"BERNIE SANDERS YOU BASTARDS"/ Sanguineness > Cynicism, at least for today.
As the Orange Goon continues to show no sign of recognizing his folly of appearing in public at sports events the indignities continue to pile up on to this wholly undignified boor.
After getting booed again at Madison Sq Garden (following the World Series appearance), Drumpf had to watch as a noted supporter, UFC champion Gregor Gillespie, got knocked out so hard he was flat on his back.
Though I'm not a fan at all of this brutal sport this fighter Kevin Lee interests me at the moment. It happened to be a black challenger who floored the undefeated white guy Gillespie in the first round. And one who's shown signs in the past of willing to accept a more public role critical of RW politics.
Trump got loudly booed last night when he attended a UFC event. After the fight, the winner, Kevin Lee, posted this shot with the caption: "BERNIE SANDERS YOU BASTARDS" - @MoTownPhenom pic.twitter.com/NhcHB5H2TK
— People for Bernie (@People4Bernie) November 3, 2019
It may be hyperbolic to say but Lee's triumphant bellow at Trump supporters is reminiscent of Joe Louis decking Max Shmelling. Ideologically, though, it's not that different.
Two years ago he was here:
“For somebody like Lebron James that’s been there and done that—the man has $1 billion dollars," Lee said at a UFC 216 media luncheon in Las Vegas, per MMAjunkie. "He’s got enough money to run a country, and for him to stand up for the little folks, I really have to take my hat off to him."
Lee, who faces Tony Ferguson for the interim title Saturday, said he was hoping to gain a wider platform of his own should he win the championship and if so would use it to address sensitive issues as James has.
“It’s just a big inspiration for me, especially as a black athlete. For some reason, everybody wants to shy away from it," Lee said. “I just wish that my voice was a little bigger. I think with that gold belt around my waist, it will be.”
His voice just got pretty big.
As Bernie continues his Back In Black leg of the tour the surge in electricity going back and forth between he and audience has been more compelling than ever. Not just that he's been introduced consecutively across the country at three stops by arguably the three most visible Congressional officers in the country, not just that choice musical guests are coming out to play for his rallies (Jack White in Detroit, Prince's New Power Generation). But most impressively, his message continues to evolve in an ever more, unabashedly radical direction. In the past couple of weeks he's been suggesting more, straight up radical things, such as that we give Israeli military aid money to the Palestinians for humanitarian help.
At the Minnesota rally with Ilan Omar the two loudest applause line were for, get this, erasing college debt and challenging Western imperialism.
Western imperialism? Abso-fucking-lutely. Bernie's rhetoric is becoming a lot more Marxist in its socialism. He's been talking a lot lately about a globally united worker's movement. Think about that...That's a whole different ballgame than anything we've seen. I think he's been leading up to this praxis for a long time. It's just that now the world is right there with him. Witness Chile, Lebanon, Spain, France, Hong Kong, Ecudaor, Haiti - all in the midst of massive public uprisings against Neoliberalism and the 1%.
Beirut tonight.
Can’t get over these protests.
pic.twitter.com/kVdVj232Vz— Joshua Potash (@JoshuaPotash) November 3, 2019
What presidential candidate would dare march behind this banner?
.@BernieSanders leading the March Against Corporate Greed tonight in Des Moines. pic.twitter.com/hrRKJxo7K5
— Nick Martin (@lancnick) November 2, 2019
Maybe because the unvarnished and focused philosophy he's carried with him for over 50 years that renders him the most authentic, genuine and believable voice in elected office by far is starting to make its way through the country. Get a load of this:
Oklahoma voted to commute the prison sentences of 527 low-level criminal offenders on Monday, the largest single-day commutation in US history. Executive director of the Education and Employment Ministry Kris Steele joins In Question to discuss (5:21)
And this,
In America, Occupy was 8 years ago, BlackLivesMatter only about 6, and Bernie's presidential campaign debuting in 2015 as an extension or an electoral political manifestation of these grievances.
