Hillary Scam
↧
↧
There are none so blind as those who will not see
Body:
Obama Gamed the Grand Bargain Correctly
Obama has been a disaster for the Democratic party. Centerism is a loser strategy.
↧
Presumptive Nominee Clinton is a Warhawk; and why Sanders needs to keep fighting.
Body:
[I was forced to waste my time editing and commenting on the post below, including the headline. metamars, you have already been warned to not bring right-wing tropes in your critiques of Clinton. This is your last warning.]
↧
Congratulations, Mrs. Clinton
Body:
This is not a political post, it is not an endorsement, and it is not an invitation for the discussion of policy.
It is an acknowledgement of an achievement and a note of gratitude for making it easier for the woman who come after you to dream big, work hard, and define their role in the world for themselves.
Thank you.
↧
Single Payer off the DNC platform table
Body:
email from HealthcareNOW:
The DNC strikes again!
The Democratic National Committee announced that in an effort to make "this year’s platform process the most representative and inclusive in history", they would be holding public hearings, accepting written, video, and in-person testimony to the platform drafters.
But as it turns out, these hearings aren't so "public". The DNC is hand-picking testimony beforehand, and at the D.C. hearing yesterday, single payer was iced out.
↧
↧
Right Wing Background Check
Body:
This is the only assault weapon instant background check Republicans might consider. The top row left box or two will get a clear pass.
↧
Why does James Comey have a job?
Body:
Obama Should Demand FBI Director James Comey’s Resignation Today
Comey is all about entrapment, and can't solve any crimes he did not organize.
Also Comey has done squat to stop GamerGate.
↧
Bernie Sanders' Followers Looking To Move On
Body:
A comment at ShadowProof.com diary THE ‘POLITICAL REVOLUTION’ HAS OPPORTUNITY TO WIELD POWER—WITH OR WITHOUT SANDERS expressed things, well:
↧
Preparing to reinstate the draft
Body:
Senate passes defense bill including women in draft
This tells me three things, enlistment is down, they are planning to reinstate the draft, they are planning a major new war and the current enlistment is not sufficient. We need to call for the immediate disbandment of the Selective Service. No one should be called to register for a possible draft.
↧
↧
Wherein I attempt to define neoliberalism
Body:
Neoliberalism's goal is the formation of a supranational corporate totalitarian system, with an espoused "intense faith in the spontaneous responses of the market"1 to better the lot of the common man. Machiavellian in their conspicuous doling out of crumbs to wage slaves who are expressly excluded from any linkage of their needs/labors to the fruit of their labors. Its evangelists extol the virtues of entrepreneurship as the only vehicle for individuals to become participants in the upside of Neoliberal capitalism.
↧
American "progressives" don't mince words about where their allegiance lies
Body:
If a bunch of nostalgic/resentful/racist oldsters vote Britain out of the EU, they'll be forcing their bitterness on a generation that doesn't want it. The truth is that Brexit will barely affect older voters either way: they mostly don't work and they mostly have only local friendships.
↧
Kick Down, Kiss Up has Limits. Maybe
Body:
The dynamic that created the Brexit vote is also at work in the US. That shouldn't be a shock. It is what drove both the Trump phenomenon (fascist anti-immigrant xenophobia), and what drove the Sanders campaign (rejection of neo-liberal, status quo, financial globalization).
Ian Welsh has probably best described Brexit, in a series of posts. Not just that one.
Since 1976 a lot of Britons who do not live in London (or not the nicer parts) have been doing very badly. The economy is trash if you aren’t connected to the various London money spigots because Britain insisted on de-industrializing. So, we have a very large number of people who have done very badly for 40 years. They were given an opportunity to vote against the status quo, and they did so.
↧
So define 'Liberal' for me.
Body:
You see to me 'Liberal' means socially progressive and non-discriminatory, someone who's in favor of economic equality and the Labor movement, someone who believes in democracy and accountability to the electorate, a person who values courage and accuracy in reporting.
'Liberalism' is not putting your faith in buildings full of faceless technocrats of no particular merit, expertise, or success who got their jobs because of accident of birth, pedigree of schooling, or both.
↧
↧
Any way we can stop denigrating Ralph Nader as a scapegoat for the epic failures of centrist democrats?
Body:
[If Ralph Nader hadn't written 'Unsafe at any Speed,' thus becoming the most effective consumer advocate ever] "…there would have been no protracted recount spectacle and no Supreme Court involvement."
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2016/05/31/nader_elected_bush_...
And if Rosa Parks just sat in the back of the goddamn bus…
↧
Confucianism
Body:
Among the lesser known factoids of history is that there was actually a guy named Confucius and he wasn't trapped inside a Fortune Cookie factory.
Now we could argue about specific principles (not much into the whole ancestor worship thing myself) but my main point is that you can make a very compelling case that he is the inventor of the Professional State Bureaucracy. In it's simplest form this seems like an obviously good idea. Instead of giving power to make stuff work to a big scary guy with a club because they are big and scary and have a club, why not give it to a guy who has demonstrated some competence making stuff work?
There is a problem with this concept in operation that China struggled with again and again. Instead of measuring actual competence and holding people accountable for their performance (which back in the day involved looking at your still twitching, blood gushing body from an unusual perspective) the Professional State Bureaucracy substituted rote memorization of approved texts in prestigious academies and nepotism.
↧
Class war
Body:
As police gear up to employ drones and bombs against suspects in America without due process, we need to broaden our rage beyond race and realize they're there as a tool of the oppressors. And all of us on the bottom need to push back if anything is to change.
As Northern cities grew and filled with mostly immigrant wage workers who were physically and socially separated from the ruling class, the wealthy elite who ran the various municipal governments hired hundreds and then thousands of armed men to impose order on the new working class neighborhoods
↧
Wings over Philadelphia
Body:
“The art of war is to gain time when your strength is inferior.”
— Napoleon
Our strength is inferior? I already hear the cries of “Blasphemy!” But if blasphemy it be, so be it.
To put it most simply, we in the Sanders movement are up against a Democratic Party Establishment backed by Wall Street, funded by corporate America, entrenched in the corridors of power. Their bullshit is blasted out night and day from every nook and cranny.
Are we therefore powerless? Far from it. We have had an astonishingly effective grassroots campaign organization. But a campaign organization is a very fragile and unwieldy beast. It is designed to (obviously) run electoral campaigns. It is not designed for doing much else.
↧
↧
Reflections on tragedy
Body:
I just read that three students from the University California at Berkeley were among the injured in the terror attack yesterday. One UC student is still missing. Students from around the world convened in Nice for a three-week seminar on how to rise to the top as high-tech entrepreneurs. The video below capture some of the intensity that is present in this conclave of today's best and brightest. Yet, is the world they envision really going to be a better place? And for whom?
↧
You Say You Want a Revolution
Body:
Incomes declining or stagnant for the vast majority in “rich” countries
"The impact [of declining earning power for large swaths of the population] could be more than purely economic if the disconnect between GDP growth and income growth persists.” In the cautious bureaucratic jargon of the McKinsey researchers, “more than purely economic” carries a freight load of meaning: it signifies the recognition by this think tank that the deterioration of working-class living standards has revolutionary implications.
↧
Call the Midwife
Body:
Bursaries for student nurses will end in 2017, government confirms
the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said the changes were unfair and risky, while the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) argued that the move threatened the future of maternity services in England.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/jul/21/nhs-bursaries-for-studen...
↧
More Pages to Explore .....
