—By Rachel Morris and Daniel Schulman | Sun Aug. 9, 2009 7:21 PM EDT
Photo courtesy of Fearless Blogging.
Ann Coulter thinks they’re "cranks." Right-wing radio kingpin Michael Medved prefers to call them "nutburgers." Their ranks include a 9/11 conspiracy theorist, a Clinton conspiracy theorist, a habitual presidential candidate, and a professional poker player. They’re convening amateur grand juries and suing the President—not to mention suing each other. Meet the birthers: people who believe, despite truly overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that Barack Obama was born in Kenya and has illegally usurped the presidency.
[.. here, with basically the beginnings of more on most all inside is a list the prominent birthers featured in this 4 page Mother Jones article..]
[ page 1 ]
Orly Taitz ...more than anyone she has vaulted birthers—their preferred nomenclature is "doubters" or the "eligibility movement"—into the public eye.
Philip Berg ...a 9/11 Truther who hopped the birther train after a brief detour with the PUMA crowd
Alan Keyes ...perennial candidate, anti-gay crusader, and anti-abortion activist is nevertheless perhaps the birther movement's most credible member
Carl Swensson A Georgia-based activist, Swensson is spearheading a novel but legally meaningless tactic: convening "citizen grand juries" to file "presentments" indicting Obama for fraud and treason.
[ page 2 ]
Dr. Ron Polarik Polarik (not his real name) claims to be a "document imaging" expert.
Andy Martin Who started the rumor that Obama was a secret Muslim? Martin, whose real name is Anthony Robert Martin-Trigona, usually gets the credit.
Joseph Farah Farah made his name in the conservative movement pushing conspiracy theories about the death of Clinton associate and former White House counsel Vincent Foster. Now his right-wing website, WorldNetDaily...
Jerome Corsi You may remember Corsi, co-author of Unfit for Command, for his leading role in swiftboating Sen. John Kerry during the 2004 election.
[ page 3 ]
Lt. Col. Donald Sullivan Sullivan, an Air Force veteran, unsuccessfully sued North Carolina's secretary of state and board of elections in an attempt to block the state's electoral college votes, on the grounds that Obama was ineligible to hold office due to questions over his birthplace. This was not Sullivan's first time going up against the government. In 2003, he sued the Bush administration, claiming the Iraq War was illegal.
Walter Francis Fitzpatrick III Fitzpatrick was once a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy, but departed after being court-martialed in 1990 for improper use of Navy funds. (He claimed he was the victim of a vendetta.) Today, he is one of a small group of figures with military ties who have challenged Obama’s authority as commander in chief.
Leo Donofrio Donofrio is a retired lawyer and professional poker player who, according to Bluff magazine, competes under the moniker "Jet Schizo." A bipartisan birther, he tried to get both Obama and McCain removed from the New Jersey ballot last year
[ page 4 ]
Chuck Norris: He penned an open letter to Obama saying that while he considered "it a bit of a groundless stretch not to believe" the president was born in Hawaii, he still wanted to see Obama's original birth certificate just to be sure.
Lou Dobbs: The CNN host and professional nativist has been the most prominent MSM figure to bestow a sliver of credbility on the birthers
Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.): ... You have to be born in America to be president."
[ incredible he didn't know that was not true ]
Rep. Bill Posey (R-Fla.): The freshman congressman sponsored a bill that would require presidential candidates to submit their birth certificates for verification that they're US citizens. Yet, in late July he was one of 378 lawmakers who voted unanimously to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Hawaii's statehood, and, yes, recognize it as Obama's place of birth.
[ shudder ]
Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.): In late July, Blunt told blogger and Democratic activist Mike Stark: "What I don't know is why the president can't produce a birth certificate. I don't know anybody else that can't produce one. And I think that that's a legitimate question." Just the same, a spokesman for the minority whip told a reporter that Blunt believes Obama is indeed a natural born citizen.
Rep. John Sullivan (R-Okla.): At an August meeting of the Tulsa Republican Club, Sullivan remarked: “It’s a very frightening time. I see Barack Obama is creating an enemies list of people who oppose this miserable health care plan. I think that’s frightening. That’s from a guy that can’t even show a long-form birth certificate. I think we all ought to be prepared to fight that.”
[ there is more on all of them, except the last three, and Chuck Norris (think it was), inside ]
About 1.5in down in yours the articles revealing that Cruz's claim to being eligible for the presidency is in fact shakier than Obama's ever was were good ones .. i wondered (well not really) why the birthers were so quiet these days, then decided to out the list above .. one of your articles here ..
and 61 .. You just can't make this crap up on how crazy these Republicans are. .. End times right around the corner! George W. Bush to Raise Money for Group That Converts Jews to Bring About Second Coming of Christ http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=93870098
That's a good place to end this trip.
Dunno, it just felt like a decent idea to have those birther names in the open, could be useful for someone.
Executive orders:, one of Trump's throwaway lies in the debate today was that he said during Reagan's time, when he worked with Tip ONeil, you never "hardly heard" of executive orders .. trouble is, at least through Oct. 20 2014 Reagan used more executive orders per year than Obama did ..
and am guessing Obama still sits at the bottom of that heap .. so much for Cruz and Trump's clarion call of Obama abusing executive power.
UPDATE:
Here is the number of Executive Orders issued by presidents from Richard Nixon to Obama. The first figure shows the total number of orders issued, the second figure is the average per year:
* Richard Nixon - 346 or 62 per year * Gerald Ford – 169 or 69 per year * Jimmy Carter – 320 or 80 per year * Ronald Reagan – 381 or 48 per year * George H.W. Bush – 166 or 42 per year * Bill Clinton - 364 or 46 per year * George W. Bush – 291 or 36 per year * Barack Obama (through Dec. 31, 2015) – 227 or 33 per year http://www.al.com/news/index.ssf/2016/01/what_is_an_executive_order_and.html
It's gonna be interesting to see how many throwaway lies there were in the GOP debate today .. my guess Trump was the champ on that .. lol.
Bibi talk: ‘New York Review of Books’ trivializes Israeli fascism
"Donald Trump May Not Be a Fascist, But He is Leading Us Merrily Down That Path "
.. in the Republican debate today the question of how much a supporter of Israel candidates were came up .. Rubio and Cruz both attacked Trump for saying he would attempt to work as a relatively impartial negotiator in hopes of bringing about a peaceful solution to the conflict there .. Cruz, i think it was went further than Rubio by saying Trump's position was actually an "anti-Israel" stance ..
US Politics Philip Weiss on April 3, 2015 37 Comments
-- the Israeli electorate is still dominated by hypernationalist, in some cases proto-fascist, figures. --
Later:
-- As Zvi Barel has cogently written in Haaretz, “Netanyahu has succeeded in overturning the principle that the state exists for the sake of its citizens and putting in its place the Fascist belief that the citizens exist for the state.” --
The New York Review of Books sells this piece to its readers with two headlines that call Netanyahu “Bibi.” The cover line is here:
But guess what: Shulman never calls Netanyahu Bibi in the piece. He uses his actual name, Benjamin Netanyahu. Just what you’d expect from a serious voice on the conflict (Shulman is a Ta’ayush activist and a Sanskrit scholar.) Why would you ever call a leader of proto-fascists “Bibi”? Do Palestinians call Netanyahu “Bibi”– the man who complained that Arabs were voting in “droves”?
-- When they call him Bibi, it gives the impression that this is a goofy guy who holds up a Wile E Coyote picture of a bomb at the U.N.; he seems a little bit of a bumbler; he seems the equivalent in the political sphere of those two thieves who were foiled by Macaulay Culkin in Home Alone — bad but inept and goofy.
Instead of a liar who presides over a nuclear powered colonial state that people are killed for opposing, where thousands are imprisoned and many of them, according to international human rights agencies, are tortured, and where the death of Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old innocent young woman, was recently whitewashed. --
Why call him Bibi? Because a good number of your older Jewish readers feel affection for him; and the editors of the publication are themselves unable to see him as altogether other than harmless. They should get over this. By the way, David Corn, Howard Fineman and Chris Matthews are also guilty of Bibi talk..
P.S. Shulman’s piece is also remarkable for its quiet call for one vote for all persons between the river and the sea and its announcement of the inevitability of mass violence. On violence:
-- It seems ridiculous to have to write this, but in case anyone has any doubt: there is no way a privileged collective can sit forever on top of a disenfranchised, systematically victimized minority of millions. We can expect mass violent protests of one sort or another (maybe, with luck, some large-scale nonviolent protest as well). Sooner or later, the territories will probably explode, and the Palestinian Authority may be washed away. At that point Netanyahu will complain loudly that you can never trust the Arabs. --
Here is the idealistic statement about the political future:
-- Perhaps hope lies in a vision of all the territory west of the Jordan River as somehow more than one state but less than two, under conditions of true equality. Already there are groups within what is left of the Israeli left that are thinking creatively, and practically, along these lines. One thing is certain. The demand to fully enfranchise the Palestinians now suffering under Israeli rule will eventually prove irresistible. --
Israel is uncomfortable (cough) with this report from the UN. They feel that they are not really involved in this. Only Hamas is of course... ;) ___ UN accuses Israel and Hamas of possible war crimes during 2014 Gaza conflict
Commission appointed by UN human rights council says those responsible for suspected violations of international law must be brought to justice
Peter Beaumont in Jerusalem 22 June 2015 16.28 BST
One morning last month in Burlington, Vermont, at the law office of John Franco, one of Bernie Sanders’ best friends since the 1970s, Franco talked to me at length about Sanders’ commitment and his consistency and his charisma. Even at the beginning of Sanders’ career, he said, four decades before he started packing arenas in college towns and liberal havens as a renegade 73-year-old, self-described socialist taking on Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party establishment, “People didn’t want him to stop talking.” He talked about how Sanders “completely changed the political culture” in Vermont. He talked about how Sanders’ surprising current surge in national polls is “validation.”
“I’m proud of Bernard,” he said.
All of that was interesting. But I wanted to know not just about what Sanders has done. I wanted to know more about who he has been. So I asked what I thought was an innocuous question about Sanders’ son. How did Sanders juggle aspirations as an eager political activist with his role as a divorced young father?
“That’s out of bounds,” Franco said.
Out of bounds?
“It’s none of your f—-ing business,” he said. He smiled, but he wasn’t joking.
It’s always been that way with Sanders. The issues. The issues. Stick to the issues. The rich are too rich. Those with power have too much. The middle class is withering. Inequality is a crisis, and the system is rigged. With Sanders, what you see is what you get, insist the people who know him best — and that’s almost all you get.
But if his positions are well known, the person, it turns out, is less known. Before Sanders was a U.S. senator, before he was a congressman, before he was mayor of Burlington — before he won one shocking election, then 13 more — he was a radical and an agitator in the ferment of 1960s and '70s Vermont, a tireless campaigner and champion of laborers who didn’t collect his first steady paycheck until he was an elected official pushing 40 years old.
In his chosen home, a state that at the time was morphing from one of the country’s most resolutely conservative to one of its most reliably liberal, the New York City-raised Sanders found an environment that suited him: a tolerant, loosey-goosey era and place, but with an abiding Yankee sense of privacy. It allowed him to focus on what fueled him without being forced to discuss publicly significant details about his personal life — like his meager finances, his bare-bones living arrangement, and the fact that the mother of his one biological child is not his ex-wife. That’s a surprise to some who have known him for decades. It’s also very much a product of an unwritten compact between Sanders, his supporters and local reporters who have steered clear rather than risk lectures about the twisted priorities of the press.
That these kinds of basic biographical details could emerge now, almost 44 years after he first ran for office, is a point of sharp contrast with the woman he’s running against, and gaining on. Clinton just might be the most unceasingly scrutinized citizen of her generation — while, of all the 2016 presidential candidates, Sanders, public figure and private person, is a rarity on the national stage: the known unknown.
***
Sanders’ life in electoral politics started on Oct. 23, 1971, in Plainfield, Vermont, in the library of Goddard College, a campus that doubled as a lefty hot spot, when the nascent anti-war Liberty Union Party was looking for someone to run for U.S. Senate. Sanders was barely 30 years old. He had thick-rimmed glasses and dark, curly hair, and his toddler son, Levi (pronounced LEH-vee), was seated in his lap. Sanders raised his hand.
“We didn’t have a lot of choices, and he was willing to do it,” John Bloch, a party member who was at the meeting, told me on the phone.
“Liberty Union was running anybody and everybody they could find,” Martha Abbott, another party member who was there, said when we met in her office in Burlington.
“Sanders said, ‘You know what? I’ll try it. What do I have to do?’” Peter Diamondstone, one of the party’s founders, told me at his home in the woods in Dummerston, Vermont, near Brattleboro.
Early in his first campaign, Sanders would say later, he was so nervous during a radio interview the microphone picked up the sound of his knees knocking the table. “A strange thumping noise traversed the airwaves,” he would write in 1997 in Outsider in the House, the closest he has come to an autobiography. “And the few calls that came in expressed no doubt that this career was to be short-lived. ‘Who is this guy?’ one of the listeners asked.”
Sanders had grown up in Brooklyn, in Flatbush, in a three-and-a-half-room walkup. He was lower middle class, the son of a housewife and a Polish immigrant who sold paint. He was Jewish. He was, he once said, “very conscious as a kid that my father’s whole family was killed by Hitler.” He was cut from his high school basketball team, which wounded him, but he was good on the track team. He could run and run.
After he graduated from James Madison High School in 1959, he went to Brooklyn College for a year before transferring to the University of Chicago, where he joined the Congress of Racial Equality, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the Student Peace Union and the Young People’s Socialist League. He read psychology, sociology and history. He read Marx, Lenin and Trotsky. He demonstrated against segregated housing owned by the college and against the city’s segregated schools – the latter getting him arrested and charged with resisting arrest for which he ended up paying a $25 fine. He met a woman who would become his wife. In 1964 he graduated with a degree in political science and got married in Baltimore.
That summer, not quite 23, he and his wife, Deborah Sanders, bought for $2,500 some property in Vermont, near Montpelier in the town of Middlesex off Shady Rill Road, according to property records. He wanted to live in the country, he has said, and had some inheritance money from his father, who had died in 1963. They spent parts of the next few summers on the property, living in what had been a maple sugar shack with a dirt floor. The marriage ended only two years after it began, in 1966.
He bounced around for a few years, working stints in New York as an aide at a psychiatric hospital and teaching preschoolers for Head Start, and in Vermont researching property taxation for the Vermont Department of Taxes and registering people for food stamps for a nonprofit called the Bread and Law Task Force.
By 1968, he was living in Vermont full time. On March 17, 1969, according to records, Sanders bought another property, in out-of-the-way Stannard, with a population of fewer than 200 people, in the rural area of Vermont called the Northeast Kingdom. Four days later, Levi Noah Sanders was born, at Brightlook Hospital in St. Johnsbury, Vermont; according to his birth certificate, his mother was a woman named Susan Campbell Mott.
Sanders had met Mott in New York and lived with her there. He lived with her in Stannard, too, but not for long before moving to Burlington, Vermont’s biggest city. Raised in New York, educated in Chicago, Sanders’ deep-woods idyll was over. Burlington, according to Liberty Union archives and campaign finance records, is where he lived when he started running for office.
Sanders was “not a politician,” he said at the start, but he nonetheless possessed characteristics that would make him a successful one. He could be prickly and yet captivating. He had a way of being somehow simultaneously doom-and-gloom and inspirational. Even though he considered his personal life off limits, he still relentlessly solicited attention, sending to newspapers and radio and TV stations onslaughts of typewritten press releases that could read like screeds. And even though he had little appetite for chit-chat, he still loved to campaign, and he did it tirelessly — traipsing around the state in his drab blue, Bondo-bound Volkswagen bug without working windshield wipers, showing up at newspaper offices and asking to be interviewed, visiting prisons and power plants, talking at schools and churches and inside people’s homes, and talking and talking and talking.
He ran on the Liberty Union ticket for Senate in a special election in early 1972, and for governor later in 1972, and for Senate again in 1974, and for governor again in 1976, never getting more than 6 percent of the vote.
Liberty Union was a ragtag new party — small, anti-war, left-wing — that existed only in Vermont. Some people called it a socialist party, but it had no official affiliation. Sanders and other members had generally egalitarian sensibilities, advocating for the young, the old, the poor and the rights of women and workers. Sanders was more Old Left than New Left, “a 1930s radical, not a 1960s radical,” as Garrison Nelson, a University of Vermont political science professor, would later put it. He was not a hippie. He did not live in a commune. He considered himself a radical, a third-party independent, but he didn’t call himself a socialist. The Liberty Union, he thought, was “a reason to knock on doors,” “a good way to organize and educate people.”
He had, already, the consistency of a piston.
“In America today,” he told the Bennington Banner in late 1971, “if we wanted to, we could wipe out economic hardship almost overnight. We could have free medical care, excellent schools and decent housing for all. The problem is that the great wealth and potential of this country rests with a handful of people …”
“A handful of people own almost everything … and almost everybody owns nothing,” he wrote in the Liberty Union newsletter called Movement in 1972.
From a 1973 radio address by Sanders.
“There are two worlds in America,” he said on a radio show called Vermont Spectrum in 1973.
By 1974, around Vermont, from Rutland to Barre to White River Junction and all the way up to the Canadian border, Sanders was impossible to ignore. His worldview was clear. So was his M.O.
“He’s a unidirectional wind-up — I don’t want to use the word toy, because he’s nobody’s toy, but he’s a growler,” said Denny Morrisseau, an anti-war activist who was a Liberty Union member in the early ‘70s. “Straight ahead, growl. Straight ahead, growl.”
The radio shows. The newspaper quotes. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE.
“… the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer and the vast majority in the middle are having a harder and harder time …”
“… and the situation is getting worse …”
“This,” he wrote in one of his releases in 1974,” is the burning and fundamental issue of this campaign.”
Of every campaign.
***
His message was clear and unwavering. His private life, meanwhile, was complicated and less settled.
He shared custody of his son in an informal arrangement with Mott, according to people who knew them. “She was around a lot,” Nancy Barnett, a friend who lived nearby, told me. Barnett called Mott “a pretty quiet, private person.” Sanders rented a small brick duplex at 295 1/2 Maple Street that was filled with not much furniture and not much food in the fridge but stacks of checked-out library books and scribbled-on legal pads. His son, who called his father “Bernard,” had an upstairs bedroom.
“Pretty sparse,” Gene Bergman, an old friend, said about the apartment.
“Stark and dark,” said Darcy Troville, a fellow Liberty Unionite who lived around the corner and shared with Sanders homemade jellies and jams.
“The electricity was turned off a lot,” Barnett said. “I remember him running an extension cord down to the basement. He couldn’t pay his bills.”
He worked some as a carpenter, although “he was a shitty carpenter,” Bloch told me. “His carpentry,” Morrisseau said, “was not going to support him, and didn’t.”
He worked as a freelance writer, putting intermittent pieces in the low-budget Vermont Freeman, a Burlington alternative weekly called the Vanguard Press and a glossy, state-supported magazine called Vermont Life.
The standards of the Freeman were not strict. “It was always fun to see what came through the mail,” said Jennifer Kochman, one of the editors when Sanders was a contributor. The recent uncovering of something he wrote in an issue from February 1972 created a burst of news coverage. It was a jumbled rant about gender roles that mentioned masturbation and rape, but even in Sanders’ commentary on the sexes he reverted to his central theme of injustice: “Slavishness on one hand breeds pigness on the other hand. Pigness on one hand breeds slavishness on the other.”
His writing wasn’t a living. The Vanguard paid as little as the rest. “It would’ve been not more than 50 bucks,” said Greg Guma, a former editor. Vermont Life? “Our rate was 10 cents a word,” said Brian Vachon, a former editor.
“He was always poor,” Sandy Baird, another old friend, told me in Burlington.
“Virtually unemployed,” said Nelson, the political science professor at the University of Vermont.
“Just one step above hand to mouth,” said Terry Bouricius, who was involved with Liberty Union, served at times as a de facto campaign manager for Sanders and at one point crashed for a couple months on his couch.
Liberty Union “people found it difficult to support themselves while engaging in full-time political work,” Michael Parenti, one of those people, wrote in the Massachusetts Review in the summer of 1975. “Some held jobs that allowed free time for campaign activities, while others lived off unemployment insurance.”
Sanders, according to an article in 1974 in the Bennington Banner, was one of them. He was on unemployment for a few months in 1971. In subsequent Liberty Union campaigns he advocated for “the doing away with all time limitations for unemployment benefits.”
“His work was to be a politician,” Guma said. “He put everything into what he was doing.”
“I don’t know what he did for money,” Troville said. “Everything was always campaigning. Everything was always organizing. Everything was always writing.”
“He was totally involved in his attempts at running for office,” Marvin Fishman, who knew him at the time, told me on the phone.
In 1977, though, weary of running and losing, his hair turning gray, he quit Liberty Union. The party had stalled, he believed, its members talking more to each other than to potential voters. He needed to try to make a better, more stable living, but didn’t want to give up a platform from which he could preach.
He started a business out of 295 1/2 Maple, making low-budget films about people, places and events in Vermont and New England history that he felt were getting short shrift in the region’s schools. American People’s Historical Society, he called it — “a newly formed nonprofit organization producing audio-visual from an alternative point of view,” he wrote in a pamphlet he distributed.
His biggest project was “a 30-minute color documentary videotape,” he wrote in a flier, about Eugene Debs, “the great American trade unionist, socialist and revolutionary” and frequent early 20th century Socialist Party presidential candidate — one of Sanders’ heroes. He priced it at $200 or offered it for rent for $35. He drove all over, like he had running for Liberty Union, inviting himself into schools, meeting people and trying to persuade them to listen.
“It wasn’t just a way to make money,” said Steve Goodkind, a longtime friend. “He made filmstrips about people he admired and believed in. He just thought kids should know the truth of how things really were.”
Sanders believed he was finished with electoral politics – until in late 1980, when his friend Richard Sugarman, a religion professor at the University of Vermont, showed him a breakdown of his Liberty Union vote tallies. As a whole, they were scant, but Sanders had done better in Burlington than anywhere else — and especially in the city’s poorest wards. Sanders decided to run for mayor — and then, by 10 votes, he won. It was March of 1981. It was a big story. The irritant activist was an elected official, now making $33,800 a year, more than he ever had. Reporters started showing up in Vermont.
Clippings from news coverage of Sanders in the 1970s.
On a resume Sanders distributed, he wrote: “Divorced, One Son.”
***
Sanders was interviewed by Phil Donahue on NBC. He was on Canadian TV. He was on British TV. He was featured in Garry Trudeau’s nationally syndicated Doonesbury comic strip. He was in the Boston Globe and the San Francisco Chronicle and the Philadelphia Inquirer and the New York Times and Newsweek and the Irish Evening Post, and what he was, in all of the coverage of his improbable win, was cinched into one grabby word.
Socialist.
He was the socialist mayor who somehow had gotten elected in the immediate wake of the inauguration of Ronald Reagan. He was, as Rolling Stone declared, the “red mayor in the Green Mountains.”
Sanders, who long had fashioned himself as something of a media critic, poked fun at the facile storyline.
“Yeah, OK, I’m a socialist,” he told the Globe. “We’ll charge $10 a head to come see the freak mayor of Burlington.” He said he was being “bombarded” by questions from reporters. “There are a lot of people looking at us.”
That more people knew his name, though, didn’t mean people knew everything about him.
As a reporter named Louis Berney wrote in the Vanguard after Sanders’ win, “his rumpled appearance and harried style, his charismatic oratory and fiery invectives against corporate America … are familiar to the Vermont electorate and have become woven into the state’s political folklore. Yet as Sanders prepares to take over the helm of Vermont’s largest city, little is known about the man.”
Berney’s article in the Vanguard, headlined Sanders on Sanders: Meet the Mayor, included a mention of Sanders’ normally off-limits private life — but what Berney wrote was incorrect:
Sanders in 1981 after a thin victory in the Burlington mayoral race. Rob Swanson
He and his wife had a son, Levi.
In an email this week from China, where he teaches journalism, Berney wrote: “I can’t remember the particulars of the interview. And I couldn’t swear that he actually said, ‘My wife and I had a son.’ It’s possible that he said it in a way that is similar to what you quote from his resume. I might have erred in putting one and one together and coming up with two and a half. I do know that neither Bernie nor anyone else attempted to correct the error.”
“He was very, very guarded about that,” Alan Abbey, who covered Sanders and City Hall at the time for the Burlington Free Press, told me in a Skype conversation from Israel, where he now lives. “I know we didn’t probe that, for sure. I would say I didn’t push enough, and I certainly wasn’t pushed by my newspaper. We knew he was divorced. We knew he had a kid. I think we may have left it at that.”
Sanders’ biggest obstacle in his initial term as mayor was an obdurate City Council, suspicious of the socialist Sanders’ aims, not a prying press corps. As mayor, though, Sanders got more and more people to vote — he later called that increased political engagement his “proudest accomplishment” — and he got more and more people to vote for him. In ’81, he got barely more than 50 percent; by ’87, it was 56. U.S. News & World Report called him one of the nation’s best 20 mayors.
He decided to leave office in ’89. The next year, he was elected to Congress, and he was reelected in ’92, and again in ’94. In '96, he faced a Republican named Susan Sweetser. And she paid an investigator to look into his background.
Cathy Riggs called his ex-wife.
Sanders called a news conference.
“This is the kind of activity which makes politics so distasteful to people in the country and I think encourages people not to participate in the political process, not to vote, and certainly not to run for public office,” Sanders said.
His second wife, Jane Sanders, whom he married in 1988 – and to whom he is still married – also talked. “We are who we say we are,” she said.
Riggs said she was just doing her job and that she had done nothing illegal.
Sanders in his Outsider book devoted nearly three pages to the episode.
“She contacted my ex-wife, Deborah Messing, from whom I’ve been divorced for over 25 years,” he wrote. “Deborah contacted her friend and neighbor, Anthony Pollina, who used to work with me, and Anthony contacted me. Deborah and I then talked.
“Clearly, Riggs was hoping to find a disgruntled ex-wife who would spill the beans on her former husband. But that was not going to happen with Deborah, who has been remarried for over 20 years. While we don’t see each other very often, we remain good friends, so Deborah told Riggs where to get off. Her sentiments were reflected all over Vermont.”
Sanders cited a chunk of an article from the Associated Press written by Christopher Graff, who at the time was the AP’s longtime Montpelier bureau chief (and whose son, Garrett Graff, is the editor of Politico Magazine).
“What may be considered fair and proper in other states leaves Vermonters apoplectic,” Graff had written. “It is against this background that Vermonters viewed Susan Sweetser’s hiring of a private eye to probe Sanders’ background. Such a hiring would not even gain a passing mention in most states these days. It is accepted practice.”
Sweetser, seeing that this attempt at a thorough vetting of Sanders had backfired, denounced the woman her campaign had hired. “I want to make it clear to the people of Vermont that Cathy Riggs went too far,” she said. Too late. Sanders trounced Sweetser, winning the election by more than 20 percentage points.
Sanders went on to win another election in 1998, and another in 2000, and another in 2002, and another in 2004, and was elected to the Senate in 2006. In 2012, 40 years after he got 2.2 percent of the vote in his first bid for the Senate, he was reelected to that seat with 71 percent. “He’s very trustworthy,” said Donna Kaplan, who gave him $20 when he was running for governor in 1976. “What Bernie is saying is the truth,” said Bob McKee, who gave him $100 during that campaign. “And he’s never wavered,” said Betty Clark, a friend from his time with Liberty Union.
Over the last three and a half decades, occasional personality profiles have appeared; invariably, they have focused on his socialism and his looks — his unfussy clothes, his uncombed hair.
“I do not like personality profiles,” he told the New York Times Magazine in 2007.
This past May, in Burlington, he announced he was running for president on a blue-sky day on the bank of Lake Champlain. Some 5,000 people came to see him do it. “This campaign is not about Bernie Sanders,” he said in his speech. In speeches in Denver, in Wisconsin, in Iowa and in Maine, he has said the same thing over and over. “Not about me.”
CNN issued its “Bernie Sanders Fast Facts,” listing his children, his three stepchildren as well as Levi. “With first wife,” it said.
***
“I knew this was going to happen sooner or later,” Deborah Messing, Sanders’ first wife, said last month when she answered the phone at her home in Montpelier and I introduced myself.
She then asked if she could think about whether she wanted to talk about her ex-husband. I said sure. She called back not even half an hour later.
“I don’t feel comfortable giving an interview,” she said.
Susan Campbell Mott is now Susan Mott Glaeser. She lives in Burlington. I reached her on her cell phone earlier this month. She didn’t even let me ask a question.
“I’m really busy, and I don’t have time to do this sort of thing,” she said.
Bernie Sanders holds a rally to kick off his run for U.S. Congress in Burlington, Vermont, in this Sept. 16, 1988, photo. AP Photo
Levi Sanders, who lives in Claremont, New Hampshire, not far from the Vermont border, didn’t return messages left over the past couple weeks, at his home and at his office in Boston, where he works as a social security and social security disability insurance senior analyst for Greater Boston Legal Services.
On Wednesday, I sent Michael Briggs, Sanders’ spokesman, an email with a list of questions, including personal questions about the parts of his past that to this point have gone largely unknown or unchecked. Knowing his opinions about the media and recalling the Sweetser incident, I expected at least a lecture.
Sanders has criticized the press his entire political career.
“The question of who decides what’s important and what’s not important is really the most important issue,” he said at a forum on the media in Burlington in 1988, “and the media does not have a habit of focusing on what’s important.”
Something like that.
Briggs called me a little more than an hour after I sent my questions. He said he had talked with Sanders and had answers. He ticked them off one by one.
He told me where Sanders met and married his first wife and how the marriage ended. “She got a Mexican divorce, is what I was told,” Briggs said. He explained the origin of the money Sanders used to buy the Middlesex land and the carpentry he did on the sugar shack. He said Sanders received unemployment, “for a few months,” in 1971, though Sanders can’t remember what the job was that qualified him for the benefits. He told me where Sanders had met Mott and where they lived together. He confirmed she was the mother of Sanders’ son, despite previous news accounts. “Whatever has been reported,” he said, “what you have is accurate.”
The last question I had sent him was whether there was anything else he thought I should know.
“Yes,” Briggs said.
“The middle class is collapsing. Income and wealth inequality is greater now than it has been at any point since before the Great Depression. The American people are working longer hours for lower wages, and they’re angry. Those kinds of things, you should know.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Freud aficionado, in 2015. (Brian Snyder/Reuters)
By Justin Wm. Moyer June 1, 2015
Updated
Warning: The following contains graphic [verbal] imagery.
In mid-February 1972, an article by future Vermont senator and presidential candidate appeared in an alternative newspaper called the Vermont Freeman. Title: “Man — and woman.”
“A man goes home and masturbates his typical fantasy,” the 31-year-old author wrote, as Mother Jones reported. “A woman on her knees, a woman tied up, a woman abused. A woman enjoys intercourse with her man — as she fantasizes being raped by 3 men simultaneously.”
What was — what is – this? Nothing but a sex column by Bernie Sanders. Or, at least, what seems to be a sex column.
“This was a dumb attempt at dark satire in an alternative publication intended to attack gender stereotypes in the 1970s, and it looks as stupid today as it was then,” Sanders’s spokesman, Michael Briggs, said in a statement, as USA Today reported [ http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2016/2015/05/28/sanders-essay-sexual-fantasies/28120647/ ]. “When Bernie got into this race, he understood that there would be efforts to distract voters and the press away from the real issues confronting the nation today. He’s determined to run a campaign that takes on the big problems facing the American people, and not a campaign of salacious gossip and innuendo.”
But on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday, Sanders called it “a piece of fiction that I wrote in 1972, I think. … It was very poorly written and if you read it, what it was dealing with was gender stereotypes, why some men like to oppress women, why other women like to be submissive, you know, something like ‘Fifty Shades of Grey.'”
On one hand, Sanders seemed to be writing about the importance of gender equality — if in brute terms.
“Women, for their own preservation, are trying to pull themselves together,” he wrote. “And it’s necessary for all of humanity that they do so. Slavishness on one hand breeds pigness on the other.”
But then, the column also seemed pretty fatalistic, even for a socialist.
“Men and women — both are losers,” he wrote. “Women adapt themselves to fill the needs of men, and men adapt themselves to fill the needs of women. In the beginning there were strong men who killed the animals and brought home the food – and the dependent women who cooked it. No more!”
So: Does that mean Sanders was decrying the death of patriarchy? Does he want women to be dependent?
Not really. But — maybe?
“There are no ‘human’ oppressors,” he wrote. “Oppressors have lost their humanity. On one hand ‘slavishness,’ on the other hand ‘pigness.’ Six of one, half dozen of the other. Who wins?”
Is that a rhetorical question?
Responses to Sanders’s decades-old writing were divided. The reliably liberal Mother Jones called the piece “a stream-of-consciousness essay on the nature of male-female sexual dynamics” that “reflected his affinity for Sigmund Freud,” offering it as an example of the candidate’s “aimless” period before his evolution as a politician. And Jezebel, though it called the work a “creepy little essay,” said any brewing controversy was unwarranted.
