink into the mire and be kept alive on 'screens'.

But hey, they're just doing their jobs...

My old man used to say, "I vote for the man, not the party." This is a popular stance here in the USA, elections are popularity contests as the parties, most especially the one supposed to be the 'popular' party, do not stand for anything but getting elected. No accident, this, flexibility is required in meeting the ruling class's needs and a genuinely 'popular' ideology would surely get in the way of effective government(for the rich).

By fronting the bipartisan boob the Dem bosses guaranteed disaster in the mid-terms and proly beyond. Well, it's good for fund-raising...It also displays the ruling class consensus, of which the Democratic party has an integral part in implementing. Like the man said, the 'lesser evil' is the more effective evil.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Sat Sep 04, 2021 2:16 pm

JOE BIDEN ON THE BRINK OF SENILE DEMENTIA
3 Sep 2021 , 11:41 am .

Image
It is doubted that US President Joe Biden will end his term due to senile dementia and other health problems (Photo: AFP)

Every day the signs of a clear deterioration in the mental and physical capacity of the current president of the United States, Joe Biden, are more evident.

Confusion, setbacks, incongruous responses, among others, have marked the development of those who are at the fore (at least visibly) of the North American Empire, which is also in decline and shows the same signs of disorientation.

And it is not that we want to forcibly establish a parallel between the US government and its "driver", because we know that before Biden's arrival his deterioration was already evident, but we will still use the resource to the extent possible. That the current president represented the return to values ​​lost during the term of Donald Trump was already a clear sign that things were not well in the cradle of Empire.

But 78-year-old Joe Biden's signs of senile dementia are neither new nor surprising. During the campaign for the presidential elections last year, it was said that he was not qualified to assume the position of greater responsibility in the United States.

And it is that since last year you could already notice the stuttering, the lapses of silence during his speech and the "dialectical stumbling". More than once, Biden was seen with a lost face, indecisive reflections and the desperate gesture of someone who cannot get the words to say, episodes that are becoming more frequent.

Goofs and nonsense were also frequent during the campaign. In a debate last year, he said that "150 million Americans" had died from gun violence and was confused when he appeared at a public event as a candidate "for the United States Senate," a position he held for decades before becoming vice president.

Continuing with the exaggeration of figures, last year it said that 200 million Americans had died from covid-19. The large number even contrasted with the number of victims globally, which by then did not even reach a million deaths.


"Here's my son Beau Biden, who many of you helped elect to the Delaware Senate, and here's my granddaughter Natalie," he said. Then he backed off saying, "Oh, don't wait, she's not. She's the other one."

WHAT AM I DOING HERE?
As we said before, it is not difficult to draw a parallel between the empire-president and recent events demonstrate this.

Just as the US government long concealed its failure in Afghanistan, long showcasing a muscle it ultimately lacked, Biden's mental incapacity painfully tries to be covered up. The question can be symbolic for both scenarios.

On several occasions, Biden's longevity has been spoken of as a positive development insofar as it is assumed to be proportional to experience.

"It's a legitimate question to ask about my age," Biden told The View . "I hope I can show that it is not only with age that comes the wisdom and experience that can make things so much better," The New York Times reviews .

"What am I doing here?" He asked himself in the middle of his speech, already in his time as president, during a visit to a vaccination center in Houston. In that same event, he mistook the name of a congresswoman.


Beyond longevity, it is doubted that Joe Biden will complete his term due to physical and mental disability. Some even doubt that he will reach 2022 in power. The funny thing is that the 78-year-old president says he is ready for his re-election in 2024.

The ravings of the head of the White House could have a foothold in a real health problem. The image below summarizes his clinical picture and gives us an idea of ​​why Biden is a time bomb.

Image
2019 Biden Medical Report (Photo: GW Medical Faculty).

On Biden's health there are discrepancies in the medical sector. While some claim that he has a 79% chance of surviving a first term, they even say that he has a 70% chance of reaching the second, according to an analysis by the American Federation for Aging Studies (Afar).

Ronny L. Jackson, a former White House doctor, recently said that there is evidence that Biden suffers from mental decline: "I have seen Joe Biden on the campaign trail and I am concerned and convinced that he does not have the mental capacity, nor the cognitive ability. to serve as our commander-in-chief, "he stated.