In NYC this past weekend young activists showed up en masse to protest an NYPD edict to station more cops at turnstiles, effectively criminalizing being poor.
People protest NYPD policing the MTA by mass hopping the turnstiles pic.twitter.com/Roli76gPMX
— barely informed with elad (@elaadeliahu) November 2, 2019
Let's not forget this fact. Even WaPo couldn't brush over this, noting that in 2016 "More young people voted for Bernie Sanders than Trump and Clinton combined — by a lot."
Good thing the campaign has taken seriously the responsibility to collect evidence of media malfeasance and collusion against Bernie. To what end this will matter I'm not sure. But it can't be a bad thing to have such a repository.
Here's the latest missive from David Sirota, BERN NOTICE: The Bernie Surge -- And The Media's Attempt to Ignore & Derail It
THE ACTUAL POLLS: "Sanders has surged since he returned to the campaign trail"
Before we review The Media’s Manufactured Narrative, let’s first take a look at some key polling data from the last week that proves what The Hill had the guts to accurately report: Bernie “has surged in the polls since he returned to the campaign trail.”
•BERNIE LEADS IN NEW HAMPSHIRE: The new CNN New Hampshire poll shows Bernie leading the field in the first-in-the-nation primary state. That includes big leads among self-described conservative Democrats, independents, and Democratic voters who did not vote in 2016. The poll also shows Bernie is seen as the most likable candidate in the field.
• BERNIE IS SURGING IN IOWA: The New York Times’ new Iowa poll shows Bernie in a statistical tie for first place. That poll shows Bernie’s support is the most robust: 55% of his Iowa supporters say their minds are made up — by far the highest percentage of any candidate.
• BERNIE IS SURGING IN MICHIGAN: Emerson’s new Michigan poll shows Bernie gaining 5 points since March, and now in a strong second-place position behind Biden, who plummeted 10 points in the same time period.
• BERNIE IS THE ONLY CANDIDATE BEATING TRUMP IN 3 KEY STATES: The New York Times’ polling data shows Bernie is the only candidate beating Trump in the three previously Democratic states — Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan — that delivered Trump the 2016 election.
• BERNIE SHOWS STRONG SIGNS IN NATIONAL POLLS: The new ABC/WashPost national poll shows Bernie in a statistical tie for second place, and shows that the largest segment of voters see him as “the most honest and trustworthy” candidate as well as the candidate who “best understands the problems of people like you.” The NBC/WSJ national poll shows Bernie gaining 5 points since September — the largest gain of any candidate.
THE MEDIA’S MANUFACTURED NARRATIVE: Misreported polls and the Bernie BlackoutDespite all this data, many in the national press corps continued to both inaccurately report the polling results — and also pretend Bernie doesn’t exist.
Misreported Polls
In a report about its own poll showing Bernie in first place in New Hampshire, CNN put an inaccurate graphic up showing Bernie in second place.
In a story on the Iowa poll showing Bernie in second place, CNN wrongly reported that Bernie was in third place.
In promoting a story about its own Iowa poll showing Bernie ahead of Pete Buttigieg, the New York Times insisted Buttigieg has “eclipsed” Bernie.
Bernie Blackout
The Intercept’s Ryan Grim reported that “CNN has five articles up about its new NH poll that shows Sanders in front, yet none of the five say that in the headline.”
In a headline about its own poll showing Bernie in a statistical tie for second place, the Washington Post didn’t mention Bernie and instead touted Pete Buttigieg’s “rise” — even though Buttigieg has less than half the support of Bernie and was a distant 4th place in their own poll.
In promoting its Iowa poll showing Bernie in second place, the New York Times blasted out a news alert mentioning every top-tier candidate — except for Bernie.
In its report about the Iowa poll showing Bernie in a close second place, CNN’s chyron was “Iowa Poll: Biden & Buttigieg Within Striking Distance of Warren.”