“Thus far, Sanders’ abuse fantasies and his own fantasy that women dream of rape by multiple men have been covered by precisely zero mainstream news outlets,” the Web site wrote [ http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/05/28/five-scandals-for-hillary-clinton-and-bernie-sanders-that-would-sink-any-republican/ ]. “Mother Jones didn’t even bother quoting the essay directly, instead choosing to embed a screenshot. That’s because rape fantasies are funny and charming when they come from an aged socialist hippie.” (That last sentence was sarcastic.)
As reds and blues line-up on predictable sides of this small-time campaign dust-up nine months before the Iowa caucuses, perhaps all should remember that life is fleeting. After all, this is what Sanders implies in the conclusion of piece, which implies that man — and woman — can’t seem to get on the same page.
Sort of.
“And they never again made love together (which they had each liked to do more than anything) or never ever saw each other one more time,” he wrote.
If a Republican had written what Bernie Sanders did, the press would be circling.
By Peter Roff June 1, 2015, at 6:00 p.m.
If he were a serious candidate for president, the essay that Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders penned back in 1972 would be getting more attention. As his bid is merely a kind of neo-socialist vanguard, to the extent most people know about it they are simply chuckling because, let's face it, no one really takes him seriously.
His thoughts – expressed back at the time when McGovern was getting shellacked by Nixon to the disappointment of a generation of future leftists, many of whom showed up later in the Clinton and Obama administrations – say an awful lot about the license the left, then as now, gives itself for its base instincts and behavior.
Anyone interested in what Sanders had on his mind back then would do well to consult the Washington Examiner [ http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/sanders-woman-fantasizes-being-raped/article/2565191 ], which had the temerity to print sections of the essay. I'm hopeful the moderator of the first Democratic presidential debate will have the courage to ask Sanders if he still stands by his claim that women fantasize about being raped.
As I said, I'm hopeful, but I'm not going to hold my breath. Those kinds of questions are only asked of Republican candidates by moderators like George Stephanopoulos, a Clinton Foundation donor and on-air employee of ABC News. Asking Sanders to explain himself – and he probably doesn't have the good sense the Lord gave an ox to keep quiet about it – and giving former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley and anyone else on the stage a chance to respond would take the entire debate, and the party, off message.
We’ve already had a preview over the weekend of what it would be like. NBC’s Chuck Todd tried to help Sanders defuse the issue [ http://www.mediaite.com/tv/bernie-sanders-addresses-1972-sex-rape-fantasy-essay-on-meet-the-press/ ], while giving him the widest possible swath with which to do it. And while Vermont’s junior senator did explain that he thought the essay poorly written, he nevertheless appeared to defend the substance.
For myself, I'm not sure what Sanders' view of relations between the sexes has to do with his qualifications to be president or his vision for the job. It must have something to do with it, though, because Republicans get asked these kinds of questions – maybe not about things they themselves might have written, but certainly on similar subjects – all the time.
The lack of interest in the backgrounds of any Democrat seeking high public office – what they studied in school and where, what they've written in the past, the particulars surrounding the dissolution of a previous marriage – is comparatively amazing. If a Republican candidate anywhere in America had written "A woman enjoys intercourse with her man – as she fantasizes being raped by three men simultaneously," as Sanders did, most every current GOP presidential candidate would be asked about it – all except Carly Fiorina because the political press corps just doesn't have the guts.
Sanders' running today is a stalking horse for Massachusetts Democrat Elizabeth Warren running tomorrow (that is, in 2020). His ideas about health care and income inequality and the role of big banks in the economy and the need for them to be regulated match up with hers fairly closely. Not so sure about how his views on sex align with hers though – but that will all be water under the bridge by then.
Essay It Ain't So! Bernie Sanders' campaign has tried to distance him from a 1972 essay in which the Democratic presidential candidate wrote that a woman "fantasizes being raped by three men simultaneously." TRUE Sep 22, 2015 http://www.snopes.com/bernie-sanders-essay/
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"You Might Very Well Be the Cause of Cancer": Read Bernie Sanders' 1970s-Era Essays
Chuck Myers/ZUMA Wire
The presidential candidate's old writings were rambling, raw, and sometimes misinformed—but undeniably Bernie.
By Tim Murphy Mon Jul. 6, 2015 9:08 AM EDT
Last month Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent socialist seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, repudiated a 1972 essay [ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/05/young-bernie-sanders-liberty-union-vermont ] he wrote for the Vermont Freeman, an alternative newspaper, which included depictions of a rape fantasy from male and female perspectives. On Meet the Press, he dismissed the article as a "piece of fiction" exploring gender stereotypes—"something like Fifty Shades of Grey."
Yet as the New York Times recently reported [ http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/04/us/politics/bernie-sanderss-revolutionary-roots-were-nurtured-in-60s-vermont.html ], during his years as a contributor to the Freeman in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Sanders often wrote about sexual norms, as he presented a broader critique of repressive cultural forces that he believed were driving many Americans literally insane. His early writings reflect a political worldview rooted in the fad psychology and anti-capitalist rhetoric of the era and infused with a libertarianesque critique of state power. Sanders feared that the erosion of individual freedom—via compulsory education, sexual repression, and, yes, fluoridated water—began at birth. And, he postulated, authoritarianism might even cause cancer.
Yet he insisted that individual acts of protests could turn things around—a belief that would give rise to his political career.
Sanders was initially drawn to Sigmund Freud and his theories as a high school student in Brooklyn. He then studied psychology at the University of Chicago and at the New School for Social Research in New York. And he worked at a mental institution in New York City before settling in Vermont for good in 1968. Like many lefties of his time, he was heavily influenced by the Austrian psychologist Wilhelm Reich, a disciple of Freud whose work drew a connection between sexual repression and fascism. When Paris student demonstrators took the street in that year, they held up copies of Reich's book.
In a 1969 essay for the Freeman called "Cancer, Disease and Society [ https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2157403-sanders-cancer.html ]," Sanders, then 28, contended that conformity caused cancer by breaking down the human spirit and inflicting emotional trauma. He quoted liberally from Reich's 1948 book, The Cancer Biopathy, which, he noted, was "very definite about the link between emotional and sexual health, and cancer," and he walked readers through Reich's theory about the consequences of suppressing "biosexual excitation."
Then Sanders got to the point: "The above references, in no uncertain terms, state that you might very well be the cause of cancer." He continued:
What do you think it really means when 3 doctors, after intense study, write that 'of the 26 patients (who developed breast cancer) below 51 (years of age), one was sexually adjusted.' It means, very bluntly, that the manner in which you bring up your daughter with regard to sexual attitudes may very well determine whether or not she will develop breast cancer, among other things.
And there was more:
How much guilt, nervousness have you imbued in your daughter with regard to sex? If she is 16, 3 years beyond puberty and the time which nature set forth for childbearing, and spent a night out with her boyfriend, what is your reaction? Do you take her to a psychiatrist because she is "maladjusted," or a "prostitute," or are you happy that she has found someone with whom she can share love? Are you concerned about HER happiness, or about your "reputation" in the community.
With regard to the schools that you send your children to, are you concerned that many of these institutions serve no other function than to squash the life, joy and curiosity out of kids. When a doctor writes that the cancer personality "represses hate, anger, dissatisfaction and grudges, or on the other hand, is a 'good' person, who is consumed with self pity, suffers in stoic silence", do you know what he is talking about, and what this has to do with children, parents, and schools.
Theories about psychological causes of cancer were widespread in the mid-20th century, but never accepted within the scientific mainstream. According to the National Cancer Institute [ http://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/coping/feelings/stress-fact-sheet ], psychological stress can have adverse health effects, but "the evidence that it can cause cancer is weak." The American Cancer Society [ http://www.cancer.org/treatment/treatmentsandsideeffects/emotionalsideeffects/attitudes-and-cancer ] says that "{b}ased on what we know now about how cancer starts and grows, there's no reason to believe that emotions can cause cancer or help it grow." Reich died in prison in 1957 after ignoring an order by the Food and Drug Administration to stop advertising his Orgone Box as a cancer cure.
"These articles were written more than 40 years ago," Sanders spokesman Michael Briggs said in an email to Mother Jones. "Like most people, Bernie's views on many issues have changed over time."
The big problem, Sanders noted in these early writings, was never-ending cultural oppression. The crisis, in his view, started with birth and continued through early childhood, the school years, and the daily grind of adulthood. In 1972, writing for a lefty newspaper he founded called Movement, Sanders published a lengthy interview [part one https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2157455-sanders-movement-5.html , part two https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2157464-movementvol6.html ] with a friend who lived on a commune, on the subject of natural childbirth. The birth of the woman’s second child culminated in the sounding of a "hunting horn," and the ritual eating of the placenta. ("Don't all mammals eat the afterbirth?" Sanders asked.)
Sanders was trying to make a political point:
All aspects of life are intimately related—and it is only a schizophrenic society such as ours which segregates them and puts them into separate little boxes. We go to school and study 'education' and 'psychology' and 'sexuality' (if it's a 'progressive' school). How absurd: all of life is one and if we want to know, for example, how our nation can napalm children in Vietnam—AND NOT CARE—it is necessary to go well beyond 'politics.' We have got to get into the areas of feeling and emotion, pain and love—and how people related to each other and how people shut off their feelings. And all of this takes us way back to our mommies and to the way they dealt with us when we were infants.
In a letter to the editor published in the Freeman in 1969 [ https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2157401-sanders-destructiveschools.html ], he called the growing disillusionment with public schooling "one of the most heartening signs in recent years," and he remarked that "the basic function of the schools is [to] set up in children patterns of docility and conformity—patterns designed not to create independent and free adults, but adults who will obey orders, be 'faithful' uncomplaining employees, and 'good' citizens." He took a similar tack in another essay, this one tongue in cheek, entitled "On Education [ https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2157404-sanders-education.html ]."
Treating children with kid gloves, he believed, was turning them into sexually repressed worker drones. In a 1969 essay in the Freeman, he wrote, "In Vermont, at a state beach, a mother is reprimanded by Authority for allowing her 6 month old daughter to go about without her diapers on. Now, if children go around naked, they are liable to see each others sexual organs, and maybe even touch them. Terrible thing! If we [raise] children up like this it will probably ruin the whole pornography business, not to mention the large segment of the general economy which makes its money by playing on peoples sexual frustrations."
Some of his rants bordered on libertarian. He referred to water fluoridation, dairy regulations, and compulsory education as perhaps well-meaning infringements on individual choice that were contributing to the overall deterioration of the human condition. "It is obvious that in the name of 'public safety' the State is usurping the rights of free choice in many domains of life," he wrote in a 1969 essay entitled "Reflections on a Dying Society [ https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2157596-sanders-reflection.html ]." Such regulations had a depressing effect on the soul, Sanders contended, citing a condition Freud referred to as the global "death instinct."
His assessment of late-stage capitalism and American politics was grim. In another 1969 piece, he summed up modern life: "The years come and go, the suicide, nervous breakdown, cancer, sexual deadness, heart attack, alcoholism, sensibility at 50. Slow, death, fast, death. DEATH."
But Sanders wasn’t fatalistic. Unlike many of his contemporaries, his response to the crushing corporate state was to rise up against it through the political system he decried. In 1971, two years after his first essays for the Freeman, he launched his first political campaign. He ran for Senate and lost, and then lost three more campaigns over the next four years.
The Revolution is coming and it is a very beautiful revolution. It is beautiful because, in its deepest sense, it is quiet, gentle, and all pervasive. It KNOWS. What is most important in this revolution will require no guns, no commandants, no screaming "leaders," and no vicious publications accusing everyone else of being counter-revolutionary. The revolution comes when two strangers smile at each other, when a father refuses to send his child to school because schools destroy children, when a commune is started and people begin to trust each other, when a young man refuses to go to war, and when a girl pushes aside all that her mother has 'taught' her and accepts her boyfriend's love.
The revolution comes when young people throughout the world take control of their own lives and when people everywhere begin to look each other in the eyes and say hello, without fear. This is the revolution, this is the strength, and with this behind us no politician or general will ever stop us. We shall win!
Twelve years later—after all those failed campaigns—he was elected mayor of Burlington. And his own revolution was under way.
Read Late 1970s Bernie Sanders’ No-Holds-Barred Critique Of Mass Media
Donna Light / AP
Sanders wrote that media abides by the “well-tested Hitlerian principle that people should be treated as morons and bombarded over and over again with the same simple phrases and ideas.”
Andrew Kaczynski posted on Jun. 26, 2015, at 10:58 a.m.
In the late 1970s Bernie Sanders, then still known mostly as the perennial Liberty Union candidate and freelance writer, wrote a critique of mass media and television for the Vanguard Press, an alt-weekly that ran from the mid 1970s into the early 1980s.
In the critique, Sanders holds contempt for the mainstream media, which he said abided by the “well-tested Hitlerian principle that people should be treated as morons and bombarded over and over again with the same simple phrases and ideas.”
Sanders noted three major functions of the television industry.
“First, it is supposed to make as much money as possible for the owners of the industry and for the companies who advertise,” he wrote. “Second, like heroin and alcohol, television serves the function of an escapist mechanism which allows people to ‘space out’ and avoid the pain and conflict of their lives — and the causes of those problems. Third, television is the major vehicle by which the owners of this society propagate their political points of view (including lies and distortions) through the ‘news.’”
Today, the socialist Vermont senator who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination still views mass communication as an important issue facing the country. He maintains a page on his website where he notes [ http://www.sanders.senate.gov/legislation/issue/media-ownership-and-telecommunications ], “media consolidation suppresses diversity and ignores the needs and interests of local communities.”
Sanders noted a “fundamental contradiction” in television like many aspects of a capitalist society. He said owners of the mass media industry don’t want to educate people because “to do so would be to act against their own best interests.”
“What the owners of the TV industry want to do, and are doing, in my opinion, is use that medium to intentionally brainwash people into submission and helplessness,” wrote Sanders.
“With considerable forethought they are attempting to create a nation of morons who will faithfully go out and buy this or that product, vote for this or that candidate, and faithfully work for their employers for as low a wage as possible.”
Sanders said if “the television industry encouraged intellectual growth, honesty, and the pursuit of truth, it would put most major corporations out of business.” He noted “most advertising consists of lies designed to sell products which are either identical to the competition, totally useless, grossly overpriced, or dangerous to human health or the environment.”
“The last thing that the owners of the TV industry would want is for people to know the truth about the products sold on the air,” he wrote.
Sanders concluded by noting control of television is a political issue that is necessary to address for those “who are concerned about living in a democratic and healthy society.”
Actually, the ‘billionaire class’ might be more progressive than Sanders says
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., speaks to a crowd during a campaign stop Monday in Birmingham, Ala. (Brynn Anderson/Associated Press)
By Charles Lane January 20, 2016
Thirty-six years ago, a local gadfly’s column [ http://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/social-control-and-the-tube/Content?oid=2434173 ] in a free Vermont weekly argued passionately for “democratic control” of television, so as to rid the industry of corporate advertisers who believe that “people should be treated as morons and bombarded over and over again with the same simple phrases and ideas.”
Today, that gadfly, Bernie Sanders, is a U.S. senator, and he’s gaining traction as a challenger to Hillary Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination — by bombarding people over and over again with the same simple phrases and ideas.
Obviously, Sanders is trying to conjure the evil specter of the Koch brothers, Charles and David, who stand accused of using their combined net worth of $80 billion [ http://www.forbes.com/forbes-400/list/#version:static ] to impose a right-wing agenda through super PACs and other non-transparent instruments of political control.
George Soros bankrolls left-wing organizations worldwide; the marijuana-legalization movement received huge amounts of his money, and that of the late Peter Lewis, another billionaire. Penny Pritzker, Obama’s secretary of commerce, was last seen strolling the streets of Havana, promoting U.S. investment in communist Cuba.
One way to square these data with Sanders’s rhetoric would be to say that supporting the left exonerates billionaires from membership in the billionaire class, as Sanders defines it. The hallmark of the class, Sanders senior adviser Tad Devine told me, “is the use of wealth and power to intervene in the political system for one’s own economic self-interest.”
Fair enough: Many, if not most, billionaires do, indeed, back conservative, pro-business candidates and causes. Wall Street titan Paul Singer is an example. Yet even Singer agrees with Sanders that same-sex marriage should be legal, and once set up a super PAC [ http://www.businessinsider.com/paul-singer-super-pac-gay-marriage-republican-2012-6 ] to support GOP candidates who were sympathetic to it as well.
It’s complicated, this issue of economic “self-interest.” Does Elon Musk favor tougher carbon regulations [ http://www.wsj.com/articles/tesla-presses-its-case-on-fuel-standards-1438559469 ] and generous electric-car subsidies because, like Sanders, he cares deeply about the planet, or because they help make his multibillion-dollar stake in Tesla more valuable?
Or maybe the mundane reality is that what motivates a lot of billionaires are their own pet notions and personal causes — pot for Soros, Israel for Sheldon Adelson — not some monolithic class interest.
Plutocrats’ spending on candidates and elections is huge and influential, but not nearly as decisive, or as unidirectional, as Sanders would have it. Sometimes, in fact, the results billionaires get confirm that old saw about a fool and his money.
In a recent interview with the Financial Times, Charles Koch [ http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/3a5c5d40-b4a3-11e5-b147-e5e5bba42e51.html ] bemoaned his inability to affect the current chaotic Republican presidential race. He distanced himself from positions taken by the top two contenders, Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) and Donald Trump, expressing particular dismay with the latter’s call to temporarily ban Muslim foreigners from entering the United States. If any Republican epitomizes the Koch brothers’ libertarianism, it’s Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.), but his presidential campaign has flopped.
Trump still leads the pack, unaided by money from any billionaire but himself. What propels him is ego, attitude and a relentless populist message — which, in its nuance-free bashing of Social Security “cuts,” trade agreements and political money, often sounds copied from Sanders.
During the MSNBC town hall, Donald Trump was asked to guess a candidate while host Mika Brzezinski listed off a variety of their traits. Listen to who Trump mistakenly guessed as himself.
Even so, I see benefits in searching for common ground and greater civility during this overly negative campaign season. That’s why, in spite of the fact that he often misrepresents where I stand on issues, the senator should know that we do agree on at least one — an issue that resonates with people who feel that hard work and making a contribution will no longer enable them to succeed.
The senator is upset with a political and economic system that is often rigged to help the privileged few [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2015/11/13/ahead-of-democratic-debate-sanders-debuting-ad-on-the-rigged-economy/ ] at the expense of everyone else, particularly the least advantaged. He believes that we have a two-tiered society that increasingly dooms millions of our fellow citizens to lives of poverty and hopelessness. He thinks many corporations seek and benefit from corporate welfare while ordinary citizens are denied opportunities and a level playing field.
I agree with him.
Democrats and Republicans have too often favored policies and regulations that pick winners and losers. This helps perpetuate a cycle of control, dependency, cronyism and poverty in the United States. These are complicated issues, but it’s not enough to say that government alone is to blame. Large portions of the business community have actively pushed for these policies.
Consider the regulations, handouts, mandates, subsidies and other forms of largesse our elected officials dole out to the wealthy and well-connected. The tax code alone contains $1.5 trillion [ https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/114th-congress-2015-2016/reports/50724-BudEconOutlook-3.pdf ] in exemptions and special-interest carve-outs. Anti-competitive regulations cost businesses an additional $1.9 trillion [ https://cei.org/10kc2015 ] every year. Perversely, this regulatory burden falls hardest on small companies, innovators and the poor, while benefitting many large companies like ours. This unfairly benefits established firms and penalizes new entrants, contributing to a two-tiered society.
Whenever we allow government to pick winners and losers, we impede progress and move further away from a society of mutual benefit. This pits individuals and groups against each other and corrupts the business community, which inevitably becomes less focused on creating value for customers. That’s why Koch Industries opposes all forms of corporate welfare — even those that benefit us. (The government’s ethanol mandate is a good example. We oppose [ http://kochnews.com/CMSPages/GetFile.aspx?guid=31435545-e921-41b6-9fa2-a907649f7899 ] that mandate, even though we are the fifth-largest ethanol producer in the United States.)
It may surprise the senator to learn that our framework in deciding whether to support or oppose a policy is not determined by its effect on our bottom line (or by which party sponsors the legislation), but by whether it will make people’s lives better or worse.
With this in mind, the United States’ next president must be willing to rethink decades of misguided policies enacted by both parties that are creating a permanent underclass.
Our criminal justice system, which is in dire need of reform [ http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/03/charles-koch-overcriminalization-115512 ], is another issue where the senator shares some of my concerns. Families and entire communities are being ripped apart by laws that unjustly destroy the lives of low-level and nonviolent offenders.
Today, if you’re poor and get caught possessing and selling pot, you could end up in jail. Your conviction will hold you back from many opportunities in life. However, if you are well-connected and have ample financial resources, the rules change dramatically. Where is the justice in that?
Arbitrary restrictions limit the ability of ex-offenders to get housing, student or business loans, credit cards, a meaningful job or even to vote. Public policy must change if people are to have the chance to succeed after making amends for their transgressions. At Koch Industries we’re practicing our principles by “banning the box.” We have voluntarily removed the question about prior criminal convictions from our job application.
At this point you may be asking yourself, “Is Charles Koch feeling the Bern?”
Hardly.
I applaud the senator for giving a voice to many Americans struggling to get ahead in a system too often stacked in favor of the haves, but I disagree with his desire to expand the federal government’s control over people’s lives. This is what built so many barriers to opportunity in the first place.
It is results, not intentions, that matter. History has proven that a bigger, more controlling, more complex and costlier federal government leaves the disadvantaged less likely to improve their lives.
When it comes to electing our next president, we should reward those candidates, Democrat or Republican, most committed to the principles of a free society. Those principles start with the right to live your life as you see fit as long as you don’t infringe on the ability of others to do the same. They include equality before the law, free speech and free markets and treating people with dignity, respect and tolerance. In a society governed by such principles, people succeed by helping others improve their lives.
I don’t expect to agree with every position a candidate holds, but all Americans deserve a president who, on balance, can demonstrate a commitment to a set of ideas and values that will lead to peace, civility and well-being rather than conflict, contempt and division. When such a candidate emerges, he or she will have my enthusiastic support.
Charles G. Koch is chairman and chief executive of Koch Industries.
By Mike Lux 02/20/2016 08:43 am ET | Updated Feb 20, 2016
Charles Koch gets my award for the single most audacious, ridiculous and unintentionally funny op-ed [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-koch-this-is-the-one-issue-where-bernie-sanders-is-right/2016/02/18/cdd2c228-d5c1-11e5-be55-2cc3c1e4b76b_story.html (item just above)] I have read this year -- and maybe ever. In it, he alternately complains about Bernie attacking him, does his usual anti-government screed, rolls out his claims to be on the same side as Bernie on criminal justice reform and attempts to wrap his right-wing ideology into Sanders' populist rhetoric. It is a mind-blowing alternate reality well worth taking a look at if you need a good laugh.
Here is Koch at the height of his populist passion:
The senator is upset with a political and economic system that is often rigged to help the privileged few at the expense of everyone else, particularly the least advantaged. He believes that we have a two-tiered society that increasingly dooms millions of our fellow citizens to lives of poverty and hopelessness. He thinks many corporations seek and benefit from corporate welfare while ordinary citizens are denied opportunities and a level playing field. I agree with him.
If there were any way I could take that seriously, I'd be thinking, "Hey, even I might have something in common with Charles Koch." Here's the thing, though: all you have to do to understand how full of s--t Koch is to read the transcripts of audio [ http://ladylibertine.net/2014/09/02/road/ ] my colleague Lauren Windsor obtained from a source at Koch's donor retreat in 2014, which laid out in gory detail the unvarnished truth about his philosophy.
In that meeting, the billionaires and multi-millionaires that make up the donor network listened as the top Koch lieutenant, Richard Fink, gave a speech that included some deeply populist, pro-working family thoughts. About the minimum wage, he said that it's a slippery slope to Nazi fascism:
The big danger of minimum wage isn't the fact that some people are being paid more than their valued-added -- that's not great. It's not that it's hard to stay in business -- that's not great either. But it's the 500,000 people that will not have a job because of minimum wage... making dependence part of government programs, and destroying their opportunity for earned success. And so we see this is a very big part of recruitment in Germany in the '20s... If you look at the Third -- the rise and fall of the Third Reich, you can see that... And what happens is a fascist comes in and offers them an opportunity, finds the victim -- Jews or the West -- and offers them meaning for their life, OK?
In talking to the gathered billionaires about how to sell their free market ideology, he made their profit motives clear:
Yeah, we want to decrease regulations. Why? It's because we can make more profit, OK? Yeah, cut government spending so we don't have to pay so much taxes... There's truth in that, you all know, because we're in the 30 percent of the freedom fighters. But the middle part of the country doesn't see it that way.
So now you see why Mr. Koch dresses up his extremist anti-government views in the language of Bernie Sanders. Even on criminal justice reform, where Koch says he does agree with Sanders and other Democrats, the little known fact [ http://www.prwatch.org/news/2015/12/13002/koch-criminal-justice-reform-trojan-horse ] is that Koch lobbyists pressured Republicans drafting the bill in the House to put language in that would make prosecution for white-collar corporate crimes far tougher than it is today. So much for the getting rid of special favors thing.
Earlier that same day Dr. Will Ruger, the Charles Koch Institute's Senior VP for Policy and Research, described [ http://ladylibertine.net/2014/09/02/features/ ] the kind of government they were seeking as "limited to a small, but absolutely critical number of tasks, basically keeping our neighborhoods and cities safe from crime, defending our country from those who might violate our national territories, our commerce at sea and providing justice in a fair and apolitical -- political court system."
So when Charles Koch tells you he shares Bernie Sanders' disgust with cronyism, with a political system rigged on behalf of the top tier of society, but that the way to get there is more freedom and less government, keep in mind the kind of society he wants our nation to be: no minimum wage, no programs to help the homeless and other poor people out of poverty, less regulation so that he can make more profit, less government spending so that he can pay fewer taxes and a government so limited that it does not have any Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public education or responsibility for clean water, clean air or consumer protection.
Here's something else to keep in mind -- just a few weeks ago at a posh resort outside Palm Springs, Charles Koch convened his winter donor meeting, bringing together billionaires and politicians willing to do their bidding. If that's not cronyism, I don't know what is.
The 29-year-old resident of Portland, Oregon, is marketing [ https://www.instagram.com/stonedwarecompany/ ] homemade ceramic pipes emblazoned with decals of Sanders’ head and campaign logo.
“It was really just a way to show my support for him as a candidate,” Zimman told the Center for Public Integrity [ http://www.publicintegrity.org/ ]. “People love [the pipes], and once they hear they are contributing in some way to the campaign, they are all about that too.”
But artists like Zimman looking to make a buck off Bernie best beware: While most observers say political campaigns are unlikely to take legal action against their own supporters, attorneys say entrepreneurs open themselves to risk by using candidates’ names, likenesses or logos — especially when promising to donate a specific portion of their sales.
“You can’t promise to pass the money along to the candidate,” said Joe Birkenstock [ http://www.sandlerreiff.com/attorneys/joseph-m-birkenstock/ ], an attorney at Sandler Reiff who previously served as the chief counsel of the Democratic National Committee.
That’s a step that Sanders-supporting artist Jackie Dandelion of Beacon, New York, has already taken.
Dandelion sells her “Another Mermaid for Bernie Sanders [ https://www.etsy.com/listing/254240374/another-mermaid-for-bernie-sanders ]” bumper stickers for $8.50 apiece. She used to advertise that she’d donate 25 percent of each sale to Sanders. Now she simply notes that a portion of the proceeds — an unspecified figure greater than 25 percent — goes to his campaign.
“Just know when you purchase from me, you're purchasing from someone who actively supports Bernie Sanders for president,” she wrote [id.] on the peer-to-peer e-commerce website Etsy.com.
Other lawyers contacted by the Center for Public Integrity didn’t find these activities as troubling.
Ken Gross [ https://www.skadden.com/professionals/kenneth-gross ], who leads the political law practice at Skadden Arps, noted that such artists are “actually doing good for the campaign,” even if the products they make are not licensed or authorized.
“I can’t imagine the campaign going against them,” Gross said. “They’re supporters. They don’t want to turn them off.”
Dan Backer [ http://www.dbcapitolstrategies.com/#!dan/galleryPage ], an attorney at DB Capitol Strategies, said pro-Sanders artists pledging to donate a portion of their profits are “attempting to entice sales from a target audience” and “are saying what they will do with their revenues,” not engaging in formal fundraising.
“It only becomes a problem if they say they will forward the money — not the profits — to the campaign,” Backer continued. “If they specifically say ‘Give me $10, I will send $2 to the campaign in your name, and the other $8 will go towards this stuff,’ that’s a problem.”
Kenneth Pennington, Sanders’ digital director, told the Center for Public Integrity that the Sanders campaign doesn’t “authorize or condone” volunteer fundraising through the selling of products with the intent of passing along money to the campaign.
He declined to comment on the specific examples raised by the Center for Public Integrity, although he noted that “it’s not okay to sell things with the campaign’s logo.”
Zimman, the Portland-based pipe-maker, said she hasn’t heard one way or the other from Sanders’ campaign. But, she added, “If they need me to stop and they ask me to stop, I’ll stop.”
To date, Zimman said she’s contributed about $150 to Sanders. She plans on donating another $200 within a month. That amounts to about $3,000 worth of pipe sales, she said.
To hit the legal limit on how much she could donate to Sanders, she would need to sell about 400 more — likely a stretch for her one-woman operation.
“There is profit on my side of the business, but I’m also doing it for their profit as well,” Zimman said.
“It’s not a huge profit scheme that I’m working on,” she continued. “I would hope that Mr. Sanders would be like, ‘Yeah, you’re a small business, and you’re doing something that obviously is filling a need in the marketplace.'”
That Time Bernie Sanders Said He Was a Bigger Feminist Than His Female Opponent
Alex Hanson/Flickr
The woman who beat Bernie Sanders 30 years ago says not much has changed.
By Tim Murphy Thu Feb. 4, 2016 6:00 AM EST
A few days before the 1986 Vermont gubernatorial election, Bernie Sanders held a rally in downtown Burlington. Sanders, then the independent mayor of the state's largest city, was trailing badly in a three-way race with Democratic Gov. Madeleine Kunin, the state's first female chief executive, and Republican Lt. Gov. Peter Smith, and he was running out of time.
So, as Kunin recounts in her 1994 memoir, Living a Political Life, Sanders leveled a tough attack against her. At that rally, Kunin wrote, Sanders declared that "he would be a better feminist than I." According to her account, Sanders shouted that Kunin had "done nothing for women." And, she recalled in her book, "When my husband, there as my surrogate (I was scheduled to speak elsewhere), rose to speak in my defense, he was booed by the crowd. Arthur's red-faced anger became the children's horror story of the campaign, which they embellished in the retelling—our private macabre joke." Kunin was already coming under attack from the right for her vocal support of the Equal Rights Amendment; now she was being hammered for not being feminist enough.
Sanders, who was elected mayor of Burlington as an independent five years earlier, had entered the governor's race with high hopes but struggled to gain traction. His fundraising was anemic, and members of the lefty coalition that formed his base in the state's largest city had discouraged him from running, fearing that a vanity campaign might hurt other progressives further down the ticket. He also found himself battling against a historic candidate—a position he finds himself in once again, as he seeks to prevent Hillary Clinton from becoming the first woman to earn the presidential nomination of a major party.
"Liberals were angry I was running against a female Democrat," Sanders recalled in his own memoir, Outsider in the House. Sanders, for his part, inflamed the tensions, arguing at the time that Kunin was an empty suit. "[M]any people are excited because she's the first woman governor," he told an interviewer in 1986. "But after that there ain't much." In another interview, he suggested [ http://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/interview-why-im-running-bernie-sanders-quest-for-a-grassroots-revolution/Content?oid=2434331 ] the governor was coasting by on superficial approval. "I think [her] popularity is not very deep," he said. "In other words, she does very well on television. She has an excellent press secretary."
Days before the election, a group calling itself Women for Sanders took out an ad in the Burlington alt-weekly Vermont Vanguard asking voters whether they would choose "substance or image." Sanders' record, the ad said [ http://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/will-you-vote-for-substance-or-image/Content?oid=2434350 ], "is one of commitment, support, and substantive accomplishment—not just rhetoric and symbolism." The message was clear: Don't vote for the woman just because she's the woman.
Kunin won reelection easily. Sanders finished a distant third. He then used the campaign as a springboard for a congressional campaign in 1988 but lost that race. He ran for Congress again two years later—and won. In 1996, when he faced Republican Susan Sweetser in a bid for reelection to the House, he again found himself up against a female candidate. This time, feminist writer Gloria Steinem traveled to Vermont to endorse Sanders, joking that she'd come to make the congressman "an honorary woman [ http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2016/01/time-bernie-sanders-became-honorary-woman ]." Another speaker, a female state senator, emphasized Sanders' feminist credentials. "As we know, to be a feminist a person does not have to be a woman," she said. "A feminist is a person who challenges the power structure of this country…Bernie Sanders is that kind of feminist."
