Oligarchy in Action


ridski said:
RobB said:

If you encouraged morons to vote for Jill Stein, you were a Trump supporter.

I encouraged Trump supporters to vote for Gary Johnson. 

That makes you a Hillary Clinton supporter. 


Which, according to the re-write that seems to be happening to the left of me, is no better than being a Trump supporter. 


So good job, fascist. 



RobB said:



ridski said:
RobB said:

If you encouraged morons to vote for Jill Stein, you were a Trump supporter.

I encouraged Trump supporters to vote for Gary Johnson. 

That makes you a Hillary Clinton supporter. 

It does? Because I also encouraged Jill Stein supporters to vote for Jill Stein.


You must have worked really hard in the last election, running around encouraging all sorts of voters.



LOST said:

You must have worked really hard in the last election, running around encouraging all sorts of voters.

You'd think so with the amount of **** I got for it at the time.



nan said:

nohero said:

nan said:

The Deadly Rule of the Oligarchs

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/deadly-rule-oligarchs/

excerpt:

" . . . The longer we are ruled by oligarchs, the deadlier our predicament becomes, especially since the oligarchs refuse to address climate change, t"he greatest existential crisis to humankind. The oligarchs have many mechanisms, including wholesale surveillance, to keep us in check. They will stop at nothing to maintain the sophistry of their rule. History may not repeat itself, but it echoes. And if we don’t recognize these echoes and then revolt, we will be herded into the abattoirs that tyrannies set up at the end of their existence."
I appreciate the message, but not the messenger, Chris Hedges.  When it mattered, it was not convenient for him to join the side trying to keep Trump from being elected.  He deliberately supported Jill Stein and argued against voting for the only viable alternative to Trump.  He knew that Jill Stein was not going to win.  As he wrote in his endorsement: "If Jill and the Green Party can get 5 percent of the vote we will have $10 million in federal funds in 2020 and broad, nationwide ballot access. This election is about building the momentum for this historical moment."

He did not care whether Trump won or not.  That means that he did not care about the consequences of a Trump win.  And that means that he did not care about protecting Dreamers, preserving environmental protections, protecting LGBTQ rights, protecting civil rights, protecting voting rights, protecting the rights of religious minorities, and much more.  We knew how Trump would act in those areas, and he has acted that way.

So when Chris Hedges writes a “call to action” against oligarchy, I ignore him.  He had a choice to take substantive action, and he chose not to.  We don’t need lectures from someone who put his self-interest (as a fairly privileged white male) over the needs of the less vulnerable.
Chris Hedges has a larger world view of history than you do.  He sees beyond one elections cycle to patterns of history.  He knew where we were heading with HIllary Clinton and he could no longer support that system.  He's a very religious man and he votes his conscious. .  He sees the damage caused by 30 years of neoliberal policies and has seen historically how that kind of corrupt system leads to the election of fascists.  He sees that continuing to vote for more neoliberal policies is just going to eventually give us a fascist. He wants people to stop voting for a system that will not benefit them and start calling for revolution.  The Democrats are better than the Republicans, but they are still owned and operated by corporate interests so the environment or DACA are not their first concerns (as we saw demonstrated recently).

“Larger world view of history” and “sees beyond one election cycle to patterns of history” are sorry excuses for choices that cause real harm to real people.  If he really was acting because of a “larger view” or “seeing beyond one cycle”, he would be working on grass roots efforts to change the system, either by active party involvement or local political change.  But his theory was, if Trump wins, so what?  He was more concerned with helping Jill Stein’s group, than the negative consequences for people who are not Chris Hedges.

“He wants people to stop voting for a system that will not benefit them and start calling for revolution.”  So instead, he worked for a result that would HARM them more.  The whole “Green Party” scheme is like Baron Harkonnen’s scheme in “Dune” – after “the Beast” Rabban mistreated the Fremen, they would welcome Feyd-Rautha as their savior.  Similarly, they expect Trump will "naturally" drive more voters to the Green Party.  Idiots.