As far as I'm seeing it this is about the difference in a fundamental change in how we view and interact with society. And the difference between Bernie and the rest of the entire political and media establishment, both Right and Left (including Liz "Capitalist to her bones" Warren, and obviously the DNC) is not comparable. Bernie's vision is resonating this time again to more and more people because they recognize on varying levels subconsciously or consciosly that the whole conformist consumerism of Capitalism, American Exceptionalism and individualism is a Lie, as is the whole media delivery system of the "news."
Bernie's laying down all the cards on the table with a choice: An uber capitalist society of he-man individualism and aspiring to get rich quick, or one based on the mutual aid of socialism that recognizes empathy and compassion are the true twin engines of society.
I want you all to take a look around and find someone you don’t know, maybe somebody who doesn’t look kind of like you, who might be of a different religion, maybe who come from a different country.
My question now to you is, are you willing to fight for that person who you don’t even know as much as you’re willing to fight for yourself?
Are you willing to stand together and fight for those people who are struggling economically in this country?
Are you willing to fight for young people drowning in student debt, even if you are not? Are you willing to fight to ensure that every American has health care as a human right, even if you have good health care?
Are you willing to fight for frightened immigrant neighbors, even if you are native born? Are you willing to fight for a future for generations of people who have not yet even been born, but are entitled to live on a planet that is healthy and habitable?
Because if you are willing to do that, if you are willing to fight for a government of compassion and justice and decency, if you are willing to stand up to Trump’s desire to divide us up, if you are prepared to stand up to the greed and corruption of the corporate elite, if you and millions of others are prepared to do that, there is no doubt in my mind that not only will we win this election, but together we will transform this country.
As Bernie has also been saying a lot lately, quoting the great Nelson Mandela, "Everything seems impossible until it's done."
Comments
Hey folks. Just whipped this up here...
sipping a scotch after another long and exhausting day, ruminating on all that I had been reading and watching during my day when time allowed or in the background.
Realized so much of it was hopeful, and I wished some real journalist could stitch something together showing the correlation between so many bubbling under signs to the massive uprisings that give feet to the idea that the 99% are waking up.
But just as I say that I become less sanguine. Like many of you I've just been through this up and down roller coaster too much to think that this is a verifiable trend in our favor.
At least for tonight, though, I'll try to remain sanguine.
'Nite all, from Gotham.
"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC"
- Kurt Vonnegut
Let's enjoy what we can today then
I've had a horrible couple of weeks, culminating in the worst bad day today I've had in a very long time. I'm glad to see some glimmer of optimism and hope somewhere. Cheers to you, Mark!
Every once in awhile --
I will publish a diary chronicling the insane state of dilapidation our colleges and universities are in. Perhaps "College for All" is the sort of thing they need.
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.
Be sure to note the multi-million dollar salaries
Of the Presidents and other management officials, and compare them to the salaries of those actually teaching and doing research.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Our college and university systems
are in pretty desperate states right now. A comprehensive solution is in order. Yes of course bloated administrations are a big, big part of the problem. I would be happy to see some proactive moveement.
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.
The President of U of I at Champaign makes
three times what the President of the United States makes. Numerous coaches in this public school system make over a million dollars a year.
Illinois is in debt up to it's eyeballs and cannot pay teacher's pensions. police pensions, DMV clerk's pensions so they keep trying to renege on them while paying bloated amounts to these appointed officials. I wonder how much our politicians get in kickbacks for these appointments?
Oh, and that U of I President gets a pension after FIVE years of service!
No wonder kids have to mortgage their lives to get through four years. And free college will only make it worse unless there are pay constraints.
The usual argument is that these administrators could make more in private industry. That should be stopped as well.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
I'm a 4th-generation UIUC graduate.
At the time I got my diploma, my sister and I were likely the first and only people who could say that. For all I know, we still are.
If I lived in Illinois now, I would not be able to afford to send my kids there.
4 generations.
When my mother attended, tuition & fees were something like $100/year. (Per a conversation in another thread, the hospital bill when I was born was about $50.)
When I matriculated, I think tuition was about $1000/year. Maybe $1500.