Kunin, who was later appointed ambassador to Switzerland by President Bill Clinton, endorsed Hillary Clinton during the 2008 presidential race, and this time around she is again backing Clinton. Noting that these days Sanders has a better haircut (which is to say, a haircut) and a nicer suit, she does have some kind words for him: "You usually say somebody's caught up with the times—the times have caught up with Bernie." She's referring to his positions on income inequality.
But she sees a parallel between the ongoing Democratic primary and her own clash with Sanders. Namely, the idea that Sanders benefits from a subtle double standard. "He'll grab an issue and because he's so determined and passionate about it, it makes it seem like he cares more than Hillary," Kunin says. "He can say things with a forcefulness that most women can't. If a woman shouted all the time with her answers like Bernie does, she'd be booed off the stage. So women still have to behave well, where men don't have to."
Hillary Clinton has all but said as much. After Sanders suggested last fall that "all the shouting in the world" would not fix the problem of gun violence, some Clinton supporters suggested it was a sexist remark (especially in light of his own propensity for shouting). Clinton herself told a Des Moines audience that "sometimes when a woman speaks out, some people think it's shouting." More recently, the top two Democratic candidates clashed over Planned Parenthood, after the organization's political-action wing endorsed Clinton in January. Sanders suggested it was only natural that the group would embrace the establishment candidate. The Clinton campaign responded by accusing Sanders of tarring a women's health organization as the enemy.
The New York Times' entrance poll [ http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/02/01/us/elections/iowa-democrat-poll.html ] of Iowa caucus attendees revealed a gender divide, with Sanders winning male voters by eight points and Clinton winning female voters by nine. But the more telling divide was over age, not gender—Clinton won just 14 percent of voters under 30; Sanders just 26 percent of seniors. And Sanders' support among the younger generation of women has left his long-ago rival puzzled. "[NPR] interviewed a young woman who said [Sanders] could do more for women than Hillary and that astounded me," Kunin says. "I was really bothered by that, because I've been a feminist all my life and promoted issues like child care and the ERA and been fighting for that all my life like Hillary has. And for reasons that really baffle me he has attracted younger women—they like his energy and think he'll get things done."
In Kunin's eyes, the same double standard she struggled against is alive. "I think people will say they're not biased," she observes, "and I think we've come a long way in that regard, but subconsciously—and this is true of women judging other women—we have certain expectations. You'd think people would be tired of his style but they're not."
By Madeleine M. Kunin 02/05/2016 03:53 pm ET | Updated Feb 05, 2016
Hillary Clinton is not the first progressive Democratic woman to be challenged by Bernie Sanders. He ran against me in 1986 when I was running for my second term as governor of Vermont. At that time he had little affinity for the Democratic Party. When advised that his third-party candidacy might result in a Republican victory, he saw no difference between Democrats and Republicans, saying, "It is absolutely fair to say you are dealing with Tweedledum and Tweedledee."
Voters did not agree. Sanders received 14 percent of the vote, the Republican candidate, Peter Smith received 38 percent, and I won with 47 percent.
By any measure, I was regarded as a progressive governor. If I was vulnerable, it was for being too liberal. As a legislator, my maiden speech on the floor of the Vermont House was in favor of ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. My first priority as governor was universal access to kindergarten. I set a record for a Vermont governor's appointees; women filled half of my cabinet. I sought out talented women, many of whom were the first women to head their agencies.
Women draw on a different network than men and can share an alternative definition of "qualified." Hillary Clinton's campaign staff, according to Fast Company, is over 50 percent female. Sanders' campaign began with a a predominantly male inner circle and continues to face accusation of keeping women out of the top ranks.
When Sanders was my opponent, he focused like a laser beam on "class analysis," in which "women's issues" were essentially a distraction from more important issues. He urged voters not to vote for me just because I was a woman. That would be a "sexist position," he declared.
Sanders has emerged as a more sophisticated and astute politician since those early days, and his message has more resonance.
Thirty years later, women and men assume that gender no longer matters in politics. Now only 8 percent of voters would declare in a poll that they would not vote for a woman president. I remember precisely the time and place when a barber in Springfield, Vermont, ran out to tell me, "I will never vote for a woman."
Rare then, even more rare today. But that does not mean that gender no longer plays a role in how we judge a woman's candidacy for the top job. Women, it turns out, are influenced by gender bias to almost the same degree as men. For example, both Clinton and Sanders have declared they are favor paid maternity and sick leave, and equal pay for equal work.
What sets them apart? I believe it is both style and substance. Sanders can shout his message and wave his arms for emphasis. Clinton can't. If she appeared on stage as angry at the "system" as he is, she would be dismissed as an angry, even hysterical, woman; a sight that makes voters squirm.
An angry female voice works against women, but is a plus for men. It demonstrates passion, outrage and power. Sanders bristled when he was accused of sexism after he implied that Clinton was among the shouters. Ironically, it is he who has, according to his doctor, suffered from laryngitis.
Gender adds muscle to substance. How will a female president differ from the men who have ruled the world?
Living in a woman's body makes the world look different on some -- though far from all -- issues.
As a new legislator, my first bill introduced in the Vermont House was to increase funding for childcare. I had young children and I knew that finding childcare determined whether or not I could leave my house and come to the capital, Montpelier. And I knew, that for poor women, childcare determined whether they could go to work and support their children. As governor, I saw to it that childcare funding was quadrupled and funding for education doubled.
Hillary Clinton's career follows a similar trajectory. Education reform was her priority as the governor's wife in Arkansas. A bill to cover children's health insurance (CHIP) was her achievement as a New York senator. "Women's rights are human rights and human rights are women's rights" was the message she sent to every country she visited as secretary of state. Yes, Hillary has been around, she's been a determined, consistent fighter for children's welfare and women's rights. It's part of her DNA.
She was drawn to these women's issues -- now urgent economic issues -- in the same way that I was, by our experiences as working women, wives and mothers. A number of men will protest: "I believe the same thing as she does."
What's the difference? The difference is how do they rank on the agenda. Is equal pay near the bottom of the list, or is it a priority? Is defense of Planned Parenthood an issue that saves women's lives, or is it only another institution among many? Placement on a competitive agenda is vital to achieve results.
I believe that Hillary Clinton will give high priority to equal pay for equal work, not because she has experienced discrimination herself, but as a woman, she can empathize with women who have been discriminated against. It is a kind of empathy that allows no definition, but I felt it every time I made eye contact with the women I met along the parade route or on the factory floor.
One of the criticisms Clinton has received is that she is not authentic, that she is too political (i.e. scheming) and that she has been around for a long time so that she is a captive of various institutions.
If we're counting from when Sanders was elected mayor of Burlington, he has been around for some time, too: 35 years. In part because he is a man, he can run as the ultimate outsider. Clinton can't be the outsider even as her very candidacy defies precedent. Ever since women got the vote, we believed, like the good students we are, that the path to political participation, as instructed years ago by the League of Women Voters, was to be informed, understand the system and play by the rules. That's how we could make it in a man's world.
That responsibility did not rule out reform, but it did crimp revolution. When I campaigned for governor, I believed that I had to assure voters that I would not be that different from the male governors who had preceded me, even when I knew that I would be. Being the first woman and a revolutionary would be too much for the voters to swallow.
Sanders is brave, pairing Socialist with Democrat. And I agree with him on the growing cancer in America of income inequality and a democracy-threatening campaign finance system. He is a bold truth teller, and I am grateful that he has changed the conversation. He makes the answers sound easy, which in turn, makes him look authentic. But the answers are not simple. The word "complex" does not win applause in a political speech. Nuance is not welcomed. "We need a revolution," is more powerful than "I have a plan."
I understand that voters are looking for authenticity; they always have been, asking, "Are you who you claim to be?" A woman, running for a leadership position that has always been held by a man, has to create a new persona. To succeed, she has to play the game as it has always been played, but at the same time, play it differently. It's difficult to find that sweet spot where a woman is "just right" tough enough to be commander in chief and feminine enough to be mother of the nation.
When we elected the first African American as president, we believed that an African American man would be revolutionary and bring us hope.
Barack Obama, in many ways, has changed the rules, and had new priorities on his agenda, but not to the extent that some voters had hoped and others had feared.
Still, the world seen through the eyes of a black man looks different than through those of a white man. As a result of President Obama's leadership, we look at him and ourselves differently.
And the world as seen through the eyes of a woman will not result in revolution, but it will mark a change towards greater gender equality. Visualizing Hillary raising her right hand to take the oath of office, and Bill holding the Bible, will tell every little girl and boy, that, yes, women can achieve anything.
Madeleine May Kunin, who served as governor of Vermont for three terms from 1985-1991, is a Marsh Professor at the University of Vermont, and the author of "The New Feminist Agenda, Defining the Next Revolution for Women, Work and Family [ http://www.amazon.com/The-New-Feminist-Agenda-Revolution/dp/1603582916 ]."
At Morehouse College, the Run the Jewels rapper took aim at Hillary Clinton:
When people tell us, ‘Hold on, wait awhile.’ And that’s what the other Democrat is telling you. ‘Hold on, Black Lives Matter. Just wait awhile. Hold on, young people in this country, just wait awhile.’ And then, and then … she have your own mama come to you. Your own mama say to you, ‘Well, you’re a woman.’ But I talked to [activist] Jane Elliott a few weeks ago, and Jane said, ‘Michael, a uterus doesn’t qualify you to be president of the United States. You have to be—you have to have policy that’s reflective of social justice.’
The implication, of course, is that Clinton isn’t qualified to be president based on her actual accomplishments, and that her supporters have only rallied behind her because she’s a woman—specifically, one with a uterus. Now, Killer Mike is protesting that he can’t be held responsible for the crude phrasing because he didn’t think it up—he just parroted it. “I didn't say that,” he tweeted [ https://twitter.com/KillerMike/status/699784887461638144 ] on Tuesday night. “A progressive activist woman said [it] to me.” His fans are saying “haters” are “distorting his words [ https://twitter.com/noreallyhowcome/status/699859050679250944 ]” and quoting him out of context:
But Killer Mike did say that. He made a vaguely sexist, incendiary remark that paints a woman politician as little more than a 3D printer for fetuses [ https://twitter.com/bill_nye_tho__/status/512357282487615489 ], then absolved himself of all accountability because another woman said it first. In this case, context doesn’t make things better. If Killer Mike had said something like, “It’s a shame that our own backers have been saying some weird things lately, reducing female candidates to a collection of reproductive organs. For example …” or “I would never say something like …” he’d have an argument for contextual nuance. But he didn’t! He set up a straw man about gender-related arguments for Clinton’s candidacy and used the “uterus” rebuttal to knock it down. When a campaign surrogate quotes a fellow supporter to support his own statement, it’s safe to assume that he agrees with the sentiment. If he’d actually thought the wording was insensitive, he could have paraphrased.
Elliott’s response does illuminate the strategy behind Trump and Sanders’ secondhand sexism, though: If you want to belittle an opponent through misogynist rhetoric but don’t want the backlash, don’t do it yourself—repeat someone else. But as Killer Mike’s case demonstrates, it’s hard to keep sexism at arm’s length while reaping its rewards.
"What we are learning around the world is that if women are healthy and educated, their families will flourish. If women are free from violence, their families will flourish. If women have a chance to work and earn as full and equal partners in society, their families will flourish. And when families flourish, communities and nations do as well. That is why every woman, every man, every child, every family, and every nation on this planet does have a stake in the discussion that takes place here."
These are the words of Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered at the 1995 United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. (See the full-speech transcript below.) They are words exemplary of the principles that Clinton has made central to her public policy throughout her career. And which, as it turns out, was the topic of this September 23, 2014 talk [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lKlJ3Ed4fQ (just below, as embedded; comments disabled; speech given September 23, 2014; reference link http://www.goldmansachs.com/citizenship/10000women/index.html ) before Goldman Sachs Officials honoring 10,000 women entrepreneurs. It is one of the talks that Bernie Sanders has been asking Clinton to publicize but which has been on the web since October 2014. (Hillary Clinton begins speaking at the 3:50 mark.)
But beside considering the Beijing and the Goldman Sachs videos as testaments of Clinton's consistent concern for improving the lives of women in all parts of the world and at all economic levels, I should like to explain why so many of us care to defend Hillary Clinton's record.
Millennial voters who grew up during -- or were born after -- the Bill Clinton presidency, have understandably found the Baby Boomer loyalty to and support of our former First Lady, New York Senator and Secretary of State, to be utterly inexplicable. But to the many Boomers supporting her, there is little if any mystery, given that it is Hillary Rodham Clinton's history itself that we share and that compels us to be loyal and even nostalgic. We even understand the flip flops regarding implementing liberal policies by the Clintons, given the degree of adversity facing liberal legislation required backtracking to salvage what gains could be pushed through a Republican-controlled Congress during the 1990s, all of which required giving some to gain some. Despite the compromises, we knew the Clintons were the main route for governmental progress.
Amid that history, perhaps no moment epitomizes Hillary Clinton's courage, activism, brilliance and defiance of convention and imposed authority than her challenge posed to the Chinese government when she spoke before the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing on 5 September 1995.
It was a moment I was reminded of when Clinton took on Senator Bernie Sanders in Thursday Night's Debate in New Hampshire. It was in particular the moment that Clinton finally confronted one of the nagging complaints that the Left has had about her ever since she cast her 2002 Senatorial vote sanctioning US entry into Iraq. When Senator Sanders during the debate copy-catted then-Senator Obama in his 2008 debate with Clinton by raising her Iraq vote, he no doubt wished it would sink Clinton's chances to become President as it had done then. But this time Clinton was ready with what was the most resoundingly-singular soundbite of the night, and one that rings out, and will likely continue ringing, with clarion urgency.
"A vote in 2002 is not a plan to defeat ISIS. We have to look at the threats that we face right now."
With this well-turned and agonizingly-urgent retort, Clinton finally carved out a path through the granite-like sediment of blame and condemnation that had been heaped around her by the Left for fourteen years. A blame that should never have proved so formidable an impediment to her political ambitions given that she was Senator to New York during 9/11 and throughout the years in which New Yorkers struggled to recover from the war visited on it by al-Qaeda's pilot hijackers. Clinton has been unfairly castigated considering that the majority of Congress took then-Secretary of State Colin Powell for his word when he testified that Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction. It was also the majority opinion of the constituency Clinton served in New York State, as well as in the country, as disclosed shortly after the 9/11 attacks, by a Gallup poll that showed 74% of Americans wanted to enter Iraq [ http://www.gallup.com/poll/6658/majority-americans-favor-attacking-iraq-oust-saddam-hussein.aspx ], with just 20% of Americans opposed. By August 2002, Gallup reported that a near-unanimous majority believed that the Iraqi government trains and supports terrorists, with 86% stating they think "Saddam Hussein is involved in supporting terrorist groups that have plans to attack the United States."
While many of us are rightly critical of Senator Clinton's vote, we should simultaneously consider that when she voted, she may have remembered how her husband had hesitated to embroil the US in the Balkans until after Milosevic's ethnic cleansing was well underway, and that he failed to even intervene on the Rwandan genocide. But while this confluence of hostilities, misjudgments, and constituency make Clinton's vote more understandable, the same man who wants us to consider that his Vermont constituency comprised of rural hunters accounts for why he voted against the Brady Bill and several other bills limiting access to firearms, he at the same time wants us to forget that Clinton too had a constituency to whom she had a duty to ensure there would never again be another 9/11 on American soil. But if Sanders persists in blaming Clinton, he also persists in blaming the majority of polled Americans who Senator Clinton was representing, that is many of us who will be voting in the primaries and the general election.
When Clinton snapped back at Sanders Thursday night about her vote, I could not but remember the firm tone she took as First Lady as she distinguished herself from all other First Ladies (with the exception of Eleanor Roosevelt) upon addressing the U.N. Fourth World Conference on Women, 5 September 1995, in Beijing, China. It more than any other speech by Clinton voices her determination to right the social injustices and bigotries, the economic, racial, religious and gender inequalities of not just Americans but of all citizens around the globe.
You can watch and hear Clinton deliver her remarks in the Beijing video above while reading along from the text below.
*
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Remarks to the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women Plenary Session
Thank you very much, Gertrude Mongella, for your dedicated work that has brought us to this point, distinguished delegates, and guests:
I would like to thank the Secretary General for inviting me to be part of this important United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women. This is truly a celebration, a celebration of the contributions women make in every aspect of life: in the home, on the job, in the community, as mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, learners, workers, citizens, and leaders.
It is also a coming together, much the way women come together every day in every country. We come together in fields and factories, in village markets and supermarkets, in living rooms and board rooms. Whether it is while playing with our children in the park, or washing clothes in a river, or taking a break at the office water cooler, we come together and talk about our aspirations and concern. And time and again, our talk turns to our children and our families. However different we may appear, there is far more that unites us than divides us. We share a common future, and we are here to find common ground so that we may help bring new dignity and respect to women and girls all over the world, and in so doing bring new strength and stability to families as well.
By gathering in Beijing, we are focusing world attention on issues that matter most in our lives -- the lives of women and their families: access to education, health care, jobs and credit, the chance to enjoy basic legal and human rights and to participate fully in the political life of our countries.
There are some who question the reason for this conference. Let them listen to the voices of women in their homes, neighborhoods, and workplaces. There are some who wonder whether the lives of women and girls matter to economic and political progress around the globe. Let them look at the women gathered here and at Huairou -- the homemakers and nurses, the teachers and lawyers, the policymakers and women who run their own businesses. It is conferences like this that compel governments and peoples everywhere to listen, look, and face the world's most pressing problems. Wasn't it after all -- after the women's conference in Nairobi ten years ago that the world focused for the first time on the crisis of domestic violence?
Earlier today, I participated in a World Health Organization forum. In that forum, we talked about ways that government officials, NGOs, and individual citizens are working to address the health problems of women and girls. Tomorrow, I will attend a gathering of the United Nations Development Fund for Women. There, the discussion will focus on local -- and highly successful -- programs that give hard-working women access to credit so they can improve their own lives and the lives of their families.
What we are learning around the world is that if women are healthy and educated, their families will flourish. If women are free from violence, their families will flourish. If women have a chance to work and earn as full and equal partners in society, their families will flourish. And when families flourish, communities and nations do as well. That is why every woman, every man, every child, every family, and every nation on this planet does have a stake in the discussion that takes place here.
Over the past 25 years, I have worked persistently on issues relating to women, children, and families. Over the past two and a half years, I've had the opportunity to learn more about the challenges facing women in my own country and around the world.
I have met new mothers in Indonesia, who come together regularly in their village to discuss nutrition, family planning, and baby care. I have met working parents in Denmark who talk about the comfort they feel in knowing that their children can be cared for in safe, and nurturing after-school centers. I have met women in South Africa who helped lead the struggle to end apartheid and are now helping to build a new democracy. I have met with the leading women of my own hemisphere who are working every day to promote literacy and better health care for children in their countries. I have met women in India and Bangladesh who are taking out small loans to buy milk cows, or rickshaws, or thread in order to create a livelihood for themselves and their families. I have met the doctors and nurses in Belarus and Ukraine who are trying to keep children alive in the aftermath of Chernobyl.
The great challenge of this conference is to give voice to women everywhere whose experiences go unnoticed, whose words go unheard. Women comprise more than half the world's population, 70% of the world's poor, and two-thirds of those who are not taught to read and write. We are the primary caretakers for most of the world's children and elderly. Yet much of the work we do is not valued -- not by economists, not by historians, not by popular culture, not by government leaders.
At this very moment, as we sit here, women around the world are giving birth, raising children, cooking meals, washing clothes, cleaning houses, planting crops, working on assembly lines, running companies, and running countries. Women also are dying from diseases that should have been prevented or treated. They are watching their children succumb to malnutrition caused by poverty and economic deprivation. They are being denied the right to go to school by their own fathers and brothers. They are being forced into prostitution, and they are being barred from the bank lending offices and banned from the ballot box.
Those of us who have the opportunity to be here have the responsibility to speak for those who could not. As an American, I want to speak for those women in my own country, women who are raising children on the minimum wage, women who can't afford health care or child care, women whose lives are threatened by violence, including violence in their own homes.
I want to speak up for mothers who are fighting for good schools, safe neighborhoods, clean air, and clean airwaves; for older women, some of them widows, who find that, after raising their families, their skills and life experiences are not valued in the marketplace; for women who are working all night as nurses, hotel clerks, or fast food chefs so that they can be at home during the day with their children; and for women everywhere who simply don't have time to do everything they are called upon to do each and every day.
Speaking to you today, I speak for them, just as each of us speaks for women around the world who are denied the chance to go to school, or see a doctor, or own property, or have a say about the direction of their lives, simply because they are women. The truth is that most women around the world work both inside and outside the home, usually by necessity.
We need to understand there is no one formula for how women should lead our lives. That is why we must respect the choices that each woman makes for herself and her family. Every woman deserves the chance to realize her own God-given potential. But we must recognize that women will never gain full dignity until their human rights are respected and protected.
Our goals for this conference, to strengthen families and societies by empowering women to take greater control over their own destinies, cannot be fully achieved unless all governments -- here and around the world -- accept their responsibility to protect and promote internationally recognized human rights. The -- The international community has long acknowledged and recently reaffirmed at Vienna that both women and men are entitled to a range of protections and personal freedoms, from the right of personal security to the right to determine freely the number and spacing of the children they bear. No one -- No one should be forced to remain silent for fear of religious or political persecution, arrest, abuse, or torture.
Tragically, women are most often the ones whose human rights are violated. Even now, in the late 20th century, the rape of women continues to be used as an instrument of armed conflict. Women and children make up a large majority of the world's refugees. And when women are excluded from the political process, they become even more vulnerable to abuse. I believe that now, on the eve of a new millennium, it is time to break the silence. It is time for us to say here in Beijing, and for the world to hear, that it is no longer acceptable to discuss women's rights as separate from human rights.
These abuses have continued because, for too long, the history of women has been a history of silence. Even today, there are those who are trying to silence our words. But the voices of this conference and of the women at Huairou must be heard loudly and clearly:
It is a violation of human rights when babies are denied food, or drowned, or suffocated, or their spines broken, simply because they are born girls.
It is a violation of human rights when women and girls are sold into the slavery of prostitution for human greed -- and the kinds of reasons that are used to justify this practice should no longer be tolerated.
It is a violation of human rights when women are doused with gasoline, set on fire, and burned to death because their marriage dowries are deemed too small.
It is a violation of human rights when individual women are raped in their own communities and when thousands of women are subjected to rape as a tactic or prize of war.
It is a violation of human rights when a leading cause of death worldwide among women ages 14 to 44 is the violence they are subjected to in their own homes by their own relatives.
It is a violation of human rights when young girls are brutalized by the painful and degrading practice of genital mutilation.
It is a violation of human rights when women are denied the right to plan their own families, and that includes being forced to have abortions or being sterilized against their will.
If there is one message that echoes forth from this conference, let it be that human rights are women's rights and women's rights are human rights once and for all. Let us not forget that among those rights are the right to speak freely -- and the right to be heard.
Women must enjoy the rights to participate fully in the social and political lives of their countries, if we want freedom and democracy to thrive and endure. It is indefensible that many women in nongovernmental organizations who wished to participate in this conference have not been able to attend -- or have been prohibited from fully taking part.
Let me be clear. Freedom means the right of people to assemble, organize, and debate openly. It means respecting the views of those who may disagree with the views of their governments. It means not taking citizens away from their loved ones and jailing them, mistreating them, or denying them their freedom or dignity because of the peaceful expression of their ideas and opinions.
In my country, we recently celebrated the 75th anniversary of Women's Suffrage. It took 150 years after the signing of our Declaration of Independence for women to win the right to vote. It took 72 years of organized struggle, before that happened, on the part of many courageous women and men. It was one of America's most divisive philosophical wars. But it was a bloodless war. Suffrage was achieved without a shot being fired.
But we have also been reminded, in V-J Day observances last weekend, of the good that comes when men and women join together to combat the forces of tyranny and to build a better world. We have seen peace prevail in most places for a half century. We have avoided another world war. But we have not solved older, deeply-rooted problems that continue to diminish the potential of half the world's population.
Now it is the time to act on behalf of women everywhere. If we take bold steps to better the lives of women, we will be taking bold steps to better the lives of children and families too. Families rely on mothers and wives for emotional support and care. Families rely on women for labor in the home. And increasingly, everywhere, families rely on women for income needed to raise healthy children and care for other relatives.
As long as discrimination and inequities remain so commonplace everywhere in the world, as long as girls and women are valued less, fed less, fed last, overworked, underpaid, not schooled, subjected to violence in and outside their homes -- the potential of the human family to create a peaceful, prosperous world will not be realized.
Let -- Let this conference be our -- and the world's -- call to action. Let us heed that call so we can create a world in which every woman is treated with respect and dignity, every boy and girl is loved and cared for equally, and every family has the hope of a strong and stable future. That is the work before you. That is the work before all of us who have a vision of the world we want to see -- for our children and our grandchildren.
The time is now. We must move beyond rhetoric. We must move beyond recognition of problems to working together, to have the comment efforts to build that common ground we hope to see.
God's blessing on you, your work, and all who will benefit from it.
Searching for campaign infractions real and imagined, the media's etiquette police have been busy writing up Hillary Clinton for numerous violations lately.
"Has nobody told her that the microphone works?" quipped Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough, who led a lengthy discussion [ http://www.vox.com/2016/2/3/10909354/morning-joe-hillary-clinton-shouts-bob-woodward ] about Clinton's voice (the "tone issue"). Scarborough and his guests dissected Clinton's "screaming," and how she is supposedly being "feisty" and acting "not natural."
The New York Times' debate coverage [ http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/05/us/politics/democratic-debate.html ] pushed the same "angry" narrative, detailing "The ferocity of Mrs. Clinton's remarks," and how she appeared "tense and even angry at times," "particularly sensitive," and was "going on the offensive." (By contrast, her opponent "largely kept his cool.")
Media message received: Clinton is loud and cantankerous!
But what's happening inside the confines of the mainstream media is more troubling. Rush Limbaugh advertising [ http://mediamatters.org/video/2016/02/04/rush-limbaugh-hillary-clinton-is-a-screeching-b/208386 ] his insecurities about powerful women isn't exactly breaking news. Watching Beltway reporters and pundits reveal their creeping contempt for Clinton and wrapping it in condescension during a heated primary season is disturbing. And for some, it might trigger bouts of déjà vu.
She was referred to as a "white bitch" on MSNBC and CNN; a blood-sucking "vampire" on Fox; the "wicked witch of the west" on CNN; and "everyone's first wife standing outside of probate court," a "she devil" and the castrating Lorena Bobbitt, all on MSNBC.
That Clinton was unfairly roughed [ http://www.shakesville.com/2013/08/hillary-sexism-watch-115.html ] up by the press in 2008 isn't really a question for debate anymore. Even the man who campaigned against her, President Obama, recently noted that "there were times where I think the media probably was a little unfair to her" during their Democratic primary battle.
I wonder if Obama thinks the press is once again being unfair with its primary coverage.
For example, as the press continues to focus on the issue of Clinton's speaking fees as a private citizen, the New York Times reported [ http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/05/us/politics/goldman-sachs-hillary-clinton.html ], "The former secretary of state has for months struggled to justify how sharing her views on global affairs could possibly fetch $225,000 a pop from banks. "
The former secretary of state can't justify her large speaking fee, even though former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, and former Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, among others, have all pocketed [ http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/washingtons-highest-lowest-speaking-fees/story?id=24551590#1 ] large, six-figure speaking fees?
Author Carl Bernstein said [ http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1602/06/cnr.09.html ] at CNN, "Now, you've got a situation with these transcripts, a little bit like Richard Nixon and his tapes that he stonewalled on and wouldn't release."
Over the past week, media outlets have been trying to explain how Clinton's hard-fought win in Iowa wasn't really a win.
Much of Hillary Clinton’s difficulty in this campaign stems from a single, unalterable fact: She is a woman.
I’m not referring primarily to the Bernie Bros, those Bernie Sanders supporters who fill the Internet with misogynistic filth about Clinton. What drags down her candidacy is more pervasive and far subtler — unconscious, even.
Joe Scarborough, the host, agreed: “Has nobody told her that the microphone works?”
At that, Clinton supporters hollered — about the double standard that condemns her but not Sanders, who bellows at the top of his lungs. The episode was part of a constant stream of commentators (generally men) taking issue with Clinton’s demeanor and conduct — “She’s got to become herself,” David Gergen advised on CNN before Thursday night’s debate — in a way they don’t do with Sanders.
At a Clinton rally last week in New Hampshire, I discussed the decibel dilemma with Jay Newton-Small of Time magazine. “It’s very hard for a woman to telegraph passion,” she explained. “When Bernie yells, it shows his dedication to the cause. When she yells, it’s interpreted in a very different way: She’s yelling at you.”
That’s not about Clinton; it’s about us. “It is a subtle kind of sexism that exists that we don’t recognize,” said Newton-Small, who literally wrote the book on the matter. “Broad Influence: How Women Are Changing the Way America Works [ http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1618931555 ],” out last month, includes a chapter on Clinton. “When women raise their voices, people tend to get their hackles up. People I talk to at Clinton events put her in a maternal role: Why is she screaming at me? Am I in trouble?”
Campaigning While Female also deprives Clinton of the ability to make lofty promises. Sanders, for example, has a $15 trillion non-starter of a health-care plan. If Clinton floated such a plan, the media would mock it as patently absurd. But Sanders gets a pass.
Why the double standard? “Men are the guys who want to go out and buy the motorcycle, and women are the purse-string holders,” Newton-Small said. “It’s a very traditional role we are putting women into by making them the one saying, no, we can’t do all these really fun things. This is a very stereotypical box she gets put into, which then makes it very hard for her to be inspirational.”
This is the essence of Clinton’s trouble: If she can’t plausibly offer pie in the sky, and she can’t raise her voice, how does she inspire people? This hurts particularly with young voters — the same segment that shunned Clinton in 2008.
Clinton’s “likeability” problem also has something to do with her lack of a Y chromosome. It’s a direct consequence of the imperative that she demonstrate her toughness. Men can be tough and warm at the same time — think Ronald Reagan — but for women, it’s a trade-off.
In 2008, she played down gender and positioned herself as “ready to lead on day one.” This time she took a softer approach but eventually found herself back in the position of arguing that she’d be a better wartime leader than Sanders. For Clinton, “it’s a really tough needle to thread to be tough enough to be a commander in chief and still be likeable,” Newton-Small said.
I disagree with those who scream “sexism” every time somebody criticizes Clinton. But there’s no denying that women are more often the victims of online savagery. That was true long before the Bernie Bros (who could be heard booing a mention of Madeleine Albright at Thursday’s debate). Sanders objects to the Bernie Bros but may encourage them when he talks about the “drama” Clinton creates and her “shouting [ http://nymag.com/thecut/2015/11/bernie-sanders-bros-are-coming-for-the-hillary-clinton-bots.html ].” It’s also hard to imagine a male candidate being faulted for his wife’s misbehavior the way Clinton is blamed for her husband’s.
There’s not much Clinton can do about this. But she can make the case that while Sanders talks “revolution,” her presidency actually would be one, because the first female president would govern differently from her 44 predecessors.
Clinton has been at the vanguard of the women’s movement for decades, but the movement has been so successful that young voters, even women, don’t realize how much has changed — and how having a woman as president could complete that Quiet Revolution.
“Women in general are better listeners, are more collegial, more open to new ideas and how to make things work in a way that looks for win-win outcomes,” Clinton told Newton-Small [ http://time.com/4166539/hillary-clinton-woman-governing-campaigning/ ] in “Broad Influence.”
Bernie Sanders wags his finger a lot, and people are starting to talk about it
Video [embedded] Bernie Sanders's many finger wags Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders wagged his finger at many comments made during the PBS NewsHour democratic debate on Feb. 11. Here's just a few instances of his fervor for the finger wag.
By Justin Wm. Moyer and Jenny Starrs February 12, 2016
It’s a gesture familiar to anyone who’s ever been warned, cautioned, scolded, told they are not very nice or otherwise belittled. A hand, often the dominant one, is raised. An index finger is extended skyward. The finger moves from left to right in a workmanlike arc or, for those with more rococo tastes, a flamboyant circle. Sometimes, a pen adds gravitas to the motion. Though the tempo and exact meaning may vary, the message is always similar, and always at least a little bit threatening. I know better than you. You are making a huge mistake. Back off.
No politician in modern memory seems to favor the finger wag as much as Democratic presidential contender Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). And people are starting to talk about it.
Sen. Bernie Sanders at Thursday’s debate. (PBS NewsHour)
Though no official count was available, Sanders wagged his finger, at minimum, 13 times during Thursday night’s debate with Hillary Clinton in Milwaukee. He wagged when discussing the costs of his health-care plan. He wagged during a heated foreign policy discussion with his rival. He wagged when she cited his past criticisms of President Obama.
“Do senators have the right to disagree with the president? Have you ever disagreed with a president? I suspect you may have,” he shot back, finger in full force.
