As rumors swirl that Joe Biden is considering withdrawal, it becomes even more urgent that he should do it right! While I like Kamala Harris, it is not a good idea for her to be automatically crowned by right of inheritance.
It's not too late to do this in a manner that will show maturity, deference to the convention delegates, and flamboyant pride in the deep bench of the Democratic Party.
A win-win-win scenario that I described here.
But onward. This is gonna be a long one.
== And meanwhile, Vlad Putin attacks! Using his 5th column dogs ==
Among all of the Kremlin shills who are quisling us daily, Steve Bannon stands out for medals from Putin's KGB Old Guard of "ex" commissars. In this Guardian puff piece, Bannon makes clear that he, at least, is fighting the war on expertise that I often describe.
"A question about how Bannon defines “Make America great again” (Maga) leads to a stream of consciousness that touches on “salt of the earth” guys he knew in the navy; Robert Clive, the British soldier and administrator who conquered India; the American civil war (“Lincoln was an ultranationalist”); and today’s struggle between a credential class and the citizens denied a seat at the table. Says Bannon:
“What the ruling class in our nation should fear is President Trump’s audience, from Wildwood, New Jersey, to South Bronx to Miami to Charlotte,” he says. “The commonality is that American citizens who work their ass off – the whole country depends on them – of every race and ethnicity don’t think they’re at the table and they don’t think anybody except Trump wants them at the table. Trump not only puts you in the room, he puts you at the head of the table and that’s why they [the elites] hate him and that’s why they have to destroy him.”
Like Steve Bannon ever 'worked his ass off!' Of course none of this is surprising from a Putin mouthpiece and traitor.
What shocks me every day is the polemical ineptitude of Democrats, never even trying to demolish this ‘elites’ narrative. Which they could do by demanding:
“WHO were the elites oppressing common folk across all continents, for at least 4000 years?"
Do you assume that average citizens cannot answer that simple question? Okay, that assumption of yours IS elitist! In fact, even ill-educated folk know the answer, if only from movies.
The oppressors were always kings and lords who owned all the land and all the money. Noble castes, who used swords and warped laws to repress the sons and daughters of workers and farmers and tradesmen, so they would stay in their places, ignorant and poor and cringing before the lords’ inheritance brats.
Go on. Name a time and place that broke this pattern! There were a few, such as Periclean Athens. Republican Florence… and our recent, 250 year enlightenment experiment! During which -- (too slowly, but inexorably) -- a person’s place in the world became more about their accomplishments and character, not the color of their father’s skin… or of his money!
That is what 'made America great!' As Adam Smith wrote, general equality is the only thing that generates flat-fair-competitive creativity. And inherited dominance is exactly what cheaters used to make the rest of human history a living hell.
That is what the American founders rebelled against. GO NOW and actually read the Declaration of Independence. Or Thomas Paine and the rest! Were they denouncing 'credentialed' civil servants? Or the kings and tyrants who owned almost everything and used that power to cheat and turn their spoiled brats into gods?
That was never free enterprise.
Free enterprise is a flat fair competitive playing field! Again that's what cheater inheritance brats suppressed for at least 4000 years. And that’s what the new lords fear most.
(See in first comment proof, how the US Founders seized and redistributed cheater/lordly wealth to combat any trace of inheritance feudalism. Oh, how the GOPper brats don't want you realizing that!)
== Those horrible 'credentialed elites'! ==
Funny thing about today’s MAGA rage against cities and universities and all the ‘credentialed elites’. The fifty million or so Americans who built the inventions and industries that actually made America great. The doctors you go to, in order to live longer. The innovators who made food and clothing and housing so cheap and safe that all of you, even the poor, live in greater comfort than past lords. The inventors and military officers who deterred an Evil Empire. The FBI & Intel folks who cracked schemes by the nefarious (and now relabeled) KGB. The teachers and scientists who made us the wonder of all ages. And the tens of millions of less-credentialed folks who work side-by-side with the 'credentialed' and who know that fact 'elites' are a lot more earthy and grounded and sharing and satiably sane than the spoiled brat kind!
