Tag Archives: election

Political Rants

Round nine.

Just watching the ninth Democratic debate. Debate, so called, though of course there is no proposition that’s being debated aside from who should be president. I’ve been watching it for a few moments, and I have to say … it’s kind of shrill. Lots of shouting, yes. Lots of finger pointing, accusations, counter-accusations. Lots of nasty looks, back and forth. Bad hairdos. You know the drill. Hoo boy. Our elections are way too freaking long. The process goes on for two years, pretty much. The debates are not very illuminating. It’s more like political speed dating – no particular depth.

Presidential debates: Shriller in vanillaThis is a media driven process. The horse-race coverage of the primary campaigns has pretty much swallowed up MSNBC, for instance. They basically pushed Melissa Harris-Perry out the door because she didn’t particularly want to be a campaign correspondent. Hard to blame her for that. Horse-race politics coverage is basically like sports journalism. The marketing approach is practically indistinguishable from that of sporting events – same kinds of music, graphics, etc. And this debate is a bit like Pacquio vs. Bradley. Except that it’s shrill white people.

I will be honest. I support Sanders, but I am not overly concerned with who wins the nomination. I am more concerned with the movement that supports his campaign – the broad public sentiment revealed by the strength of his primary and caucus performances, not to mention the attendance at his public events. The popularity of the Sanders campaign is based on issues, not on personality, likable as Bernie may be. The fact that these issues reflect the sentiments of the upcoming generation of young people, kids who have faced substantial economic headwinds from day one, gives me some hope for the future. My primary concern is that young people see some results from progressive policies in the near term, should a Democrat win this fall. If the left fails this generation, they are likely to turn right for answers.

So, this is a kind of race, but not the kind MSNBC wants to cover. It’s a race against time with respect to climate change, with respect to economic justice, with respect to social justice. Young people can bring about a more progressive future, if they get a chance.

Oh, boy. Hillary just said some pretty awful stuff about foreign policy. Dubya Bush in drag, frankly. I’ve heard enough.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

A worthy vessel.

Well, it happened again … the neocons and the Petersen Institute have lost their candidate. The only real pleasure I derived from last Tuesday’s primaries was to watch them have their asses handed to them yet again, this time with even greater finality. They really don’t have any even marginally viable candidates left. Cruz makes some of the right noises for them, but he’s from a different stream of reactionary politics and no one can stand the guy. Kasich is basically finished, unless he discovers some way to earn 110% of the remaining GOP primary delegates. Rubio was the last worthy vessel for that extremist clown car, and that fucker and his retrograde cold war revival worldview is out. Good riddance.

Lost my little tin car.With that out of the way, I am sure the imperial war machine party is looking for another tin car to drive around in. It’s quite possible that they would settle on Trump. Someone, after all, is going to populate his foreign policy establishment – thousands of them, keeping the gears of empire turning day by day. That’s kind of what makes him dangerous, though not so much as a Rubio or a Bush. It is also just conceivable that the neocons at least might begin to look favorably on a Clinton presidency. She is bellicose, obviously, and her differences with the Bill Kristol crowd on regime change are relatively minor. They might not overtly support her, but I could see them not vehemently opposing her if the alternative is Trump.

Many of the folks I know who have been involved in the Sanders campaign found Tuesday night to be very discouraging. I really think that, aside from the fact that Sanders would make a good president, an important function of his campaign and the movement associated with it is to push forward progressive policy positions that have never really seen the light of day in the institutional Democratic party. Win or lose, he can accomplish this, and it may be our best defense against neocons and paleo-imperialists (like Kissinger) looking to find a new political home. I support Sanders’s decision to continue fighting for that reason as well as the simple fact that a Bernie victory is still mathematically possible (unlike Kasich, though it’s hard to discern this fact from the news coverage – neither MSNBC nor any of the other cable outlets played Sanders’s speech Tuesday night, though they did cover Kasich’s).

So, fight on, Bernie people. We owe it to the country and to the millions around the world who are sweating out this scary superpower election.

luv u,

jp

 

Political Rants

Blind justice.

As promised, I wanted to scribble a few lines about the loss of Justice Scalia and the consequent shit-storm that has engulfed our nation’s political landscape. I’m sure that most of your conservative friends have shared 10 and 20-year-old speeches by Chuck Schumer and Joe Biden as support for the insupportable position taken by the G.O.P. leadership in the Senate. You could do worse than to remind them that (1) both of those speeches were made in a year when there was no vacancy on the court, and (2) both speeches came something like a year after extremist justices were appointed by a Republican president and approved by the Senate without filibuster – in the case of Biden’s speech, it was Clarence Thomas, who was approved by a Democratic controlled Senate. (Though it’s hard to tell because he’s so deathly quiet, Thomas is to the right of their sainted Scalia.)

The neocon establishment's new little tin car.All that said, Obama’s natural inclination will be to offer an olive-branch appointment, something like the one he trial-ballooned this week, namely the Republican governor of Nevada. Seriously … what is it with this president’s Pangloss-like insistence on attempting to curry favor with the Republicans? Hasn’t he been burned enough times in the last seven years? He’s like freaking Charlie Brown trying to kick the football again. Earth to Obama: they hate everything you want to do … doesn’t matter what it is. Best to nominate someone that might energize the Democratic base for the upcoming election; make the point that the election is, in substantial measure, about this issue. It’s about a lot of things, but the Supreme Court is a biggie.

The remaining G.O.P. candidates discussed this during the CNN debate on Thursday night. I say “discussed”, though it was more a pissing contest. Apparently John Roberts is now too liberal for Donald Trump’s taste. I wish I could say that this food-fight was the worst display of the entire debate, but that’s not even close to being true. Anyone watching was treated to a rehash of John McCain’s health plan (i.e. let insurance companies sell their products across state lines), resurrection of the ultimate neocon foreign policy (apparently Marco Rubio is now the little tin car Bill Kristol drives around in), and rabid celebration of trickle-down economics. And a lot of good yelling and screaming, of course.

One thing’s for certain, people … if anyone on that stage in Texas gets anywhere near the White House, don’t buy any green bananas. You’d just be throwing your money away.

luv u,

jp