Of course, Sanders is not the only politician in history to have a signature gesture. Indeed, legacies are often made or broken by body language. Consider: Theodore Roosevelt’s chiseled smile. Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s grimace, usually wrapped around a cigarette holder. Richard Nixon’s scowl — and the scowl that cost George W. Bush a debate against John Kerry in 2004. Bill Clinton’s thumb-pointing. And Donald Trump’s contemptuous shrug.
But in the hard-fought winter of an election year, gestures mean a lot. And Sanders caught some flak for a move some thought condescending.
Isn’t Sanders guilty of the same thing — and getting a pass because he’s a man? As another Twitter user boldly put it [ https://twitter.com/sadydoyle/status/697984498315689984 ]: “IF YOU [Expletive deleted] WAVE YOUR FINGER ONE MORE TIME WHILE SHE IS SPEAKING I WILL PERSONALLY BOYCOTT THE STATE OF VERMONT FOREVER.”
Gender Watch 2016 @GenderWatch2016 How would Senator Sanders' body language - more hand gestures, finger wagging - be received if it were a woman candidate? #genderwatch2016 9:00 PM - 11 Feb 2016 [ https://twitter.com/GenderWatch2016/status/697978577812398080 ]
James Downie @jamescdownie It's pretty amazing the number of people who (RIGHTLY) get mad at talk about Clinton's tone, then complain about Sanders's finger wag. 9:52 PM - 11 Feb 2016 [ https://twitter.com/jamescdownie/status/697991620235563010 ]
Whatever the implications of the Vermont senator’s go-to maneuever, it’s clear that his supporters will follow wherever his finger leads them. As one Sanders enthusiast put it Thursday night: “If I could get a Bernie Sanders “Finger Wag” GIF tattoo; I’d freaking get that thing TOMORROW!”
One last finger wag from the Vermont senator. (PBS NewsHour)
By Susan Bordo 02/05/2016 06:10 pm ET | Updated Feb 07, 2016
I am one of those "over 65" women who belong to the faceless, aging "demographic" with a Hillary sign on my front lawn. For weeks I've listened, fists clenched, while 19-year-olds and media pundits alike lavish praise on Bernie Sanders for his bold, revolutionary message and scorn Hillary for being "establishment."
He is "heart" and she is "head"--a bitter irony for those of us familiar with the long history of philosophical, religious, and medical diatribes disqualifying women from leadership positions on the basis of our less-disciplined emotions.
He is "authentic" in his progressivism while she has only been pushed to the left by political expediency--as though a lifetime of fighting for universal healthcare, for gender equality, for children's rights don't pass the litmus tests for "progressive" causes. He is the champion of the working class while her long-standing commitments to child care, paid sick leave, the repeal of the Hyde Amendment, and narrowing the wage-gap between working men and women are apparently evaporated by her accepting highly-paid invitations to speak at Goldman-Sachs.
As I witness Sanders become the gatekeeper of progressivism, while in the interests of his own campaign allowing a generation of twitter-educated kids to swallow a sound-bite generated portrait of Hillary, I am amazed at all that has gotten eclipsed by the terms of the current debate. The continuing virulence of racism in all its forms. The assault on reproductive rights. And, oh yes, that still inflammatory little "ism," Sexism. Bring it up nowadays and you will get accused of "playing the woman card." On the other hand, if you suggest that the election of Hillary to the Presidency would be a strike against business-as-usual, you will be reminded that she is not really a woman but one-half of that mythical unity, "The Clintons." She even gets blamed for Bill's infidelity--a tactic cooked up by Trump but taken seriously throughout the media, as pundits actually debated whether she should be held accountable for being "an enabler."
Sexism and Hillary-hating are old comrades. When she was a candidate for the Democratic nomination in 2008, the media coverage of the primaries often seemed like a re-run of the relentless punishment she endured for refusing to stay in her place as first lady. Hillary's early transgressions--requesting a West Wing office, making health care (rather than, say, charity work or refurbishing the White House) her priority, not caring enough about fashion, and seeming to denigrate cooking-baking housewives--had made her "The Lady Macbeth of Arkansas", "The Yuppie Wife From Hell"; a New York Post cartoon pictured Bill Clinton as a marionette, with a ferocious Hillary pulling the strings. For a time during his presidency, her husband's bad behavior won her some sympathy, and her productive but low-key (Carl Bernstein called it "deferential") performance as a senator earned her praise. But then--oops--she started leaning in too much once again, trying for the Presidency, and the "hellish housewife" (as Leon Wieseltier called her) was reincarnated: Hillary was ""satan" (Don Imus): "Mommie Dearest," "the debate dominatrix" and "Mistress Hillary " (Maureen Dowd.) And it wasn't just the right wing. Chris Matthews (who in 2016 has thankfully changed his tune) saw her as a creature from the bowels of hell: "witchy" and a "she-devil." He wasn't the only one. You all remember, don't you? Don't you?
If you are a 19-year-old Bernie supporter, you probably don't; you were 11 years old. But Bernie Sanders remembers, and he remembers, too, that his isn't the first mass-movement of young people filled with anti-establishment fervor. A lot of us were "socialist" (or some version of it) in those days. But some of us, too, were women. Women who were charged with making coffee while the male politicos speechified. Women who were shouted down and humiliated for daring to bring up the issue of gender inequality during rallies and lefty confabs. Women whose protests were seen as trivial, hormonally inspired, and "counter-revolutionary." Women who were told, over and over, that in the interests of progressive change, we had to subordinate our demands to "larger" causes. Some of us could see that those "larger" issues were thoroughly entangled with gender; we would ultimately develop ways of understanding the world that couldn't be reduced to a single "message" but demanded complex analyses (and action) that looked at the intersections of race, gender, and class. In those days, though--before the women's movement--we often found ourselves simmering and stewing as our boyfriends and husbands defined what was revolutionary, what was worthy, what was "progressive."
So it's somewhat déjà vu for me all over again, as a charismatic male politico once again is telling women what issues are and aren't "progressive." I can only assume that those of you who booed Hillary at the Iowa caucus when she described herself as a progressive have no idea of either how the women's movement was born or Clinton's contributions to it. Ironically, the women's movement, along the struggle for racial justice, is one of the true revolutions of the 20th century--a revolution that you benefit from every day of your lives, and that is far from fully accomplished.
The boo-ers have no idea, I can only assume, of the price Hillary has paid for being openly and vigorously feminist, for daring to fight for health care (yes, it was called "Hillarycare" in those days) before there was a movement to clap for her, for speaking her mind about what she accurately described as "a vast right-wing conspiracy" aimed at her husband (and now at Obama.) Instead, through some perverse and unconscious collusion between the decades-old Hillary-hating of the right, the headline-hunger of the media (which never tires of exploiting the latest faux scandal) and now, cruelest cut of all, the Bernie Movement, you have decided that she is simply "the establishment."
I was born in 1947, the very first year of the post-war baby boom. I was a young teenager at the dawn of the sixties, just a few years younger than Bernie and half a year older than Hillary. I know how intoxicating it is--particularly now, for a generation numbed by a culture that has given you snapchat in place of community--to feel yourself on the side of "revolution" and to find yourself, shoulder to shoulder with like-minded others, with a cause to fight for. And I, too, am charmed by Bernie's scruffy white hair and unmodulated passion. I understand, I do. Do not make the mistake of thinking, though, that Hilary's caution is a sign of her "inauthenticity" or conventionality, rather than the price she has paid for attempting to be an effective public servant in world that has allowed men the privilege of political passion and labeled women "strident" and "shrill" when they did the same. Please remember, too, that while a "clear message" may make for a good political campaign, complexity--which doesn't lend itself to sound bites--is what the real world is made of. In that complex real world, income inequality is not merely the product of Wall Street greed but survives only through the happy collusion of other inequalities that have been with us long before Goldman Sachs opened its doors.
Susan Bordo is Singletary Chair in the Humanities at University of Kentucky. She is currently writing a book on how facts became obsolete in American culture and politics.
5 Myths (And One Big Truth) About Hillary's 2002 Iraq War Vote
ASSOCIATED PRESS
By Jeffrey Marburg-Goodman 02/08/2016 11:06 am ET | Updated Feb 08, 2016
Although Hillary Clinton has many advantages in the current Presidential campaign (advantages of policy, programs, and, yes, personality) surely her greatest strength vis-à-vis her principal primary opponent is in the area of foreign and global policy--including matters of war and peace, global development and economics, our war against terrorism, and even climate change and preserving the environment. This writer believes that the success of the next President in dealing with these issues will define her or his legacy; indeed the survival of the human race may well turn on how these issues are handled over the next eight years.
In the face of Secretary Clinton's undisputed strength in these areas, when Bernie Sanders is asked how his experience measures up to hers in the "Commander In Chief" category, he invariably comes up with a single Talking Point.
Unfortunately that Talking Point, presented in Bernie's shallow vernacular, simply isn't true. It usually goes something like this:
The key foreign policy vote in modern American history was the 2002 vote as to whether we should go into Iraq. I made the decision not to go to war. Hillary Clinton on the other hand, voted for the war...
Like many simplistic and "sound bite" arguments of the modern era, and of Sanders in particular, the argument that Hillary Clinton supported the war George W. Bush prosecuted in Iraq is nonsense. This falsehood can be broken down into five sub-myths.
Myth #1: The 2002 Congressional Resolution authorizing the use of military force against Iraq, on which Hillary Clinton and a large majority of U.S. Senators voted yes, gave George W. Bush "carte blanche" to pursue war against Saddam Hussein.
False! In fact exactly the opposite is true: While that Resolution did indeed authorize President Bush, under strict requirements of the 1973 War Powers Act, to use force, Section 3(b) of the Act also required that sanctions or diplomacy be fully employed before force was used, i.e. force was to be used only as "necessary and appropriate in order to defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq," and to do so only upon the President certifying to Congress that "diplomatic or other peaceful means" would be insufficient to defang Saddam.
Despite those legal conditions, the following year we were at war--and millions of us were astonished that the Bush Administration, running roughshod over Congress's requirements, hadn't given more time for U.N. inspectors to complete their job of searching for weapons of mass destruction.
Myth #2: By voting for the 2002 Congressional Resolution which authorized (but was also designed to limit) George Bush's power to wage war in Iraq, Hillary Clinton cannot be considered a "progressive" Democrat.
False! On October 11, 2002, Clinton joined a strong majority of Democrats, including liberal and left-center Democrats like Tom Harkin, John Kerry, and Joe Biden, in voting in favor of the Resolution authorizing the use of military force against Iraq. Later on, Clinton came to deeply regret giving President Bush the benefit of the doubt on the Resolution, and she has plainly admitted her mistake. Yet it is a "mistake" which many other senators of conscience made with her; if Clinton bears any blame for the resulting war, it is because she placed too much reliance on legislation that was actually designed to check a president's war-making ability but instead inadvertently gave that president cover to run roughshod over the interests of both Congress and the public at large.
Myth #3: At the time of her vote, Clinton was very supportive of going to war in order to remove Saddam Hussein from power.
False! While Clinton quickly turned against the war, another piece of "lost history" is the deep concern she expressed at the very time of her vote in the fall of 2002. Given the Resolution's several prerequisites to waging war, Clinton's vote was for a Resolution that was also supposed to restrain the President's ability to wage war, and her 2002 floor speech leading up to consideration of the Resolution made this clear:
My vote is not a vote for any new doctrine of preemption or for unilateralism or for the arrogance of American power or purpose, all of which carry grave dangers for our Nation, the rule of international law, and the peace and security of people throughout the world.
These words presaged the doctrine of "smart power" Clinton later espoused as Secretary of State. Her vision is neither interventionist on the one hand nor hesitant and supine on the other, but rather something in between: a belief that the United States is the indispensable leader--in a troubled world where such leadership matters--but a belief still grounded in reality, the limits of American power and, perhaps most significantly, the importance of collaboration with like-minded actors who can be found in every corner of the globe. Meanwhile, as Clinton has said many times, then as now, armed intervention is only to be used as a last resort.
Myth #4: At the time of the 2002 vote, the "architecture" of George Bush's Presidency was well understood, including a philosophy and history of carrying out pre-emptive wars.
False! In 2002, Clinton palpably feared a precipitous rush to war, but was willing to trust a leader who at the time was only in the second year of his presidency, having just suffered the most calamitous attack on the homeland since Pearl Harbor--and, notably, whose only international venture up until then was a widely applauded campaign to overthrow the Taliban in Al Qaida's sanctuary of Afghanistan. While it was already well known that Bush had neocon advisers like Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz, the true extent of their influence had not yet been manifested. (Colin Powell was also an important adviser and George W. was, after all, George H.W. Bush's son.)
Myth #5. Hillary Clinton's vote belies support for an "Imperial Presidency" that brooks no dissent, and disrespects Congress and other partners, foreign or domestic.
False! To the contrary, one of the reasons Hillary Clinton is so well qualified to be president is because she deeply respects the rule of law and, in particular, appropriate Congressional prerogatives and the Constitutional principle of checks and balances. (Indeed, this is precisely why she voted the way she did on the 2002 Iraq Resolution.) In this vein, she is also uniquely capable of reaching across the aisle to forge common-sense solutions, a "progressive who delivers results," as she says.
One big truth: Hillary Clinton possesses another, singular, quality: she has the capacity to learn from the hard lessons that our Iraq adventure taught us, including from the misplaced trust she and others conferred on an Administration that brought so much grief to this country. She has said as much in her memoir, Hard Choices:
As much as I might have wanted to, I could never change my vote on Iraq. But I could try to help us learn the right lessons from that war and apply them to Afghanistan and other challenges where we had fundamental security interests. I was determined to do exactly that when facing future hard choices, with more experience, wisdom, skepticism, and humility.
It is clear that Hillary Clinton is a candidate for president who has learned from the lessons of history, and is capable of applying them to the future; in fact this quality is a critical ingredient of great leadership.
Vetting Bernie: He Never Voted For Intervention In Iraq — Except Twice
Joe Conason February 17, 2016 10:57 am
The only topic that preoccupies Bernie Sanders more than income inequality is his vote against authorization of war in Iraq, which he mentions at every debate and whenever anyone questions his foreign policy credentials. Fair enough: Sanders turned out to be right on that vote and Hillary Clinton has admitted that she was wrong to trust George W. Bush.
But the socialist Vermont senator is under fresh scrutiny today on the (further) left, where his support for intervention in Bosnia and Afghanistan has raised sharp questions. In Counter-Punch, the online magazine founded by the late Alexander Cockburn [ http://www.counterpunch.org/ ], his longtime collaborator Jeffrey St. Clair complains that even on Iraq, Sanders is a “hypocrite [ http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/02/16/blood-traces-bernies-iraq-war-hypocrisy/ (next item below)]” who was never as consistently anti-intervention as advertised:
In 1998 Sanders voted in favor of the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 [ https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/105/hr4655/text ], which said: “It should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime.”
Later that same year, Sanders also backed a resolution that stated: “Congress reaffirms that it should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime.”
According to St. Clair, Sanders has dismissed those votes as “almost unanimous,” but that implies an absurdly elastic definition of the term. Looking up the actual vote, St. Clair found that 38 members of varying ideology and party affiliation voted no. To him, this means Sanders should be held responsible for the bombing campaign that followed, as well as the deaths of 500,000 Iraqi children who allegedly perished as a result of US sanctions (which seems to absolve the late dictator of any culpability for the sanctions regime, but never mind).
Certainly it is fair to ask Sanders — who strives to distance himself from his rival on foreign and security policy – why he cast those fateful votes to support Bill Clinton’s Iraq policy in 1998.
Bernie Sanders has been tagging Hillary Clinton for her 2002 vote in support of George W. Bush’s war against Saddam Hussein. Here Sanders is closely following Obama’s 2008 playbook, where Obama used the Iraq war vote to repeatedly knock Clinton off balance.
But Sanders’s shots at Clinton haven’t inflicted much damage this time around, largely because there’s so little breathing space between the two candidates on foreign policy. Both Clinton and Sanders are seasoned interventionists, often advancing their hawkish policies under the ragged banner of “humanitarianism.” (See: Queen of Chaos [ http://store.counterpunch.org/product/queen-of-chaos/ ] by Diana Johnstone.)
Sanders supported Bill Clinton’s war on Serbia, voted for the 2001 Authorization Unilateral Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF), which pretty much allowed Bush to wage war wherever he wanted, backed Obama’s Libyan debacle and supports an expanded US role in the Syrian Civil War.
More problematic for the Senator in Birkenstocks is the little-known fact that Bernie Sanders himself voted twice in support of regime change in Iraq. In 1998 Sanders voted in favor of the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 [ https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/105/hr4655/text ], which said: “It should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime.”
Later that same year, Sanders also backed a resolution that stated: “Congress reaffirms that it should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime.” These measures gave congressional backing for the CIA’s covert plan to overthrow the Hussein regime in Baghdad, as well as the tightening of an economic sanctions regime that may have killed as many as 500,000 Iraqi children. The resolution also gave the green light to Operation Desert Fox, a four-day long bombing campaign striking 100 targets throughout Iraq. The operation featured more than 300 bombing sorties and 350 ground-launched Tomahawk cruise missiles, several targeting Saddam Hussein himself.
Even Hillary belatedly admitted that her Iraq war vote was a mistake. Bernie, however, has never apologized for his two votes endorsing the overthrow of Saddam. On the rare occasions when Sanders has been confronted about these votes, he has casually dismissed them as being “almost unanimous.” I went back and checked the record. In fact, many members of the progressive caucus in the House, as well as a few libertarian anti-war Members of Congress, vote against the Iraq regime change measures. Here’s a list of the “no” votes on the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998:
Abercrombie Bartlett Brown (CA) Carson Chenoweth Clay Conyers Davis (IL) Doggett Everett Ewing Ford Furse Hastings (FL) Hilliard Hostettler Jackson (IL) Jefferson LaHood Lee Lewis (GA) McKinney Miller (CA) Mink Paul Payne Pombo Rivers Rush Sabo Serrano Skaggs Skelton Stark Towns Vento Walsh Waters
So what changed? Only the party in power. In 1998, Bill Clinton was president, pursuing his own effort to takedown Saddam’s government. In Clinton’s State of the Union address of that year he laid the political groundwork for Bush’s war:
“Saddam Hussein has spent the better part of this decade, and much of his nation’s wealth, not on providing for the Iraqi people, but on developing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and the missiles to deliver them. The United Nations weapons inspectors have done a truly remarkable job, finding and destroying more of Iraq’s arsenal than was destroyed during the entire gulf war. Now, Saddam Hussein wants to stop them from completing their mission. I know I speak for everyone in this chamber, Republicans and Democrats, when I say to Saddam Hussein, “You cannot defy the will of the world”, and when I say to him, “You have used weapons of mass destruction before; we are determined to deny you the capacity to use them again.””
Recall that over the 8 years of Clinton Time, Iraq was bombed an average of once every four days.
Even though Sanders markets himself as an “independent socialist,” in fact, he has rarely dissented against the Democratic Party orthodoxy, especially when it comes to military intervention. That should permanently settle the notion of whether Bernie is a real Democrat. With the blood of 500,000 Iraqi children on his hands, surely Sanders has already won the “Humanitarian Warrior Seal of Approval,” which leaves us with only one haunting question: Was it worth it, Senator Sanders?
Following her ever-so-narrow win in Iowa, Clinton touted [ http://www.vox.com/2016/2/2/10892714/hillary-clinton-iowa-reaction ] her bona fides as a "progressive who gets things done," much to Sanders' distaste. "Most progressives I know were against the war in Iraq," Sanders tweeted, without specifically naming Clinton. "One of the worst foreign policy blunders in the history of the United States."
But evaluated on the basis of his own lengthy record, Sanders is not as progressive as he makes himself out to be on at least three big issues: guns, criminal justice reform, and — despite the Iraq vote — foreign policy.
More broadly, it is never a good look for a progressive to have such an uncertain record in three major policy areas. Running against Clinton, Sanders can rightfully lay claim to progressive voters' support. But they could be forgiven for suspecting he is less one of their own than his tweeting suggests.
Why Immigration Is The Hole In Bernie Sanders’ Progressive Agenda
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., speaks at a campaign rally in Portland, Maine.
by Kira Lerner Jul 30, 2015 2:34 pm
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders outlined his immigration reform plan Thursday, saying he would support comprehensive immigration reform and go further than President Barack Obama to protect undocumented immigrants already in the United States. But when it comes to allowing new immigrants into the country, Sanders reiterated his position that opening the border would hurt employment and wages.
“I see two issues. I see the absolute need to provide legal status and protection to the undocumented people who are in this country now — some 11 million people,” the independent senator from Vermont said during a Q&A with the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Thursday.
“But here’s where I do have concerns,” he continued. “There is a reason why Wall Street and all of corporate America likes immigration reform, and it is not, in my view, that they’re staying up nights worrying about undocumented workers in this country. What I think they are interested in is seeing a process by which we can bring low-wage labor of all levels into this country to depress wages for Americans, and I strongly disagree with that.”
“I frankly do not believe that we should be bringing in significant numbers of unskilled to workers to compete with [unemployed] kids,” Sanders said. “I want to see these kids get jobs.”
But Sanders fails to see it that way, pointing on Thursday to the 36 percent unemployment rate for Hispanic young people. “You bring a lot of unskilled workers into this country, what do you think happens to that 36 percent?”
Sanders’ poor track record on immigration goes back further than just his presidential campaign. In 2007, he voted against a bipartisan immigration reform bill sponsored by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA). At the progressive Netroots Nation conference earlier this month, Sanders said [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHhrvKlZyS4 (next below; with comments; the referenced question and answer begin at c. the 12:55 mark)]
the reform bill would have allowed for low wage workers to enter the country who would “be competing against kids in this country who desperately need jobs.”
“There’s a very significant difference in scope of what the recent bill does compared to what that bill does,” Bernie said Thursday. “My concern about the bill that I voted against has to do with…that there was too much emphases on bringing low-wage workers into this country. What I want to see and what is better about the recent bill is that number one, there is a path towards citizenship which is absolutely essential. And second of all, that I was able to get a fairly significant amount of money into providing jobs for young people in this country.”
“Economically and morally, it is unacceptable that we have millions of workers who are living in the shadows,” he said. “Some of my Republican colleagues apparently think that the solution is I guess in the middle of the night to round up everybody and throw them out of the country. I think that anybody thinking those kinds of ideas is ugly beyond belief.”
Bernie Sanders Has an Immigration Problem With the Left
Senator Bernie Sanders speaks at George Mason University on Oct. 28, 2015, in Fairfax, Virginia. Photographer: Alex Wong/Getty Images
His rhetoric against guest-worker programs has brought him trouble with the left. Can he reframe it?
by Arit John November 13, 2015 — 4:00 AM CST
With immigration in the forefront of the presidential race, Bernie Sanders faces a potential obstacle at Saturday's Democratic debate: How to defend his concerns about guest-worker programs without alienating would-be supporters.
As an independent senator from Vermont in 2007, Sanders was among progressives who objected to the program in President George W. Bush's immigration bill. Now, while seeking the Democrats' nomination, he's been accused of leaving Latinos “at the altar” with his vote against the bill; attacked by rival Martin O'Malley; and accused by immigration advocates of employing GOP talking points.
Sanders has been working to shore up his reputation as a fighter for immigrant rights, by hiring prominent activists and putting out a detailed policy agenda. On Monday, Sanders promised [ http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/trackers/2015-11-09/sanders-vows-immigration-action-beyond-obama-s-if-elected ] to go beyond President Barack Obama’s executive actions to prevent the deportation of people who would have been protected by the Senate immigration bill in 2013, “dismantling inhumane deportation programs,” and more.
But it's Sanders's rhetoric against guest-worker programs for legal immigrants that has brought him trouble with the left. He now says his problems with such programs are rooted in humanitarian concerns; his warnings about immigrants taking Americans' jobs, however, have gotten more attention. Whether he can move past the issue may depend on whether he can re-frame it to Democrats—in a way that doesn't evoke the GOP they'll face next fall.
‘Lower Wages’
At an immigration forum in Las Vegas on Sunday, O’Malley accused the rivals he's trailing of only supporting an immigration overhaul to win votes.
“If poverty is increasing and if wages are going down, I don’t know why we need millions of people to be coming into this country as guest workers who will work for lower wages than American workers and drive wages down, even lower than they are right now.”
“That's right,” Sanders said. “They have no good response.”
The Sanders campaign notes even immigration activists weren't universally sold on the bill. Arturo Carmona, ?the campaign’s national Latino outreach director and southwest political director, said it would have created “slave-like conditions” for guest workers and “one of the worst pathways to citizenships that we’ve seen.” “It’s kind of an amnesia moment where people are just saying ‘He voted against it,’” Carmona said. “But who did he vote with? He voted with Latinos and with immigrant rights organizations.”
America's Voice founder Frank Sharry, whose group supports a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, said while he doesn't agree with what Sanders said, he doesn't think the sentiment comes from an anti-immigrant perspective.
Ultimately, Sharry said, Bush's bill failed for other reasons.
“We lost because Republicans would not support a bill—even though it was written to appeal to Republicans—because it had a legalization with a path to citizenship for 11 to 12 million undocumented immigrants,” Sharry said.
In other words, Republicans left Bush at the altar. “That’s why I don’t get all worked up like ‘Bernie Sanders screwed us,’” Sharry said. “Upon reflection, we really realized that we had made a mistake, a strategic mistake, in allowing progressives to get divided in hopes of getting Republican votes.”
‘Grossly Mistreated’
O'Malley's attack wasn't the first time Sanders’s guest-worker stance had met liberal criticism. In a July interview with Vox [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf-k6qOfXz0 (next below; with comments)],
Sanders called open borders a Koch brothers plot.
“What right-wing people in this country would love is an open border policy,” Sanders said. “Bring in all kinds of people to work for $2 or $3 an hour, that would be great for them.”
What Sanders didn't talk about then was the humanitarian concerns surrounding guest-worker programs. He had before, writing a 2008 op-ed [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-bernie-sanders/the-harvest-of-shame_b_96759.html ] about visiting Florida tomato pickers that concluded U.S. consumers don't want their produce to be picked by workers “who are grossly mistreated, underpaid, and in some case even kept in chains.” Later that year, a Senate panel on which Sanders served held a hearing on the tomato pickers' conditions.
Mary Bauer of the Legal Aid Justice Center, who testified at the hearing, explained the bind such workers may find themselves in: “When they get to the United States, if the employment is less than ideal, if it’s not what was promised, they can’t go work anywhere else, and as a practical matter they can’t go home because they owe a huge amount of money they’ll never be able to pay back,” she said in an interview.
Daniel Costa, director of immigration law and policy research at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, said the backlash to Sanders's past comments highlighted the candidate's need to refine his rhetoric. When Sanders talks about immigration leading to lower wages, he's talking specifically about low-wage guest-worker programs, Costa said, and “it’s hard to get that context in a sound bite.”
During Democrats' last debate on Oct. 13, Sanders tried to do just that. CNN's Juan Carlos Lopez asked Sanders why Latinos should trust him on immigration when he voted against the 2007 bill and “left them at the altar.”
I didn't leave anybody at the altar. I voted against that piece of legislation because it had guest-worker provisions in it which the Southern Poverty Law Center talked about being semi-slavery. Guest workers are coming in, they're working under terrible conditions, but if they stand up for their rights, they're thrown out of the country. I was not the only progressive to vote against that legislation for that reason. Tom Harkin, a very good friend of Hillary Clinton's and mine, one of the leading labor advocates, also voted against that.
That didn’t end the discussion. “Tom Harkin isn’t running for president,” Lopez said. “You are.”
By Arturo S. Rodríguez President, United Farm Workers 02/17/2016 11:55 pm ET | Updated Feb 18, 2016
There is more to Bernie Sanders' record on immigration than what was revealed during his debate exchange with Hillary Clinton last week in Wisconsin. He has made invaluable contributions to the presidential debate, championing issues such as income inequality and economic unfairness that the United Farm Workers embraces. But the UFW has also been intimately involved championing badly needed reform for immigrants, especially farm workers, over the last 16 years. Sen. Sanders has had a contradictory record on immigration.
We came close to winning comprehensive immigration reform when a bipartisan bill by Sens. Edward Kennedy and John McCain nearly passed the Senate in 2007. That measure, which would have granted legal status to millions of undocumented immigrants, also included AgJobs, negotiated by the UFW and major grower associations. AgJobs would have let undocumented farm workers earn the right to permanently stay in this country by continuing to work in agriculture after passing criminal background and national security checks.
The 2007 comprehensive bill had flaws, including big expenditures on border enforcement and a wall. There were too few guarantees to protect guest workers in new industries, although the bill boosted safeguards for guest workers in agriculture.
The UFW had to make hard and painful choices during negotiations with historic adversaries -- the growers -- in exchange for legal standing freeing the undocumented from what makes them so vulnerable to abuse. If that proposal--which President George W. Bush pledged to sign -- had passed in 2007, would there still be 11 million undocumented immigrants living today in fear and constantly subjected to mistreatment? There would not be. Would Donald Trump and most Republican presidential candidates be appealing today to bigotry and rancor by scapegoating immigrants? Maybe, but he would have to deal with as many as a million new voters. The new president will also have to make painful choices, even as the Latino and immigrant vote, and the immigrant rights movement gain strength.
Sen. Sanders voted against the Kennedy-McCain bill and led the push for amendments that killed the measure because he opposed the conditions pushed by business interests for guest workers, he said during the Feb. 11 debate.
But Sen. Sanders' opposition to abusive guest worker programs didn't extend to a bill he cosponsored in 2011, to allow agricultural guest workers into his home state's largest farm sector -- Vermont's dairy industry. The federal H2A guest worker program only applies to seasonal farm industries; dairies offer year-round employment so they are excluded. But S. 852, cosponsored by Sen. Sanders, would have let dairies use H2A guest workers. There is no cap on the number of H2A farm workers and a well-documented pattern of abuse of agricultural workers in the H2A program. So the Sanders-backed measure could have let dairies replace all current domestic farm laborers with foreign guest workers -- with the same damaging impacts on wages and working conditions for both domestic and foreign guest workers Sen. Sanders decried in other industries.
Although Sen. Sanders opposes use of guest workers because of concerns over exploitation, is he willing to make an exception for guest workers in agriculture? Is this the same kind of exception that saw -- and still sees -- farm workers excluded from the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act guaranteeing minimum wages and overtime pay after eight hours, and other protections.
For the last five decades I've seen the farm labor system in this country chew up and spit out farm workers, denying them the most basic protections afforded nearly all other American workers. That is wrong.
The UFW respects Sen. Sanders' record on many things. But his contradictory immigration record troubles farm workers. We hope he can address these questions during the next presidential debates and town halls.
As the son of an immigrant--my dad came to this country at the age of 17 from Poland--I strongly support the concept of immigration reform, and I applaud the Judiciary Committee and all of those people who have been working hard on this legislation.
Sen Sanders is strongly in favor of protecting immigrants, undocumented or otherwise, who are already in this country. As he said:
There are a lot of provisions within this bill that I think should be strongly supported by the American people.
I strongly support a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country.
I strongly support the DREAM Act to make sure the children of illegal immigrants who were brought into this country by their parents years ago are allowed to become citizens.
I strongly support providing legal status to foreign workers on family farms. Dairy farmers in Vermont and the owners of apple orchards in my State have told me that without these workers, they would go out of business, and it is obviously true in many parts of this country.
However, Bernie has great concern with the legal immigration provisions included in both the 2007 and 2013 bills, namely the guest worker provisions, of which Bernie counts both low-skilled and high-skilled immigrants. As he stated in that same 2013 floor speech:
At a time when nearly 14 percent of the American people do not have a full-time job, at a time when the middle class continues to disappear, and at a time when tens of millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages, it makes no sense to me that the immigration reform bill includes a massive increase in temporary guest worker programs that will allow large corporations to import and bring into this country hundreds of thousands of temporary blue-collar and white-collar guest workers from overseas. That makes no sense to me.
He further stated:
Let me be very clear. The same corporations and businesses that support a massive expansion in guest worker programs are opposed to raising the minimum wage. They have long supported the outsourcing of American jobs. They have reduced wages and benefits of American workers at a time when corporate profits are at an all-time high. In too many cases, the H-2B program for lower skilled guest workers and the H-1B for high-skilled guest workers are being used by employers to drive down the wages and benefits of American workers and to replace American workers with cheap labor from abroad.
The 2007 Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill Vote
This concern about immigrants, both lower skilled H-2B and high-skilled H-1B workers, driving down Americans’ wages is a long standing concern of Sen Sanders. During the 2007 debate [ https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2007-05-22/pdf/CREC-2007-05-22-pt1-PgS6430-2.pdf#page=11 ] Sen Sanders outlined his concern with that Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill. He stated
Here is my concern about this legislation. At a time when millions of Americans are working longer hours for low wages and have seen real cuts in their wages and benefits, this legislation would, over a period of years, bring millions of low-wage workers from other countries into the United States. If wages are already this low in Vermont and throughout the country, what happens when more and more people are forced to compete for these jobs? Sadly, in our country today—and this is a real tragedy—over 25 percent of our children drop out of high school. In some minority neighborhoods, that number is even higher. What kind of jobs will be available for those young people?