SLEEPY JOE
Recently, during a meeting with the Prime Minister of Israel, Naftalí Bennett, the President of the United States fell asleep for a period of approximately 30 seconds.


Although this fact is recent, former President Donald Trump coined the term "Sleepy Joe" during the campaign because more than once he had rheumatic reflexes and a sleepy face.

Prior to meeting with the Russian president in June, former President Trump wished President Joe Biden "good luck" in his next meeting with President Vladimir Putin and also joked about giving him some last-minute advice.

"Good luck to Biden in dealing with President Putin; do not fall asleep during the meeting and please give him my warmest regards," the former president said in a statement.

HIDING FROM REALITY
Beyond the nonsense, inconsistencies, asleep and stuttering of the long-lived president, the effort to hide that reality is also remarkable. More than once, Biden's surroundings have been seen busy trying to stop some of his nonsense in time.

They have even suspended press wheels and evicted journalists because the president had one of his moments of incoherence. That is why it is not often that the president is without someone to assist him.

In addition to being the oldest president in office, Biden claims to be the president who has taken the longest to give a press conference. The first was offered in March of this year.

Given the situation in the White House, it is worth asking, who is currently in charge in the United States? It is demonstrated that the figure of the current president is not indispensable because the establishment is the one who is determining the functioning of the structure of the State, values ​​that he has precisely said to represent on several occasions.

That is why Biden has been singled out for being an empty shell, a puppet, and even an inflatable doll. Will he be able to finish his term in office, before he falls into (a very natural and definitive) senile dementia?

https://misionverdad.com/globalistan/jo ... ncia-senil

Google Translator
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Thu Sep 09, 2021 1:49 pm

Manchin lays out long list of demands as key Senate chairs move to win his vote
By Manu Raju, CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent

Updated 12:48 AM ET, Thu September 9, 2021

(CNN)In the Senate, all roads lead to Joe Manchin.

The West Virginia Democrat and his staff have been engaged for weeks in intensive negotiations with the chairs of key Senate committees ahead of his party's release of a sprawling bill to expand the social safety net, laying down his demands on a wide-range of issues: health care, education, child care and taxes, according to multiple sources familiar with the talks.

And Manchin is making clear he won't cave on aggressive climate provisions sought by many Democrats, throwing a wrench in his party's efforts to make the bill key to combating global warming.

With Democrats needing every vote in their caucus to get the bill through the Senate along straight party lines, Manchin has received more attention than any other Democrat, even as others -- like Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema -- have also balked at the $3.5 trillion price tag. Indeed, as committee chairs have held regular meetings with their members over the summer recess to shape key provisions of legislation under their jurisdiction, they often will later have individual meetings with Manchin, even if he doesn't serve on their respective committees.
As she met with her members on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, Washington Sen. Patty Murray, who chairs the panel, also talked privately with Manchin to hear his concerns about provisions on free community college and universal pre-K -- issues that are also central to President Joe Biden's agenda. Her staff has since been in contact with Manchin's aides, while Murray has been in constant communication with other members as well.

Manchin and his staff have been in consistent talks with Senate Finance Chairman Ron Wyden of Oregon, a committee where the two powerful Democrats have clashed over several key provisions central to financing the proposal, including on corporate tax hikes, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. Wyden has had weekly Zoom meetings with his committee members on individual areas of their proposal, but has made sure to have regular talks with Manchin -- either with him directly or through his staff.

And Manchin has engaged in long discussions with rank-and-file Democrats as well, including Sen. Michael Bennet over the Colorado Democrat's push to broaden and bolster the child tax credit, which the West Virginian wants to bring down to a level far lower than what many in his party want, multiple Democrats said.
On education, Manchin is trying to limit the Democrats' efforts to provide universal pre-K and tuition-free community college. He's talked to Democrats about limiting the number of Americans eligible for pre-K by setting income thresholds, while also discussing ways to measure students' performance for community college assuming their tuition is paid for over two years. And on health care, Manchin has suggested substantially reducing funding for home-care services, a key priority of many Democrats.

<snip>.

"There are some in my caucus who believe $3.5 trillion is too much. There are some in my caucus who believe it's too little," Schumer said Wednesday. "And we're going to work very hard to have unity because without unity, we're not going to get anything."

(more)

https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/08/politics ... index.html
"We can't afford it", yet somehow no one makes a peep about the huge treasure that has been bestowed upon the rich and their corporations over the last 13 years. As has been shown as long as the empire is at least somewhat intact money is never an issue, just print more...