Tuition and fees are now 16K-21K, depending on your major.
To put this in perspective, the minimum wage in 1958 was a buck an hour.
The Illinois minimum wage is now $8.25 an hour.
So the minimum wage has gone up by a factor of 8.25
And the tuition/fees at UIUC have gone up by a factor of 150.
The combination of:
A. Skyrocketing healthcare costs for the university as an employer
and
B. Slashed state funding (as a percentage of total costs of instruction)
is rendering our elite public universities the private playgrounds of the upper middle class.
BTW, UW-Madison just reported the highest proportion in decades of out-of-state students in the entering freshman class. They love to bring in the out-of-state students, because those students pay full freight. Many of them are rich kids from the wealthy northern burbs of Chicago (Wilmette, Northbrook, Barrington, Lake Forest) or from the east coast, who couldn't quite make the cut to get into the Ivy league schools. Meanwhile, Wisconsin students are taken by the subsidiary campuses of the "UW System".
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
@UntimelyRippd
$150 when I was 18 and a state scholarship which made it free pretty much if you asked for it which my counselor didn't because he was having "personal issues". At the same time, pre-Reagan, California had free tuition for in-state students. So those who say it can't be done are wrong.
At that time a physics professor's salary at the private college I would up going to was about $11,000 a year. That would be about $130,000 now which I think is reasonable. I've read that it's double now which is how those million dollar administrative salaries are justified.
Here's a radical idea: Why do bosses have to make more than workers? Are their not people who just want to be boss? Do they not plot and knife one another to claw their way to the top? Is it just for the money? Or does power attract them? I think the latter.
Notice I'm not saying everyone should make the same as Lenin said, but is not power and prestige its own reward? If you boss mechanics, why be paid more than mechanics? If you boss engineers ... Notice that my proposal says Generals should make the same as Privates. No incentive to be a General? Getting out of digging foxholes and cleaning latrines is plenty of incentive.
EDIT:
And I worked my way through that private college working in factories during the summer (and a side job feeding mice and cleaning cages during the school year). it was possible to do that then. Now the factories are in China and summer jobs pay much less and school pays much more. My last summer job, testing CRT's in incoming inspection at Motorola paid about $2.10 an hour, the equivalent of $25 an hour now. Those jobs are long gone. Do you want fries with that?
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
There must be a system of quid pro quo among the directors
of the company boards and the preposterously overpaid CEOs. An often cited excuse for corporate austerity and outsourcing with regard to labor is that the company has a fiduciary responsibility to maximize profit. But that is BS, because the boards completely ignore that "responsibility" when it comes to negotiating pay, benefits, and golden parachutes for CEOs. Why is it that the expression "if you don't like it there are 10 people behind you that will do a better job for less pay" only applies to average grunts but not CEOs? Shareholders should be suing companies for pissing away cash on undeserving and overpaid CEOs.
Absolutely!
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Hey Mark ~~
This was inspiring. Thanks for posting it. Earlier, I watched a piece by someone covering the Sanders rally in Minnesota. Ilan Omar was breathtaking. She brought tears to my eyes. Bernie was remarkable. You quote his closing. Another tear jerker.
I, too, move forward with trepidation. How did Dubbya put it - fool me once...
I’m watching, trying to steer clear of the fray. The creme appears to be rising.
Be well, my friend and a hug to the family.
"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 think in a year, Trump will be history, one way or the other
Debbie Wasserman Schultz, on the other hand, seems on the verge of making a big comeback as chair of the House Appropriations Committee.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article236811358.html
The trouble with party politics is, often, you or I can work our butts off thinking it’s on behalf of Bernie or Tulsi or whoever, and later it turns out the ones who benefited most from our work are the Debbie Wasserman Schultzes of the world.
She has GOT to be punished
There has GOT to be a way. We cannot let she and her droogies slide any longer. They are bullies, gangsters, and abusers, and as you say, they exploit us. There is nothing left to be gained from appeasing them (at least, not that outweighs what is lost). We need to treat them the way they've treated us, without flinching or apologizing, because that is what works for people like them. There is a world of difference between doing it as precisely-targeted retaliation and doing it as a way of life.
