Now let's get to the Democratic resistance to this offal-ness. Frontrunner Joe Biden (Fascist-lite) looks more corrupt by the minute, with reports (so far, by only right-leaning media outlets) that not only did he work closely with the CIA "whistleblower" in the White House, this same informant may also have accompanied the former vice president to Ukraine during and after the US-backed coup. Another report, via Rudy Giuliani, claims that Biden received a $900,000 contribution from a Ukraine lobbyist. Biden's campaign is furiously attacking the corporate media for covering all this sleaze, essentially demanding that they cease and desist from practicing journalism in the public interest (not that journalism in the public interest is that much of a thing any more.) Whether these allegations are true, mainly true, somewhat true, or false, mainly false or somewhat false seems moot at this point. Biden is being tainted by them. It's such a shame that this taint is covering up his proven 40-year record of anti-social neoliberal rhetoric and policy. But whoever said life was fair?
Elizabeth Warren, although inching up in the polls and threatening Biden's standing, is nevertheless being hammered from both right and left for "PregnancyGate." The scandal is that although Warren has been saying on the campaign trail that she was fired from a teaching job nearly half a century ago because of pregnancy, earlier video then surfaced of her explaining she'd quit the profession because she lacked the necessary teaching credentials.
Both narratives are likely true. Even if she weren't actually physically fired by her now-deceased principal, she had been due to give birth just as the new school year was starting in September. She knew she wouldn't be allowed to show up for classes either in labor or immediately postpartum, so she preemptively quit before they ever had a chance to fire her. Sure, she fudged the facts, but the essential truth remains that her pregnancy, and all the sexist bigotry then in play, got in the way of her career. She was, for all intents and purposes, barred from employment. So I'd give her a "mostly-to-somewhat true" rating. Her slanted version of events doesn't rise to the gross level of, say, Hillary Clinton's totally false claim that she once dodged sniper fire in Bosnia. Warren was trying to show empathy for women. Clinton was trying to show she was a war hawk to her bones.
But still, I'm torn. Even little bitty lies in the greater service to the truth are fraught, because they tend to turn into greater big fat lies in the service of whatever definition of "truth" is convenient at the time. What do you think?
Also of concern is Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's implied threat that he will meddle with Warren's campaign by suppressing her ads and other campaign information as payback for her direct threat to break up his monopolistic social media giant. The pasty-faced little putz was caught on audio vowing to "go to the mat" to insure his continuing status as Master of the Universe. He might even do more damage than Russian troll farms in swinging the election away from Warren and toward, probably, Trump. Or just as bad, toward Hillary Clinton in the brokered convention lots of people are predicting.
Finally, there was Bernie Sanders's heart attack, and to make the blow even worse, the nearly simultaneous death of his daughter-in-law. The corporate press can barely contain its glee, producing an avalanche of "questions are now being raised about his candidacy" and "shadows are being cast on his candidacy" - which is nothing but code that ever so subtly bellows out "Quit, Bernie, Quit!"
My take is that if he wants to stop holding raucous rallies in order to rest and recuperate, then let him, and don't hold it against him. He can easily address the voters by video. Campaign seasons are way too brutally long anyway. If the other candidates in the field had any decency, they'd cut back on their own schedules out of solidarity, and as a way of protesting the made-for-TV spectacle that our politics has become. For those who market "party unity" above all else, then let them put their money where their mouths are for a change.
Speaking of protests, Tulsi Gabbard is threatening to boycott next week's debate over the continued rigging of the process by the Democratic National Committee, along with its rank commercialization into spectacle. If I were her, I'd use the few minutes allotted to her out of the dozen competing voices on the stage to vocally and loudly expose everything she knows about corrupt party machinations and profiteering media bias. Otherwise, the viewers at home might think she's acting out of sour grapes, or that she simply wimped out.
Somebody on that stage should, at the very least, express concern that a new poll reveals that fully 77 percent of Democrats "trust" the same CIA that, among its many other fascistic activities and atrocities, once rescued and then recruited Nazi war criminals to come work for the United States in the Cold War battles against "the Russians."
So my question is what they'll be chanting at next summer's Democratic Convention. Will "USA! USA! USA! be replaced by "CIA! CIA! CIA!"?
This affinity for the "intelligence community" and "less-bad" fascism no doubt stems from Trump-hatred and not from any true admiration of this unaccountable and often rogue de facto branch of the government. Public opinion can turn on a dime, depending on whatever propaganda is being spooned out to the public at any given time. It was only a few short years ago that the public was on the definite outs with the spooks because of Bush-era torture and the break-in by the CIA of the computers of the senate committees that were investigating the torture.
But wait. Since comic Ellen DeGeneres recently shared a private box with George and Laura Bush at a Dallas Cowboys football game, the message the ruling class wants to impart is that since the ruling class mission of Bush rehab has been accomplished, all the fans and maimed Iraq war veterans at home should just relax and enjoy it. If you're a contrarian who took issue with a celebrity schmoozing with a folksy war criminal, then it just proves how petty you are, announced a whole slew of co-celebrities and Democratic donors, strategists and pundits.
What a horrific commentary about our times that @TheEllenShow should even have to explain herself for hanging with President Bush.
Good for her!
