DNC changing the rules of the debates
OK. Maybe this rules change isn't aimed directly at Tulsi Gabbard, but it certainly looks like she's in danger of being it's biggest victim.
Presidential candidates looking to participate in the Democratic National Committee's sanctioned primary debates initially had to meet one of two thresholds to be eligible: achieving at least 1% in three separate DNC approved polls or obtaining at least 65,000 donations with minimum of 200 donors from at least 20 states.
...
To appear at the recently-announced third set of debates in September, candidates must achieve 2% in at least four DNC-approved polls and double the minimum of number of donors to 130,000. That quickly became a death sentence for candidates who for months have not even cracked the first donor threshold.
To make this clear, the requirements for the THIRD debate went from "at least 1% in three separate DNC approved polls or obtaining at least 65,000 donations" to " 2% support in four national or early voting state polls AND 130,000 unique donors to their campaign, including 400 unique donors from at least 20 states".
For most of the candidates, unless they really score in the first two debates, they won't be in any more debates.
To help put this into context, consider what the DNC has been up to recently.
They chose Chris Korge as the new finance chair of the Democratic National Committee.
Democratic National Committee Chair Tom Perez went on a hair-on-fire rant about Russiagate.
“We are at war right now with the Russians — it is a cyber war — [and] our commander-in-chief is compromised,” Perez said. “We should be able to rely on the federal government for help from this. ... It is unconscionable that this administration has paid such little attention to what Mueller acknowledged today, [which is] Russian interference. ”
Yes, the DNC is busy looking out for what is important to you.
Comments
I don't want them all (the DNC) to die
just be neutralized in some way.
Same way I feel about the Clintons.
Just stay home, play with the grandbabies and shut up.
Hillary is still bitter
link
Begrudgingly?
He campaigned for her! Which is why I'm only giving nominal support this time.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
The word you are looking for is "entitled"
As in "the Democratic elite are entitled to your vote."
"the Democratic elite are entitled to the party nomination."
"the Democratic elite are entitled to praise and worship from the progressives that they betray."
Wasn’t Manson an
“outstanding murderer?”
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
.
https://caucus99percent.com/comment/423142#comment-423142
Neutralized? or Neutered?
Might keep Biden's hands where they belong.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
I guess I don't see the problem.
Is September really too early to start culling the second dozen candidates? Getting everyone on a stage for the first one or two debates seems a worthy goal, but is cracking 2% by September such a stretch for serious candidates? Gabbard got to 65,000 donors pretty quickly, once she gets a little exposure in the first couple of debates she should be able to reach out to more donors.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
I agree, sort of
At some point winnowing the field will be necessary and I'm unclear how this point and this winnowing is "wrong".
That being said, I have no doubts that the DNC will do whatever it takes to put an establishment candidate on the November ticket. Whether or not this, in particular, is one of those moves doesn't really matter to me.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
I would agree.
The sooner the Left is betrayed in this election cycle, the better. They need to understand early on where they stand. An extended time before election day — while the Left shakes off the mind-wasting election kabuki — could prove to be invaluable.
The absence of a Left Wing party in America may not have mattered so terribly in the early years when the frontier was so bountiful, before the plutocrats began to asset strip it in order to fund their perverse ambitions. But in this moment, the People have never needed the values of the missing Left Wing as much as they do now. The time to act is passing us by. The entire planet calls out for balance and stillness. An evolutionary-level human adaptation to the dying world around us is waiting for the changes we must bring. We understand long-term sustainability and colony preservation. These are the values of the Left. We must come together for strength and boldness; leaders must lead.
But “coming together”
is more than a feeling, and there’s the failure of the kinder people among us: what’s needed is a clarifying moment. Think ‘storming the Bastille’; the Navy joining the workers to protest the Tsar...
The specific titration of sentiment in an action, following which, everyone knows things as they are can no longer stand.
The Powers that Be seem to be a colossus standing over all, but at the same moment it has feet of clay, standing on sand. To my mind any genuine analysis has to end up finding the 1%s main tool as their narrative control. Johnstone harps on this, and she’s right to do so.
Therefore, the needed “Bastille Moment” has to be a meet up inside Big Media. Specifically, something on the order of a million communications a day to Big Media’s executives and talking heads “The Two Parties are corrupt and incompetent and serve only themselves. Talk about this everyday, or betray The People.” (As well as massive horizontal communication among the 99%)
The way to get that million-a-day is through our most prominent bloggers, left right and center, pushing the action. We’ve all been angry, depressed, outraged and lots of other feelings about Things As We Have Them for a long time. Without a focused action, The Bad will continue steamrolling us, and indeed, all life.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
I like where you're going with this.