Chucky is almost right, we'll get something alright, Republican spending which the prez will declare as a victory for bipartisanship.

Yeah, it really is starting to look like Kabuki Theater, but that's because 'the predictable' is baked into the 'art form'. And when the dust clears from the electoral trainwreck in 2022 the Dem's will be all 'radical' again and want your money to elect a 'Real Democrat' instead of Joe Manchin, pretending that Machin is not the real face of the party. We've seen this movie so many time but I guess some people never get tired of the abuse.

****************************************************

Democrats, Abortion and Phony Politics

Democratic party leadership are as uninterested in fighting for abortion rights as they are in addressing anything else their members need and want.

Most leftists in this country still remain loyal to the Democratic Party despite decades of deception, overt collusion with ruling class interests, and support of U.S. imperialism. The Democrats use a variety of means to keep the support of millions of people who yearn for something other than the excuses and double dealing they are constantly offered.

Pointing to Republicans as the embodiment of all evil is one of their methods, and no issue suits this strategy more than abortion. Democrats point to Republicans’ strict anti-abortion stance to keep their left members in line. Democrats who want to see progressive initiatives enacted still feel tied to their party and convince themselves they have no choice but to be snookered on a regular basis. This dilemma of going along with treachery is particularly acute for Black people. The Republicans are the proud party of white racism and few Black Democrats are willing to declare their independence from their corrupt so-called leaders.

Enter the state of Texas, which passed a draconian law making abortion illegal after six weeks of pregnancy and giving ordinary citizens the right to sue any provider who might violate this legislation. The Supreme Court chose not to hear arguments and allowed the law to come into being.

Democratic party propagandists immediately sprang into action, predicting the end of the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision, excoriating anyone who dared to question Democrats, and reviving their cynical attacks on anyone who didn’t support Hillary Clinton in 2016 as being at fault.

Of course it must always be said that Clinton raised more than $1 billion in her campaign but failed to get a mere 78,000 more votes in the swing states that she needed to win. She and her team relied on everything except an old fashioned get out the vote effort, and are responsible for the worst political debacle in U.S. history. Neither she nor anyone else in Democratic party leadership will ever acknowledge how badly they failed their people. They haven't changed since 2016. They still hope to win by doing as little as they possibly can.

The Texas law spawned hand wringing and foolish deification of the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg. But like Clinton she bore responsibility for the makeup of the current Supreme Court. In 2013 Barack Obama asked the 80-year old, two-time cancer patient to step down, just in case Democrats lost control of the senate the following year. That is precisely what happened but truth telling doesn’t suit the political image makers.

Even worse, the Democrats lie about their ability to protect abortion rights. They could pass the Women’s Health Protection Act which would make Roe v. Wade federal law and do away with all abortion restrictions across the country. They could have done this when Bill Clinton and Barack Obama had democratic control of both houses of congress and they can still do it now. Democrats have been lying about their ability to protect abortion rights for the past 30 years.

The Democrats constantly treat their members as suckers. They raise millions of dollars claiming that they will stop the Republican onslaught against abortions or some other issue that is important to their voters.. The Women’s Health Protection Act could be passed now but any expectation of that happening is for the suckers to believe. The Democrats claim that it would be too hard to pass because of the filibuster, which they also do nothing about. Round and round they go, with nothing to show except excuses for their inaction. Meanwhile their paid mouth pieces in corporate media use every trick in their worn out playbook to keep the rank and file from noticing they have been conned yet again.

The dysfunctional relationship between the Democrats and their members brings to mind an old saying. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” There is a lot of political shame to go around amongst the Democrats and their hapless members.

There comes a point when the abuser can no longer be blamed. The U.S. political duopoly are like professional wrestlers with phony villains and phony heroes too. At least their fans are in on the joke and know full well that they are watching a theatrical performance. Not so members of the Democratic party. They behave as though conservative Joe Manchin is the only one who can make demands on a president. Their progressive idols are afraid or uninterested in confronting what passes for leadership and theatrics rule the day.