What concerns me," Senator Sanders said, "are provisions in the bill that would bring low-wage workers into this country in order to depress the already declining wages of American workers. With poverty increasing and the middle-class shrinking, we must not force American workers into even more economic distress."
The 2013 Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill Vote
In 2013, Sen Sanders voted in favor of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill, despite the 2013 version containing similar guest worker provisions.
The bottom line is that I feel, very much, that a lot of the initiative behind these guest workers programs, a very large expansion of guest worker programs — H2B visas would go up to as many as 195,000, H1B to as many as 205,000 a year — is coming from large corporations who want cheap labor from abroad. Absolutely, there is a need for foreign labor. I recognize that in agriculture and certain areas in the high tech industry, you need foreign labor. But this is a massive effort to attract cheap labor, a great disservice to American workers.
Senator Sanders could have pointed out that labor unions, like the AFL-CIO, which were against the 2007 bill because of views similar to Sen Sanders’, had flipped and were now supporting the 2013 version [ http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/how-unions-went-from-border-hawks-to-immigration-doves ]. But he didn’t. To him, the guest worker program, both low-skilled and H1-B workers, still represented a “massive effort to attract cheap labor [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/05/25/this-is-a-massive-effort-to-attract-cheap-labor-why-sen-bernie-sanders-is-skeptical-of-guest-workers/ ]”. Ostensibly, Sen Sanders switched his vote in 2013 because he was able to get $1.5 billion in funding included that would provide jobs for 400,000 teenagers, an amount he himself said “doesn’t go anywhere far enough” [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvEfCsSFueg&feature=youtu.be&t=120 ]. Sanders’ willingness to trade his support for the 2013 immigration bill for the $1.5B funding for youth jobs further belies his claim of prohibitive concern about guest workers being taken advantage of. After all, demanding inclusion of this $1.5B in funding for jobs for teenagers in a seemingly unrelated bill about immigration, only makes sense if you think the immigration bill will affect jobs for young people, not if your concern is about corporations exploiting guest workers.
The cynic in me wonders if, as a veteran politician, he realized then what a disaster having two ‘no’ votes on comprehensive immigration reform would have been in a democratic presidential primary. Anyone wanting to run for President as a democrat would have realized the political necessity of finding a way to get to a ‘yes’ vote on that 2013 immigration reform bill. Indeed, only four months after that 2013 vote, Sen Sanders was openly discussing [ http://inthesetimes.com/article/15784/social_democracy_in_the_south ] the possibility of running [ http://crooksandliars.com/diane-sweet/bernie-sanders-considering-run ] for president in 2016.
Strange Bedfellows
Sen Sanders’ views that immigrant workers provide a downward pressure on American wages has made for strange bedfellows with him on that topic. This is not to say that he shares the racist views of the people mentioned below who praised his views. In fact, I know he is not a racist and that he abhors the racist positions of these people. But his views about immigrants driving down American wages are so far from progressive thought that they find praise among right wing anti-immigrant zealots. For example, in 2007 he appeared on nativist bigot Lou Dobbs’ show (video below [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38M9vfg4TPE (with comments)]) to argue against the comprehensive immigration bill, not out of concern about guest workers’ well-being, but about the fear of these immigrant workers driving down American wages. Sen Sanders made his case, while Lou Dobbs ranted about “socio ethnic-centric interest groups who really have very little regard for the tradition of this country , the values of this country or the constituents”.
“I admire Bernie’s passion and I notice that his immigration position is closer to mine than it is some of the presidential candidates on the Republican side,” King said in an interview with an Iowa radio station over this past summer. “He’s said ‘Let’s take care of American workers.’ I’m all for that.”
King went further:
“ and Bernie has taken some positions that I agree with. And part of his immigration policy is something that I agree with.”
The same year, House Republicans were playing politics on behalf of their friends in the Minutemen, the vigilantes who set up outposts at the border to hunt immigrants. Republicans even crafted a bill that played right into one of their right-wing conspiracy theories that the U.S. government was somehow guiding immigrants past the Minutemen camps in the desert.
And when Republican Representative Jack Kingston put forward an amendment restricting the Department of Homeland Security from revealing information about groups like the Minutemen – a pure fantasy driven by anti-immigrant pandering to the right-wing -- Representative Sanders took the bait, split with Latinos and progressives in Congress, and voted in favor of this absurd measure.
Why would Bernie possibly have voted for this? Even racist former Rep Tom Tancredo was shocked [ http://www.buzzfeed.com/evanmcsan/in-2006-bernie-sanders-voted-in-support-of-an-immigration-co ] to have learned that Bernie voted in favor of that amendment — “I certainly would never have expected it”, he said. Senator Sanders campaign could only say [id.] that the amendment was “a meaningless thing” when asked about it.
Furthermore, Sanders’ endorsers Robert Reich and MoveOn.org made a video (see below [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KR3JyVg7VzU (with comments)]) last year combating some of the myths about immigration spewed by Donald Trump. Reich states that we need more immigrant workers and that immigrants do not take away Americans’ jobs. Bernie Sanders’ restrictive immigration views would seem to be out of step with Reich’s, and, on the narrow point about immigrants lowering American wages, alarmingly closer to Trumps’ than to progressive thinking.
As an immigrant myself, and coming from a family of immigrants, immigration reform is personal to me. I have no doubt that a President Sanders would work to improve the lives of immigrants already in the country, including making a pathway to citizenship, enacting the DREAM act and working to end deportations. But quite frankly, I also have no doubt he views efforts to increase legal immigration with deep suspicion, and even outright hostility.
His record on immigration issues isn't a good one.
By Maria Cardona Feb. 19, 2016, at 1:30 p.m.
On Saturday, Nevada will hold the first of its two presidential caucuses. When campaigning here, candidates would be wise to remember that this state, with its Spanish speakers and immigrant labor, its majority-minority youth and growing Latino communities, looks a whole lot like a future version of America.
The Nevadans I know want a candidate who welcomes these changes, someone who can build on President Barack Obama's strong immigration efforts. For Nevadans, demographics go deeper than documentation, and as America becomes more diverse we ask that the next president work to help all Latino families.
Clearly, Republican candidates want to roll back immigration reform, build a wall and the front-runners want to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants. But a Democratic hopeful, Sen. Bernie Sanders, has his own mixed record on the issue. In favoring American laborers over their immigrant counterparts, and in focusing solely on economics, Sanders has at times defied progressives, earning praise from those on the right whose policies have made things harder for immigrants instead.
In a speech on the Senate floor about the vote, Sanders said the bill was about "bringing into this country over a period of years millions of low-wage temporary workers with the result that wages and benefits in this country, which are already going down, will go down even further." This is a Republican talking point that has been used to oppose comprehensive immigration reform.
This issue goes beyond supply and demand. With his narrow focus on American workers, Sanders has taken stances on immigration different from those that would help the immigrant and Latino communities who lose sleep at night afraid of hearing a knock on their door.
Sanders’ campaign proposals may check the right boxes now, but historically, in his efforts to help Americans born here, he has sometimes made things harder for many immigrants and their families, those living in the shadows, arduously contributing to our society, but living in fear. Latino and immigrant voters need to decide whether that is deserving of their support.
Clinton campaign contrasts Sanders's stories on 2007 immigration vote
Getty Images
By Ben Kamisar February 19, 2016, 04:08 pm
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's campaign is suggesting rival Bernie Sanders's current explanation for his vote against a 2007 immigration reform bill is different from what he said at the time.
Sanders said during Thursday's Democratic town hall on MSNBC that the exploitation of guest workers was a "major reason" why he decided to vote against the bill. The reasoning echoed what he has said on the campaign trail in recent months.
But the Clinton campaign is highlighting a press release [ http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/immigration-bill-defeated (next item below)] Sanders sent out in June 2007, which is still available online. The statement makes no mention of exploitation but instead frames the guest workers as harmful to the wages of U.S. workers.
"At a time when the middle class is shrinking, poverty is increasing and millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages it makes no sense to me to have an immigration bill which, over a period of years, would bring millions of ‘guest workers' into this country who are prepared to work for lower wages than American workers. We need to increase wages in this country, not lower them," Sanders says in a quote from the release.
The candidates are sparring over immigration and other issues that affect minorities ahead of Saturday's Nevada caucuses.
Clinton once led by large margins in the state, propelled by big leads with minority voters, but polling has shown Sanders catching up.
During Thursday's town hall, Sanders noted that he voted against that 2007 bill "in agreement with groups like LULAC, one of the large Latino organizations, in agreement with the AFL-CIO."
"Included in that legislation was a guest worker provision which organizations saw as almost akin to slavery," Sanders said.
"And many of those workers were terribly, terribly exploited. And that was the major reason that I voted against that. I don't want to see workers in this country exploited."
Bernie Sanders United States Senator for Vermont Press Release Thursday, June 28, 2007
The Senate rejected an immigration reform package that Senator Bernie Sanders opposed because it would have driven down wages and benefits for U.S. workers by letting employers recruit lower-paid foreign guest workers. "At a time when the middle class is shrinking, poverty is increasing and millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages it makes no sense to me to have an immigration bill which, over a period of years, would bring millions of ‘guest workers' into this country who are prepared to work for lower wages than American workers. We need to increase wages in this country, not lower them," Sanders said after senators voted 53-to-46 to set aside the legislation.
"We need an immigration policy which addresses the very serious problems of illegal immigration, continues our historic support of legal immigration, but protects the shrinking middle class."
By Daniel Kushner 02/09/2016 03:04 pm ET | Updated Feb 10, 2016
I began this campaign as a Hillary fan who respected Bernie Sanders and what he had to say about the economy and U.S. politics. I'm not surprised that this message has appealed to so many people, both those I know, and those I don't, in part because it's something which has gotten less attention than it has deserved, even if there are problems with elements of it.
In my calmer moments, I think that the Sanders campaign might represent a positive shift for the discussion of certain topics within the Democratic Party and the broader populace. Listening to him over the past year, however, I began to increasingly believe that for all the positive things his campaign represents, it also represents something deeply problematic: a fetishization of not knowing.
For me, this probably began with the discussion over foreign policy. I spend a decent amount of my time being horrified by the genocide in Syria, and how the instability that seems to be pouring out of that country may produce horrifying outcomes in states ranging from Turkey to Lebanon to Western Europe. I think there is space for multiple proposals about what we do now, and though I'm sympathetic to much of what Obama is doing and Hillary is suggesting continuing, I would have thought a liberal candidate for the presidency would have been talking about the need for increased foreign aid, or greater openness to refugees, or, well, something.
Instead, his primary comment on international affairs seems to be to reiterate and reiterate and reiterate that he had voted against the Iraq War in 2002. When forced to discuss other matters, he quickly bobbles. In the most recent debate, he seemed unsure about whether North Korea has a single or multiple dictators, and then managed to take both positions in a matter of minutes about whether the U.S. should negotiate without preconditions with other countries.
Now, Bernie Sanders is not the first candidate to not be an expert on even something as significant as foreign affairs. But what's deeply troublesome here is how he seems to have no respect for knowledge on it. It's visible in the almost-disdain he expresses for Hillary Clinton's experience on the matter. She had been Secretary of State for four years, but he has been in Congress for more than two decades. Exactly when does he think he'll have sufficient experience to speak fluently on foreign policy?
Even more disconcerting has been his apparent unwillingness to find advisers to help bridge the gap. It was only 15 years ago that Democrats mocked George Bush Jr.'s disinterest in foreign policy; he at least had the courtesy to be embarrassed by what he didn't know, and hired a staff, including professors of international relations and former Secretaries of Defense, to help. They proved to provide much terrible advice, but there was at least an effort to appear informed. Sanders hasn't done so.
But foreign policy isn't a crucial part of the Sanders campaign. Health care, though, is. Five years ago, Sanders proposed a universal health care bill that failed to get any co-sponsors. When he was reticent to provide information about what plan he was proposing now, the Clinton campaign started to criticize that bill. In response, Sanders withdrew his support of that bill, meaning it now had zero support. Shortly before the Iowa caucuses, Sanders proposed a new plan, which was written by Gerald Friedman, a professor of economics at U-Mass Amherst, whose research focused on the history of the labor union movement in France and the U.S. The plan would cost in the area of $14 trillion over 10 years (for reference, Obamacare was projected to cost in the vicinity of $800 billion over that same time period).
Kenneth Thorpe, a professor of health policy at Emory, whose research is on the cost of medical programs, and has advised the Democrats in the Vermont State Legislature when they sought to pass a single-payer plan, noted that the plan promised savings in the area of $324 billion a year from prescription drugs, which would have been impressive, considering Americans spend only in the vicinity of $305 billion a year.
When the Sanders campaign was presented with this disparity, as well as others, they quickly attacked Thorpe, and then changed their numbers to acknowledge $444 billion per year of increased costs, but also, instantaneously, magically, found the same number of savings elsewhere. This is not how somebody tries to suggest a serious effort to improve the deeply problematic health care plan in the U.S.
This disrespect for expertise is also manifest in how Sanders speaks about the establishment. Recently, when Planned Parenthood and the Human Rights Campaign endorsed Clinton, he referred to their leadership as being parts of the establishment. They are, to be sure, members of an establishment. They're members of the liberal Democratic establishment that has been promoting, sometimes intelligently and other times not, sometimes effectively and other times less so, liberal ideals for decades.
For efforts to promote human rights, these are the people one would expect to have the most understanding of how to do so. One of the fascinating things about this campaign has been seeing how so many of those who should know Bernie Sanders the best, and have worked the hardest on what would appear to be his issues, have been so eager to oppose him. He spent more than a decade in the House; of the 188 Democrats there now, two endorsed him, and 157 endorsed Hillary.
Sanders serves in the U.S. Senate with 45 Democratic-voting colleagues; not only have none endorsed him, but 39 have endorsed Hillary. Sanders has been a significant figure in Vermont politics for four decades. Patrick Leahy, his fellow Senator from Vermont, endorsed Hillary. The incumbent governor of Vermont, and two former Democratic governors of Vermont, endorsed Hillary.
Sanders has focused on issues relating to the labor movement; virtually every single major labor union has endorsed Hillary Clinton. For contrast, in the 2008 campaign, many of these people waited until a few primaries had been held before endorsing. This time, there is almost glee in their desire to make their views known.
Again and again, when the Sanders campaign learns of these moves, the emphasis is on their being parts of the establishment. And they are parts of an establishment. But if this establishment is the enemy, then on whose side is he?
Breaking up the big banks is a crowd pleaser, but it wouldn't fundamentally change Wall Street. Here are three ways he can make his plan a real threat to the finance industry.
By Mike Konczal January 28, 2016
In advance of the Iowa primary, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have duked it out over who would tackle Wall Street best. Clinton’s reform package aims wide, extending scrutiny from the banks to smaller players who played an outsized role in the financial crisis. Sanders—who, unlike Clinton, has rejected Wall Street money—actually takes a narrower approach that favors a popular but insufficient strategy to “break up the banks.” If Sanders wants to challenge modern finance, he should incorporate and surpass Clinton’s plan.
It’s helpful, first, to understand why many find Sanders’s approach insufficient. Sanders wants to break up the banks in two ways: by size and by line of business. Picture a horizontal cut making the largest banks smaller. Then picture a vertical cut separating ordinary banks from the investment banks. That would be the reintroduction of the Depression-era Glass–Steagall Act, which is at the core of Sanders’s proposed reforms.
However, the financial crisis started with the failure of Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers. Neither of these were traditional banks, so Glass–Steagall wouldn’t have changed them. The panic created by those two failures spread through many other financial institutions, creating, for example, runs on money-market mutual funds. These, too, exist outside the traditional banking sector and would not be addressed by Sanders’s plan.
The tactic would also change the financial landscape less than many hope. The main policy tool proposed has been to cap the banks’ risky debt at 3 percent of the economy, or about $522 billion. That cap is larger than that of Bear Stearns, and not much smaller than Lehman’s $613 billion when it went bankrupt. A firm like Goldman Sachs would only have to downsize by about a third in order to make the cap—which would hardly change its power over markets and politics.
Because he views their primary sins as political—big banks wield big influence—Sanders focuses on making the banks smaller. But the left can and should change the way that modern finance shapes the economy directly.
Sanders could start by emphasizing the cushion that the financial sector needs to maintain in the event that times go bad. These cushions are called “capital requirements”; they limit how much banks can fund themselves with riskier forms of debt. It’s too easy right now for any financial institution, regardless of its structure or size, to quickly blow itself up with too much debt, destabilizing the economy. The Dodd–Frank Act already made an important start here: JPMorgan Chase slimmed down 6 percent based on the act’s initial requirements, and General Electric broke off its finance unit rather than comply. Building through Dodd–Frank is a perfect place to start.
Sanders also needs to address the “shadow banking” sector: short-term lending and borrowing in arcane financial markets like commercial paper and repo, which invite the risks of banking without any of the accountability. Reducing leverage and increasing requirements on these players is a necessary first step. These reforms would reduce risky activities across several kinds of institutions.
Finally, finance does bad things besides crashing our economy through risky derivatives. Since the “shareholder revolution” of the 1980s, Wall Street has pushed companies away from investment and toward high shareholder payouts. Corporations gave more than $1 trillion in buybacks and dividends to shareholders in 2014, largely to keep them happy and avoid takeovers. This far exceeds the roughly $200 billion these companies invested. Finance is sucking money out of productive enterprises rather than spurring investment in them. Rebalancing this power is essential for any left agenda.
Hillary Clinton is proposing reforms that address these problems, with a risk fee for debt and a focus on “short-termism” for investment. Republicans are likely to pay lip service to these issues, while stressing ways to weaken the progress that has been made. Sanders could immediately change the nature of this debate by proposing even stronger reforms, pointing toward a positive vision of finance.
Bernie’s bad accounting: Sanders is selling his followers a bill of goods on Hillary Clinton, Wall Street and the 2008 crash
Two-dimensional JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images
Editorial NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Sunday, February 7, 2016, 4:05 AM
In the cartoon world inhabited by Bernie Sanders, criminal Wall Street titans get ever richer by looting the fortunes of American workers, and nothing short of breaking up big banks will restore hope of justice.
Sanders’ Occupy-worthy storytelling is scaring up plenty of votes, many from millennials still suffering from the financial crisis that began in their childhood and shadows them still.
At the same time, the democratic socialist’s tale is unhinging Democratic politics from reality, in the way that Trumpian lunacy has often disconnected the Republican nominating contest from the facts on the ground.
Sanders doodled two strips of comic-book panels at Thursday’s debate with rival Hillary Clinton, whom he paints as a corrupted stooge of financiers for having accepted their contributions and opulent speaking fees.
Comic strip 1: Wall Street’s criminals would be hauled off in handcuffs, if only a President had the nerve to criminally convict and imprison them.
As one recent example, Sanders sees a conspiracy in a pending legal settlement between Goldman Sachs and the Justice Department and the New York and Illinois attorneys general. The investment bank will pay a hefty sum to close investigations into alleged misrepresentations in decade-old mortgage-securities dealings.
“Kid gets caught with marijuana, that kid has a police record,” inveighed Sanders. “A Wall Street executive destroys the economy (and gets a) $5 billion settlement with the government, no criminal record. That is what power is about. That is what corruption is about.”
Except that the Justice Department already investigated and found insufficient evidence to pursue criminal charges.
It is a measure of the anger abroad in the land that anyone believes this hooey. Plainly, U.S. attorneys like Manhattan’s Preet Bharara and state prosecutors like Manhattan DA Cy Vance would love to have bagged a top banking chief.
But the facts and the law just weren’t there — even with New York’s super-strong Martin Act.
Comic strip 2: Pliant politicians brought doom by allowing banks to get too big.
At the debate, Sanders obsessed about Glass-Steagall, a repealed Depression-era law that kept a firewall between banking and speculative investment.
“I helped lead the effort against deregulation,” Sanders harrumphed. “Unfortunately, we lost that. The result was the worst financial disaster since the Great Depression.”
Try again. Letting big banks grow may have worsened the crisis, but the immediate cause was too-risky financial engineering by entities that were beyond Glass-Steagall’s reach.
Punchline: As senator, Sanders voted in favor of a 2000 law that made such disastrous wheeling-dealing possible.
The crusty Vermont firebrand is selling his economically ill-informed legions a bill of goods.
On foreign policy, the issue that is generally considered your greatest weakness, I believe that you have consistently shown yourself to be responsible, inquisitive and level-headed. And you and Secretary Clinton have run campaigns which, a few stumbles aside, stand in such stark contrast to the GOP field that it is difficult to fathom how anyone could possibly consider any of them over either of you.
Senator Sanders, I like you. I admire you. Most of the time, I wish that we had 99 more senators just like you.
And I would, wouldn't I? I'm on the younger end of the likely voter spectrum. I'm male. I'm white. I'm liberal as hell. I'm the kind of voter that you should have a lock on.
But Senator, we have a problem, and it's a big one. When it comes to the specifics surrounding the core issue of your campaign, you have too often come across as either disingenuous or strangely removed from current reality.
What the plan that you and Sen. Paul have put forth does is, a) pander to low-information voters, and b) make the Federal Reserve's every decision subject to congressional pressure. What you are proposing, Senator Sanders, would set the Fed's independence [ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/why-the-federal-reserve-needs-to-be-independent/ ] back four decades and allow Paul Ryan to pressure it at every turn.
Even when I agree with your proposed policies, I am too often alarmed by your extreme departures from reality.
Of course, it should bring in some money -- a good deal, perhaps. Taiwan, Hong Kong, India, South Africa and South Korea currently raise tens of billions (combined, annually,) with the tax. And a group of ten European nations is now hoping that a similar tax might generate [ http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/dec/08/decision-financial-transactions-tax-june-eu ] as much as $15 billion annually, between them. (Good luck with that, say Italy and France.)
Senator, you're not going to pay for universal free public college with a Tobin tax.
But none of this holds a candle to the bizarre narrative you have consistently pushed around Glass-Steagall, your primary point of distinction from Secretary Clinton on finance. You have repeatedly insinuated, implied and said flat-out [ https://berniesanders.com/yes-glass-steagall-matters-here-are-5-reasons-why/ ] that the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which you tend to call a repeal of Glass-Steagall, caused the financial crisis.
The law had little if anything to do with the practices leading up to the crisis. It aimed, as you well know, to separate commercial from investment banking. You can support that policy or oppose it, with honest, pro-regulatory arguments on either side. I might even agree with you. But you cannot with a straight face blame the financial crisis on its absence.
I often pose the following question to critics who claim that repealing Glass-Steagall was a major cause of the financial crisis: What disasters would have been averted if Glass-Steagall was still on the books?
I've yet to hear a good answer. While mortgage underwriting standards were disgraceful, they were promulgated by banks and mortgage finance companies and did not rely on any new GLB powers. The dodgy MBS were put together and marketed mainly by free-standing investment banks, not by newly created banking-securities conglomerates. All five of the giant investment banks (Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Lehman Brothers, and Bear Stearns) got themselves into severe trouble without help from banking subsidiaries, and their problems certainly did not stem from conventional investment banking activities--the historic target of Glass-Steagall. Similarly, Wachovia and Washington Mutual died (and Bank of America and Citigroup nearly did) of banking diseases, not from entanglements with or losses imposed on them by related investment banks. In short, I don't see how this crisis would have been any milder if GLB had never passed.
If you had to pick a single government move that did more than any other to muck things up, it was probably this bill, passed by a Republican Congress and signed into law by lame-duck President Bill Clinton in December 2000. It effectively banned regulators from sticking their noses into over-the-counter derivatives like credit default swaps. There's no guarantee that regulators would have sniffed out the dangers in time. But banning them from even looking sent a pretty clear anything-goes message to OTC derivatives markets.
I'm not saying this to pin the blame on any one law, Senator. Certainly not to pin it on you. That would be absurd. I am merely pointing out that Glass-Steagall is an especially ridiculous boogeyman.
In fact, there is good reason to believe that Glass-Steagall would have made the crisis worse. The kind of combined institutions the law aimed to prevent weathered the financial crisis far better than the kind of independent investment firms it aimed to mandate.
The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act had little if anything to do with the current crisis. In fact, economists on both sides of the political spectrum have suggested that the act has probably made the crisis less severe than it might otherwise have been...
Deregulated banks were not the major culprits in the current debacle. Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and J.P. Morgan Chase have weathered the financial crisis in reasonably good shape, while Bear Stearns collapsed and Lehman Brothers has entered bankruptcy, to name but two of the investment banks which had remained independent despite the repeal of Glass-Steagall.
Observers as diverse as former Clinton Treasury official and current Berkeley economist Brad DeLong and George Mason University's Tyler Cowen, a libertarian, have praised Gramm-Leach-Bliley has having softened the crisis. The deregulation allowed Bank of America and J.P. Morgan Chase to acquire Merrill Lynch and Bear Stearns. And Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have now converted themselves into unified banks to better ride out the storm.
Sometimes, Senator, you really live up to your initials.
I realize that you're giving people easy answers to complicated problems because they respond to that better than wonky lectures about shadow banking. I am fully aware that three quarters of all readers checked out of this piece somewhere around the Tobin tax.
The problem is that you're talking to people who sense that something is wrong, are angry about it and want to know where to place the blame. You are giving them a cabal of boogeyman bankers, corporations and allegedly bought politicians to bear the brunt of that resentment. You're doing this through a fair degree of dishonesty, and the response of your supporters and campaign to any kind of reality check has thus far been to impugn the motives of impartial observers.
Bernie -- do you mind if I call you Bernie? That's bullshit, Bernie.
Senator, you are forming a mob of angry, misinformed people and then turning it on the likely Democratic nominee [ http://cookpolitical.com/story/9258 ]. That, Senator, is a dangerous and destructive game. Does your campaign honestly wonder [ http://www.buzzfeed.com/evanmcsan/the-bernie-bros ] why it has become synonymous with nasty online invective? If you mention the Bernie Bros online, fifty people fitting the profile pop up with abusive comments informing you that they don't exist. On the eve of the Nevada caucus, one of your supporters attempted to place [ http://www.reviewjournal.com/politics/caucuses-2016/attempt-place-review-journal-obituary-hillary-clinton-prompts-report-secret ] an obituary for Secretary Clinton in the Las Vegas Sun-Journal. Don't you think this all might have a little something to do with your "me against the corrupt establishment" bluster?
Meanwhile, anyone hoping to back up your claims will almost certainly be directed to your surrogate Robert Reich--whose website [ http://robertreich.org/ ] currently sports thirty-nine "above fold" links to purchase books targeted at leftist consumers. Your campaign is built on questioning the motives of the people who aren't trying to sell your supporters anything, Senator, while simultaneously directing them toward someone who is.
To be clear: I am not questioning Reich's sincerity. I am, however, pointing out how ridiculous it is, given the circumstances, for your campaign to behave as if the only honest, informed economists in the world are the ones acting as your surrogates.
Senator, I'm not an economist. But I know when someone is spouting nonsense because they think it's what I want to hear. If you want to know how that story ends, just take a look at the current Republican field.
Why young Democrats love Sanders and really don’t like Clinton
Students Molly Rose, Tim Pearson and Megan Roche explain why they are supporting Bernie Sanders for president at the University of New Hampshire, in r Durham, N.H., on Feb. 4, 2016. David Lightman - McClatchy
Student Rachael Moss tries to write a song expressing why she likes Bernie Sanders. Sitting at a table of Sanders supporters, she sang some verses at the University of New Hampshire. David Lightman - McClatchy
Emily Rice and Sarah King, Saint Anselm College students, campaign for Hillary Clinton in a Manchester neighborhood in New Hampshire on Feb. 6, 2016. David Lightman - McClatchy
They went overwhelmingly for him in Iowa
Like his independent spirit
Don’t feel the excitement about possible first woman president
By David Lightman February 8, 2016 1:00 AM
DURHAM, N.H. — To voters under 30, Bernie Sanders is one of them.
Forget Hillary Clinton. “She’s a corporate sellout,” said Emmy Ham, a senior international affairs and anthropology major at the University of New Hampshire.
And forget the notion that young women are eager to see Clinton president because of her gender. “There will be other opportunities for me to vote for a woman for president,” Ham said.
Sanders has surged among young people as few candidates have since the U.S. senator from Vermont was a college student in the turbulent 1960s. Sanders, 74, topped Clinton 84-14 [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/2016-election/primaries/iowa-entrance-poll/ ] among Democrats 29 and younger in Iowa’s Monday caucus. He’s got a 3-1 lead among those aged 18-29 in the latest NBCNews/WSJ-Marist New Hampshire poll.
Sanders has two important traits common to younger voters: He’s new and he won’t compromise his ideals.
Young voters see Clinton as part of another era. She’s been in the national spotlight 24 years, before most young people were born. “She’s been there their entire life, and she’s yesterday’s news,” said Andrew Smith, director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center [ http://cola.unh.edu/survey-center ]. “But no one knew who Bernie Sanders was until recently.”
In Sanders they see someone who stubbornly follows his own path. He pitches higher taxes and universal health care, initiatives long derided as woefully incompatible with Washington’s incremental, cautious ways of proceeding. He won’t take corporate contributions, and unapologetically promotes himself as a democratic socialist [ https://berniesanders.com/democratic-socialism-in-the-united-states/ ].
That’s not unlike the thinking of a young person, full of energy and confidence they can shove aside all those boulders of political resistance and end up changing the world. They see Sanders helping them fulfill those dreams, and they’re fascinated.
“He owns himself,” said Jacob Moss, a senior geography major at UNH. “He follows his own moral compass.”
And he follows it with the same uninhibited fervor as a college student.
“Hillary is a good candidate, but Bernie has more passion,” said Megan Roche, a sophomore English major at UNH.
Clinton’s forces insist she has appeal to younger voters. “She loves talking to young people,” said Joel Benenson, Clinton’s pollster [ http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/election/article58653393.html ]. Her supporters note she’s built her career working with younger people on a host of issues, such as easing the cost of college and women’s rights.
When Clinton campaigned door to door in Manchester Saturday, students from Saint Anselm College were waiting for her. “She’s the first person to say women’s rights are human rights,” said Emily Rice, a student from Saint Anselm College.
But she acknowledged that most young people she knows are Sanders backers. “People our age are very angry,” Rice said. “They don’t see a path forward, and Sanders has tapped into that.”
That’s easy to see on the University of New Hampshire campus. A Sanders for president table outside the food court in the Memorial Union building has constant traffic. “Feel the Bern” T-shirts are a popular fashion item. Fifteen traveled 37 miles to Concord at 12:30 A.M. Tuesday to await Sanders’ arrival from Iowa, and found students from other campuses waiting in a parking lot.
There’s no evidence of much, if any Clinton support There’s no table outside the food court and editors at the student newspaper were unaware of any organized effort.
The Sanders allure runs deep, fueled by several factors.
Students appreciate his views on the military. They see Clinton as part of the Obama administration team that’s had trouble controlling terrorism, and some cite her 2002 vote to authorize the war in Iraq. Clinton last week reiterated that vote was a mistake.
“I don’t support all-out war in the Middle East, and I do believe there’s a better chance that could happen with Clinton,” said Jacob Compagna, a freshman classic major.
Many of these students grew up in homes where parents came of age during or just after the Vietnam War. That means they protested, or were reluctant to back, mass American involvement. Emma Booth, a junior women’s studies major, said her parents are pacifists, helping drive her into Sanders’ camp.
Sanders also has a huge weapon that helps endear him to young voters – his plan to make public colleges and universities tuition free.
Gabrielle Greaves, a sophomore English major, has a brother entering college soon. Her family, she said, is “going to need a lot more money in the next two years.”
Clinton has a detailed program to help with tuition, largely by reducing interest rates on college loans. Not enough, said Greaves, explaining, “She just wants to pick up where Obama has failed.”
Who would pay for Sanders’ plans? “Top 1 percent,” said Tim Pearson, a sophomore women’s studies major. Sanders would raise the current top income tax rate, 39.6 percent, to 52 percent. The Tax Foundation found [ http://taxfoundation.org/article/details-and-analysis-senator-bernie-sanders-s-tax-plan ] that overall, Sanders’ proposed tax increases would raise $13.6 trillion over the next 10 years.
To young people, his willingness to shift the tax burden is another example of a gutsy approach. “I’ve never agreed with any politician as much in my life,” said Quincy Abramson, a freshman communications major, who added "Bernie Sanders is more progressive and more pro-woman."
Students feel empowered. Athena Valkanos contributes $3 a month to Sanders effort. She proudly notes that the average contribution nationwide during the last three months of 2015 was $27.16.
Not even the prospect of the first woman president deters the young voters. “Feminism is the belief in equality,” said Sarah King-Mayes, a freshmen who hasn’t chosen a major.
They grew up seeing women in powerful roles. “All my professors are women,” said Madeline Clemons, a sophomore nursing major.
The challenge for Sanders is to harness this energy at the polls, and that can prove difficult. Young people historically don’t turn out in big numbers. They often don’t feel the same self-interest as older voters with mortgages, debt and health care challenges.
And they see politics as ultimately frustrating them. They turned out for President Barack Obama in big numbers eight years ago, and many were disillusioned four years later. “People see polarization, so they get reluctant,” said Ham.
There is hope. Eleven percent of 17-to-29 year olds participated [ http://civicyouth.org/iowa-caucuses-2016/ ] in the Iowa caucus, down from 2008’s 14 percent, but enough to make a difference.