It actually seems a do-able action; one that most people can bend their minds around. And one I would readily participate in.
And yet, the practicalities: what's the "or else" here? In order to truly wrest power from the MSM, and destroy their ability to deliver the approved narrative (because you know they're not going to do this voluntarily, no matter how much we bombard them), it seems we'd all have to voluntarily kill our cable, cancel our newspaper subscriptions, stop using Google, etc.
Personally, I've long since done the first two and now happily use DDG thanks to people here -- but it's going to be hard to convince most of America to do the same. Would that be part of that horizontal communication?
My thinking is when
the first talking head asks the first Party Rep "Why do you think most Americans see the Two Parties as corrupt and a threat?" we're in a whole new game as far as narrative-making goes. The crack in the dam that opens the flood. The horizontal effort is to make sure the Big Media figures/politicians can't go anywhere at all without being aware that everyone they see KNOWS them as traitors to the people. Boycott isn't necessary, nor will be enough to crack the propaganda wall.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
Devil's advocate.
How do you see motivating said talking head to actually ask that question? They're all just cogs in the Six Corporation machine, and unless they truly have no fear of the repercussions for straying from The Narrative, I don't understand how this can work.
I mean, I just don't see millions of messages directed at MadCow suddenly transforming her into a real journalist.
Thanks for playing the role.
There's no guarantee. But just one has to have their conscience activated, or their vanity hit by the realization everyone sees them as shitstains and then we're off to a whole new game. Plus, whoever opens the topic in public first will become Ratings Royalty overnight.
The narrative-making machines has to have a wrench thrown into it if we're to have a chance to change the situation. I can't imagine, nor have heard of, any doable action to get there than what I've proposed. Even Caitlin Johnstone, who I adore, seems to think just seeing it will change it. But there has to be a concrete action.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
I agree, and
I think I'd put that a bit differently:
This is why I feel optimistic, albeit cautiously.
If the human race is to survive, it will have to make major changes, in a relatively brief period of time. As Caity Johnstone puts it, we're at the "evolve or die" point. This is literally true, not metaphorically.
I personally believe that at some level, the human species (not necessarily individual humans, but the species as a collective) has decided to survive. So evolution isn't waiting for us. It's happening.
As to how the evolutionary process is going to play itself out, and what human life will look like when we get there, it's interesting to speculate.
Because it has to happen in such a short period of time, the evolution may seem like a revolution.
"Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep."
~Rumi
"If you want revolution, be it."
~Caitlin Johnstone
which is why betrayal will appear late
Most everyone knows already, as I pointed out in my own diary on this topic, that there are two candidates with a chance running for the Dem nomination, Biden and Sanders, and that the rest of them simply cannot inspire enough popular inspiration (and thus generate sufficient popular organizational power) to challenge the Big Two. Popular inspiration is of course important as a first step to creating organizations which can mobilize large numbers of people. Biden can pay for such organizations; Sanders has had them in place since '16.
So Sanders has already been betrayed by this media-blather about how other candidates are each individually "the one." It's fine that Andrew Yang or Elizabeth Warren can promote some nice policies and bring them into debates, for instance, but really, we would do much better to host debates in which ordinary people are allowed the chance to imagine policies and hold roundtables in which they get to discuss them in all seriousness without, you know, actually having to put time and energy and money into running for President. Maybe that way we could avoid wasting time with Beto O'Rourke, Pete Buttigieg, and so on.
So the betrayal has already happened, and the real problem is in making said betrayal explicit. The Presidential selection process is incredibly inappropriate to the challenges facing America as it tries to come to grips with the nightmare that global capitalism has become. Popular energies are therefore best applied in having people organize for themselves regardless of whomever is running for what, rather than staking the whole of the future upon whether or not Bernie Sanders will be betrayed when he's already been betrayed, again.
The ruling classes need an extra party to make the rest of us feel as if we participate in democracy. That's what the Democrats are for. They make the US more durable than the Soviet Union was.
We already
get to hear "ordinary people" sound off -- they are called focus groups. Depressing to watch their dull-mindedness, lack of imagination, limited facts and false facts.
Probably the result of decades of misinformation, limited information and false information from the MSM. Most seem no better than what they've heard on Fox, Msnbc or CNN.
