What matters in a president?

While it may be foolish to look to our political system for solutions to our problems, it is arguable that who is president at any given time matters. I used to be less certain about this. I had come to the view that any president was basically a spokes-model for the 1%, and hence the military industrial complex, Wall Street, the establishment, the oligarchy, etc. I had become inured to the notion that even 'good' presidents could do very little to change the god-awful trajectory of a nation driven mad by greed. Now, having seen the wreckage a horrible president can wreak on a helpless nation, I'm starting to re-question why none of the 'good' presidents ever had much impact. They had the same power to do good as he has to do evil. I'm starting to think they didn't want to change anything. Or were paid not to. (Shocking, I know.)

Yeah, I'm starting to think they all bamboozled us, promising change and justice, but with forked tongues as they blithely went about the business of the 1% and the great American war machine. Our government has been for many years a playground for lobbyists and profiteers, who often write their own laws. The government may seem dysfunctional, but it's just serving a purpose other than the well-being of the American people - and certainly not the well-being of the rest of the world.

I'm beginning to think it does matter who's president – you know, assuming we could ever have one who wasn't a turn-key functionary of the 1%. Even if they could get no support or cooperation from congress, four years of a true anti-Trump in the bully pulpit couldn't hurt. We need much more of course, but that alone would be manna from heaven at this point.

So assuming the presidency matters, I am endlessly perplexed by the criteria by which people decide which candidates to support. I am especially agog at how many people are single issue voters – people who vote for someone because of their race, ethnicity, gender, religion, geographic origin, appearance or a better-than-average ability to speak the language. If you vote for a presidential candidate for dumb reasons, you may well end up with a dumb president. Res ipsa loquitur.

Presumably, everyone wants a composed, well spoken president, one that can conduct him or herself with a trace of grace, some modicum of decorum, one who won't embarrass us every time they speak or try to close an umbrella. Being nice looking also matters since we have to look at this person a great deal more than we really want. A good smile, nice teeth, real hair; all of that matters – to some extent. Just not all that much. An attractive appearance and a suave command of the language actually guarantees very little. If anything such characteristics have the potential to conceal deep flaws and questionable actions and policies. Glib good-looking people get away with a lot of crap.

I'm often struck by how little people question these things. Or just how incurious they can be. Many people seem to be on some kind of weird cultural auto-pilot, cruising through daily life, checking all the boxes, meeting expectations, not questioning anything too rigorously, settling for simplistic propaganda because the truth these days seems so hard. I mean who has the time to go rooting about?

I sympathize really. It can be the devil to find untainted news. And the world is awash in corporate bullshit.

One of the few things the American people agree on is that the mainstream media is woefully inadequate. According to a 2016 Gallup poll, only about 20 percent of Americans have confidence in the television news and in newspapers. Donald Trump effectively harnessed this distrust during his campaign, and still attacks the media before his fans when he wants to prompt applause.

Americans recognize that the media does not represent their views, and media consolidation is largely to blame. It depends how you count, but, today, about six corporations control around 90 percent of our broadcast and print news — down from 50 corporations in the early 1980s

How Media Consolidation Threatens Democracy: 857 Channels (and Nothing On)

Six giant, billionaire-owned corporations control 90 percent of the information that gets disseminated. They decide what merits attention and what doesn't, and they decide how it is framed and spun. That amounts to a massive domination of the public conversation and a dastardly manipulation of the public mind.

So little is actually what it seems, especially in the present environment, that intellectual caution and a certain minimum rigor would seem well advised. It's important to be skeptical. It can be astonishing how quick people are to jump to conclusions. It's baffling how dead certain so many people are – even on the most complex and nuanced subjects. As a society, we perhaps failed to teach people how to think things through, how to be rigorously critical, how to respect logic and reason, how to appreciate nuance and complexity.

The dumbing down of society has had some alarming consequences. The buy-in of the public to the national mythology is a fait accompli and it's hard to get anyone to question it. It's as if they sense that picking at the threads could unravel the whole thing, then where would we be?

Decades of Madison Avenue social programming have led to a culture where it is commonly believed (generalizing of course) that: as much as possible, everything should be easy, convenient and affordable (preferably on sale); for every problem there is a solution available at Amazon; for every ill a pill; for every need an instant fix.

