@HenryAWallace @HenryAWallace

          The Kennedys were something of a role model for me, sometimes as a cautionary tale, sometimes for inspiration. They were among the first of the "non-Hollywood" crowd to be so very pubic public as the new media television slowly became ubiquitous.

#1 #1
Don't remember where I read or heard this, but, as kids, growing up, the Ken nedys had to come to the dinner table with two interesting topics to discuss with the family; and they were asked questions. I suspect this was Rose's doing. Ditto drilling public service into them. She seemed to want them to be the best people they could be. As adults, they reportedly did things like listen to recordings of Shakespeare while showering.

On the other hand, Joe's ambition for his kids seemed to come out of his resentment of the Irish being mistreated by Boston Brahmins. Joe probably found John's defeating Brahmin Henry Lodge to win a senate seat very sweet.

@FreeSociety
have spots. Tigers have stripes.

#1
General Comment:

Hillary's problems were never about mere tactics or mindlessness.

She is, and has always been a committed agent and ruthless practitioner for the Wall Street / Rothschilds-Bankster-club / Globalists and criminal "Deep State" Warfare interests. And she has never been able to disguise that fact as well as her husband once did (who was a better actor) at one time.

The Clintons/Obama/Biden/Pelosi/etc. they are all elitist, paid-off scum who not ever going to be "progressive agenda" people. No amount of questioning, or confrontation, or reflection will ever take them to that place. They view campaigning as mere "theater" to fool and trick people into voting for them by the various psych-ops techniques of: "identity politics", "political correctness", gender card gimmicks, race card gimmicks, and posturing with celebrities. They laugh at the peasant class that is so easily fooled into thinking that they are "on their side", when all of their policies and backroom bribery and corruption should have made it clear all along just who and what they represent.

A Leopard never changes its stripes, so .... do not expect a Clinton to ever do so (whether or not there is a risk of losing an Election). Their salary comes from the FAT CATS that they protect, and that is always their overriding objective.

@native

#2

it is merely a means to an end -- and the end is power, simply that.

@Dark UltraValia Correct. That's what blows my mind. There are literally dozens of politicians willing to shill for the elites. Many of them are reasonably photogenic and can manage to do campaign politics with some skill, by which I mean they can deliver a rousing speech, handle a press conference, and work a rope line without ending up shaking their finger in somebody's face.

How fucking hard is it to find someone who can dress up in an expensive suit, recite talking points, deliver a speech and shake people's hands without the condescension and smugness coming off you in waves? How hard is it to find and run someone who isn't hated before they begin?

I mean, I guess in a way we're lucky they did stick with her; another figure would make it much easier to pretend that neoliberalism is fit for human consumption. But I'm flabbergasted that they did stick with her; I actually believed last year, for a time, that they were going to substitute Biden for her at the convention and that everyone would throw their arms around Joe in relief that it wasn't Hillary, thus removing the need for Joe to persuade even a single voter.

The obvious use of Hillary vs Trump is to make people accept someone without requiring that person to prove himself/herself, because people are so desperate to escape from the dichotomy of horrors.

But they really meant it. They really ran her, stuck with her, and are still sticking with her. Unbelievable.

#3

It's not just that Bernie would have won. Biden would have won, Warren would have won, any number of high profile Dem Senators or Governors would have won. There is exactly ONE reason Dems lost to a spraytan buffoon who is the most unqualified assclown to ever run for president: they made Hillary Clinton the Dem nominee.

@HenryAWallace And another problem is, Her ego, and that of those around her, blinded them to seeing all these differences. Just the fact that they seriously thought they would pick up all these Republican votes when Her crossover appeal was to bring people out to vote against her regardless of who was running showed how out of touch they are.

#3

the electoral advantage is to Republican Presidential nominees, not Democrats. Democrats cannot rely solely on the loyalty to Democrats of blue states to win a Presidential.

Obama did very well in 2008. IMO, this was for a few reasons, none of which pertain to Hillary:

1. Of the two main contenders in the 2008, he ran to Hillary's left.

2. He had an enormous amount of personal appeal in his own right, and not merely as opposed to played out McCain. He excited the base/

3. He had a great campaign team.

4. Bill Clinton was not butting into his campaign.

5. He had not been hated by Republicans and some indies for decades or opposed by much of the left.

6. Expressly and implicitly, by age and race and content of speeches, he stood for change. He didn't deliver much policy change, but, in 2008, he convinced many he would.

7. He was following a President with an approval rating under 30%.

And so on.