And “He's a very religious man and he votes his conscious”?  I suppose if he was a follower of Cthulhu that would be some sort of an explanation.  But since he’s identified as an ordained Presbyterian minister, that doesn’t cut it.  There’s nothing particularly “Christian” about deciding that the less fortunate just have to suffer so that Chris Hedges can get his “revolution”.  And the sad part is, I'm sure he knows that.

I expect the next excuse for him is that we have to destroy the village in order to save it.


Chris Hedges can speak on a deep level about the harm Hillary Clinton has caused.  Her foreign policy, with tutelage by Henry Kissinger, caused death, destruction and destabilization all over the world.  She also promoted fracking worldwide.  She also supported NAFTA and TPP.  She was in bed with Wall Street.  Trump is worse, but as I keep saying, 30 years of neoliberal policies (and Hillary Clinton buying a nomination) got him elected, not Russia. 

As Hedges sees it, everytime we give in and vote lesser evil they see how we will accept small crumbs and pull the noose a bit tighter.  Might be some of the reason we have the greatest wealth inequality since before the Gilded Age and 60% of the country is poor and can't afford a $1000 emergency.  We are also the only developed nation without some type of single-payer healthcare.  And don't get me started about college or the gig economy.  These problems were not started by Trump.



nan said:

We are also the only developed nation without some type of single-payer healthcare.  And don't get me started about college or the gig economy.  These problems were not started by Trump

Hillary’s fault! If she had just used her secret murder squad she could have gotten all those republicans that oppose single payer on board. For 30 years she tried her best and we slapped her across the face at every turn. 


And I really don’t want to argue about the Democratic primary again. The choice was between someone you don’t care for and a wannabe despot. Unless you held your nose and voted for Hillary, you supported Trump. 


you seem to be kind of saying that Clinton would have been worse than Trump.

Really?


nan said:

Chris Hedges can speak on a deep level about the harm Hillary Clinton has caused.  Her foreign policy, with tutelage by Henry Kissinger, caused death, destruction and destabilization all over the world.  She also promoted fracking worldwide.  She also supported NAFTA and TPP.  She was in bed with Wall Street.  Trump is worse, but as I keep saying, 30 years of neoliberal policies (and Hillary Clinton buying a nomination) got him elected, not Russia. 

As Hedges sees it, everytime we give in and vote lesser evil they see how we will accept small crumbs and pull the noose a bit tighter.  Might be some of the reason we have the greatest wealth inequality since before the Gilded Age and 60% of the country is poor and can't afford a $1000 emergency.  We are also the only developed nation without some type of single-payer healthcare.  And don't get me started about college or the gig economy.  These problems were not started by Trump.





RobB said:



nan said:

We are also the only developed nation without some type of single-payer healthcare.  And don't get me started about college or the gig economy.  These problems were not started by Trump

Hillary’s fault! If she had just used her secret murder squad she could have gotten all those republicans that oppose single payer on board. For 30 years she tried her best and we slapped her across the face at every turn. 




And I really don’t want to argue about the Democratic primary again. The choice was between someone you don’t care for and a wannabe despot. Unless you held your nose and voted for Hillary, you supported Trump. 

Lots of Democrats oppose single-payer, especially when they are funded by big pharma.  It's not just the Republicans.  The whole system is corrupt.  And we should not forget about the Democratic primary which was rigged to ensure the nomination of the one person who could lose to Donald Trump.  That is why we have him now, not because of Susan Sarandon or JIll Stein or some other smuck with no money or power.



drummerboy said:

you seem to be kind of saying that Clinton would have been worse than Trump.

Really?



nan said:

Chris Hedges can speak on a deep level about the harm Hillary Clinton has caused.  Her foreign policy, with tutelage by Henry Kissinger, caused death, destruction and destabilization all over the world.  She also promoted fracking worldwide.  She also supported NAFTA and TPP.  She was in bed with Wall Street.  Trump is worse, but as I keep saying, 30 years of neoliberal policies (and Hillary Clinton buying a nomination) got him elected, not Russia. 

As Hedges sees it, everytime we give in and vote lesser evil they see how we will accept small crumbs and pull the noose a bit tighter.  Might be some of the reason we have the greatest wealth inequality since before the Gilded Age and 60% of the country is poor and can't afford a $1000 emergency.  We are also the only developed nation without some type of single-payer healthcare.  And don't get me started about college or the gig economy.  These problems were not started by Trump.