I don't want to entirely underestimate them -- "ordinary people" did elect FDR 4 times it must be said. But it's now 3 generations later or more, and the ordinary people of today seem almost propagandized and zombified beyond any ability to revive the patient. I'll take the announced candidates in all their variety and quirkiness any time.
She won't be in the first 2 debates
She will be on the first night or the second night.
Prof: Nancy! I’m going to Greece!
Nancy: And swim the English Channel?
Prof: No. No. To ancient Greece where burning Sapho stood beside the wine dark sea. Wa de do da! Nancy, I’ve invented a time machine!
Firesign Theater
Stop the War!
The first 3 debates
will be held in two parts, over two consecutive nights, the first in late June, then a month later in July, then in Sept.
So Tulsi will indeed be in the first 2 debates, in June and July. No candidate as yet, afaik, has qualified to meet the new criteria for the 3d debate in Sept.
The candidates themselves
don't seem to find it a problem, judging from the lack of complaints I've seen from their various camps.
I'm most concerned however about Tulsi, who generally gets ignored outside of Fox and often is not mentioned in opinion polls. Has she been invited on Rachel, Chris Hayes or Lawr O'Donnell?
The DNC will bend the rules
until they come up with the candidate they want - Biden. Can anyone get that through their heads? Sanders is toast to them.
As an independent, I'm just sitting back and watching the show - Game of Demorats. Which rat will rise to the top? Which rat will be placed on top? Now, that's the real question!
Do I believe the process will be fair? No, which is why, this time around, I will not change my registration to DIM in order to vote in the primary. Let the rats fall where they may. I will probably vote third party anyway or not at all. It will all depend on who is ALLOWED to run and it probably ain't gonna be Bernie or Tulsi.
"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
if not Biden then Harris
Yeah - whoever, but it won't be
who the people actually want.
"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
Right. It won't be those candidates
...proposing policies and a determination to immediately improve the lives of the People.
I'm glad Americans get to see this one more time in such a stark fashion. To feel it slip through their fingers. In 2009, the bottom fell out of the economy. There wasn't much of a safety net. The people got austerity instead, while their wealth was transferred to the upper classes. 2020 is shaping up to be the next 2009. The elections will be over and when the bottom falls out the People won't have as much to lose or as far to fall.
Neoliberalism Is Dead— Neoliberal Elite Didn’t Get the Memo
link
The only problem with w/neoliberalism being dead
it only leaves us with right wing nut jobs,
no other alternative is contemplated.
We're so fucked
And the D's will go the way of the Whigs after
this election
Little donnie will be our last president
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
Not dead, but dying.
Like a brontosaurus with a fatal wound, it thrashes in the swamp, crushing anything nearby, while the nerve impulses crawl towards it's plum-sized brain. Like a blind drunk man whose life is making its final spin around the drain picking a bar fight with a bunch of tough guys half his age. Like a gambler going all in on one last hand. Dying, but not dead, and dangerous because it has nothing left to lose.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
You can say the same about our empire
Empire - Imperialism - Neoliberalism
It's all connected.
That IS
what WD is saying ~ and quite eloquently, I must add.
"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
Bingo!
Neoliberalism and the empire are one and the same.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Neoliberalism and Neoconservatism
go together like gasoline and matches.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Neoliberalism is not
going quietly - it is being dragged out kicking and screaming!
"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
I agree.
I find the Democrats far more repulsive than the Republicans. At least the Republicans openly avow their evil intentions while the Democrats hide the dagger and poison the chalice (a little hyperbole hurts no one) in order to harm those who trust them. I won't register as a Democrat this time but I will vote for Bernie if the DNC somehow fails to stop him. However, I don't think the Democrats will be that incompetent in obeying the oligarchy's wishes.
Is there a third party candidate? People want to know.
-Greed is not a virtue.
-Socialism: the radical idea of sharing.
-Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
John F. Kennedy, In a speech at the White House, 1962
I completely agree.
As for a third party candidate, I don’t think anyone has ventured forward - I’d imagine anyone is waiting to see how the dim candidates shake out. We’ll see!
"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
Howie Hawkins
appears to be the Green Party's candidate. I am not impressed.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
i'm sorry to hear
that you're not impressed. while i have a few quibbles with him, i'll gladly vote for him if he gets on the ballot in CO.
Howie is a Russia Gater apparently
Where's the hyperbole part? nt
Egads. Has Perez no self awareness?