Of course acting to protect abortion rights would make the Democrats more friends than enemies. They would energize millions of people and would be assured victories in most of the country. But the last thing they want is an engaged group of voters. They thrive on trickery and keeping a seat at the table of permanent government. They can then cut deals with their bosses in the oligarchy while millions of people believe they are being represented. Only the rubes are really fighting over abortion.

https://www.blackagendareport.com/democ ... y-politics
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
Posts: 10592
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 5:44 pm
Location: Turtle Island
Contact:

Re: Sympathy for the Devils...

Post by blindpig » Mon Sep 13, 2021 1:35 pm

Lesser Evils...
Manchin Says He Won’t Support $3.5 Trillion Spending Plan, Could Back it at $1.5 Trillion
BY DANIEL POLITI
SEPT 12, 202112:27 PM

Image
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) leaves the U.S. Capitol following a vote on August 3, 2021 in Washington, D.C. Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin categorically said Sunday he will not support President Joe Biden’s $3.5 trillion spending plan and said there was no chance the measure could get approved by Sept. 27 as Democratic leaders want. “We don’t have the need to rush into this and get it done within one week because there’s some deadline we’re meeting or someone’s going to fall through the cracks,” Manchin said on NBC’s Meet the Press. Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union, Manchin said, “There’s no way we can get this done by the 27th if we do our job.”

Manchin, a crucial Democratic vote in the evenly divided Senate, said Democratic leaders were well aware of his stance on the $3.5 trillion price tag. “We’ve already put out $5.4 trillion and we’ve tried to help Americans in every way we possibly can and a lot of the help that we’ve put out there is still there and it’s going to run clear until next year, 2022, so what’s the urgency?” Manchin asked on CNN’s State of the Union. During the interview, Manchin hinted at what the dollar amount would be that he could support. “It’s going to be $1, $1.5 [trillion]. We don’t know where it’s going to be. It’s not going to be at $3.5 [trillion], I can assure you,” Manchin said after CNN’s Dana Bash pressed him multiple times on what number he would support.

The Senator from West Virginia made clear that he would only support the up to $1.5 trillion price tag if the bill maintains a “globally competitive” tax code. “The numbers they’re wanting to pay for it and the tax changes they want to make, is that competitive?

<snip>

Sen. Bernie Sanders quickly blasted Manchin for his stance. “No, it is absolutely not acceptable to me,” Sanders said on CNN when asked about the $1.5 trillion ceiling that Manchin outlined. “I don’t think it’s acceptable to the president, to the American people, or to the overwhelming majority of the people in the Democratic Caucus.” Sanders said progressives had already compromised plenty. “Many of us made a major compromise in going from the $6 trillion bill that we wanted, supported by the overwhelming majority of Democrats, down to 3.5,” the Vermont senator said.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/202 ... nders.html
"Nobody cares what you think, Bernie, you're just a sheepdog. Get back to herding your flock into this Republican spending plan that we're gonna shove down your throat."

Ain't gonna be no tax increases for wealthy individuals and corps will get a light tap at best. Climate change will not even get the lip-service which is the best that capitalism will allow, and that grudgingly. And on and on. But by golly it will be bipartisan!

*******************************
American Liberals Praise Biden at the Expense of True Peace
Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor 08 Sep 2021

Image
American Liberals Praise Biden at the Expense of True Peace

Joe Biden is committed to the imperatives of the bipartisan war party.

The majority of those who call themselves the “left” in the United States are really just liberals in disguise. Nowhere is this clearer than in the reaction to Joe Biden’s so-called withdrawal from Afghanistan. Squad Congresswoman Ilhan Omar and a number of “left” pundits praised Joe Biden for supposedly ending the war. Little mention was made of the scores of civilians killed by Biden’s approved drone strikes against “ISIS-K” amid the chaotic withdrawal. Biden’s history of supporting the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan in the first place was further buried underneath the heaps of praise thrown at him for ending a war that never should have started.

Make no mistake, any de-escalation of the U.S.’s military presence abroad is a good thing. However, a war criminal does not deserve praise for doing what could have been done twenty-years ago. In 2001, the Taliban offered Osama Bin-Laden in exchange for an end to U.S. airstrikes. George W. Bush and the rest of the neocon hawks in Washington declined the offer. Biden was one of these hawks on the Democratic Party side. As chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Biden supported the initial invasion of Afghanistan so long as U.S. forces carried out their so-called mission of destroying Al Qaeda.