People lined up for blocks to vote for him. Millions who did that for him in 2008 stayed home in 2016. And, no, it wasn't because Sanders tripped her on the way to her coronation. In 2008, Obama won despite even stiffer competition during the primary. And it wasn't because Jill Stein got a whopping 1% of the vote nationwide, either. Rather, Sanders did well and Jill Stein got votes because so many were ABC (Anybody But Clinton). And it wasn't all personal, by any means. Her campaign stunk and so did her policies. And her attitude.

@Dr. John Carpenter @Dr. John Carpenter
I said the other day that what makes me angriest about this THE RUSSIANS DID IT crap is that it's a lie that insinuates that we're too damn stupid to have our OWN reasons for not wanting the Clinton Creature anywhere near the White House. She's got over 30 years of bullshit and baggage trailing her around. i don't need anything else. If a person's actions tell you she a liar and there's nothing she's not willing to stoop to pad her bank account and it's backed up by a record of doing the same, that's all I need.

This was written by Bob Herbert on February 6, 2001.

The Clintons may or may not be led away in handcuffs someday. But whatever happens with the criminal investigations, it's time for the Democratic Party to wise up. Ostracism would be a good first step. Bill Clinton should be cut completely loose. Cold turkey. No more talk about his political genius, his fund-raising prowess, his ability to captivate audiences. He was president for eight years and the bottom line politically is this: For the first time in nearly half a century, the Republican Party controls the presidency and both houses of Congress.
Bill Clinton has been a disaster for the Democratic Party. Send him packing.

There's not much the Democrats can do about Mrs. Clinton. She's got a Senate seat for six years. But there is no need for the party to look to her for leadership. The Democrats need to regroup, re-establish their strong links to middle-class and working-class Americans, and move on.
You can't lead a nation if you are ashamed of the leadership of your party. The Clintons are a terminally unethical and vulgar couple, and they've betrayed everyone who has ever believed in them.
As neither Clinton has the grace to retire from the scene, the Democrats have no choice but to turn their backs on them. It won't be easy, but the Democrats need to try. If they succeed they'll deserve the compliment Bill Clinton offered Gennifer Flowers after she lied under oath: ''Good for you.''
https://mobile.nytimes.com/2001/02/26/opinion/in-america-cut-him-loose.html

I remember the Clintons and their history very well. THAT is why is say no more Clintons. EVER!

EDIT: fixed 2nd sentence so it made sense.

#3 and she did so, spectularly. This is a point that needs to be made over and over. I'm so tired of all the "yeah, but..." arguments. She lost what should have been the easiest election in history to win. It shouldn't have mattered if there was election tampering, real or imagined, or progressives voting for Stein or James Comey or whatever the excuse du jour is.

The DNC wants to argue in their fraud case that they are a private entity? Any private firm that tanked as hard as the DNC did in 2016 would be demanding resignations and order a complete overhaul. It's only because the media and so many others are willing to accept all the "yeah, but..." qualifiers that the Dems are gearing up to do more of the same going forward.

@aliasalias
A friend told me that the law were going to be changing for bankruptcy and that I should do that before they pass it. I did and I am free from my debt.
People aren't aware of the damage that Biden did during his time in congress. Some know about the bankruptcy bill, but after Nixon started the war on drugs, Biden was always willing and able to vote away our rights. The 3rd amendment took a big hit because of him.
Read Ray balko's book the rise of the warrior cop to see what he did to us.
I put him in the same category as the Clintons.

#4 including those without one that still care should not forget what Joe Biden did to make their debts one that can't be discharged thru bankruptcy courts.

"“It’s overwhelming,” Ryan told International Business Times of her debts. “I can’t pay it back on the schedule the lenders have demanded."

In the past, debtors in her position could have used bankruptcy court to shield them from some of their creditors. But a provision slipped into federal law in 2005 effectively bars most Americans from accessing bankruptcy protections for their private student loans.

In recent months, Democrats have touted legislation to roll back that law, as Americans now face more than $1.2 trillion in total outstanding debt from their government and private student loans. The bill is a crucial component of the party’s pro-middle-class economic message heading into 2016. Yet one of the lawmakers most responsible for limiting the legal options of Ryan and students like her is the man who some Democrats hope will be their party's standard-bearer in 2016: Vice President Joe Biden.

As a senator from Delaware -- a corporate tax haven where the financial industry is one of the state’s largest employers -- Biden was one of the key proponents of the 2005 legislation that is now bearing down on students like Ryan. That bill effectively prevents the $150 billion worth of private student debt from being discharged, rescheduled or renegotiated as other debt can be in bankruptcy court."

Read the whole article but for those that may not do so I gotta add this part here...

