Tag Archives: Presidential election

Politics and the people

I’ve rarely had any enthusiasm for any candidate for federal political office, Democrat or Republican, because I know they have all be bought off by the power elite whose agenda is to dominate and exploit at any cost.

What I have been passionate about is a movement to promote social justice, economic equity, personal freedom, ecological restoration, community empowerment, peaceful relations with all, and human unity.

Surprisingly, in the current Presidential campaign, a candidate has emerged who seems to have the courage and ability to lead the political arm of such a movement. This recent message from Tulsi Gabbard speaks for itself:

This desperate coordinated campaign by the establishment elite and its backers in the corporate media can only mean one thing: They’re afraid of us. Afraid of the clear evidence that our movement is growing stronger every day, our message getting louder and harder to ignore:

The New York Times, CNN, the DNC, Hillary Clinton, her proxies; They’ve shown they’re afraid of our movement to dismantle the for-profit American war machine, to finally make Big Pharma pay for its predatory policies, to decriminalize marijuana and reform our broken criminal justice system, to make polluters pay for the devastation they’ve caused to our planet, our air, our water. 

They’re afraid of a Party reform agenda that will root out the corruption and rot, and re-establish the Democratic Party as the big tent party that looks out for the little guys. The Party that is truly of, by and for the people.

Are you up for it? 

Neither Tulsi nor anyone else can be our “savior.” It is still up to “we the people” to save ourselves, but part of that involves promoting a standard bearer who expresses our needs and desires and will work to implement policies that promote the common good.

Donald Trump promised to do a lot for the people, but has delivered very little. In fact, he has done much to damage us further. While he has made some moves to shift US foreign policy away from endless regime-change wars and covert interventions, his actions have been erratic and mutually-contradictory. His tax policies have increased income and wealth disparities, his energy policies have further damaged the environment and ecological balance, his immigration policies have done nothing to address the root cause of the refugee crisis, his trade policies, while seemingly well-intended, have damaged many American businesses, especially the small and medium sized enterprises he purports to champion.  

We can do better. We need a leader who can unify the people in common cause. I think Tulsi Gabbard is that leader.

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What do Trump supporters and Sanders supporters have in common?

It has been said that “all TV is entertainment.” Whether a program is labeled “news” or a “candidates’ debate,” that characterization still applies. Well, the current Presidential campaign has sure been entertaining, with Donald Trump’s bombast and Bernie Sanders’ grandfatherly populism, in contrast to Hillary Clinton’s bland appeal to feminism and her (dubious) record of achievement.

Hillary is clearly the favorite of the establishment, the darling of Goldman Sachs and big corporate business, and the standard bearer for the status quo and continuation of Obama’s policies.

On the Republican side, it seems that no establishment candidate has so far been able to derail the Trump march toward the nomination. The last best hope for them at this point seems to be Ted Cruz. While Cruz has been trying to portray himself as being against the big banks, the fact is that his wife, Heidi, is an investment banker and a longtime employee of Goldman Sachs. Furthermore, his 2012 Senate campaign was financed in part by a sizeable loan from Goldman Sachs. For the details on all of this see John Cassidy’s New Yorker article at http://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/ted-cruzs-goldman-sachs-problem.

Despite the evident philosophical differences between Republicans and Democrats and the outdated characterization of political sentiments as being either right or left, conservative or liberal, the phenomenon of massive popular support for the two apparent anti-establishment candidates, Donald Trump and Bernie Sander, reflects a deeper concern that is shared amongst their supporters.

They are sick and tired of politics as usual and the course this country has been on for the past three decades.

They are sick and tired of:

  • Politicians who promise one thing but deliver another.
  • “Political correctness” that interferes with our ability to debate the deeper issues and concerns.
  • The rich getting richer and ever more powerful while the middle class is being destroyed.
  • Big banks that are “too big to fail” yet refuse to provide adequate financing to small local businesses.
  • Legislation that favors big corporations over small and medium-sized enterprises.
  • Fiscal policies that reduce taxes on corporations and the rich while forcing states and municipal governments to assume ever greater burdens.
  • Trade agreements that cede power from sovereign governments to transnational corporations thus undermining democratic government, the rights of labor, and environmental protections.
  • A disastrous foreign policy of interference in countries around the world that kills thousands of innocent people and stirs up hornet’s nests of resentment that manifest as massive displacements of people and acts of terror against the U.S. and its European NATO allies.

Can either Trump or Sanders, or anyone else for that matter, remedy any of those concerns from the White House? Given the present political structures and dynamics of power based on the control of money, that seems very unlikely. Reversing the destructive anti-democratic trends will take a massive popular movement, one that makes clear to people what their common interests are, and is able to get them to work in harmony toward common goals.

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