The mission, of course, was always a big lie. Al Qaeda was the spawn of Operation Cyclone, the code name for U.S. covert support for the Mujahideen rebels that fought a bloody war against the Soviet Union and the socialist-oriented government in Afghanistan beginning in 1979. Born from this more than decade-long proxy war was an international jihadist network armed, trained, and funded by the U.S. and its Gulf allies. Biden jumped at the opportunity to wage the War on Terror along with the rest of the ruling class in the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy because new wars were on the horizon after the collapse of the socialist bloc. NATO General Secretary Wesley Clark was told by then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld shortly after the 9/11 attacks that the U.S. would respond by invading seven countries in five years.

Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Iran rounded out Rumsfeld’s list . The list excluded Afghanistan because the U.S. was already bombing that country at the time of the secret directive. This underscores how the invasion of Afghanistan has always been linked to the fate of the entire region and indeed U.S. hegemony itself. Following his support of the war in Afghanistan, Biden pushed hard for the 2003 invasion of Iraq . He then supported Ethiopia’s overthrow of the Somali government and Israel’s bloody invasion of Lebanon in 2006. Under Obama, Biden demonstrated a modest reluctance to lend creditability to the U.S.-led overthrow of Libya but in the end rendered no challenge to the Commander and Chief’s expansion of the imperialist war machine deep into Africa and Asia.

The end result of Biden’s warmongering has been the loss of millions of lives and trillions of U.S. dollars. Furthermore, Biden’s lust for war has only rendered the world more dangerous and volatile. His past support for covert and “hot” military operations has led directly to Great Power Competition, the U.S. doctrine for maintaining military and economic supremacy amid the decline of its empire. In many ways, Biden’s support for a transition from a “hot” war to a more covert operation in Afghanistan is in keeping with the strategic shift of the Pentagon toward ensuring that Russia and China are not allowed to assume the mantle of global leadership. Russia and China share nuclear capacity with the United States, but their geopolitical vision of multipolarity and respect for international law has been deemed intolerable by a belligerent empire that views the political and economic rise of both countries as a threat to its hegemony.

That is why Biden has not only maintained Donald Trump and Barack Obama’s hostilities toward China specifically, but also escalated them in important ways. American liberals are too busy praising Biden to pay any attention to his strengthened military support to Taiwan or his ratcheting up of the propaganda war to justify economic sanctions on Russia and China . Biden has aggressively reinforced anti-China sentiment on the U.S. mainland to push through domestic and foreign policy objectives. His call for U.S. intelligence to investigate “lab leak theory” produced zero results and deflected from his failed policy to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. Constant handwringing over the South China Sea has expanded the U.S.'s military presence in the Asia Pacific, while fears of China’s economic ascendance have given Biden a “competitor” with which to deflect attention from the privatization of his infrastructure spending plans .

American liberals oppose the fight for true peace because their entire political agenda centers on the search for a “good” Democrat. No such thing exists. The Democratic Party is the War Party. Biden is but one of its most influential leaders over two-plus generations. Genuine peace emerges from anti-war struggle, not from praise of war criminals.

The correct approach to the struggle for peace is multi-faceted and indeed requires support for the full withdrawal of U.S. forces of Afghanistan. This includes the removal of NGOs posing as “aid”, unmanned aerial drones, and special operations. Furthermore, the same opportunity that existed under Trump in relation to Russia exists under Biden with regard to Afghanistan and the Middle East. When a president declares an end to a war or calls for détente with a so-called “adversary,” those who champion peace must not only be prepared to hold the administration accountable on its limited promises but also capitalize on the empire’s vulnerabilities. Nothing short of the demand for an end to all wars and the redistribution of wealth to the impoverished and exploited classes should be considered satisfactory.

At this moment, the world is being held captive to the decline of U.S. imperialism. The shackles of liberalism have caused a political decay among “left” movements in the United States that correlates with the overall decay of imperialism. American liberals only worsen the situation by painting Biden as a warrior for peace. All of the hubris and racist saviorism of liberal politics lead down only one path: that which seeks individual reward from the lords of capital and the guardians of their militarist empire. The goal of any movement should not be to stabilize the system, but to bring a modicum of power to the people on the road to revolution. Praising war criminals achieves the former and eschews the latter.

https://www.blackagendareport.com/ameri ... true-peace
There it is: bipartisanship again. Isn't it grand when the bosses agree?

Whenever that happens you know the working class is getting screwed again.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

Post Reply