Perez got a sad when Mueller announced that he has no intention of speaking publicly on Russian election meddling in the future.
(There is no doubt that Mueller is backing away from his failed investigation as fast as he can. Already he is being criticized for his investigation strategy, which was based on an evidence-free hoax. Mueller wasted his time and our money on intellectual dead ends and entrapment cut-de-sacs, while deliberately ignoring rich veins of information that would have resolved the investigation in a matter of months. Mueller knew if he pursued the evidence-based fact that the DNC server was not hacked by Russia, with Julian Assange's help, out would expose his attempt to cover-up the criminal abuse of power and election sabotage by the Intelligence Community and members of the Obama Administration.)
But Perez, inside his bubble of delusion, just cannot understand people who live in the real world.
Perez just cannot understand why the world is behaving in such confusing ways. When people suggest to Perez that the Democrats should just move on, Perez responds:
Reality is not going to be kind to Perez when they finally meet.
Trump's second term, followed by Pence
if they keep shoveling the same horse manure.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Here's the write up on the wishy washy report
Blah blah blah...
High confidence? What does that even mean?
Certain actors? Who were those certain actors and why didn't Mueller put them in his report? Remember all he said that the CIA has high confidence and some beliefs.
Every link except the first one that goes to the report just goes to another article written by WP where evidence in that article goes to a link to another one and so forth and on and on...
No votes were changed. None whatsoever. Nada! But still after Mueller stated that he found no evidence that any members of Trump's campaign worked with Russia... people still think that they did. The brainwashing is thoroughly complete and this silly stain on American's minds will be something that will be studied in whatever future we have. But as we have seen both parties are playing along with this Russian nonsense. Why not? The defense companies have been making huge profits off the new red scare.
It was absurd from day one.
What it means, bottom line, is that the tax revenues of this wealthy nation will not be spent to create a healthy, secure, educated society who live in a modern, well-planned, nation of the future. The nation will continue to be asset stripped for the war profiteers while the people live diminished lives.
Two years later we see how preposterous these Intelligence Community lies were. Why did these psychopaths think we would go along with this deception and the theft of the civilization that we inherited from the people who came before us. Did they think we wouldn't see it? We will never un-see what they've done with our nation's treasure and our futures.. They better run.
From day one!
"Why did these psychopaths think we would go along with this deception."
This will be the question that future historians will ponder just like we ponder why citizens in other countries have gone along with whatever nonsense their rulers came up with. But what I don't understand is how the same people who saw through the Saddam had WMDs could turn around and buy the new WMDs scam being told by the same people in the intelligence agencies.
Comey, Mueller, Brennan, Herheinous, etc. The list is long since the same people keep rotating through the government and its think tanks.
Well, Russia is sitting on
vast resources within their borders that are rightfully our 1%s, when you think about it. Yeltsin understood this.Putin, not so much.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
BINGO
This country had a good thing going with Yeltsin letting it transfer its wealth out to the USA, but then Vlad got elected and not only put a stop to it he also locked up the oligarchs that were helping us do it. This is one of the reasons why Russia has been targeted since Herheinous lost. But this was already being planned even before we overthrew Ukraine's government.
Heh..Russia has Trump and Bolton in a bind. If we go to war with Iran then Russia will be the country that others rely on for oil. $100 barrel oil prices will also destroy our economy and support Russia's. What to do, what to do?
Putin’s 2012 speech
where he proposed the former Soviet nations join with the EU as a trading block (short version) was the point whereat he had to be deposed. As every Anglo-Saxon strategist since Peter the Great believes: the big countries of Europe have to be kept apart or they will together be supreme.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
DNC can't fool as many people now
After the 2016 Democratic primary, it will be a lot more difficult for the DNC to fool people. Even if the DNC has a legitimate reason to change some rule, it will now be questioned by people. The DNC has lost the trust of some voters due to their overtly biased support of Clinton over Bernie. I don't know when the DNC will learn that there are consequences for displaying crappy behavior.
The problem is - the DNC doesn't 'care' if they're
fooling anyone, or not. As we were shown last time, exposing voting irregularities doesn't change the outcome of an election, one whit.
My prediction (at this time) is that Biden, Beto, or Mayor Pete will be the Dem Party presumptive Presidential nominee (maybe, if they were to dare to be bold enough to nominate a woman--ol' Liz).
Probably, a woman or man of color, for VP. Like Harris.