Reported CIRCLE, which studies youth voter trends, “Young people appear to be at least one of the keys to the very close Democratic results in Iowa.”
Noam Chomsky Says GOP Is 'Literally A Serious Danger To Human Survival’
ullstein bild via Getty Images
The MIT professor and noted author said "strategic voting" can keep Republican candidates away from the levers of power.
By Matt Ferner 01/25/2016 08:43 pm ET | Updated Jan 26, 2016
Noam Chomsky, the noted radical and MIT professor emeritus, said the Republican Party has become so extreme in its rhetoric and policies that it poses a “serious danger to human survival.”
“Today, the Republican Party has drifted off the rails,” Chomsky, a frequent critic of both parties, said in an interview Monday with The Huffington Post. “It’s become what the respected conservative political analysts Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein call ‘a radical insurgency’ that has pretty much abandoned parliamentary politics.”
Chomsky cited a 2013 article [ https://www.amacad.org/publications/daedalus/spring2013/13_spring_daedalus_MannOrnstein.pdf ] by Mann and Ornstein published in Daedalus, the journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, analyzing the polarization of the parties. The authors write that the GOP has become “ideologically extreme, scornful of facts and compromise, and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition.”
Chomsky said the GOP and its presidential candidates are “literally a serious danger to decent human survival” and cited Republicans' rejection of measures to deal with climate change, which he called a “looming environmental catastrophe.” All of the top Republican presidential candidates are either outright deniers, doubt its seriousness or insist no action should be taken [ http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/10/ultimate-climate-candidate-matrix ] -- “dooming our grandchildren,” Chomsky said.
The policies that the GOP presidential candidates and its representatives in Congress support, Chomsky argued, are in “abject service to private wealth and power,” despite “rhetorical posturing” of some, including House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.). GOP proposals would effectively raise taxes on lower-income Americans and reduce them for the wealthy.
Chomsky advised 2016 voters to cast their ballots strategically. He said the U.S. is essentially “one-party” system -- a business party with factions called Republicans and Democrats. But, he said, there are small differences between the factions that can make a “huge difference in systems of enormous power” -- like that afforded to the president.
“I’ve always counseled strategic voting, Chomsky said. "Meaning, in a swing state, or swing congressional district, or swing school board, if there is a significant enough difference to matter, vote for the better candidate -- or sometimes the least bad.”
Chomsky said if he lived in a swing state, he’d vote for Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton.
By no means should this be viewed as an endorsement of Clinton. Chomsky has been a vocal Clinton critic, saying her presidency would resemble that of President Barack Obama, who Chomsky has condemned [ https://chomsky.info/201309__/ ] for using drone strikes to kill individuals the president deems worthy of execution [ https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/the-assassination-complex/ ].
Regardless of who wins the Democratic nomination, Chomsky told Al Jazeera he'd cast his general election vote "against the Republican candidate” because there may be dire consequences to a GOP victory.
“The likely candidates are, in my opinion, extremely dangerous, at least if they mean anything like what they are saying,” Chomsky said. “I think it makes good sense to keep them far away from levers of power.”
The US academic tells Mehdi Hasan who he would vote for in the upcoming election.
30 Jan 2016 11:12 GMT
Renowned political theorist Noam Chomsky is often cited for his criticism of the US political system.
In the second of a special two-part interview, Chomsky sits down with Mehdi Hasan to discuss the US presidential election and the rise of Islamophobia.
The US academic says Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has the "best policies", but little chance of winning in a "mainly bought" election.
When asked if he would vote for presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton if he lived in a swing state, Chomsky says: "Oh absolutely... my vote would be against the Republican candidate."
Obama Insiders Say Clinton, Not Sanders, Is His Natural Heir
President Barack Obama is seen in an armored vehicle while arriving at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Jan. 25, 2016, in Bethesda, Maryland. Photographer: BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images
Former staffers to the president weigh in on which candidate's campaign better resembles Obama's in 2008.
While Obama didn't elaborate, former top aides weren't reticent to say they view Hillary Clinton—not the insurgent Vermont senator whose rhetoric has drawn comparisons to Obama—as the natural heir to the president.
“Then-Senator Obama ran for President to tackle longstanding challenges that our country had debated for decades but was unable to resolve. A ‘politics as the art of the possible’ candidate,” Ben LaBolt, a national spokesman for Obama's 2012 campaign, said in an e-mail. “Senator Sanders has been in Congress for decades but hasn't tackled any major longstanding challenges—he's been too busy shouting his point of view across the aisle with few results.”
Jon Favreau, who worked on the Obama 2008 campaign before becoming a speechwriter for the president, said Sanders' campaign “resembles Howard Dean's a lot more than it resembles Barack Obama's.” In key respects, he said, “Hillary is much closer to Obama than Bernie is.”
Obama “campaigned as an idealist in terms of the goals he articulated but a pragmatist when it came to the policies needed to reach those goals. And he had very, very detailed policies that were grounded in pragmatism,” said Favreau, who nevertheless praised Sanders as genuine. “Obama has always believed it's more important to take action that actually makes a difference now and improves people's lives instead of settling for the satisfying purity of moral indignation.”
Obama and Sanders used transcendent rhetoric to inspire millions of progressives, particularly younger voters. But unlike Sanders' ambitious proposals, which rely on a “political revolution,” Obama's policies were center-left and rooted in political reality, the former staffers said. Where Obama proposed to help the uninsured and those with preexisting conditions, Sanders proposes to replace private insurance with a single-payer system. Where Obama vowed to protect consumers from predatory banking practices, Sanders says he would break up the largest financial institutions.
Obama “certainly championed progressive policies, first and foremost his opposition to the Iraq war, but I think part of his appeal stemmed from the fact that he is pragmatic and had a history of working across the aisle in the Illinois state senate,” said Tommy Vietor, a former Obama 2008 campaign aide and spokesman for the National Security Council. “I think the tone of the Sanders campaign and Obama’s 08 race are different.”
Idealism vs. Pragmatism
Where Clinton excels at pragmatism and Sanders excels at idealistic rhetoric, Obama's unique talent was to meld both.
Jared Bernstein, a former economist in the Obama White House, said Clinton “seems like more of an incrementalist based on her platform versus Bernie's platform. But I don't know how Bernie Sanders would govern. ... When I hear Bernie Sanders say the things he says I think that's tremendously inspirational, I see where that's coming from, but I'd also like to hear Plan B.”
By contrast, former Obama aides see a pragmatism to Clinton's approach, borne by her mix of executive and legislative experience, that reflects the president's own vision. While Obama veterans have praise for Sanders, some believe the pragmatic streak makes Clinton a better fit to govern in a political reality that would require grinding out incremental victories though legislation that will be constrained by a likely Republican-run House, and executive actions.
“In terms of approach to governing, clearly Secretary Clinton is closer to the president,” said Anita Dunn, a top policy and communications aide to Obama's 2008 campaign who went on to serve as White House communications director. “The president aims big, pushes as much as he can to get as much as he can, but at the end of the day he's willing to accept that he may need to compromise.”
The campaign arcs also have some differences. By this point, Obama picked up endorsements from powerful party actors—the so-called invisible primary that political scientists say is historically critical in nominating contests—such as Ted Kennedy, then-Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, and Senator Claire McCaskill. Now, Clinton is thoroughly dominating [ http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-endorsement-primary/ ] that contest with hundreds of endorsements from lawmakers and governors, while Sanders has a mere two congressional endorsements, both in the House. Labor unions, which split [ http://www.gwu.edu/~action/2008/labor/laborendorse08.html ] between Obama and Clinton in 2008, are overwhelmingly behind Clinton.
Dunn called that a “huge difference” between 2008 Obama and 2016 Sanders.
David Plouffe, Obama's former campaign manager, “used to talk about building a permission structure so people felt they could support Barack Obama,” she said. “Senator Obama having the support of prominent party elders and politicians—established people—was a way of telling voters it was OK to be with him.”
The senator from Vermont has become Hillary Clinton’s chief rival in the contest for the Democratic nomination.
By Editorial Board January 27, 2016
SEN. BERNIE Sanders (I-Vt.) is leading in New Hampshire and within striking distance in Iowa, in large part because he is playing the role of uncorrupted anti-establishment crusader. But Mr. Sanders is not a brave truth-teller. He is a politician selling his own brand of fiction to a slice of the country that eagerly wants to buy it.
Mr. Sanders’s tale starts with the bad guys: Wall Street and corporate money. The existence of large banks and lax campaign finance laws explains why working Americans are not thriving, he says, and why the progressive agenda has not advanced. Here is a reality check: Wall Street has already undergone a round of reform, significantly reducing the risks big banks pose to the financial system. The evolution and structure of the world economy, not mere corporate deck-stacking, explained many of the big economic challenges the country still faces. And even with radical campaign finance reform, many Americans and their representatives would still oppose the Sanders agenda.
Mr. Sanders’s story continues with fantastical claims about how he would make the European social model work in the United States. He admits that he would have to raise taxes on the middle class in order to pay for his universal, Medicare-for-all health-care plan, and he promises massive savings on health-care costs that would translate into generous benefits for ordinary people, putting them well ahead, on net. But he does not adequately explain where those massive savings would come from. Getting rid of corporate advertising and overhead would only yield so much. Savings would also have to come from slashing payments to doctors and hospitals and denying benefits that people want.
He would be a braver truth-teller if he explained how he would go about rationing health care like European countries do. His program would be more grounded in reality if he addressed the fact of chronic slow growth in Europe and explained how he would update the 20th-century model of social democracy to accomplish its goals more efficiently. Instead, he promises large benefits and few drawbacks.
Meanwhile, when asked how Mr. Sanders would tackle future deficits, as he would already be raising taxes for health-care expansion and the rest of his program, his advisers claimed that more government spending “will result in higher growth, which will improve our fiscal situation.” This resembles Republican arguments that tax cuts will juice the economy and pay for themselves — and is equally fanciful.
Mr. Sanders tops off his narrative with a deus ex machina: He assures Democrats concerned about the political obstacles in the way of his agenda that he will lead a “political revolution” that will help him clear the capital of corruption and influence-peddling. This self-regarding analysis implies a national consensus favoring his agenda when there is none and ignores the many legitimate checks and balances in the political system that he cannot wish away.
Mr. Sanders is a lot like many other politicians. Strong ideological preferences guide his thinking, except when politics does, as it has on gun control. When reality is ideologically or politically inconvenient, he and his campaign talk around it. Mr. Sanders’s success so far does not show that the country is ready for a political revolution. It merely proves that many progressives like being told everything they want to hear.
moderator Chris Cuomo presented Bernie Sanders with what has been a common complaint about his presidential campaign: Sanders’s relentless focus on income inequality, in this campaign and through his career, raises the question of whether he is prepared to address the full spectrum of issues faced by a president. But there is a deeper problem with Sanders’s vision of American politics. It is not just that he has trouble talking about issues other than the redistribution of income; it’s that he has trouble conceptualizing those issues in any other terms. His rigidly economistic frame of mind prevents Sanders from seeing the world as it is.
The phrase Sanders invokes constantly, and which distinguishes him from Hillary Clinton and other Democrats not merely in degree but also in kind, is “political revolution.” The political revolution is the secret sauce. When presented with any concrete obstacles that would stand between him and his desired policy outcomes, Sanders brings up the revolution, which will transform the world he inhabits into the one he desires. One questioner at the town hall asked how Sanders proposes to pass his left-wing economic program, given “the likelihood that Republicans will win control over at least one house of Congress.” This poses a massive obstacle, given the twin facts of a map [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/01/26/can-bernies-revolution-break-the-gop/ ] that requires Democrats to win Republican-leaning districts in order to gain a majority and polarization so deep that almost all voters [ http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/11/politics-where-nobody-changes-their-mind.html ] now choose the same party up and down the ballot. How to get around these obstacles? Sanders again brought up (this time, without using the term) the revolution:
In my view, you have a Congress today that is much more worried about protecting the interest of the wealthy and the powerful and making sure they get campaign contributions from the wealthy and the powerful.
If we are serious about rebuilding the American middle class, if we are serious about providing paid family and medical leave to all of our people, if we are serious about ending the disgrace of having so many of our children live in poverty, the real way to do it is to have millions of Americans finally stand up and say, enough is enough, for people to get engaged in the political process, to finally demand that Washington represent all of us, not just a handful of very wealthy people.
Note that Sanders, asked about Republican opposition to his proposals, defined that opposition as “protecting the interest of the wealthy and the powerful.” It is certainly true that fealty to the interests of the rich heavily colors Republican policy. But Sanders is not merely presenting corruption as one factor. It is the entirety of it. Likewise, Sanders has difficulty imagining any reason other than corruption to explain disagreements by fellow Democrats, which he relentlessly attributes to the nefarious influence of corporate wealth. One does not have to dismiss the political power of massed wealth to acknowledge that other things influence the conclusions drawn by Americans who don’t share Sanders’s full diagnosis.
In reality, people have organic reasons to vote Republican. Some of them care more about social issues or foreign policy than economics. Sanders would embrace many concepts — “socialism,” big government in the abstract, and middle-class tax increases — that register badly with the public. People are very reluctant to give up their health insurance, even if it is true that Sanders could give them something better.
What’s more, the interests of the wealthy do not cut as cleanly as Sanders indicates. It’s true that business and the rich tend to oppose parts of his program like higher taxes on the rich, more generous social insurance, and tougher regulation of finance. But the Obama administration’s stimulus encountered intense Republican opposition even though it did not pose a threat to any business interests. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce even endorsed [ http://prospect.org/article/chamber-commerce-and-stimulus ] the stimulus, which profited business both directly (by pumping billions into contracts for projects like infrastructure) and indirectly (by goosing public demand for its members’ products). That did not stop 100 percent of House Republicans from opposing it. Nor did the unified opposition of the business lobby dissuade Republicans from holding the debt ceiling hostage in 2011, or persuade them to pass immigration reform in 2013. Sanders currently proposes a massive infrastructure program, which would make lots of money for the construction industry. Clearly, subservience to big business only goes so far in explaining Republican behavior.
The depiction of conservatism as a mere cover for greed is a habit Sanders indulges over and over. Donald Trump’s appeal, in Sanders’s telling [ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/why-bernie-sanders-thinks-he-can-win-donald-trump-supporters/ ], has nothing to do with xenophobia or nationalism: “They're angry because they're working longer hours for lower wages, they're angry because their jobs have left this country and gone to China or other low-wage countries, they're angry because they can't afford to send their kids to college so they can't retire with dignity.” Sanders does not explain why this economic security has manifested itself almost entirely among white voters when minorities are suffering the same conditions. He simply assumes Trump has converted economic frustration into a series of pseudo-concerns, and rather than deal with those beliefs, Sanders proposes instead to convert them back into their original form: “I think for his working-class and middle-class supporters, I think we can make the case that if we really want to address the issues that people are concerned about ... we need policies that bring us together that take on the greed of Wall Street, the greed of corporate America, and create a middle class that works for all of us rather than an economy that works just for a few.”
It is not only Republican voters whose ideas Sanders refuses to grapple with. Here he is in the previous debate [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/01/17/the-4th-democratic-debate-transcript-annotated-who-said-what-and-what-it-meant/ (along with a YouTube of that debate, at/see {linked in} the post to which this is a reply and preceding and {other} following)] explaining Republican climate-science denial: “It is amazing to me, and I think we'll have agreement on this up here, that we have a major party, called the Republican Party, that is so owned by the fossil-fuel industry and their campaign contributions that they don't even have the courage, the decency to listen to the scientists.” It is surely true that fossil-fuel contributions have encouraged the spread of climate-science denial. But the doctrine also appeals philosophically to conservatives. It expresses their disdain for liberal elites, and, more important, it justifies opposition to government action. Psychologists and social scientists have poured years of study into identifying the causes [ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/03/denial-science-chris-mooney ] of climate-science denial. One does not need to harbor even the slightest whiff of sympathy for climate-science denial to grasp that its causes run deeper than a cash transaction with Big Oil. Figures like George Will and Charles Krauthammer [ http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/05/krauthammer-george-will-attack-climate-science.html ] dismiss climate science because it is a way to maintain order within their mental world. Many other conservatives have social or professional reasons to believe, or at least to say, that Will and Krauthammer are serious intellectuals rather than loons spouting transparently preposterous conspiracy theories. There are deep tribal influences at work that cannot be reduced to economic self-interest.
Sanders’s story provides a comforting fable for his party. Not only are Democrats not hemmed in by the Republican hold on Congress, but they don’t even need to do the laborious work of persuading the political center to come to their side. They need only to rise up and break the grip of moneyed interests on the political system.
There are many reasons to doubt Sanders’s promise that he can transform American politics. Perhaps the most fundamental is that he does not actually understand how it works.
Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz have something in common. Both have an electoral strategy predicated on the ability of a purist candidate to revolutionize the electorate—bringing droves of chronic non-voters to the polls because at last they have a choice, not an echo—and along the way transforming the political system. Sanders can point to his large crowds and impressive, even astonishing, success at tapping into a small-donor base that exceeds, in breadth and depth, the remarkable one built in 2008 by Barack Obama. Cruz points to his extraordinarily sophisticated voter-identification operation, one that certainly seemed to do the trick in Iowa.
But is there any real evidence that there is a hidden “sleeper cell” of potential voters who are waiting for the signal to emerge and transform the electorate? No. Small-donor contributions are meaningful and a sign of underlying enthusiasm among a slice of the electorate, but they represent a tiny sliver even of that slice; Ron Paul’s success at fundraising (and his big crowds at rallies) misled many analysts into believing that he would make a strong showing in Republican primaries when he ran for president. He flopped.
Is there a huge core of committed ideological conservatives who have not voted before because they had only “moderates” on the ballot? Other than the fact that no objective person could look at the policy positions of John McCain and Mitt Romney as moderate, there is no evidence; the only real parallel to draw on for the theory is Barry Goldwater in 1964. Important as voter identification and get-out-the-vote efforts are, they do not convince chronic non-voters to vote. And, of course, a truly purist ideological campaign would stir a clear counter-reaction on the other side, diluting its impact.
The more important question, in many ways, that flows from this theory is about governing. It is here that the Bernie Sanders approach needs more dissection. Let’s say Sanders is accurate enough that his nomination would lead to his election via a bump in turnout from young voters and other populists disgusted by inequality, the billionaire class privilege and the distorted campaign-money system. Let’s say that he survives the billion dollars [ http://www.vox.com/2016/2/3/10903404/gop-campaign-against-sanders ] that might be spent by the Koch brothers’ alliance, the business community, the Republican candidate, and the Republican Party to destroy him as an unreconstructed socialist who will raise everybody’s taxes.
What then? The odds that a Sanders victory would lead to a Democratic House or a majority of more than one in the Senate are very slim. House districts have grown in partisan tilt; there is no room at all for a Democratic landslide, and not much for significant gains. Democrats have a real chance, if they win the White House, to pick up the four seats needed to recapture a majority, but it would be a very heavy lift to shift that number to seven, eight, or 10. So Sanders, like Obama, would face a divided government. It would be a very different situation than Obama encountered when he first entered the White House, and more like what he faced after the first, disastrous midterm election in 2010. Sanders has made it clear that he would have an extraordinarily ambitious agenda, including Medicare for all, reinstatement of Glass-Steagall, free college for all, and sweeping campaign-finance reform just to start with, along with stiff tax increases to pay for it.
Republicans, no doubt, would have the same approach they had when Obama first got elected in a sweeping party victory, voting as a united parliamentary minority against every presidential initiative. They would offer the same rationale as they did when Obama won reelection while the GOP retained the majority in the House: If he won a mandate, they also won a mandate—and theirs was to block his.
So all of Sanders’s initiatives would start as non-starters. Here, his theory of election and governance comes into play. He would go to the public, a public disgusted with Washington and its corrupt ties to the billionaire class and to business, and force members of Congress to their knees, shifting the debate and the agenda his way.
One of the enduring themes of our democracy is that inscribed in the Capitol, a quote from Alexander Hamilton: “Here, sir, the people govern.” But the notion that public opinion governs the agenda or the actions of Congress is, at best, a stretch. Going over the heads of Congress has long been a staple of frustrated presidents, and it has almost never worked; see Bill Clinton on health care and George W. Bush on Social Security among other recent examples. And these days, with most congressional districts resembling homogeneous echo chambers, created by a combination of people sorting themselves geographically and the distortions of redistricting, national public opinion has limited bearing on congressional leaders. Talk radio, cable news, social media, and blogs mean more. And none of those outlets would be swayed or intimidated to create some huge populist uprising that would force Congress to bring up, much less pass, a sweeping populist agenda. The more Sanders pushed, the more there would be a sharp and vicious counter-reaction that would further tribalize the country.
Sanders as president would be left with two main options: reduce his goals to aim for more incremental progress, or adopt a defensive approach to keep Obama’s policies from being rolled back—exactly what he has condemned in Hillary Clinton’s approach to governance. And while Sanders has been a more effective lawmaker than Cruz (or Rubio, for that matter, as demonstrated by Rick Santorum’s embarrassing failure on Morning Joe to find one accomplishment for his endorsee) there is little evidence that he has or could build the kinds of relationships with other members of Congress, or find ways to move the now humongous boulder up the hill (or Hill) of a thoroughly dysfunctional governing process. And, of course, he would face the deep disappointment of the activists he has inspired.
Could Clinton do better? Yes. First, she has an entirely realistic understanding of where American politics are, something she would carry into the White House on the first day. Progress can be made, on health delivery, financial regulation, the tax system, energy and infrastructure, but it will be a series of incremental steps, a tenth or a quarter of a loaf at a time. Second, in her time in the Senate she showed an impressive ability to build relationships with her Republican colleagues; many of them privately praise her even as they will do their duty and condemn her through the campaign. And she knows enough about the executive branch to use its tools effectively early on to protect the Obama legacy and extend it a bit further. Some progressives, like Bill Press, have expressed disappointment with Obama’s failure to further their agenda; to one who has watched the lawmaking process up close and personal for more than four decades, his ability to move the ball in the face of challenges from his own party and Republicans, and in the face of huge headwinds from the conservative wind machine, has been extraordinarily impressive.
For better or worse—actually, very much for worse—America has a sharply divided and tribalized political system. There will be no sweeping landslide party victories for many years to come; most states, not to mention the overwhelming majority of congressional and state legislative districts, are distinctly red or blue. I would love to get all Americans voting, but there is no reason to believe that moving turnout from 50 or 60 percent to 95 or 98 percent would bring any profound change in policy direction because of a silent supermajority either on the left or the right, or across the populist divide. Presidents almost always face serious constraints on their agendas, with a handful of exceptions built around landslides driven by crises or events. No candidate now running will transform the system in 2016. But some candidates would have an easier time governing through the dysfunction. Ron Brownstein and others have noted [ http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/02/how-hillary-clinton-could-lose-by-winning/459846/ ] that facing that reality could seriously hamper Hillary Clinton in her outreach to voters demanding inspiration, not perspiration. That could well be true. But it also reflects her realistic understanding of the limits of American politics in this unfortunate day and age.
Bernie Sanders: Prolific Democratic Party fundraiser
Bernie Sanders rails against big money in politics, but has consistently helped and benefited from the Democratic Party fundraising apparatus
Sanders was listed as a co-host at a major Democratic fundraiser in each year between 2011 and 2015
By Eric Bradner Updated 1:15 PM ET, Mon February 8, 2016
Manchester, New Hampshire (CNN)—Bernie Sanders complained on the campaign trail Friday that dialing for dollars "affects your entire being."
What he didn't mention: The Vermont senator and presidential candidate is a prolific fundraiser himself and has regularly benefited from the Democratic Party apparatus.
In recent years, Sanders has been billed as one of the hosts for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee's retreats for the "Majority Trust" -- an elite group of top donors who give more than $30,000 per year -- at Martha's Vineyard in the summer and Palm Beach, Florida, in the winter. CNN has obtained invitations that listed Sanders as a host for at least one Majority Trust event in each year since 2011.
The retreats are typically attended by 100 or more donors who have either contributed the annual legal maximum of $33,400 to the DSCC, raised more than $100,000 for the party or both.
A Democratic lobbyist and donor who has attended the retreats told CNN that about 25% of the attendees there represent the financial sector -- and that Sanders and his wife, Jane, are always present.
"At each of the events all the senators speak. And I don't recall him ever giving a speech attacking us," the donor said. "While progressive, his remarks were always in the mainstream of what you hear from senators."
Sanders' political leanings were well known by the donors who attended the retreats. "Nobody was more surprised that Bernie was there than the donors were," said another Democrat who attended the retreats.
But Sanders maintains that members of Congress now spend far too much time making calls seeking campaign contributions -- or "dialing for dollars," he said during a speech at the New England Council's "Politics and Eggs" event Friday morning.
"That's what they do. And not only should members who are elected be working for the people, not raising money -- if you think you could simply divide your brain in half, if you're working on unemployment or health care and think, now I've gotta go out and raise money, it affects your entire being," he said.
Benefits from Democratic establishment
Sanders has been an Independent while in Congress, but has caucused with the Democrats since he was elected to the Senate in 2006, helping them maintain their majority for eight years.
Michael Briggs, a Sanders spokesman, said Sanders has "raised more money for the Senate Democrats than almost any other member of the Senate Democratic caucus" because he sees helping the party regain the majority as critical.
"He has in the past written letters and helped Senate Democrats elect Democrats. He thinks that's very important to the country," Briggs said.
He got a hand from the party in 1996, when Rob Engel, then the political director for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, pushed a Democratic contender out of the race for the House seat Sanders held as an independent.
In 2006, when Sanders ran for the Senate, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee pumped $37,300 into his race and included him in fundraising efforts for the party's Senate candidates.
The party also spent $60,000 on ads for Sanders, and contributed $100,000 to the Vermont Democratic Party -- which was behind Sanders even as he ran as an independent.
Among the DSCC's top contributors that year: Goldman Sachs at $685,000, Citigroup at $326,000, Morgan Stanley at $260,000 and JPMorgan Chase & Co. at $207,000.
During that 2006 campaign, Sanders attended a fundraiser at the Cambridge, Massachusetts home of Abby Rockefeller -- a member of the same family whose wealth he had one proposed confiscating.
Two years later, when then-Illinois Sen. Barack Obama was being nominated at the Democratic National Convention in 2008, Sanders was among the senators who met with Sen. Chuck Schumer's "Legacy Circle" donors who had given the legal maximum to the DSCC five years in a row or $500,000 over their lifetimes.
He paid dues to the DSCC, too, with his Progressive Voters of America political action committee cutting checks for $30,000 to the group during the 2014 election cycle.
Broken system?
Sanders told the "Politics and Eggs" crowd that he favors a public financing system for elections, eliminating campaign contributions entirely. But his presidential campaign, just as Clinton's and Barack Obama's in 2008 and 2012, has chosen to bypass that system, allowing Sanders to raise millions of dollars more.
He has repeatedly touted his campaign's vast online fundraising apparatus, which has pulled in 3.5 million individual contributions, averaging $27 apiece, Sanders said Friday.
Pressed by MSNBC moderator Chuck Todd on why he hasn't accepted public financing in Thursday night's debate, Sanders said the system as it exists now is "a disaster" and "very antiquated" because it limits spending in early-voting primary states.
"The way it is structured right now, if you make it all the way to California, you could do pretty well. But in terms of the early states -- Iowa, New Hampshire, the other states -- it just doesn't work," Sanders said.
Bill Clinton Accuses Bernie Sanders Of Living In A 'Hermetically Sealed Box'
Former President Bill Clinton let loose on Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) Sunday. Win McNamee/Getty Images
The former president stepped up his criticism of his wife's rival on Sunday.
By Amanda Terkel 02/07/2016 07:49 pm ET | Updated Feb 07, 2016
MILFORD, N.H. -- Former President Bill Clinton took the gloves off and laid into Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) Sunday, launching some of his most pointed attacks on his wife's Democratic presidential rival thus far.
"Hillary's opponent has a different view," Clinton said, declining to mention Sanders by name. "It's a hermetically sealed box. It's very effective. The system is rigged against you by the big banks, and both parties are in the thrall of the big banks. Anybody who takes money from Goldman Sachs couldn't possibly be president."
Clinton was particularly animated when referencing a CNN report [ http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/05/politics/sanders-democratic-fundraisers/ (the item just above)] about how Sanders has been a prolific fundraiser for the Democratic Party -- meaning he has hobnobbed with the millionaires and billionaires, including some in the financial sector, he regularly rails against.
Clinton said he "fell out of [his] chair" after reading the story, joking that Sanders "may have to tweak that answer a little bit, or we may have to get a write-in candidate."
Clinton on Sunday also accused Sanders' supporters of being sexist and attacking his wife's backers online.
"[Those] who have gone online to defend Hillary and explain why they're supporting her have been subject to vicious trolling and attacks," Clinton said, calling the comments "profane" and "sexist."
"Look, we don't want that crap," he said. "Anybody who is supporting me that is doing the sexist things is -- we don't want them. I don't want them. That is not what this campaign is about."
The Clintons and their daughter, Chelsea, are traversing New Hampshire in the final days before Tuesday's primary. Although Sanders currently leads in the polls, the state has traditionally been good to the Clintons, delivering a win for Hillary in 2008 and a second-place finish for Bill in 1992 -- an outcome that reenergized his campaign.
"I was headed for single digits. And through the strength of my personal friends and the incredible effort we made, and because I had a message that was based on you -- not the Republicans, not the press not the pundits but you -- I picked up like, I don't know, 12 or 14 points in three days. The rest is history," Clinton said. "Now, this is 1992 on steroids."
Bill Clinton rips Sanders backers' 'sexist,' 'profane' attacks
Bill Clinton is campaigning for his wife's presidential bid in New Hampshire
On Sunday, he spotlighted supporters of her opponent for what he called "sexist" attacks and harassment
By David Wright and Jeff Zeleny Updated 2:27 PM ET, Mon February 8, 2016
(CNN)—Bill Clinton lashed out at "sexist" and "profane" attacks on Hillary Clinton and her supporters by proponents of Bernie Sanders, and accused them of harassing those who don't back the Vermont senator's campaign or disagree with his policies.
Speaking in New Hampshire on Sunday, Clinton delivered an extended rebuke of the Sanders supporters, whom he said subject people who back his wife to "vicious trolling."
He described a progressive blogger who wrote a favorable column about the former secretary of state but was compelled to post it under a pseudonym out of fear of blowback from Sanders proponents.
"She and other people who have gone online to defend Hillary and explain -- just explain -- why they supported her have been subject to vicious trolling and attacks that are literally too profane often -- not to mention sexist -- to repeat," Clinton said.
And Clinton slammed Sanders and his backers for derisively labeling opponents as part of the "establishment" when they disagree.
"The online campaign is, 'anybody who doesn't agree with me is a tool of the establishment,'" Clinton argued.
The former president went on, "When you're making a revolution, you can't be too careful about the facts," drawing laughs. "You're just for me or against me."
Mike Briggs, spokesman for Sanders campaign, called Bill Clinton's comments "disappointing," in this statement to CNN.
"Obviously the race has changed in New Hampshire and elsewhere in recent days," Briggs said. "Bernie will continue to focus on his message -- that America has a rigged economy that sends most new wealth to the top and is held in place by corrupt system of campaign-finance. The voters in New Hampshire and in America deserve a campaign that focuses on the real issues."
"In public (they apologized). In private they sent an email out complaining, blaming the Democratic Party for leaving the keys in the car. 'All I did was drive it off,'" he joked. "And they raised a million dollars! That's pretty good. You got to give it to them."
"I tried to loot information from the other guy's computer and I raised a million dollars out of it," Clinton laughed.
And Clinton advised the audience to reject Sanders's broad attacks on Clinton and his simple outsider-versus-establishment argument.
"(My mother) told me Bill, any time someone tries to get you to stop thinking, they are not your true friend," he warned. "I just want you to think."
Clinton critical of 'worked up' Sanders supporters
The Rachel Maddow Show 2/8/16
Hillary Clinton, Democratic candidate for president, talks with Rachel Maddow about the state of her campaign, whether rumors of a coming staffing shake-up are true, and the latest flare-up between her supporters and the Sanders campaign over issues of sexism and civility. Duration: 9:51
Clinton on Republican attacks: 'They are afraid of me'
The Rachel Maddow Show 2/8/16
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton talks with Rachel Maddow about how the residual effect of years of Republican attacks is that many voters have a general feeling of distrust, and how she plans to address that in her campaign. Duration: 7:18
Clinton pursues plan of action for Flint, Michigan water crisis
The Rachel Maddow Show 2/8/16
Hillary Clinton, Democratic candidate for president, talks with Rachel Maddow about what she learned on her recent trip to Flint, Michigan and the plan she is helping to put together to try to get the needs of the people of Flint taken care of. Duration: 6:45
WASHINGTON, D.C. – PBS NewsHour hosted the sixth Democratic Presidential Primary Debate sanctioned by the Democratic National Committee on Thursday, Feb. 11, 2016, at 9 p.m. EST, at the Helen Bader Concert Hall in the Helene Zelazo Center for the Performing Arts on the main campus of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. PBS NewsHour co-anchors and managing editors Gwen Ifill and Judy Woodruff moderated.