When Foxites yammer about ‘elites,’ they never, ever glance at the real elites who have ripped us all off! The ones who connive with each other and bribe or blackmail politicians in order to gather all the wealth, just like all the kings and lords… and commie commissars… did in the past. Bazillionaires whose wealth has skyrocketed past the stratosphere because of Republican ‘supply side’ bills that gave cheaters access to our throats!
Hey, getting-rich by delivering a better product or service is as American as apple pie. I am among those on this planet most known for pushing folks to actually read the actual writings of the actual Adam Smith, who - (along with the US Founders) - denounced inherited class as the enemy of fair enterprise!
Now? Wealth disparities have zoomed past levels in the French Revolution! And so, to avoid the inevitable result, the super-rich and their inheritance brats… and their “ex” commissar pals in the Kremlin... plus murder sheiks, casino mafiosi, drug lords and hedge fund moguls… finance this campaign to get you to “look over there and not at us!”
Stirring up America’s 250 year culture divide, they urge you to join with them and howl at other ‘elites.’ The ‘elite’ of fifty million American nerds and others who are your brothers and sisters! Your sons and daughters who happened to go to university to learn some stuff!
Their agenda - which dems never have the savvy to make clear - is to distract from the real elites, who are laser focused on restoring 4000 years of feudalism. Distract by getting dopes to wage all-out war vs all fact using professions, from science and teaching, medicine and law and civil service to the heroes of the FBI/Intel/Military officer corps who won the Cold War and the War on terror!
Conservative Americans are talked into howling at… the FBI? Seriously? At all the intel agencies who thwart Putin and China daily? At the United States military officer corps? At half a million of our finest heroes?
The very same list that Vlad Putin calls his enemies?
Say what???
A reporter for the Jerusalem Post named … David Brinn (no relation) … is there, covering the front lines. Like most educated or modernist Israelis, he is appalled by Netanyahu – their version of Trump. On the other hand, there are few more despicable creatures on the planet than the Hamas monsters who taxed the people Gaza into poverty for forty years for the sake of terror tunnels, scud rockets and Gulf parasite-billionaires. Monsters who refused to allow the moderate PLA to contest faux ‘elections,’ then murderously killed and took hostage children and civilians across the border…
… but worst of all…
... consistently and always herd Gazan civilians in front of themselves as human shields, shooting past the exposed heads of children or deliberately from hospitals, hoping to draw Israeli fire and thus win in the battleground of world opinion. (Evil? Yes, but also smart. They suckered some of you.)
Anyway, David Brinn – again, no relation – offers up this video: Rimon’s Song, about a few released hostages and those who are murdered and those stuck behind.
Again. Is Netanyahu a war criminal, for not ordering adaptive methods to (at both risk and inevitable cost) spare as many of the innocent human shields as possible? Absolutely! So are the Wahabbi cultists who have spread millions of Arabic textbooks and TV shows for kids, ranting for 80 years “Death to all Jews everywhere!”
If you were surrounded by such subsidized hate by insatiable and unappeasable fanatics... who abuse their own people and treat their own women like cattle... perhaps you might have a shorter temper, too.
And the world is getting hotter.
== Finally… ==
Let me finish with Compiled images of how thoroughly the Trumpists are Kremlin shills. Look carefully at Jill Stein (who made Trump president) dining with her bosses Putin & Flynn. Pardoned by Trump, Flynn now flies round the US urging violent civil war.
See DT's pal & campaign mgr Paul Manafort winking with Putin.
But the most horrible image is one week after DT took office, when he invited Lavrov & Kisliak - long, long before any ally could get an audience - to giggle ecstatically together over their coup and their planned demolition of NATO. Zoom in close. LOOK at the faces!
Vlad musta thought he had it made.
Their one hope in 2024? That a million or so lefty idiots will sanctimoniously flounce off to the next Nader-Stein Kremlin shill, betraying the only coalition that stands a chance of saving the world.
Hey, they've done it often and will again. Preventing that betrayal takes up half of the time of Bernie, Liz, AOC, Stacey, Jaime et. al.
Alas, such flouncing sanctimony-preening overrules (trumps?) all statistics and fact.
So here’s another counter meme for your uncle.