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
This DNC action will likely result in another loss
The problem is that such actions by the DNC (anointing Biden, etc.) will likely result in another presidential loss in 2020. Fewer voters will be energized to go to the polls and vote Democratic. Who wants to continue to support a party that keeps losing?
Oh really... "Yes"... Again?... "Yes"...
I'm waiting for them to get to the Tap dancing Regulation.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unseSFWjuqs]
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
Democrats are begging for a real war with Russia.
In some ways, I hope Hillary is handed the nomination in the second round.
And is defeated again.
This time with a real shellacking like Alf Landon.
I hope Trump opens up Uranium One and the e-mail server.
I want her ground into the dirt so bad her name will forever be anathema.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
I'm not voting for any of them
So, whatever.
" In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry, and is generally considered to have been a bad move. -- Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy "
Hear, hear! If Gravel would run as an Indie,
(he's my former Senator) would likely vote for him.
If willing to run as an Indie--would definitely consider same, for Gabbard. Maybe Bernie, but, not 100% sure, since still afraid he'd give in to the demands of Establishment Dems, again.
Unfortunately, don't really expect any of the three to step out of line, and actually do so. Which is a shame. (IMO)
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
I doubt I will vote again.
Not sure I mentioned it here, but my voting machine made sure my biggies (governor, lt. governor, US Senator votes) were correct, but the screen asking me about my vote on everyone and everything else never appeared.
I walked away from the room thinking I had completely wasted my time.
So much for starting the revolution with local government.
Local government is a Judge, 4 county commissioners, a sheriff, 4 constables, 4 justices of the peace.
Judge lost to a Republican, switched parties, is back in office.
All 4 commissioners switched parties.
The sheriff ran as a Democrat, lost, ran again as a Republican, and won.
3 constables were Democrats, switched parties, retained office. One constable, retiring in a couple of years, won by less than 30 votes.
3 of the 4 justices of the peace switched parties. One is new, ran as Republican, no Democrat opponent.
2 of the 3 former Democratic JP's were former DEMOCRATIC PARTY CHAIRMEN.
The Democratic Club...yes, Club, consists of about 6 women who throw once a month brunches to talk about Trump and how the Democrats must vote Blue no matter Who.
It is all a damn joke.
edit/addendum:
Current District Attorney sat on the bench as District judge for 12 years. Democrat. He got beat by a Republican for re-election. He switched parties, is now our law and order DA. In Texas, the District Judge and District Attorney make the same salary.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Democrats don't run in the towns I've lived in
In NY the big 4 upstate cities are "Democratic", but the counties they are in are solid red "Republican". In the past this meant "Rockefeller Republican" but the Teapublicans took over in 2010. Now they are rabid Trumpies. The Onondaga County Executive was the first Republican county party chair to endorse Trump. He wasn't Executive at the time, she left to take a position in the SUNY system, a gift from her buddy Prince Andrew.
If someone is running as a "Democrat" for a county or town office it means they are a Republican who couldn't win a primary or have a dispute with the party leadership.
Most of the elected Sheriffs in NY are Republican. All of them signed a letter opposing Marijuana legalization.
" In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry, and is generally considered to have been a bad move. -- Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy "
There's something more than meets the eye
...in this story. I find it so remarkable. There's an algorithm lurking here. Is it just politics, or is it human nature, or is it more like wind surfing?
I've got a groovy idea! Check it out!
the Dems, as run by the corrupt DNC and the big money donors, should go to the right of the Republicans!
Possible "winning" issues:
a double wall! If Republicans want a double wall then Dems go for a triple wall!
promise to lock up everybody!
make taxes 100% regressive. At a certain point, if you make enough you get rewarded. 0 taxes!
this would force the Repubs to the left, I think. Also would, maybe, create a new third party. But I guess it's possible that the "Russia!" crowd would follow the Dems there. So maybe it's not a good idea after all.
Accolades.
You're as sick minded as they come.
Welcome.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
Here's her 7 minutes at the Dem convention in SF this weekend
https://youtu.be/di6FtVZuDCA
If you haven't donated yet, go to TULSI2020.com & give her $1, buy a sticker, tee shirt,...
chuck utzman
TULSI 2020
The republicans
proved anyone can grow up to be president. The democrats proved anyone can grow up to be president, if the DNC approves of you.
P.S. just for fun.
Go to Google, type in dkos, hit search and see the 3rd entry down.
Well
I guess the order changes. This AM the third one down in the search was:
https://caucus99percent.com/content/last-time-dkos-went-after-tulsi-gabbard