Meet The Biggest Bernie Sanders Booster On The Internet
H.A. Goodman has little presence in traditional media, but appears on progressive shows like Free Speech TV's "Ring of Fire." Free Speech TV
As the national media largely dismissed Sanders' candidacy, bloggers like H. A. Goodman have found fans online by assuring supporters that the pundits are wrong. Win McNamee/Getty Images
Fantasy novelist-turned-political writer H.A. Goodman has gone viral with his complete certainty Sanders will win.
By Michael Calderone and Sam Stein 02/22/2016 07:33 am ET | Updated Feb 22, 2016
Over the past year, a series of blog posts boasting about the forthcoming presidency of one Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) have ricocheted across the Internet, achieving virality that would make most journalists blush.
The posts all rely on the same formula: self-assured headlines with predictive prose, usually placed on websites with a large liberal readership.
They're all the product of an upstart political writer whose work prior to the current election cycle included authoring two existential fantasy novels.
H.A. Goodman is the Bernie whisperer of the Internet.
Goodman has never met Sanders or attended one his rallies, but is unwavering in his support.
“I think that my outlook is refreshing for many readers, especially since I’m one of the few people out there telling voters that it’s alright to think critically without the blessings of MSNBC, Fox, or CNN,” Goodman said in an email. “The entire narrative this election cycle has been Hillary’s inevitability, and I provide an outlet for people to see that it’s Bernie, not Clinton or Trump, who’s positioned to win in 2016.”
But for all the attention he's grabbed in certain corners online, Goodman’s presence is barely felt in the traditional media. He doesn’t appear on network Sunday shows or cable news election panels and he isn’t widely known among mainstream political reporters and columnists. Some journalists closely covering the Democratic race said Goodman’s name rang a bell, but were otherwise unfamiliar with his work.
Goodman is better known among progressive writers, though not always in the most flattering way.
“I refer to him as the Baghdad Bob of the Bernie camp,” said Nation contributor Joshua Holland, in reference to the comical propagandist for the late Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein during the U.S. invasion.
Goodman, Holland said, doesn’t let “objective reality sway his vision of Bernie being the commanding frontrunner in this race for many, many months."
The quirky nature of Goodman's work makes it almost impossible to assess just how big an impact he actually has. An official with Hillary Clinton's campaign said he knew his byline but not much more. "Not a big HRC fan I believe," the official wrote. The Sanders campaign, for its part, doesn’t blast out Goodman’s laudatory columns, as it might if they came from The Washington Post or The New York Times. But an aide there confirmed that they are, at least, aware of and teased by his existence.
"I can't tell you how many times I've gone to click on a link with a great headline and seen his byline," said the Sanders aide.
That Goodman even got to this point is a testament to just how democratized the media universe has become.
A Los Angeles native, Goodman declined to say what, if anything, he does beyond writing or how he derives an income. His personal digital footprint is scant, with few details listed on Facebook (he's not nearly as big on Twitter [ https://twitter.com/HAGOODMANAUTHOR ], with about 3,300 followers ). An online biography [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/h-a-goodman/ ] notes he studied international relations at the University of Southern California and briefly worked at the U.S. Department of State's Foreign Service Institute.
From what could be gleaned online, Goodman's interest in politics seems to be relatively recent. He wrote two novels: Logic of Demons: The Quest for Nadine's Soul [ http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004ASOUYU ] (2010) and Breaking The Devil's Heart: A Logic of Demons Novel [ http://www.amazon.com/Breaking-The-Devils-Heart-Demons-ebook/dp/B007T0BDVE ] (2012). In an email, he described them as a series about "Hell being an underground corporation selling a nefarious ‘formula’ to human beings, with demons as salespeople and rogue angels as cosmic vigilantes." There was, he added, a screenplay "in the works at the moment."
Goodman wrote an op-ed [ http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Op-Ed-Contributors/What-if-they-opposed-a-synagogue ] in The Jerusalem Post in 2010 replying to critics of building a mosque near Ground Zero. But he really started pitching political publications in early 2014, writing first for The Hill and the Roanoke Times and Salon. He started writing for HuffPost in May 2014. Like other HuffPost blog contributors, Goodman is not paid for his work. He benefits from the large digital platform and can repurpose his writing elsewhere.
Salon editor-in-chief David Daley said his site has passed on some of Goodman’s pieces that felt too one-sided or over-the-top, but described others as “provocative” and said they “move the conversation.”
“I do think a lot of the debate around where Sanders voters will go if he doesn't get the nomination, and about how stridently some Sanders backers see the policy differences with Clinton, has, in some part, been driven by his pieces and the audience they achieve on social media,” Daley said.
"They certainly generate a lot of engagement and argument," he added.
Goodman chalks up his success to his ability to find angles missing in the mainstream media. He finds poll numbers [ http://www.quinnipiac.edu/images/polling/us/us02182016_Urpfd42.pdf ] that support the case that Sanders is better positioned to win and trumpets them for readers. "It's such a stark contrast from the mainstream, and the argument is backed up with so much information, that it goes viral," he explained.
From there, it's wash, rinse and repeat.
Though Goodman is now known as one of the biggest Bernie boosters on the Internet, he wasn't always gushing over the Vermonter. Rather, he took a circuitous route, pushing other candidates who either fizzled out or declined on a run before settling on Sanders.
In an email, Goodman chalked up the Paul column as a "mistake." And he made clear that his dalliance with other Democratic candidates was more about a disgust with Clinton than a love for them. "I’m never voting for a person who accepts money from prison lobbyists, runs a racist 3 a.m. ad against our nation’s first African American president, advocates a ‘neocon’ foreign policy, or was silent on Keystone XL, so I’m never voting for Clinton," he said over email.
Goodman’s first pro-Sanders article appeared in June 2015 after he came to view the senator, in his words, as a "once in a lifetime opportunity." With that inaugural post -- the one liked 730,000 times on Facebook -- Goodman struck gold. And then he kept digging.
In his writing, Goodman has suggested a correlation between popularity on Facebook and support at the polls -- the virality of his posts serving as validation of his personal political wishes. He also discounts or ignores evidence that runs counter to the idea that Sanders is destined for the nomination and oversells that which confirms it (such as general election poll numbers).
There is, in short, not much nuance and quite a bit for polling experts to quibble with.
But given the national media’s dismissal of Sanders’ chances last summer, Goodman can’t be faulted for taking a victory lap.
“It’s funny how people worship at the altar of poll numbers, even though Clinton had the same poll numbers in 2008 and her leads are slipping faster today than eight years ago,” Goodman said. “I think people who enjoy my viewpoint understand that polls today serve a purpose, and that purpose isn’t only to try and reflect public sentiment.”
“Several months ago, people thought I was crazy for being so vocal about Bernie winning the presidency,” he added. “Now, since media pundits have noticed a repeat of 2008, many observers have shifted to my vantage point, but only after media changed the narrative.”
Still, Goodman said he’d “only feel vindicated” when Sanders is sworn in as president.
And then?
"I'll make certain that his political revolution continues,” he said, “especially by making sure that President Sanders fulfills the promises he's made to the black and Latino communities, in addition to helping elect progressives to Congress."
Democratic presidential candidate and Senator Bernie Sanders is silhouetted as he speaks at a campaign rally at UMass Amherst in Amherst, Mass., Feb. 22, 2016. Photo by Brian Snyder/Reuters
By Alex Seitz-Wald 02/22/16 11:58 PM—Updated 02/23/16 08:19 AM
Bernie Sanders’ path to the Democratic presidential nomination, always a longshot, counted on wins to beget more wins, so Saturday’s loss in Nevada is a major setback. But facing critics saying the race is essentially over, the candidate and his top aides insist they can get their groove back.
“What this is about is a slog, if I may use that word, state by state by state,” Sanders told reporters at a press conference in Boston Monday, insisting that “Y-E-S” he can still win. “So for the media, please do not come to me state by state and ask, ‘Is this the end of the world?’”
Still, Sanders wanted a win so badly in Nevada that he never wrote a concession speech, according to aides, and the night before the caucuses he said that historians would mark Nevada as the beginning of his promised political revolution. That revolution has been delayed indefinitely after Saturday’s contest, which offered perhaps his best chance to shatter the theory that he can’t win minority voters.
Right now, a lot would have to go right for Sanders and wrong for Clinton for him to win the nomination. But Sanders’ candidacy, as he reminded reporters Monday, “is about more than electing a president, this is about a political revolution.”
Hillary Clinton easily defeats Bernie Sanders in South Carolina primary February 27, 2016 [...] Sanders was in the air when the race was called for Clinton, flying from one campaign stop in Texas to another in Minnesota. “In politics, on a given night, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Tonight we lost,” Sanders told reporters after getting off his chartered jet in Rochester, Minn., where he was staging an evening rally. “I congratulate Secretary Clinton on her very strong victory. Tuesday, over 800 delegates are at stake, and we intend to win many, many of them.” [...] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/hillary-clinton-easily-defeats-bernie-sanders-in-south-carolina-primary/2016/02/27/6e9787fe-dd18-11e5-891a-4ed04f4213e8_story.html [with embedded videos, and comments]
Hillary Clinton’s Winning Numbers in South Carolina Suggest Sweep in South FEB. 27, 2016 After winning South Carolina’s Democratic primary eight years ago, Senator Barack Obama declared that “after four great contests, we have the most votes, the most delegates, and have the broadest coalition for change.” Tonight it is his former opponent, Hillary Clinton [ http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/us/elections/hillary-clinton-on-the-issues.html ], who can now make the same claim. She has won South Carolina in a rout, 73.5 percent to 26 percent, exceeding Mr. Obama’s own 29-point victory in 2008 [ http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/26/us/politics/26cnd-carolina.html ]. She did it the same way that Mr. Obama did: with overwhelming support from black voters, who favored Mrs. Clinton over Bernie Sanders [ http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/us/elections/bernie-sanders-on-the-issues.html ] by a stunning margin of 87 to 13, according to updated exit polls — a tally that would be larger than Mr. Obama’s victory among black voters eight years earlier. Black voters represented 62 percent of the electorate, according to exit polls, even higher than in 2008. The result positions Mrs. Clinton for a sweep of the South in a few days on Super Tuesday and puts the burden on Mr. Sanders to post decisive victories elsewhere. If he does not — and the polls, at least so far, are not encouraging — Mrs. Clinton seems likely to amass a significant and possibly irreversible lead. [...] http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/upshot/hillary-clintons-winning-numbers-in-south-carolina-suggest-sweep-in-south.html [with comments]
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Hillary Clinton Delivers Rousing Speech Following South Carolina Primary Victory
Columbia, S.C. — As the great poet Shawn Carter (aka Jay-Z) once said, “On to the next one.”
That’s the message supporters of Bernie Sanders were left with Saturday night after the senator from Vermont suffered a widely expected but decisive loss to Hillary Clinton in South Carolina’s Democratic primary.
At a hastily organized watch party at Pearlz Oyster Bar in Columbia, roughly 100 of Mr. Sanders’s fans watched the election results roll in — or simply opted to ignore them. You might have expected the mood in the room to be downtrodden, but it was quite the opposite. The word that comes to mind is “defiant.”
Shortly before the polls closed, the upstairs room at Pearlz was sparsely populated by supporters, campaign staff and TV crews. But the crowd grew as the night wore on, even as Mrs. Clinton’s victory looked more and more certain. As the crowd grew in size, the mood at the bar grew more and more buoyant.
The mood was an apt metaphor for Mr. Sanders’s performance in the Democratic primary writ large; the more that cable news talking heads proclaimed the race to be Mrs. Clinton’s to lose, the more this crowd felt the Bern.
As The Associated Press projected Mrs. Clinton the winner shortly after the polls closed, three campaign volunteers who had not previously met sat together in a booth. Tara George, the associate registrar at the University of South Carolina, was there with her teenage daughter. Megan Taylor, who showed up at the bar despite a sinus infection, is a sophomore at the university and leads the school’s Bernie Sanders student group. And Zach Friedell, an English teacher living in Germany, had come back to his home state to visit his parents, but stayed an extra two weeks to work on the primary campaign.
“I’m not fazed,” Mr. Friedell said. He noted that superdelegates are allowed to switch their commitment, and that as more people learn about Mr. Sanders, momentum will continue to build.
But he may have some work to do with African-American voters, who backed Mrs. Clinton over Mr. Sanders by roughly 6-to-1, according to exit polling.
Juanita Moore, 62, said that she wished fellow black voters had done more research into Mr. Sanders’s campaign platform before making up their minds and voting for a familiar name.
“Especially the rural areas, it was just a name that was in their heads, and that was what they were familiar with, and that’s what they went with,” she said. “If anybody really did their homework on Bernie Sanders, they would have automatically went his way.”
Earlier in the evening, multiple attendees complained about media outlets calling the race for Mrs. Clinton before all of the precincts reported their results. “I don’t know why people in South Carolina give up so fast,” a campaign volunteer who had traveled from California said. The volunteer, a white man, noted that only the “old black vote” from rural counties had come in at that point, adding, “Who cares?” (He quickly appended, “I don’t want to sound racist or anything...”)
Women at the watch party were the most openly angry about the results. As Mrs. Clinton delivered her victory speech, a middle-aged woman jokingly plugged her ears and said “La la la!” Another sarcastically sang “All You Need Is Love” — a dig at Mrs. Clinton’s repetition of the phrase “love and kindness” — and added, “She’s playing to the hippie crowd!” A younger woman took a more direct route and emphatically gestured at the screen with a symbol meant to indicate the opposite of love and kindness.
After Mrs. Clinton finished her speech, Symone Sanders, a spokeswoman for the Sanders campaign, stood up in front of the screen at Pearlz.
“Today is not the end. Today is the beginning,” she said, to cheers.
As 9 p.m. came and went, the Sanders’s crowd’s insistence on having a good time took on an air of civil disobedience. Justin Bamberg, a state representative — who notably switched his support from Mrs. Clinton to Mr. Sanders — took the stage to thank the attendees.
“Keep your head up, because we are not done yet,” Mr. Bamberg said. “Crank the music up!”
Over the past week, as Mrs. Clinton and an army of surrogates barnstormed South Carolina, Mr. Sanders made sporadic visits to the state. He has already turned his attention toward Super Tuesday contests, holding rallies in Missouri, Oklahoma, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Texas and Minnesota, along with South Carolina. A rally at a raceway in Austin on Saturday drew more than 10,000 people, according to his campaign.
As the South Carolina primary neared, Mr. Sanders started openly managing expectations for this contest. At Claflin University in Orangeburg, S.C., on Friday, Mr. Sanders admitted that he and his campaign didn’t know many people from South Carolina before he started running for president, but said he was proud of the ground he had gained.
At the same event, the rapper Killer Mike sharply criticized Mrs. Clinton for how she dealt with a protester at a fund-raiser on Thursday night. He compared Mrs. Clinton’s behavior to Mr. Sanders’s reaction when two young women representing the Black Lives Matter movement interrupted one of his campaign events last year.
“When you have an opportunity to tell two black girls to shut up and get offstage, and you don’t, and you shake their hand and you smile and you step to the side and you listen, that is a firm difference from turning around and staring at a little black girl and saying, ‘Shut up. I’ll talk to you later. You are being rude,’ ” he said.
Supporters at the Sanders watch party agreed with the contrast Killer Mike drew and implied that Mrs. Clinton’s concern for black voters was not genuine.
“It was condescending and impersonal,” said L.L. Gaddy, who graduated from the University of South Carolina in 2015.
After Saturday’s results, a Clinton campaign victory may again seem to some as inevitable. But Mr. Sanders doesn’t place much value on the idea of inevitability. Neither do his fans. In Columbia, that much was apparent.
The results were in. The TV screen was muted. But everyone at the party — old and young, white and black, rural and urban, locals and carpetbaggers — was still mingling. They could have gone home much earlier. But they wanted to stick around to celebrate. What can you say to that?
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PARANORMAL DATE YOU ARE NOT ALONE Finally, a dating and friendship site to meet others with similar interests! Find your match that shares an interest in the paranormal, science, life after death, ghost stories, Bigfoot, UFO’s, alternative medicine and conspiracy theories. http://paranormaldate.com/
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the one, single Sanders ad repeated continuously, once every single commercial break, on MSNBC all day long on Super Tuesday, March 1, 2016, here in Texas:
A Rigged Economy: This Is How it Works | Bernie Sanders
About Bernie: Bernie Sanders is a Democratic candidate for President of the United States. He is serving his second term in the U.S. Senate after winning re-election in 2012 with 71 percent of the vote. Sanders previously served as mayor of Vermont’s largest city for eight years before defeating an incumbent Republican to be the sole congressperson for the state in the U.S. House of Representatives. He lives in Burlington, Vermont with his wife Jane and has four children and seven grandchildren.
Bernard “Bernie” Sanders was born in Brooklyn, New York, to immigrant parents and grew up in a small, rent-controlled apartment. His father came to the United States from Poland at the age of 17 without much money or a formal education. While attending the University of Chicago, a 20-year-old Sanders led students in a multi-week sit-in to oppose segregation in off-campus housing owned by the university as a Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) officer. In August of 1963, Sanders took an overnight bus as an organizer for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee to hear Martin Luther King Jr.’s historic “I Have a Dream” speech firsthand at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
After graduation, Bernie moved to Vermont where he worked as a carpenter and documentary filmmaker. In 1981, he was elected as mayor of Burlington as an Independent by a mere 10 votes, shocking the city’s political establishment by defeating a six-term, local machine mayor. In 1983, Bernie was re-elected by a 21 point margin with a record amount of voter turnout. Under his administration, the city made major strides in affordable housing, progressive taxation, environmental protection, child care, women’s rights, youth programs and the arts. In 1990, Sanders was elected to the House of Representatives as the first Independent in 40 years and joined the Democratic caucus. He was re-elected for eight terms, during which he voted against the deregulation of Wall Street, the Patriot Act, and the invasion of Iraq.
In 2006, Sanders defeated the richest man in Vermont to win a seat in the U.S. Senate as an Independent. Known as a “practical and successful legislator,” Sanders served as chairman of the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs where he authored and passed the most significant veteran health care reform bill in recent history. While in the Senate, Sanders has fought tirelessly for working class Americans against the influence of big money in politics. In 2010, he gave an eight-and-a-half hour filibuster-like speech on the Senate floor in opposition to extending Bush-era tax breaks for the wealthy. In 2015, the Democratic leadership tapped Bernie to serve as the caucus’ ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee.
Known for his consistency on the issues, Senator Sanders has supported the working class, women, communities of color, and the LGBT community throughout his career. He is an advocate for the environment, unions, and immigrants. He voted against Keystone XL, opposes the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, wants to expand the Voting Rights Act, and pass the Equal Rights Amendment. To learn more about Bernie on the issues, click here: https://berniesanders.com/issues/
Richard Ojeda suffered eight facial fractures, severe swelling, and a concussion after suspect Jonathan Porter allegedly showed up to a Sunday cookout uninvited, according to the report. ADVERTISING
Porter allegedly asked Ojeda, a military veteran, for help putting a bumper sticker on his car and started beating him with brass knuckles when he bent down to help, the local station reported. Witnesses told police the suspect also tried to run Ojeda over with his car while trying to flee the scene.
Porter turned himself into police about six hours later and was charged with felony destruction of property, malicious assault and attempt to commit a felony, according to WSAZ.
“Make no mistake....I am now even more dedicated to the cause. This doesn't scare me and I don't quit! This was premeditated and there was a reason the guy did this,” he wrote.
"I was informed that my opponent was physically assaulted and injured at a political function today. I do not now, nor have I ever, condoned violence. It has no place in our political campaigns or in our communities,” Kirkendoll said.
Why Donald Trump Might Be the Most Dangerous Presidential Candidate in History
03/02/2016 01:53 pm ET | Updated Mar 02, 2016 541
Gautam Mukunda Assistant Professor, Harvard Business School, Author, Indispensable: When Leaders Really Matter
The Washington Post via Getty Images
Unless Donald Trump announces in the next few weeks that he is secretly a Muslim, gay, undocumented Mexican immigrant (and let’s be honest, less likely things have happened in this election cycle), he’s almost certainly going to be the Republican nominee for the presidency.
In the course of my research, I concluded that presidents ultimately fall into one of two categories: “Filtered” — the ones who gain power normally, by rising through the ranks of the political system, and “Unfiltered” — those who gain power with little national political experience or over the opposition of political elites. “Unfiltered” presidents tend to have huge effects and end up remembered as either the best (e.g., Lincoln, FDR) or worse (e.g., Harding, Pierce). Trump, without a single day of experience as an elected official and actively opposed by the Republican establishment, would be the most unfiltered president in American history.
In my research, I discovered four warning signs that indicate an unfiltered leader is more likely to have an outsized negative impact — and Trump, perhaps uniquely, has all four:
1) Unearned advantages. Sometimes the race for leadership can be short-circuited because one of the candidates has huge unearned advantages that make it an unfair competition. The classic example is George W. Bush, who surely would not have been a plausible candidate for governor of Texas if his last name were Smith. Trump — despite his pretensions as a successful entrepreneur — inherited $200 million dollars from his father, runs the company his father founded, was bailed out several times by his family, and made his career in his father’s industry and using his family’s connections. Inherited wealth, position, and connections are the quintessential example of an unearned advantage.
2) Personality disorders. Calling Trump a narcissist is an insult to ordinary garden-variety narcissists. Narcissism in leaders can have surprising and counterintuitive effects .. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gautam-mukunda/well-tire-of-trumps-narci_b_8114220.html . Like many personality disorders, narcissism gives short-term benefits but imposes long-term costs. So narcissists make a powerfully positive first impression and are more likely to be chosen as leaders, but once they have power they are often disastrous failures. No President even vaguely approaches Trump’s narcissism, but Jean-Marie Messier, the legendarily catastrophic CEO of Vivendi who would sometimes sign his name “Jean-Marie Messier myself master of the world” comes close.
3) Extreme ideologies. Power liberates leaders to follow their worst instincts — like Silvio Berlusconi in Italy or Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. A leader who, even before he gets power, encourages violence towards his enemies, stokes racial hatred, engages in paranoid conspiracy theorizing, supports torture, and argues for the abrogation of treasured American ideals like freedom of speech — and Trump has not just implied these positions, he has argued for them explicitly and repeatedly — will likely use the power of the Presidency to act on those impulses.
4) Managerial incompetence. Trump’s four bankruptcies are just the beginning. Trump Airlines (gone). The USFL (gone). Trump University (gone, with a fraud lawsuit). Even those barely scratch the surface. Trump’s roster of failures — including starting a mortgage company in 2006 — may be the most impressive thing about him. He is without a doubt, a gifted publicist. But if all Trump had done was invested his $200 million in the S&P 500 in 1982 he’d have more than $7 billion now. That’s at least $3 billion more than his actual wealth. So scamming his customers, hiring illegal immigrants, using his family’s influence to get favors from the government — all of those, mated to his supposed business skill, have destroyed about $3 billion dollars of his own wealth. That’s pretty incompetent. Warren Harding, usually considered the worst-ever president, was so unable to fulfill the job’s basic requirements that even he privately acknowledged it. Trump, who is basically a brand manager with an inherited bankroll, might not challenge Harding’s record, but he’d likely be in the running.
Like most analysts, I think Trump would lose a general election. I’m not certain, though. Trump’s campaign has already beaten every prediction, and his appeal to authoritarianism and white ethnocentrism is so unique (neither George Wallace nor Pat Buchanan, the modern candidates he most resembles, were nominated) that it might reconfigure the electorate. Most importantly, elections can be weird. They can be shifted by random events as diverse as: a third party candidate (1912 and 1992), a terrorist attack (1860), an assassination attempt (1912 again) and even the illness or death of the family member of a candidate (1892). So while I don’t think Trump will win, we need to seriously consider the possibility of President Trump.
My research leaves me with an unambiguous — and genuinely frightening — conclusion: The nomination of Donald Trump will be the single most irresponsible act by an American political party in at least 150 years. Combine the real possibility of a Trump victory with his Unfiltered status and the four warning signs above, and it is not hyperbole to describe him as one of the most dangerous figures in American history. Given the stakes, blocking him from the Oval Office ought to be the overriding responsibility of everyone in politics, regardless of party. The only way someone like Trump should ever be allowed in the White House is on a tour.
Analysts See U.S. Border With Mexico As More Secure Than It's Been In 40 Years [...] Some of the findings may not surprise you. Mexicans represent 6 million of the estimated 11 million unauthorized immigrants in this country, making up 56 percent of the total. An additional 1.6 million, or 15 percent, come from Central America. Asia (China, India, Philippines, South Korea, Vietnam and Pakistan) accounts for 1.5 million, or 14 percent, of the unauthorized population. http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=121310397
Donald Trump Tells N.R.A. Hillary Clinton Wants to Let Violent Criminals Go Free
-- INSERT - A Sociopath
A sociopath is typically defined as someone who lies incessantly to get their way and does so with little concern for others. A sociopath is often goal-oriented (i.e., lying is focused—it is done to get one’s way). Sociopaths have little regard or respect for the rights and feelings of others. Sociopaths are often charming and charismatic, but they use their talented social skills in manipulative and self-centered ways (see lovefraud, for more on sociopaths).
Compulsive Liar
A compulsive liar is defined as someone who lies out of habit. Lying is their normal and reflexive way of responding to questions. Compulsive liars bend the truth about everything, large and small. For a compulsive liar, telling the truth is very awkward and uncomfortable while lying feels right. Compulsive lying is usually thought to develop in early childhood, due to being placed in an environment where lying was necessary. For the most part, compulsive liars are not overly manipulative and cunning (unlike sociopaths), rather they simply lie out of habit—an automatic response which is hard to break and one that takes its toll on a relationship (see how to cope with a compulsive liar .. https://www.truthaboutdeception.com/lying-and-deception/confronting-a-partner/compulsive-lying.html ).
"Donald Trump May Not Be a Fascist, But He is Leading Us Merrily Down That Path"
By ASHLEY PARKERMAY 20, 2016
Video Trump Addresses N.R.A. By REUTERS 1:34 Donald J. Trump on Friday told the National Rifle Association in Louisville, Ky., that Hillary Clinton was unfit for the presidency, and that Bernie Sanders should run as an independent. By REUTERS on Publish Date May 20, 2016. Photo by Ty Wright for The New York Times. Watch in Times Video » http://tinyurl.com/jbrufbz
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Donald J. Trump .. http://tinyurl.com/jg5nodv .. accused Hillary Clinton on Friday of wanting to let violent criminals out of prison and “disarm” law-abiding citizens in unsafe neighborhoods, and warned that women, in particular, would be at greater risk if she were elected president.
Accepting the endorsement of the National Rifle Association .. http://tinyurl.com/jmh8vu4 .. at its annual convention here, Mr. Trump — who has not always been the staunchest opponent of stricter gun controls — said the November election would be a referendum on the Second Amendment. He claimed, hyperbolically, that Mrs. Clinton, his likely Democratic opponent, “wants to take away your guns.”
“Crooked Hillary Clinton is the most anti-gun, anti-Second Amendment candidate ever to run for office,” he said.
Mrs. Clinton has called for tightened restrictions on guns, but not for abolishing the right to own them.
Mr. Trump, whose record of sexist remarks, among other things, has left him at a potentially crippling disadvantage among female voters, polls show, appealed directly to women in his speech, imbuing his defense of gun rights with an undercurrent of fear.
“In trying to overturn the Second Amendment, Hillary Clinton is telling everyone — and every woman living in a dangerous community — that she doesn’t have the right to defend herself,” Mr. Trump said. “So you have a woman living in a community, a rough community, a bad community — sorry, you can’t defend yourself.”
If Mr. Trump’s comments seemed reminiscent of an era when crime rates were far higher — the Willie Horton ads attacking Michael S. Dukakis, the Democratic nominee, in the 1988 presidential race came to mind — they also appeared somewhat at odds with the broad bipartisan consensus on the need to reduce incarceration rates and prison populations: Mr. Trump sought to frighten voters about the idea of criminals being released from prison.
He said Mrs. Clinton’s agenda was “to release the violent criminals from jail,” freeing them to roam the streets and put “innocent Americans at risk.”
He even tried out a new epithet for Mrs. Clinton: “heartless Hillary.”
Calling Mrs. Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, “heartless hypocrites,” he dared them to “let their bodyguards immediately disarm,” an apparent reference to their Secret Service protection.
“Let’s see how good they do,” Mr. Trump said. “Let’s see how they feel walking around without their guns and their bodyguards. In the meantime, nobody else can have the guns, right?”
Mr. Trump’s efforts to shore up his support among the N.R.A.’s more than five million members could help him in the Rust Belt states that he would need to carry to win the White House. But Mrs. Clinton must strike a more delicate balance on the issue: In the Democratic primaries against Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who has a mixed record on gun control, she has taken an aggressive tack against firearm manufacturers and sellers.
In a general election contest with Mr. Trump, however, Mrs. Clinton would vie with him for the loyalties of white voters in a number of battleground states where support for gun rights runs deep. Indeed, in recent weeks, as she campaigned before largely white, working-class audiences in Appalachian and Great Lakes states, she has de-emphasized gun control and focused more on job creation and economic aid for financially struggling communities.
But on Saturday, Mrs. Clinton will speak at a dinner of the Trayvon Martin Foundation’s “Circle of Mothers” in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., a group offering support to women who have lost a child to gun violence. And she is expected to press the issue to win over voters in Los Angeles, Oakland and other California cities before that state’s primary on June 7.
Maya Harris, a senior policy adviser to Mrs. Clinton, dismissed Mr. Trump’s attacks on Friday, saying he was “peddling falsehoods.”
-- Are You Concerned About the Republican Party’s Future? There is deep concern among Republicans about political divisions and the future of the party, a new Times/CBS News poll shows. We want to hear from the party’s longtime members or those who have just registered as Republicans. .. http://tinyurl.com/znjlhcl --
“Along with the vast majority of Americans, Hillary Clinton believes there are common-sense steps we can take at the federal level to keep guns out of the hands of criminals while respecting the Second Amendment,” Ms. Harris said.
Since announcing his presidential bid, Mr. Trump — who himself has a concealed carry permit and whose two oldest sons are avid hunters — has fashioned himself a fierce advocate of gun rights. He has released a policy paper on the Second Amendment, has called for making concealed carry permits valid in all 50 states and routinely tells his audiences, as he did again here on Friday, that terrorist attacks like those last year in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., might have been prevented if more people were armed.
But his support for gun rights has not always been so absolutist.
In his 2000 book, “The America We Deserve,” he wrote that he “generally” opposed gun control, but criticized the N.R.A.’s outsize lobbying power, saying, “I support the ban on assault weapons and I support a slightly longer waiting period to purchase a gun.”
After President Obama spoke in 2012 at a vigil for those killed in the school shootings in Newtown, Conn., Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter: “President Obama spoke for me and every American in his remarks in #Newtown, Connecticut.”
On Friday, however, Mr. Trump took his support for gun rights an additional step. In January, he said he wanted to end gun-free zones in schools. In his speech here, he said he wanted to do away with them entirely.
“We’re getting rid of gun-free zones,” he said, arguing that more guns would mean less gun violence, as his audience cheered.
Officially throwing the N.R.A.’s support to Mr. Trump, Chris W. Cox, executive director of the group’s political and lobbying arm, warned that Mrs. Clinton would appoint liberal justices to the Supreme Court who would roll back gun rights.
“We have to unite and we have to unite right now,” Mr. Cox said. (He also played a clip of Mrs. Clinton talking about the Second Amendment, but not before “accidentally” playing a video showing Mrs. Clinton barking like a dog.)
The Secret Service prevented attendees from bringing knives and guns — ordinarily commonplace accessories at the convention — into the hall where Mr. Trump was speaking, prompting some grumbling.
There was also some grumbling about the presidential campaign, despite the N.R.A.’s endorsement.
Dan Kelsey, 57, an I.T. consultant and N.R.A. member from Columbus, Ohio, said he was not excited about Mr. Trump or Mrs. Clinton, and was worried that Mr. Trump might shift his position on the Second Amendment.
“He talks a good game, but I’m not sure what his core values are,” Mr. Kelsey said. “He’s a good entertainer and marketer, but I don’t know what he really believes.”
Yet to other members of the group, Mr. Trump’s promises to support the Second Amendment were reassurance enough.
Dianne Jennings, 67, a certified N.R.A. pistol instructor from Dayton, Ohio, said she had “nothing nice to say” about Mrs. Clinton: “Basically, I detest her.”
Ms. Jennings said that she found Mr. Trump “entertaining” and “not politically correct” and that she thought he would do a good job as president.
“I think people are just terrified of his persona, but I think he has a lot of different personas,” she said, “and he can use the right one in the right situation.”