Clinton would not have been worse than Trump, but she would not have done the things needed to prevent more Trumps from running the next time.  We need to get money out of politics and more politicians that represent us, not the donors.


You have yet to explain how the primary was rigged. Somewhere, in your head, there must be some collection of events which proves this to you. What are they?

nan said:

 And we should not forget about the Democratic primary which was rigged to ensure the nomination of the one person who could lose to Donald Trump.




drummerboy said:

You have yet to explain how the primary was rigged. Somewhere, in your head, there must be some collection of events which proves this to you. What are they?

nan said:

 And we should not forget about the Democratic primary which was rigged to ensure the nomination of the one person who could lose to Donald Trump.

We have gone over this many times.  Clinton was allowed to buy the nomination in secret and the DNC only worked for her.  They also had some control over the media.  It was known that she was the "chosen one" which is why few others decided to run.  Bernie Sanders was wanted as a candidate because they did not, at the time, think he was any kind of a threat.  I know you don't agree with this but that is my view.  And even if you don't call it "rigging," I can't believe the lack of outrage over what is extremely ethically wrong.  The DNC really messed up and thanks to the Russia distraction, they are continuing, without much notice, with the same failed strategies. Bernie Sanders is now the most popular politician in country and the DNC is still doing what it can to reject him and his ideas--because they don't work for the donors and the army of paid consultants.  They would rather lose than become progressive.  Interestingly, a few probably 2020 presidential candidates, Kristen Gillibrand and Corey Booker, announced the other day that they would stop taking PAC money.   Not sure how sincere they are, but they get points for realizing that people are so fed up with bought off politicians, that they will consider a monster before voting for them.


At this point, enough time has passed that you're going to be told that it's obvious. You're a neoliberal corporatist if you keep denying the rigging. Details don't matter. 

drummerboy said:

You have yet to explain how the primary was rigged. Somewhere, in your head, there must be some collection of events which proves this to you. What are they?

nan said:

 And we should not forget about the Democratic primary which was rigged to ensure the nomination of the one person who could lose to Donald Trump.



The details point to rigging or whatever term you are more comfortable with.  How you can be comfortable with what happened there is beyond me.  

South_Mountaineer said:

At this point, enough time has passed that you're going to be told that it's obvious. You're a neoliberal corporatist if you keep denying the rigging. Details don't matter. 
drummerboy said:

You have yet to explain how the primary was rigged. Somewhere, in your head, there must be some collection of events which proves this to you. What are they?

nan said:

 And we should not forget about the Democratic primary which was rigged to ensure the nomination of the one person who could lose to Donald Trump.



“The details point to rigging or whatever term you are more comfortable with”?  That’s like saying, “Maybe it was rigging; maybe the candidate who spent years supporting other candidates received their support, and also got more primary votes, was nominated; what difference does it make?”  I am comfortable that the “rigging” argument is an incoherent mess that doesn’t deserved to be taken seriously.

This is like déjà vu all over again.  We talked about this in November.  In response to one version of your argument, claiming support from Donna Brazile’s book, I wrote: “Donna Brazile keeps saying the primary wasn't rigged.  So everyone can agree to that and move on.” 

https://maplewood.worldwebs.com/forums/discussion/-inside-hillary-clinton-s-secret-takeover-of-the-dnc?page=next&limit=330#discussion-replies-3378852

You replied that she “described an election that was rigged”, and I responded, “All I know is she said it wasn't rigged.  You said she should be believed, since she was the party chair.  I agree with the others who don't see the connection between the agreement and Hillary Clinton winding up with more votes for the nomination.”

https://maplewood.worldwebs.com/forums/discussion/-inside-hillary-clinton-s-secret-takeover-of-the-dnc?page=next&limit=330#discussion-replies-3378873

So I’m comfortable that there’s been nothing new since then to change what the facts are.


nan said:

The details point to rigging or whatever term you are more comfortable with.  How you can be comfortable with what happened there is beyond me.  
South_Mountaineer said:

At this point, enough time has passed that you're going to be told that it's obvious. You're a neoliberal corporatist if you keep denying the rigging. Details don't matter. 
drummerboy said:

You have yet to explain how the primary was rigged. Somewhere, in your head, there must be some collection of events which proves this to you. What are they?

nan said:

 And we should not forget about the Democratic primary which was rigged to ensure the nomination of the one person who could lose to Donald Trump.