It's as if we are meant to snuggle up to our TV-land dream world, consume mindlessly and be milked dry by capitalist predators at every step of the way through both life and death – as opposed to thinking hard about what we're doing: to the planet; to each other; to the future of humanity. All in the interest of those few who profit as long as nothing changes.

People don't want to admit how horrible the status quo is. It's too horrific to face. So we buy into the bullshit. We're heroes fighting for democracy and so on. In truth we are aggressors occupying and exploiting foreign lands. We fight not for democracy or liberty but for Halliburton, Teledyne and Exxon-Mobil. If we are ever going to change, this is a truth we have to face. This is what we will have to undo.

We will have to reimagine a world at peace going forward. We have to fundamentally change who we are and how we relate to the rest of the world. We need to go from swords to plowshares. This whole living off of death thing is a nightmare from which we need to awaken. Making war in the nuclear and biological age is irresponsible, morally reprehensible and eminently unsustainable, as are so many of our other practices (e.g. rainforest depletion, fossil fuel extraction, ocean pollution, etc). Humanity deserves better.

THE BUSINESS OF WAR IS THE CAUSE OF WAR

iAMerican-Flag-Militray-Industrial-Complex

If you objectively and consistently observe the mainstream media and its interpretation of global events, its omissive and deceptive character soon becomes abundantly clear. This could hardly be called incompetence. The coverage, which is popularly called “news,” is in fact nothing but a propaganda mechanism, designed to persistently shape public opinion in favor of war.

For the presidency, we need the person most likely to create substantial change -- in all the right directions, which is an important caveat. We need the person whose policies make the most sense at the present moment, someone with policies that acknowledge and confront climate change and sustainable living. And preferably someone with capability and integrity to burn. Even if we can find all of this, will it be enough? We can't know, we have to try.

We need someone who will rock the boat but be smart about it. We need a change agent devoted to changing what any honest broker must brand a dishonest and hostile society into something better for us all. It is a matter of existential survival for us to remake ourselves into the wise, supporting and nurturing society we all deserve – and often claim to be.

If humans are to last, we must make these deep changes to align our best ideas and values with our actual day-to-day realities. It's time to be the peace-loving nation we claim to be and to prove it by leading the rest of the world to peace. We could do this if we chose to. We could be pushing peace instead of war. All those bomb makers could be doing something else for a living. We need a president who will get us there and help us undertake the great changes that we must.

Whoever that might be.

Don't vote for hair, teeth, gender, race or pretty words. This is much more serious than that.

Why boil something as complex and weighty as a choice of national/international leadership at this critical juncture of history down to something so simplistic as to be absurd? She's nice, he's good looking, she's well spoken, he's part Irish. Well, who would want to miss the chance to vote for someone who's part Irish?

If there is one thing this country needs, it's a deep and profound systemic change in the way we conduct ourselves in the world and here at home. We need to become the humanitarians we claim to be. We need to live up to our lofty ideals – that all people are created equal and are equally deserving of decent treatment. We need a society based on peace, love and compassion; not war, hate and fear.

We need to uncouple from our single-minded focus on war and profiteering, and focus on planetary survival and the well-being of the human family. Because if we don't, simply put, we are done.

We've got to stop doing what we've always done. Not an easy thing. Maybe not even a possible thing. But we have got to try. We've got to learn to live in a world without violence and aggression, fossil fuels, reckless pollution and the thoughtless exploitation of resources and people. We need to become cooperative when it comes to the overall well-being of the planet and all of its inhabitants. It's going to take all of humanity working together to manage the future that's coming at us.

If we cannot overcome our violent and brutish ways, if we can't become smart about our collective behavior, if we can't all pull together, it doesn't bode well for posterity.

We can keep the peace if we are determined to do so. We do it in our everyday lives (mostly). If we can do it in our neighborhoods, why can't we do it in the world?

The answer is we can. World peace is possible and with real leadership, America could usher it into being.

With world peace, humanity will be so much better off. We'll invest our treasure in our people and make this world a better place in a million ways.

A passionate pursuit of world peace is the only rational, caring, decent thing to do...and probably the only way to ensure a reasonable future for our species. I mean we all want to do that, right?

Peace-Out-OPOL-2014
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@wokkamile
I forgot he was a Democrat. He was Reagan's big enabler.