"Biden's political fortunes rose in tandem with the financial industry's. At 29, he won the first of seven elections to the U.S. Senate, rising to chairman of the powerful Judiciary Committee, which vets bankruptcy legislation. On that committee, Biden helped lenders make it more difficult for Americans to reduce debt through bankruptcy -- a trend that experts say encouraged banks to loan more freely with less fear that courts could erase their customers’ repayment obligations. At the same time, with more debtors barred from bankruptcy protections, the average American’s debt load went up by two-thirds over the last 40 years. Today, there is more than $10,000 of personal debt for every person in the country, as compared to roughly $6,000 in the early 1970s.

That increase -- and its attendant interest payments -- have generated huge profits for a financial industry that delivered more than $1.9 million of campaign contributions to Biden over his career, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics.

Student debt, which grew as Biden climbed the Senate ladder and helped lenders tighten bankruptcy laws, spiked from $24 billion issued annually in 1990-91 to $110 billion in 2012-13, according to data from the Pew Research Center."

One more item..."But advocates for stronger protections for debtors argue that Biden was a driving force in creating the laws that made the problem worse.

“Joe Biden bears a large amount of responsibility for passage of the bankruptcy bill,” Ed Boltz, president of the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys, said in an interview with IBT."

http://www.ibtimes.com/joe-biden-backed-bills-make-it-harder-americans-r...

@Ellen North

there's a need to form that 3rd party and otherwise vote only for known progressives (who can later cross to that 3rd party of the people,) to also support the attempted take-over of the corrupt Dems where nothing better offers and refuse to support corporate representatives of either of the evils literally killing us all.

Although they are Democrats, at least for the time being, I would gladly vote for Tulsi and/or Nina.

#5 #5

I think she'd have gone over with a nuclear bomb before now. A whole bunch of them, actually.

Until people quit voting for 'the devil they know' will abuse them and sell them out, why should the Two-Faced Corporate Party not conclude that 'people don't want a new direction'?

And as long as people literally vote for murderously suicidal blind and pathological greed and corruption, they'll be in it to the death.

Estimates of human/life's extinction are now within the decade, even without nuclear destruction and global dimming, because the life support system is dying irrevocably as we speak, for the ever-increasing 'cost-cutting' poisoning and draining of the Earth and all inhabitants for profiteering polluting and other industry and the billionaires now sucking up virtually everything. There's literally no time to spare anymore.

But some pretense of democratic elections is still being maintained in America at this point, and that may change at any time - as may freedom of speech at any moment.

The corporate/military interests running the puppet-government of the US are intent on totalitarian global domination, on absolute control of all aspects of remaining life, including communications. And they eagerly hazard and destroy all life on the planet in their taking of it by financial and military abuses.

They have been permitted by the voting public remaining within the Two-Party Trade-Off Trap to claim 'rights' to pass laws to 'legally' kidnap, hold incognito and torture their own citizens, to propagandize their own citizens, to take the property of their own citizens on claimed suspicion of unproven crimes and to permit financial institutions to to empty their own citizen's bank accounts when their criminal behaviours leave the institutions short of funds, to spy upon and to kill their own citizens - and those citizens have inalienable rights - which cannot be removed by anyone - in the very US Constitution which their public officials must swear to uphold and actually uphold in order to take public office and the powers delegated by the people to that public office - not that transitory individual - so that they may function in the public interest, rather than against it, as they do, so that this government is not a legitimate government 'of by and for the people' as enshrined within the Constitution they betray.

They've demonstrated that there is no crime to which they will not sink.

Isn't enough enough yet? At least to stop asking for it to continue and worsen in the short period then remaining to us all?

Even if they will not permit a win, there's a need to form that 3rd party and otherwise vote only for known progressives (who can later cross to that 3rd party of the people,) to also support the attempted take-over of the corrupt Dems where nothing better offers and refuse to support corporate representatives of either of the evils literally killing us all.

Many here already do this, or try, and yet I keep hearing talk of Clinton or Biden or other as though inexorable.

Even if they may have been made so, at least the people must make it obvious that many of the people will no longer fall into the Two-Party Trade-Off slaughterhouse line ever again, so that, at the least, the electoral cheats are made more obvious, (if possible, with current blatancy displayed) and that at least the Independents really are so and not passively, but by The People working to create that party 'of, by and for the people' which is their Constitutional and birth-right.

Between Bernie's awareness-raising tour showing up the Dems by contrast on corporate media, (which access will be lost the instant he stops being considered useful to the corporate Dems in their 'liberal' propaganda line,) and the formation of that 3rd party with the solid, binding platform, it might even work. The odds are 99 to one, against the corruption of the top fraction of the 1%, despite the lies, media monopolies and cheating. People can smell a rat, especially when they have something better to compare it to, and the corporate Dems are a very smelly dead (par)rat indeed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vuW6tQ0218

Monty Python - Dead Parrot

Edit: typo-ed 'monopolies' - may this be an omen of their fall, lol.