The DNC was supposed to be neutral. The Chair, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, put her finger on the scale in favor of Hillary. That was certainly understandable but wrong and she lost her Chairmanship. 

There is no going back in time but my guess, based on all evidence, is that Hillary would have been the nominee no matter what Debbie did.

If the point is that the Democratic Party is a Capitalist Party, not a Socialist or even Social Democratic Party, well "Duh!", Nader and many others have been making that point for 50 years.


I guess my point is that 2016 wasn’t a normal election. Mitt Romney wins in 2012? Oh well, we’ll get by. Trump was pretty clearly going to be a disaster. 


Hey, let’s make it easier for the mentally ill to buy guns. Nothing can possibly go wrong with that. 


Cut taxes for the rich and use the ensuing deficit as an excuse to slash social programs? Check. 


Moved here 16 years ago as a baby? Go ahead and finish high school in Mexico or wherever. 


If someone tells me that the woman who was Chair of the Democratic Party favored a woman who had been working with her in the party for years, over someone who stayed out until the party would be useful to him to run for President, I can't argue with that.
But if someone tells me that woman "put her finger on the scale", I'd like to hear more details about how that actually happened, instead of the unsupported accusations which have turned into dogma for some.

LOST said:

The DNC was supposed to be neutral. The Chair, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, put her finger on the scale in favor of Hillary. That was certainly understandable but wrong and she lost her Chairmanship. 

There is no going back in time but my guess, based on all evidence, is that Hillary would have been the nominee no matter what Debbie did.

If the point is that the Democratic Party is a Capitalist Party, not a Socialist or even Social Democratic Party, well "Duh!", Nader and many others have been making that point for 50 years.




nan said:
Clinton would not have been worse than Trump, but she would not have done the things needed to prevent more Trumps from running the next time.  We need to get money out of politics and more politicians that represent us, not the donors.

We can't get money out of politics. Its not possible. It would be unconstitutional.

The simple minded think campaign reform that disallows donations to politics would get money out of politics. It won't.

Anyone can pay for media touting my favorite politicians. The government can't stop me or anyone else from expressing my opinion on paid media.


When is it OK for someone to vote for a third-party candidate? 

(So far, I’m inferring this: Only when the candidate can win or, conversely, can’t affect the outcome at all.)



South_Mountaineer said:

If someone tells me that the woman who was Chair of the Democratic Party favored a woman who had been working with her in the party for years, over someone who stayed out until the party would be useful to him to run for President, I can't argue with that.
But if someone tells me that woman "put her finger on the scale", I'd like to hear more details about how that actually happened, instead of the unsupported accusations which have turned into dogma for some.

Rep. Wasserman-Schultz was forced to resign. I do not recall the details. As Chair of the DNC she was required to be absolutely neutral in the Primaries



DaveSchmidt said:

When is it OK for someone to vote for a third-party candidate? 

(So far, I’m inferring this: Only when the candidate can win or, conversely, can’t affect the outcome at all.)

When both major Party candidates are unacceptable but neither is the scum of the Earth.


Here you go.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/25/us/politics/debbie-wasserman-schultz-dnc-wikileaks-emails.html

The breach of the Democratic committee’s emails, made public on Friday by WikiLeaksoffered undeniable evidence of what Mr. Sanders’s supporters had complained about for much of the senator’s contentious primary contest with Mrs. Clinton: that the party was effectively an arm of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign. The messages showed members of the committee’s communications team musing about pushing the narrative that the Sanders campaign was inept and trying to raise questions publicly about whether he was an atheist.

Mr. Sanders said the situation was an “outrage” on Sunday before the resignation was announced, and called for Ms. Wasserman Schultz to step down. Afterward, he said it was the right decision.

“The party leadership must also always remain impartial in the presidential nominating process, something which did not occur in the 2016 race,” he said in a statement.




DaveSchmidt said:

When is it OK for someone to vote for a third-party candidate? 