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

@UntimelyRippd said "peace is breaking out all over."

At that time, peace was considered good.

Who betrayed the Russians when the US said it wouldn't tighten its military circle around Russia? Was it Obama or Bush II that broke that promise?

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dfarrah

@dfarrah to Gorby not to move NATO one inch eastward towards Russia, in return for the Sov Union agreeing to a reuniting of Germany, began under Bush I, Poppy, or at least the anti-Russia attitude began then, after the verbal agreement was made, and continued with all presidents thru Obama and Trump.

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@wokkamile info.

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dfarrah

wendy davis's picture

@wokkamile

quite right as i'd sorta remember it was 1999, so i bingled 'bill clinton and nato expansion', and got a boatload of hits.

david stockman, believe it or not.

armscontrol.com, but part of the gist was that he hadn't wanted to seem 'like a wimp' while running against bob dole. i'm agnostic on that, but what a fucked up cold war 2.0 organization that it. now, you might be right about dubya creating one evil stepchild of nato, and he did create the neo-colonizing africom. it's motto is (or was) 'we fight chaos in african nations', while forgetting that they also use CIA agents and such to...create the chaos, then help install U-friendly puppet gummints.

on later edit: it gets worse, if more honest. i was on black alliance for peace's twit account for my own current diary, they were protesting against africom, and one tweet led to an article on africom with these lines:

"When AFRICOM was established in the months before Barack Obama assumed office as the first Black President of the United States, a majority of African nations—led by the Pan-Africanist government of Libya—rejected AFRICOM, forcing the new command to instead work out of Europe.

But with the U.S. and NATO attack on Libya that led to the destruction of that country and the murder of its leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, corrupt African leaders began to allow AFRICOM forces to operate in their countries and establish military-to-military relations with the United States. Today, those efforts have resulted in 46 various forms of U.S. bases as well as military-to-military relations between 53 out of the 54 African countries and the United States. U.S. Special Forces troops now operate in more than a dozen African nations.

Vice Admiral Robert Moeller, first and former deputy of AFRICOM, declared in 2008, “Protecting the free flow of natural resources from Africa to the global market is one of AFRICOM’s guiding principles.”

We say AFRICOM is the flip side of the domestic war being waged by the same repressive state structure against Black and poor people in the United States. In the U.S. Out of Africa!: Shut Down AFRICOM campaign, we link police violence and the domestic war waged on Black people to U.S. interventionism and militarism abroad.

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thanatokephaloides's picture

@Cassiodorus

It seems to me that if we want to focus upon this contingency, we ought to be promoting an activist "Plan B." What if the Democrats screw Bernie again, and set up useful idiot Joe Biden to win the convention with the help of the superdelegates? Bernie endorses Joe, and hope is once again replaced by despair. Such a contingency would be one possible fruit of the "elect a better President" strategy which appears as the first option for activism in America. What then? Perhaps we ought to be planning for this possibility?

Which does, in fact, force the question:

Where do we go from here?

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIlVktvZGlk]

Wink

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

@thanatokephaloides
Heads I vote Green again
Tails I go get drunk on election day instead

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

@The Voice In the Wilderness I voted green last time.

But voting for people who have never held office in their lives just seems pointless. It would be nice if a green actually got elected somewhere before he or she decided to run for President.

I live in a red state, so my vote doesn't matter. I could vote for Mickey Mouse and do as much good. Maybe that is why I am so cynical about presidential elections now.

My gut tells me that Sanders can't beat Trump in 2020 when he could have in 2016. Sanders let so many people down in 2016, that there will not be the enthusiasm this time. And Trump will have lots of never-Trumpers on board in 2020.

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@davidgmillsatty
But Reagan did it. The trick is make trump as reviled as Carter. but Trump is satifying his base, gun nuts and the nativists.

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

mimi's picture

World peace is possible and with real leadership, America could usher it into being.

You sound really like an American President. Are you running? Sigh. I have to say considering what is going on in the world, I find that sentence pretty unconvincing, if not an attempt of misleading the sheeps.

What matters in a Congressman and Senator, might be more important to know.

No offense meant, it's just that the times are over when these nice words would still work.