Ellen, remember, is a treasured member of the same incestuous NBC family which employs Bush's daughter Jenna as a co-host on its infotainment "Today Show." Just like Meghan McCain, Hunter Biden, Chelsea Clinton, Ivanka Trump and virtually all children of politicians and plutocrats, she achieved her position based purely upon her own talents and merits and expertise.
NBC is the same network that for years ignored former Today host Matt Lauer's sexual abuse of its less-elite female employees, including sweeping an alleged rape under the rug. It's currently reeling from a new Ronan Farrow book alleging that it also suppressed reports of Harvey Weinstein's long history of predation.
But I guess it could always be worse. NBC could be hosting - and tainting - next week's Democratic debate, which will be jointly controlled by the private media companies CNN and the New York Times. NBC won't get its own turn until November, when the Gong Show field could be winnowed down to a shocking final ten contestants.
It's a real nail-biter. The lucky viewers at home will have a chance to cast their votes as soon as next winter. If you're in an early primary or caucus state which doesn't require corporate party membership as a prerequisite to participation, your vote might even actually count a little bit.
Isn't capitalist Democracy grand? Isn't Fascism grand when it's a fully-owned subsidiary of capitalist Democracy?
This is an internecine struggle in the ruling class, one we should all support.
ReplyDelete"There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in" L. Cohen
As a friend of mine likes to say, "We're doomed."
ReplyDeleteOn the one hand we have Democrats endlessly consumed by purity tests and an excess of candidates. And at the same time the Democrats are continuing the timidity of Obama as they maybe, perhaps, after issuing enough subpoenas, will consider possibly impeaching Trump. On the other hand, Trump is feasting on the chaos. He loves it and since he has no domestic or foreign agendas beyond personal enrichment, it does not distract him from getting anything done. Even the wall is fake news, just something he drags out to fool the chumps who vote for him.
My friend is right.
ReplyDelete"Even little bitty lies in the greater service to the truth are fraught, because they tend to turn into greater big fat lies in the service of whatever definition of "truth" is convenient at the time. What do you think?"
What do I think? Warren tried to raise sensitivity about job discrimination against women. Virtuous deed. At the same time, Warren was fibbing not only in behalf of a greater good but (what a coincidence) to advance her standing among women voters. And enlightened [cough] males like me.
Not the first slip for Warren. Find the tergiversations in her carefully worded plank about Medicare for All. Same thing Bernie is talking about?
Of course we must not be purists. We must accept that Warren is in a war she must win at all costs, and little slips, like fibs, puffery and evasions, must be deployed to fend off attacks and attract admiration. Campaigning is a narcissist game; even if one is not a narcissist, one has to copy their moves to win.
Here's the problem. When Warren is elected President and when pressured by larger forces than she ever encountered on the campaign trail, will she feel it necessary to convert the little fib into big lie? Why not, if it reduces the pressure and restores calm or whatever greater good she is aiming for, right?
Since she cannot resist the little winds now blowing her down the easy path of lying, to what extent might she go later in lying and how often will she resort to that tool?
How many of our previous presidents (those already given to little lies, minor betrayals and brief infidelities) left office as super liars and gross betrayers than when they first crossed the threshold of the White House?
"I'll never tell a lie. I'll never make a misleading statement. I'll never betray the confidence that any of you had in me. And I'll never avoid a controversial issue."
Jimmy Carter
"when pressured by larger forces than she ever encountered on the campaign trail, will she feel it necessary to convert the little fib into big lie? Why not, if it reduces the pressure and restores calm or whatever greater good she is aiming for, right?
ReplyDelete"Since she cannot resist the little winds now blowing her down the easy path of lying, to what extent might she go later in lying and how often will she resort to that tool?"
Those are important questions, but their answers are not obvious. In fact, there are two lines of answer, and it isn't clear to me which line applies to Warren.
One, there is no core there except the easy win. Little lies are just the beginning of bigger lies, whatever is convenient.
Second, there is a core there, and as little lies win power, power is used. The core stiffens and shapes the candidate into a person of power and direction.
It isn't true that the ambitious young Lt. George Washington serving the crown on his early campaign with Gen. Braddock never told a lie. It is very true that as he grew, he became very much more difficult to push around. There was some give, such as to Congressional committees, but he resented it, pushed back, and gave less and less.
In another way, Teddy Roosevelt used lies to build himself, even as Asst. Sec. of the Navy to get the weekend chance to order the Asiatic Squadron to move against Spain. By the end, he wrecked the Republican Party rather than let Taft take it against TR's principles.
FDR was a liar -- right hand never knew what left was doing, and Gen. Marshall strongly distrusted that in him, and kept his distance for the whole War because of it. But FDR turned those lies into power, and he used that power to drive events to where he meant them to go.
I won't list the endless cycle of weak people who just lied and lied.
Which is Warren? What would she become? I'm pretty confident of Bernie, not so much of Warren more from lack of information than my own known reasons to distrust her. This is one thing I like about Tulsi Gabbard, even though I don't think she has the horses to win the race.
But hey, we knew which we had with Hillary. And Gore. And Bill end-welfare-as-we-knew-it. They'd make a weather vane seem proud. The only consistency with Hillary was her taste for wars.
Now, can we seize this moment to forge reform, or will it slide away into more of the same but not Trump, with not Trump as the smokescreen for return to abuses (i.e. Biden or Harris).