(So far, I’m inferring this: Only when the candidate can win or, conversely, can’t affect the outcome at all.)

When it’s a normal election with two fairly harmless major-party candidates. 



LOST said:

When both major Party candidates are unacceptable but neither is the scum of the Earth.

Did you (ETA: or RobB) feel the same way in 2000?


If you're saying that the chair cannot have a personal opinion in favor of one of the candidates, that's not practical and it's not necessary.  As I wrote, people make unsupported allegations instead of showing facts.

I know that she resigned, you're not telling me anything I don't know.  It was because of the Wikileaks emails.  She was thrown under the bus to placate the "Bernie Bros", so they wouldn't do something stupid like protest Hillary or not back her in the general election.

That obviously didn't work.


LOST said:



South_Mountaineer said:

If someone tells me that the woman who was Chair of the Democratic Party favored a woman who had been working with her in the party for years, over someone who stayed out until the party would be useful to him to run for President, I can't argue with that.
But if someone tells me that woman "put her finger on the scale", I'd like to hear more details about how that actually happened, instead of the unsupported accusations which have turned into dogma for some.

Rep. Wasserman-Schultz was forced to resign. I do not recall the details. As Chair of the DNC she was required to be absolutely neutral in the Primaries



"The messages showed members of the committee’s communications team musing"
So she was forced to resign because she was party to someone else "musing".  That's an example of the type of nonsense attacks on the Democrats which hurt the nominee.

And, as I noted in another thread, there's that "Intercept" article from the other day that shows what Wikileaks was up to when they put that package of leaked emails together:

"Assange spoke freely about why WikiLeaks wanted Clinton and the Democrats to lose the election.  ‘We believe it would be much better for GOP to win,’ he typed into a private Twitter direct message group to an assortment of WikiLeaks’ most loyal supporters on Twitter.”


LOST said:

Here you go.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/25/us/politics/debbie-wasserman-schultz-dnc-wikileaks-emails.html


The breach of the Democratic committee’s emails, made public on Friday by WikiLeaksoffered undeniable evidence of what Mr. Sanders’s supporters had complained about for much of the senator’s contentious primary contest with Mrs. Clinton: that the party was effectively an arm of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign. The messages showed members of the committee’s communications team musing about pushing the narrative that the Sanders campaign was inept and trying to raise questions publicly about whether he was an atheist.

Mr. Sanders said the situation was an “outrage” on Sunday before the resignation was announced, and called for Ms. Wasserman Schultz to step down. Afterward, he said it was the right decision.

“The party leadership must also always remain impartial in the presidential nominating process, something which did not occur in the 2016 race,” he said in a statement.




DaveSchmidt said:

LOST said:

When both major Party candidates are unacceptable but neither is the scum of the Earth.

Did you (ETA: or RobB) feel the same way in 2000?

You mean someone who didn’t think Gore was liberal enough and voted for Nader? I didn’t think Bush was going to be as bad as he ended up. I can’t fault someone else for being fooled.


But Trump didn’t try to fool anyone. He said during the campaign that he was going to do all kinds of awful ****. 


If 2016 was an exception, that’s an answer, but the argument against (and recrimination for) voting third party in presidential elections is not a new one.

I see independent movements being tasked with building strength without one of the biggest tools in the box and I wonder how they’re supposed to do it. To be clear, it’s a question, not an interrogation.



DaveSchmidt said:

If 2016 was an exception, that’s an answer, but the argument against (and recrimination for) voting third party in presidential elections is not a new one.

I see independent movements being tasked with building strength without one of the biggest tools in the box and I wonder how they’re supposed to do it. To be clear, it’s a question, not an interrogation.

I will disagree that running in the Presidential election is "one of the biggest tools in the box" for independent movements.  Under the electoral college system, in our modern times, the third party is not going to win.

The "biggest tool" for independent movements is local and sometimes state elections.  There are two independent Senators now, for example.  There could be independent members of Congress.  At the moment, there aren't many of them, but there's no rule against more of them running in all sorts of races.

And of course, there is local political action to have more "independent minded" people participate in the major parties.


In order to add a comment – you must Join this community – Click here to do so.