"This morning, when Wayne LaPierre, CEO of the NRA, took to the stage at the Conservative Political Action Conference (AKA “CPAC: a gun free zone”), these signs were in the lobby. You see, we Conservatives only allow restrictions on the Second Amendment to protect OURSELVES from the gun violence we otherwise abet. Hypocrisy is the homage self-preservation pays to platitudes" - Mrs. Betty Bowers, America's Best Christian http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=120983143
It must be acknowledged: There is a kind of pitiless symmetry here. Trump and the NRA make a far more insidious bedfellows than it might initially appear, given how both are comprised of the same sociocultural toxins: vicious intolerance, outlandish conspiracy theories .. http://www.npr.org/2016/05/24/479331275/a-guide-to-the-many-conspiracy-theories-donald-trump-has-embraced , fake statistics, patriarchal megalomania, racism, shameless lying .. http://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/ .. and truly acidic levels of paranoia, all coupled to a love of authoritarianism, mass incarceration and 5th-grade fantasies of macho vigilante justice. Both agree, in no uncertain terms, that concepts like kindness, inclusiveness and thoughtful humanitarianism are for “losers,” and have no place in American discourse.
Which is why it’s only moderately ironic that Trump doesn’t really care about gun culture, per se – and when he has mentioned it in the past, his views were sometimes fairly… liberal. He formerly supported the assault weapons ban, agreed with Obama regarding the horrific Newtown massacre, seemed to hold relatively reasonable opinions – if you can call anything that passes through his miasmatic slaughterhouse of a brain an actual opinion – on gun control.
Like a baffled child with a bomb
But everyone knows Donald Trump cares as much for unwavering principles as a rat cares for classical music. Trump doesn’t do integrity, or compassion. He does rage, illogic and free-association defamation, all tied to a bully’s shrugging contempt for honesty, intelligence and empathy.
As for the NRA, turns out Trump is a perfect sort of bloviated antihero. He cares even less about facts and truth .. http://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/ .. than they do. He is even more apt to spin the dark lie of America’s bogus exceptionalism into “truth.” He’s even more likely to posit insane, childish conspiracy theories about what kind of dangerous (Muslim Mexican feminist scientific intellectual progressive) wolf is at the door.
Translation: As long as kissing the barrel of a gun on camera brings raves among Trump’s white male base, he’s all for it. Never mind that guns, of course, bring nothing of value to the American experiment. Never mind that they do not protect, they do not heal, they do not unite. Who cares that communities, families, neighborhoods, relationships, marriages and melting pots and cultural harmony all suffer and bleed under their rule.
It always bears repeating: Guns are designed, built and sold for a single purpose: to annihilate life – usually human – as quickly and efficiently as possible. They are handheld apocalypse .. http://blog.sfgate.com/morford/2015/10/02/shooting-up-america/ . They are the devil in a billion tiny metal casings. Where guns dominate, love forsakes. Where vulgar paranoia rules, guns profligate. No wonder Trump is the NRA’s new BFF. They are equal-opportunity destroyers.
To defend Trump or the NRA at any real depth is to defend the worst in the human animal, the ugliest tendencies and most cynical, antagonistic compulsions. They both endorse the same spiritual gracelessness, the same moral disintegration. They are both anti, not pro. They both constrict, not expand. They offer zero joy, only fear. They both mean the world ill.
Do you wish to test this fact? That’s easy: just try to criticize either one.
You will receive death threats, savage wishes for violence or gruesome illness on your person and that of your loved ones, be called names so puerile and full of hate as to be wrought of feces and phlegm and the blood of spiders.
Conversely, offer either one your blind, unending support, and get yourself a creepy pat on the back and membership into a deeply paranoid cult of white males who’ve been trained and indoctrinated – by Rush, by Fox News, by mal-education – to have all sorts of reasons to be furious, none of which they fully understand, largely because they’re not really true in the first place. Who cares? Rage is the new STFU.
Calculating the exact number of gun deaths in America per day, week, or year is extremely difficult, but one thing’s for sure: the data is gruesome and culturally ruinous .. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/23/us/americas-overlooked-gun-violence.html , no matter who’s counting. And polls about Trump’s popularity – or savage lack thereof – are everywhere.
Far more difficult to measure is the toxic atmosphere of fear, of lies, of the American experiment gone dark and sour that both Trump and the NRA simultaneously create and feed on. The air they breathe is pure poison. Gun culture is already our nation’s most debilitating cancer, and it eats at our very core. Throw in Trump’s rabid attack-dog worldview, and the country is in for one devastating infection indeed.
[linked in that one] 3Saints, this one has much you need, the first slightly amended by outing some more content here .. h/t F6 . [one of] The NRA's Fraud: Fabrication of Second Amendment Rights http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=87067625 and preceding and following
Of course Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un support the presumptive GOP nominee. He serves their interests.
By Fred Kaplan
Donald Trump, Kim Jong-un, and Vladimir Putin. Photo illustration by Sofya Levina. Images by Spencer Platt/Getty Images, KCNA/Getty Images, Alexandros Avramis/Getty Images.
It is no coincidence that two of the world’s wiliest dictators—Russia’s Vladimir Putin and, now it seems, North Korea’s Kim Jong-un—are keen to see Donald Trump win this fall’s election.
Some attribute these odd salutes to the like-mindedness of authoritarian personalities, but this misses the point. More likely, Putin and Kim pine for a Trump presidency because they see he’s an easy mark, someone who thinks he’s smart and tough but who, in fact, is all set to give away the store.
Most leaders, perhaps especially authoritarian ones, don’t care about an opposite number’s charms or lack thereof; they care only about advancing their interests. Putin’s main interest in global affairs is to preserve what little semblance of an empire Russia once had—and, toward that end, to split the Western powers: both within Europe and across the trans-Atlantic alliance with the United States.
Putin must also have been amused by Trump’s naive remark (uttered in the same interview in which he gave the Kremlin chief an “A” for leadership): “I’ve dealt with Russia”—no doubt knowing that Trump’s only such dealings have been with Russian real-estate magnates and as the proprietor of a Miss Universe contest in Moscow. (Trump later acknowledged this fact with no apparent embarrassment, calling the Miss Universe pageant “a big deal .. http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/donald-trump-russia-moscow-miss-universe-223173 .”)
-- Donald J. Trump ? @realDonaldTrump
Do you think Putin will be going to The Miss Universe Pageant in November in Moscow - if so, will he become my new best friend? 1:17 PM - 19 Jun 2013 --
North Korea’s chief interest, dating back to the country’s founding in the 1940s, has been to play larger regional powers off one another—the shrewd strategy (as Kim’s grandfather, the original Great Leader Kim Il Sung, put it) of “a shrimp among whales .. http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/donald-trump-russia-moscow-miss-universe-223173 .” And the regime’s fanciful dream has been that the Korean peninsula reunify under the Communist North’s terms.
By this measure, Kim must be giddy at the prospect of a Trump victory as the presumptive GOP nominee has wagged his finger at our Asia–Pacific allies with special ferocity, wondering out loud why U.S. forces need to be paying anything to defend South Korea and Japan. The opinion piece in North Korea’s official party newspaper expressed the joy explicitly: “Who knew,” it says of Trump’s policy plans, “that the ‘Yankee, Go Home’ slogan we shouted so enthusiastically could come true as easily as this?” It added, “The day that the ‘Yankee, Go Home’ slogan becomes reality will be the day Korea is unified again.”
This is why, whenever President Obama meets with allied leaders these days he is plastered with questions about Trump—who is this guy, what does he want, could he really be elected? The foreigners ask these questions not out of mere curiosity but panic. They see Trump would be a disaster for their interests and U.S. interests—and a feast for our shrewdest adversaries.
President Trump fills world leaders with fear: 'It's gone from funny to really scary'
Most of the world seems to agree a Donald Trump presidency is a disturbing possibility that would inflict unthinkable damage, Guardian reporters found
‘Surely it won’t happen’: world leaders express shock, disbelief and dread at the mere thought of Donald Trump as president of the United States. Photograph: Eduardo Munoz/Reuters
David Smith in Washington and Julian Borger in Vienna
Friday 29 April 2016 02.00 AEST Last modified on Friday 3 June 2016 07.37 AEST
Authoritarianism: The political science that explains Trump
"Donald Trump May Not Be a Fascist, But He is Leading Us Merrily Down That Path"
--
Trump protesters are carrying out his supporters' most paranoid fantasies
People supporting Trump feel they're already under attack.
Updated by Dara Lind on June 3, 2016, 4:10 p.m. ET @DLind dara@vox.com
A protester faces off with police outside a Donald Trump rally in San Jose, June 2, 2016. Mark Ralston/AFP via Getty
Many Donald Trump supporters didn't need to hear about Thursday night's violent protests outside a Trump rally in San Jose, California, to feel under attack.
They already felt white Americans were losing ground to ethnic minorities in America. They expected nonwhite Americans, Democrats, and liberals to be ruthless in victory. And as far as they were concerned, Trump's opponents had been proving for months that they were really the violent, intolerant ones.
Violence wasn't just what many Trump supporters expected to see. It's something they thought they'd already been seeing.
There is a real distinction between violent and nonviolent protests. Political commentators often put a lot of energy into delineating between the two — nonviolent protest is almost always good; violent protest is always bad; and when a protest turns violent is always clear.
But for both the people attending Donald Trump rallies to praise Trump and those attending to protest him, the distinction is less important. From that perspective, the violence that has erupted at several Trump protests in California is, at most, an escalation of an existing conflict between traditional white Americans and a new order.
Trump supporters think that white people are losing — and think they'll be treated without mercy in defeat
Supporters of Donald Trump know that white Americans are, at some point in the not-too-distant future, projected to become a minority of the US population. (They may overstate how soon that day will come; Americans as a whole think that 33 percent of people in the US are immigrants .. https://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/3664/Perils-of-Perception-2015.aspx , for example, when the real proportion is 14 percent.)
These are attitudes that see race relations as a zero-sum game; these people believe the gains made by nonwhite Americans are coming at the expense of whites. They see demographic shifts not just as a matter of arithmetic, but power — and see a majority-minority America as one where the victors are unlikely to be gracious.
Mark Ralston/AFP via Getty A Trump protester stomps on a Make America Great Again hat.
Some racial conservatives see this as simple realpolitik — other ethnic groups are looking out for their interests, and white people need to step up and do the same. (This is the perspective of the alt-right, for example.) Others see it as a consequence of "identity politics" — that by identifying themselves with their ethnic heritage, people are putting their American-ness second.
But they agree that, right now, white people are the losers.
Trump says the things his supporters are afraid to say
The idea that Trump has become popular because he flouts "political correctness" is pretty broadly accepted. When I spoke to Trump supporters in the northern suburbs of Boston earlier this year, this was the one theme I heard over and over again: that people supported him because he said things lots of other people believed, but were afraid to say out loud.
"They don't want to be branded with a label that you typically get from the left," Alan Kalivas, a Trump supporter from Peabody, Massachusetts, told me in April. "If you think there should be something that border security, that immigration should be under some kind of control, you're suddenly a racist."
But sometimes it means something darker. Sometimes "afraid" actually means "afraid."
"I'm not comfortable putting any kind of sticker on my car," Stu Rosenberg of Peabody told me. "And that was never the case before."
Spencer Platt/Getty A protester holds a TRUMP sign ripped in two.
Trump protesters and Trump supporters each see the other as inherently violent
In the days before I spoke to Stu Rosenberg, protesters had disrupted Trump rallies in California. They blocked the street outside one venue, delaying Trump and forcing him to enter on foot. At another rally, protesters threw rocks at police and reportedly punched a Trump supporter.
To me, personally, there is a big difference between those two protests: One of them involves hurting people (or intending to hurt people), and the other does not. Most commentators treat this distinction, in the abstract, as not only morally black-and-white, but obvious.
In practice, people don't always see it as a bright line. That's true of Trump supporters, Trump protesters, and the media itself.
As recently as this spring, the victims of physical violence at Trump rallies were overwhelmingly protesters; the people engaging in physical violence were overwhelmingly Trump supporters.
The protesters themselves were acting in a manner you'd generally call "nonviolent" — they were standing or chanting or holding signs. To Trump supporters, that wasn't the point. Protesters were assertive, and more importantly disruptive; that made their actions unacceptable and justified whatever had to be done to stop them.
-- "We didn’t ask for them to come. We’re here having a meeting. And they want to come disrupt it? They deserve what they get. They brought that upon themselves when they walked in that door, that hell might break out. And it did. What did they think was going to happen?" --
Maybe that's a self-justifying and defensive reaction — the reaction of someone who already feels that she and her ethnic group are under threat, perhaps. (I've gotten more than one reader email justifying violence by claiming protesters were waving Mexican flags.) But media coverage of Trump rallies this spring also tended to treat "disruption" as a quasi-violent act.
Jabin Botsford/Getty
When Trump abruptly canceled a rally in Chicago on March 11, he claimed he was doing it for security reasons. Law enforcement said he was full of it, but some of the press went along. Other outlets reported "clashes" between supporters and protesters, implying there had been widespread physical violence (instead of several very tense shouting matches that sometimes involved shoving, which is a more accurate descriptor of what happened).
Many of the Chicago protesters came to see Trump speak with the explicit intention of shouting him down. They were trying to not only disrupt, but shut down, speech. This wasn't treated as nonviolent by Trump supporters, or by many commentators.
And just as Trump supporters see protest as inherently violent, many Trump protesters believe Trump supporters are inherently violent. If Donald Trump is a fascist — something many of them believe — then his supporters are aiding and abetting fascism. If his presidency poses an existential threat to them as human beings — something they also believe — then his supporters' support does too. Their aim is to stop fascism (or at least to disrupt the status quo) by whatever means necessary.
In doing this, they end up doing exactly what Trump supporters expect: They engage in violence and intimidation. But that's something Trump supporters figured was already happening, anyway.
Sometime just before Thanksgiving, some Establishment Republican flaks began voicing the opinion .. http://www.cnn.com/2015/11/24/politics/donald-trump-fascism/ .. that immigrant-bashing presidential candidate Donald Trump is a fascist. Libertarian-leaning pundits had begun levying that accusation over the summer .. http://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-fascist-354690 , but something about the attack from members of his own party helped the label stick this time.
Now bear in mind: Fascism is not the same thing as Nazism. Contrary to much of the internet chatter around use of the term to describe Trump, this is not a debate about whether or not Trump is a racist or an anti-Semite. The question is whether the policies that Trump is sort of proposing could lead to a marriage of business and government in which ideals become uniform, dissent is swiftly punished, with the whole thing centered around a personality cult similar to that of the National Fascist Party headed by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.
In an email exchange, Hull and I discussed where Trump fits on the sliding scale between "Fascist" and "Republican," and what that might mean for the future of the American conservative movement in 2016 and beyond. Below is the lightly edited text of our conversation.
Interested in dictatorships? Check out one of our classics: The VICE Guide to North Korea
[the embedded video is 20min, this one looks a longer version as it begins the same]
VICE: People are beginning to use the word "fascist" to describe Donald Trump. You seem like an expert in this area, so I thought you might be a good person to ask whether that label is correct. Isabel Hull: My first reaction is that he is not principled enough to be a Fascist. He strikes me more as a nativist-populist. That is, some one from the right wing, angry about various aspects of the present, longing for a golden past, and focused primarily against his own government, but not equipped with a set of adamantine principles to be put into practice, no matter what, and no matter the cost. Perhaps a more interesting question for you would be to ask if there is a genuine conservative running amongst the Republican candidates, as opposed to what in European history would be known as "revolutionary conservatives."
Commentators have used Umberto Eco's definition of fascism .. http://www.pegc.us/archive/Articles/eco_ur-fascism.pdf .. as a kind of litmus test for Trump's fascism. Is that a good approach? Eco's seven signposts of fascism are an OK start, but Eco wasn't an historian, and most historians would be more specific than that. [Political scientist and fascism historian] Robert Paxton once made the excellent point that fascism in the US would doubtless come from the Christian fundamentalist right—and I think he's correct about that. But the interesting thing about Trump, as [conservative New York Times columnist Ross] Douthat pointed out .. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/03/opinion/campaign-stops/is-donald-trump-a-fascist.html , is that he does not have anything to do with the normal right wing Republican base, especially on such matters as religion and economics.
If Trump doesn't fit the classic definition of "conservative," why is he so popular with people who identify as conservatives? The problem is that surveillance of presumed domestic enemies, xenophobia, anti-immigrant sentiment, and fear-mongering all have an unfortunately long history in this country. I would say that Trump is interesting more for his methods: the Big Lie—which he refuses to retract, the violent uncouth language that passes for "truth"in some circles, apparently, and the encouragement or at least acceptance of minor violence—pushing and shoving—against dissenters, whether they're journalists or just vocal critics. These things do tiptoe into the extreme right-wing. They all were characteristic of fascist movements before they assumed power, though the violence in that case was much, much more extreme.
You mentioned a "genuine conservative." What does that mean right now? Surely it would mean cleaving to the constitution and the Bill of Rights for everybody, rather than wild, interpretive interventionism à la [Supreme Court] Justice [Antonin] Scalia. [It would mean] retaining a strong government, if only for purposes of law and order, trade policy, and foreign policy—that is, not undercutting it by forcing it into huge deficits via uneven tax cutting, and certainly not by running it down as bad in principle. [It would mean] protecting the middle class's economic security, and encouraging conservation. Above all, it would do these things moderately, not by veering sharply this way or that.
InfoWars' conspiracy theorist Alex Jones recently spoke very fondly of Trump .. http://www.infowars.com/donald-trump-tells-all-on-the-alex-jones-show/, even though Jones tends to be deeply distrustful of the kinds of uses of government power Trump seems to favor. Why does this pairing seem to appeal to some American right-wing people? I'm afraid I'm not up on Alex Jones. But there are huge contradictions in Republican positions on government. On the one hand, they want to eviscerate it by denying it funds and ruining its reputation with the general public; on the other, they want it strong enough to hermetically seal [the US] off from the world, while bombing much of that world to bits. On one hand, they decry government involvement in people's personal lives—absolute freedom to own anything short of atomic weapons, absolute freedom of property use, and on the other, they want the government to regulate the most intimate details of women's reproductive lives.
So what does this new discrepancy in American conservatism mean for the Republican party? It may mean that the far-right Republican base is, in fact, through with the party, but hasn't realized it yet. I really hadn't thought of it in that way before.
Trump tweets: “Just had a very open and successful presidential election. Now professional protesters, incited by the media, are protesting. Very unfair!”
Donald can't help himself .. he could have been even a little bit presidential .. even if that hurt .. and said something along the line of accepting there were some who were wary of the future .. he could have said something toward encouraging free expression .. instead this president-in-waiting had to insult the demonstrators to show them how tough he is .. he's hopeless.
‘Bad Donald Trump’: Melbourne girl’s heartbreaking essay
"Donald Trump May Not Be a Fascist, But He is Leading Us Merrily Down That Path"
Liz Burke, news.com.au November 11, 2016 9:05am
A NINE-YEAR-OLD Muslim girl from Melbourne has written a heartbreaking essay about America’s President-elect Donald Trump, who she said is a “really mean, racist person”.
The full-page note was handed to her teacher on Thursday morning, who had been speaking with her year four class about the shock US election result the day before.
“We were talking about the election during circle time because a lot of the kids in the schools, a lot of them are Muslim, and they are quite tuned in to what’s going on,” the teacher told news.com.au.
“Afterwards we were doing some writing and this one girl seemed to be concentrating really hard on what she was doing. Then she brought that up to me, and I was just amazed by what she had written.”
The handwritten essay was titled “Bad Donald Trump”, and addressed the little girl’s concerns about the new “president in America”.
“He wants to make a wall so no Mexican people come, also Muslim people,” she wrote.
“It makes me sad because I am Muslim myself and he does not respect us and women. He does not think about family, he just thinks about himself.”
‘I want all American people to come here to have a better life’.
The young student said people who voted for Mr Trump “made a really big mistake because now America has to stick up with him as president”.
But she offered what she believed was a simple solution to Americans who may be marginalised under the Trump presidency.
“Donald Trump is a really mean, racist person. Well, I can describe him in many ways but don’t worry, I want all American people to come here to have a better life,” she wrote.
The girl also made mention of Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton, who she believed “was supposed to win president”.
“She is not racist, a very good person. She would include both men and women, which is fair,” she wrote.
“I wish Hillary Clinton was the president and my teacher would have cried tears of joy.”
The students had been quite affected watching the poll results roll in during class on Wednesday afternoon, the teacher said.
The 28-year-old, who had spent 18 months living in the US before beginning her teaching job in Dandenong and hopes to return there in the future, admitted she was “super emotional” when she learnt of the gregarious businessman-turned-world leader’s victory.
“We’d spoken about it (at school) in the weeks leading up to the election, and I guess a lot of the kids were a little bit worried,” she said.
“I had another girl say to me, ‘Does this mean I’m not allowed to go to America now?’ They’re only nine and 10, so I guess they only view the things that are applicable to them, and when they hear the world ‘Muslim’, when they hear that a leader is anti-Muslim, they get worried.”
She said there was heightened interest around the historic poll in the community where she works, which has a large refugee and immigrant population.
IMAGE: Trump has won. What now?
She was especially touched by her student’s idea that Americans should move to Australia, where she believed they could experience a peaceful and inclusive lifestyle.
“That was really powerful for a nine-year-old to just get it, and to see it so clearly,” she said.
While protests against Mr Trump’s victory continue to rage in the US, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has urged Australians to respect the election’s outcome.
Mr Turnbull has praised the President-elect as a “practical businessman” and “deal-maker’.
The PM yesterday called Mr Trump to congratulate him on gaining the presidency, and said the alliance between the two countries would remain strong for years to come.
Course that word "sequester" caught the eye .. so that's 350 ships instead of 247, just as ships go .. yup, you know where the money will come from as this is what the Republicans wanted to do 4 years ago leading to the 2013 sequester
By Republicans in Congress
The Republican House had narrowly passed a bill on December 20, 2012, which would have replaced only the defense side of the sequester with cuts to programs including food stamps, Dodd-Frank and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. In February with their reduced majority, key Republicans admitted that they would not be able to pass the bill again, even in the House. Nevertheless, many Republicans believed that the bill would serve as a template for what they wanted: no tax increases, no defense cuts, and considerable domestic spending reductions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_budget_sequestration_in_2013#Proposals_and_counterproposals
Of course, the money will come from programs or policies that are there for the protection and care of many of the people who voted for Trump.
On the plus side you'd think there would be some American jobs in building more ships. I'm assuming some would be built. You've read some Australian politicians are already salivating over the proposition.
How about the steel? Most efficiently so as not to waste moola i guess it could/should come from China. Or somewhere else overseas, but could be more American jobs there.
Will the deficit-focused Republicans in Congress who pushed for the sequester do an easy flip for P... Trump on that sequester?
Robert Paxton professor emeritus of social science at Columbia University. He specializes in modern European history with particular focus on the rise and spread of fascism. He is the author of several books, including The Anatomy of Fascism.
“Fascism: Could it happen here?” That’s a question increasingly being raised as Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump continues his bid for the White House. People as varied as actor George Clooney, comedian Louis C.K. and Anne Frank’s stepsister Eva Schloss have suggested Trump is a fascist. Earlier this month, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto criticized Trump by invoking the fascist dictators Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. Trump has retweeted quotes by Mussolini. Is Donald Trump really a fascist? We put the question to the father of fascism studies, Robert Paxton, professor emeritus of social science at Columbia University and author of several books, including “The Anatomy of Fascism.”
Transcript
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
[Amy deals with headlines of back then in the beginning of the embedded video. She mentions Bobby Jindal blamed Obama for the rise of Trump. Obama "objectively" suggested Republican political elites and many of the mainstream and social media held responsibility in that their "feeding the Republican base for the past seven years" with the idea that all he did was bad, and that "cooperation and compromise" was a betrayal created the environment for a Trump figure to arise. Which was, of course, the reality of the situation. See
We are reminded how Leslie Moonves of CBS said while Trump may not be good for country he sure is good for CBS. See
Some press must get past their irresponsible revenue focus for a start .. never forget .. "Leslie Moonves, the chief executive of CBS and a man whose 2015 compensation totaled $56.8m, had this to say about the Trump campaign. https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=130846307
Then Goodman interviews former Republican congressman Micky Edwards who talks about how undemocratic the primary system set-up is. He mentions the sore loser laws .. https://www.countable.us/articles/5803-sore-loser-laws-do-polarize-politics . He says the open primaries as California's is a much more democratic system. Then they chat about redistricting leading to gerrymandering in so many states. Edwards believes that comparing Trump's rise toe Mussolini's rise is valid, and not unfair.
The transcript below kicks in at about 47:30 in that most interesting and informative video.
AMY GOODMAN: “Fascism: Could it happen here?” That’s a question increasingly being raised as Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump continues his bid for the White House. People as varied as former Labor Secretary Robert Reich, actor George Clooney, comedian Louis C.K. and Anne Frank’s stepsister Eva Schloss have suggested Trump is a fascist. Earlier this month, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto criticized Trump by invoking the fascist dictators Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini.
PRESIDENT ENRIQUE PEÑA NIETO: [translated] And there have been episodes in human history, unfortunately, where these expressions of this strident rhetoric have only led to very ominous situations in the history of humanity. That’s how Mussolini got in. That’s how Hitler got in. They took advantage of a situation, a problem perhaps, which humanity was going through at the time, after an economic crisis. And I think what they put forward ended up, at what we know today from history, in global conflagration.
AMY GOODMAN: Republican front-runner Donald Trump has retweeted quotes by Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini. He was asked about it on Meet the Press.
CHUCK TODD: That’s a famous Mussolini quote. You retweeted it. Do you like the quote? Did you know it was Mussolini?
DONALD TRUMP: Sure. It’s OK to know it’s Mussolini. Look, Mussolini was Mussolini. It’s OK to—it’s a very good quote.
AMY GOODMAN: Donald Trump has waffled on accepting support from white supremacist groups like the KKK, and he’s even encouraged hand salutes at his rallies that some say are reminiscent of Adolf Hitler. However, Donald Trump, is he a fascist? Could fascism ever come to America’s shores?
ROBERT PAXTON: Thank you very much for inviting me.
AMY GOODMAN: So, what do you think of Donald Trump? Is he a fascist?
ROBERT PAXTON: Well, I think that Donald Trump shows a rather alarming willingness to use fascist themes and fascist styles, which—and the response this gets, the positive response, is alarming.
AMY GOODMAN: What is fascism?
ROBERT PAXTON: Well, fascism is a mass nationalist movement intended to restore a country that’s been damaged or is in decline, by expansion, by violent attacks on enemies, internal as well as external enemies, and measures of authority, the replacement of democracy by an authoritarian dictatorship.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain what happened in Nazi Germany and with Adolf Hitler. I mean, he didn’t start by killing 6 million Jews; there was a buildup. Talk about how it started—and in Italy, and you particularly look at France.
ROBERT PAXTON: Well, in the case of Hitler, it took him 13 years. It started in Munich as a minor fringe movement of disgruntled war veterans, and it percolated along.
AMY GOODMAN: That was from World War I.
ROBERT PAXTON: From World War I. This is 1920, early 1920s. In the election of 1924, he did very poorly, for a marginal party. Then you have the Depression in 1929 and 1930. And there are two things: There’s this huge economic crisis with millions and millions, tens of millions, unemployed, and there’s also a governmental deadlock. You cannot get any legislation passed without bringing in the social democrats. And the middle—center and right absolutely won’t work with social democrats, although they’re really quite moderate.
AMY GOODMAN: Wait, wait. What are—are you describing the United States, or are you describing—
ROBERT PAXTON: I’m describing—I’m describing the German—the German Weimar Republic really ceased to function as a republic in 1930, because nothing could be passed, and the president acted under Article 48 of the Constitution, which gave him powers in an emergency to rule by decree. So, between 1930 and 1933, President von Hindenburg ruled by decree. And the political elites are desperate to get out of that situation. And here’s Hitler, who has more votes by this time than anybody else. He’s up to 37 percent. He never gets a majority, but he’s up to 37 percent. And they want to bring that into their tent and get a solid mass backing. And so they co-opt Hitler. They bring him in.
The other party that’s growing is the Communist Party. And that’s what’s very different from today. There are two parties that are growing in 1932: the Communist Party and the Nazi Party. And if you don’t bring in the Nazi Party, then maybe it’s the Communists who are going to take over. There’s that dynamic of social panic. They bring Hitler into the tent. And once he’s there, he doesn’t have full power when he’s chancellor. He doesn’t even have all the ministries. But he then—then he takes over full power, and nobody is willing to fight him, because that would mean helping the Communists.
AMY GOODMAN: And then what happens.
ROBERT PAXTON: Then he becomes a dictator. He gets a four-year—he gets the Parliament to pass a four-year Enabling Act. It allows him to govern without consulting Parliament, in '33 and ’37. And he uses that to build an unbeatable machine. He doesn't bother to get it renewed. He gets it renewed, but it’s meaningless by that time. He does what he wants. And he has these huge rallies. He’s enormously successful in restoring the economy and in bringing German power back and dismantling the Versailles Treaty. And he has these delirious mass rallies. And no one will dare to try to stop him, because it’s either him or the Communists.
AMY GOODMAN: So, Eva Schloss, the half-sister of Anne Frank—Otto Frank, her father, remarried after his family was killed in the Holocaust—Eva Schloss was just quoted .. http://www.newsweek.com/holocaust-memorial-day-anne-frank-refugee-crisis-donald-trump-420312 .. as saying, in Newsweek, if Donald Trump becomes the next president of the [U.S.] it would be a complete disaster. I think he is acting like another Hitler by inciting racism.” She said, “I remember how upset the world was when the Berlin Wall was erected in 1961 and now [everybody] is building walls again to keep people out. It’s absurd.”
ROBERT PAXTON: Well, we don’t know what Donald Trump would do if he were elected president. He’s a thoroughly self-centered and aggressive personality. The danger, it seems to me, is that in a deadlock between Trump and the Congress or Trump and the courts, he would indeed take some kind of nonconstitutional action, and people would be afraid to say no.
AMY GOODMAN: You talk, Professor Paxton, about the five stages of fascism.
ROBERT PAXTON: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain.
ROBERT PAXTON: Well, fascism confuses a lot of people, because at the very beginning, when it was a handful of disgruntled veterans, it sounded quite radical. But when it’s in power, it allies with banks, industrialists, the army, churches and so forth. And so it changes. As it comes close to power and it makes the bid for power, there’s an opportunist adjustment, whereby it gets along with the previously hated conservatives. So, you have to look at each stage somewhat separately. But in general, I’m very leery of the use of the term too casually. And I do see great differences between Trump and fascism.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, let me ask you about the violence at the Trump rallies.
ROBERT PAXTON: OK, yes.
AMY GOODMAN: You’ve got March 9th, a black protester is sucker-punched; and then, February 29th, a photographer slammed on the ground; November 21st, a black protester punched, kicked, briefly choked; October 23rd, a Latino protester kicked; October 14th, immigration activists are shoved, they’re spit on. Donald Trump talks about paying the legal fees of those who are brought up on charges—most recently, the man who sucker-punched the African-American protester and then, afterwards, said into a camera of Inside Edition, “Next time I would kill him.” And Donald Trump has offered to pay his legal fees?
ROBERT PAXTON: Well, Donald Trump—Donald Trump’s pandering to the hatreds and violent instincts of some of these crowds is very alarming. But I think in a longer perspective of we’ve had greater acts of violence than this during the civil rights campaign. People were shot, dogs were put on them, fire hoses were put on them, people were killed in the civil rights campaigns. And this is—this is relatively small potatoes. I think it reveals a man of violent temperament and a dangerous person, but I think it’s still on a relatively small scale. Mussolini and Hitler fought in the streets with the Socialists and the Communists. And they were dead. There were a few dead in Germany. There were actually more dead in Italy, when Mussolini was sort of conquering the streets with his Blackshirts. That’s real political violence. If Donald Trump puts his followers in colored shirts and they begin to fight in the streets, then you’ve got fascism.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, in this country, a deindustrialized America, the increasing, growing disparity between rich and poor, do you think a kind of foundation is being laid that he is playing on?
ROBERT PAXTON: Well, I think there is a public that he’s speaking to. In Italy after the First World War, there was a global depression. Everybody was worse off. In Germany in 1933, everybody was worse off. Now, we’ve got this strange dichotomy of a few people doing incredibly well, amassing pharaonic wealth, and most people in the middle doing somewhat better, and a group of people doing worse, with stagnant wages, with job opportunities that are limited to people with technical skills that poorly educated people don’t have. So we’ve got a group of people who see the others getting ahead by leaps and bounds, and sometimes they think that black people are getting fair advantages to get ahead, and they’re slipping behind. And so, this is a very angry crowd of people.
AMY GOODMAN: Do you think Donald Trump is a danger to America or represents a danger that’s already here?
ROBERT PAXTON: I think that his violent and aggressive temperament installed in the powers of the president of the United States is unpredictable and frightening.
AMY GOODMAN: You’re an historian.
ROBERT PAXTON: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: But you’re looking at politics today.
ROBERT PAXTON: Yes. I think—I think we don’t know what he would do. We know that his temperament is such that we will have foreign policy crises that we shouldn’t have, and we will have domestic conflicts that we shouldn’t have.
And that does it for our broadcast. Democracy Now! has three job openings: broadcast engineer, director of finance and operations and director of development. Go to democracynow.org for more information.
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