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@mimi I know what you mean, Mimi. I realize how unlikely it seems given the horrifying present, yet I insist that, at least in theory, it doesn't have to be this way and that with sufficient will we could reverse the hate and war. I may well be wrong, but I believe it. If we wanted peace as badly as we wanted to go to the moon or build the atomic bomb, we'd stand a good chance of getting there.

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Perhaps with f@ck Bill Clinton and his media consolidation - tip of the iceberg.

Next up has to be Jane Fonda. “I guess the lesson is we shouldn’t be fooled by good-looking liberals no matter how well-spoken they are."

And following behind, this is one hell of a good question.

Now, having seen the wreckage a horrible president can wreak on a helpless nation, I'm starting to re-question why none of the 'good' presidents ever had much impact. They had the same power to do good as he has to do evil. I'm starting to think they didn't want to change anything. Or were paid not to. (Shocking, I know.)

I think every person running for office should have to pass a lie detector test in order to declare his/her candidacy. Questions to be written by his/her enemies. Next up, every voter must pass a current events test in order to vote. If you have no clue, you should have no vote. I'm tired of having our country's fate determined by crooks and people who don't know better and could care less.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

Alligator Ed's picture

@dkmich Unfortunately, most of the sheeples don't realize that "honest politician" is an oxymoron.

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@Alligator Ed In court, its the honest people who are so scared shitless, they come across as liars.

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wendy davis's picture

*If* a president of this nation can bring peace about, the epic barriers to third party candidates need to be reversed (especially toward the Greens), but they won't be. the only potential peace candidate would need to both anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist (not just claim to be anti-war for some™, imo. in the duopoly, there simply isn't one, although many will claim that tulsi gabbard is.

good diary, though opol.

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You're always "spot-on." But, this time, you hit it out of the park!

Wanted to turn you on to some new music...

1.) Irish singer-songwriter Hozier, just came out with his new album "Wasteland, Baby!" (easily, one of the best, politically-oriented songwriters of the current generation):

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2YgDua2gpk&list=PLxKHVMqMZqUQyODKYhMiVp...

2.) And, Jacob Collier, whom I've been raving about around here, of late...24-yr-old jazz fusion phenom, Quincy Jones manages him...already's won two Grammys, etc...Guardian's called him "the new jazz messiah"...doing some stuff you--especially, due to the graphics in this first one--will LOVE...

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlFD298wTOM]

3.) ...and here's something (Beatles' cover, "Here Comes The Sun"] Collier released on YouTube, just over the past 24 hours...

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXf1nUVdVuM]

4.) ...last but not least...another one of my jazz faves...Snarky Puppy, with CSNY's David Crosby (who's touring all over the place this year, btw)...doing "Long Time Gone"...probably like you've never heard it before...and, dayum...Crosby's still got some incredible lungs, man!

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPa6BnkLLww]

...have a great weekend!

Peace!

Bob

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"Freedom is something that dies unless it's used." --Hunter S. Thompson

@bobswern Thanks Bob, 'preciate, bro.

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karl pearson's picture

During my high school World History class, several of us approached our instructor to change some of the elements of the class. We were tired of memorizing dates of wars and battles. Her response was: "The history of the world is the history of war." I hope I live to see this instructor proven wrong.

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us.

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@Sirena
But if we can find not only someone who we believe in but someone who also believes in us, then why can we not progress?

Who are these other entities?

After all, there are more of us, than there are of them

So chins up!

If Nike says ‘Just do it’ then so should we!

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thanatokephaloides's picture

@Sirena

This may sound overly simplistic

It is, unfortunately. Solving systemic corruption is always a complex and difficult task.

But if we can find not only someone who we believe in but someone who also believes in us, then why can we not progress?

Because those whose continued ill-gotten gains depend on us not progressing anywhere apply their money power to make sure we do not progress.

Exhibit A: Bernie Sanders in 2016. The moneyed power brokers wanted Hillary Clinton. And, the desire of us hoi polloi to the contrary notwithstanding, she's what we got.

And Donald Trump bought his way into the Presidency.

Who are these other entities?

The ultra-wealthy, whose continued un-earned profits depend on no change occurring. The forever war industry, whose continued un-earned profits depend on no peace occurring, ever. The fossil-fuel industry, whose continued un-earned profits depend on no change occurring to how we power our lives. The mega-banks and the Wall Street Casino, which depend on all the above and others like them.

After all, there are more of us, than there are of them

Not where it counts (dollars under single-individual control).

So chins up!

If Nike says ‘Just do it’ then so should we!

Do please describe how we are supposed to "just do it". I would be most interested in how you suppose we should proceed here. But I must ask a favor: please don't suggest anything which has already been tried to exhaustion. Thank you.

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Raggedy Ann's picture

What I see as the problem is the deep state stopping any person in the Oval Office from accomplishing progressive goals. These war-mongers have a vice grip on our government. If the person elected would have the courage to stand up for the people instead of the deep state, then I think we have a chance.

This day will come, but it might be until the 2024 or 2028 election.

My $.02. Pleasantry

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"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

WaterLily's picture

As always, I love your message.

I just wish I weren't so cynical these days that I could actually agree with you.

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World peace is possible and with real leadership, America could usher it into being.

Forget America, it will never happen. We have not had a single world class president in my lifetime. Democracy does no such thing as guarantee a better outcome, it only provides more legitimacy. Our congress critters are a bunch of spineless cheerleaders for some odd concept of patriotism in America. They would vote to nuke Cuba if they thought that it would advance their careers. The deep-state's goal is more and better lethality of the military on an ever ballooning budget. The ultra-rich and the corporations and banks control everything. What path do you see to peace and justice? The American people vote these bastards into office. This is what they want. The only good outcome I see is if the world learns to get along without the US, and sanctions the US to the bone. I have no idea where these abstract concepts of a greater purpose for the American Hegemon ever came from. They have no relationship to reality. The best that we could do is to try to return the nation to the belief in isolationism as was popular between the two world wars.

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Capitalism has always been the rule of the people by the oligarchs. You only have two choices, eliminate them or restrict their power.

thanatokephaloides's picture

@The Wizard

The ultra-rich and the corporations and banks control everything. What path do you see to peace and justice? The American people vote these bastards into office.

False.

The selection of non-choice (or Hobson's Choice) candidates is locked-in ages before any of us hoi polloi get to vote on anything.

Bad

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

TheOtherMaven's picture

@thanatokephaloides

Interesting thought experiment, unlikely as it may be in real life....

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There is no justice. There can be no peace.

Big Al's picture

@TheOtherMaven "I have no advice for others in this election. Are you voting Democratic? Well and good; all I ask is why? Are you voting for Eisenhower and his smooth team of bright ghost writers? Again, why? Will your helpless vote either way support or restore democracy to America?
Is the refusal to vote in this phony election a counsel of despair? No, it is dogged hope. It is hope that if twenty-five million voters refrain from voting in 1956 because of their own accord and not because of a sly wink from Khrushchev, this might make the American people ask how much longer this dumb farce can proceed without even a whimper of protest."

Read More http://www.blackeconomicdevelopment.com/why-i-wont-vote-by-web-du-bois-t...

How much longer this dumb farce can proceed without even a whimper of protest? Still trying to find that out Mr. Dubois.

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snoopydawg's picture

@Big Al

It is hope that if twenty-five million voters refrain from voting in 1956 because of their own accord and not because of a sly wink from Khrushchev, this might make the American people ask how much longer this dumb farce can proceed without even a whimper of protest."

More than that stayed home last election and yet here we are again getting ready to do the voting process again over a half century since Dubois said that. The funniest thing about that Russia allegation of interfering with the election is that the GOP have gerrymandered the hell out of so many states, the democrats have let them do it and democrats not only refuse to put enough voting machines in districts with heavy turnout they don't insist on using paper ballots.

During the last primary in New York alone thousands of people were kicked off the voting rolls and had their party affiliation changed and even after the person who did that admitted it nothing was done. Next up was Brenda Snipes in Florida who destroyed lots and lots of ballots and she not only wasn't punished for doing it, she got to retire with her full pension.

DuBois condemns both Democrats and Republicans for their indifferent positions on the influence of corporate wealth, racial inequality, arms proliferation and unaffordable health care.
1956

I've been bitchin about what Trump is doing with the regulatory agencies and once again I found out how badly Obama was before him... I shouldn't have been surprised huh?

How Obama Defanged the EPA Before Trump Gutted the Agency

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

mimi's picture

@Big Al
and if it would be a direct democratic vote like in a parliamentary system, I think it would be worth voting.
Voting in the US seems to be worthless these days.

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