In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.
Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!
send ten bucks to Tim Canova
Compensated Spokes Model for Big Poor.
Energetic essay
Kudos, Mark for posting this. I'm feeling a surge in power like back during OWS and people being fed up enough to demand change.
Lots of diversity in the crowd. Lots of young people, middle aged, a few elderly and even two hippies. I love the graphic of the crowd surrounding the DNC. Ignore us at your peril.
Just watched the Minnesota ralley
So inspiring. Our rally here was excellent. Many new committed young people. Lots of people singed up to do phonebanks. Organized by the SF folks. We will start door knocking soon too. Funny, everyone in the room knew that all the tricks in the book would be pulled to prevent his nomination and that made them more committed. Young folks get Bernie.
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
"The Orange Goon"
For a minute there, I honestly thought you meant Kos.
Anyone notice how Trump is not actually orange? That's just a thing TheyTM have decided.
Funny thing is, before it became trendy to describe certain disliked pseudocelebrities and John Boehner as "orange", I was inclined to ascribe "orange" to Hispanics - just in an "old natural fruit" shade, rather than "Creamsicle-neon" (maybe it's just a lot of the people in the rural Southwestern valley I've been stuck living in, which is pretty cut-off and inbred).
Also, could we please not fall into the trap of blaming "individualism", when what you really mean is capitalism? Capitalism was NEVER individualistic; that's a fallacy left over from the Cold War (during which, ironically, "capitalism" was a completely different animal thanks to the New Deal). Ayn Rand, E.O. Wilson, Mao Tse Tung, Donald Trump, Paul Ryan, and yes, Christianity itself all fell into/emerged from this same evil yin-yang, which I have always viewed as one of the biggest metaphysical roadblocks presently stultifying the world. I'm an autistic Silicon Valley scion; I'm living proof that altruism is born of egotism. They're no more opposites than fusion is the opposite of radiation.
In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.
Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!
"Individualism" is generally understood to refer to an outlook
that we are all independent of one another -- that our comfort, our success, and our survival is entirely a matter of our own industriousness and capability, and that none of us owes anything to the rest. It stands, not in opposition to the Borg, but in opposition to society.
You are free, of course, to attach such meaning as you like to the word.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
Gimme more, please?
Maybe if you spend just a few more evenings sipping on that scotch.
Anger can be power as the Clash used to sing:
I'm not working for the clampdown
No man born with a living soul
Can be working for the clampdown
Kick over the wall 'cause government's to fall
How can you refuse it?
Let fury have the hour, anger can be power
D'you know that you can use it?
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnliAafBYzU]
Wow. Bruuuuce and Tom Morello:
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqRN7N7lH8o]
Edit/add: Yikes! I just read that Rage Against the Machine will be doing a re-UNION tour this spring with all the original band members including Zack de la Rocha, Tim Commerford, guitarist Tom Morello and Brad Wilk. Not in time for Super Tuesday it seems but who knows????
A Tale of Two Elections
One happening in the air (TV), one happening on the ground. The two will clash once the voting starts.
"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
Thanks for the positive piece Mark
As in 2016, defeating the DNC will be more difficult than Bernie defeating Trump. Thanks for spreading some hope!
Hey to the family!
“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
Going off today to vote in KY Governor's race....
am not optimistic about eliminating Bevin. Trump was here last night for a big rally in Lexington for Bevin. Got a kick out of the newspaper reporting a guy who walked up to the MAGA hat sales table and gave them shit for having the hats made in China.
This diary gave me a needed mood boost.
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
He beat Bevin!
Would like to see a diary by you, as a Kentuckian, on that.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
BERNIE SANDERS YOU BASTARDS
Thank you Mark! I enjoyed your post immensely!!
Check out this pic from what appears to be the weigh-in for the fight (I also am not a fan of this 'sport', but)-the energy on Kevin Lee's face and body posture (on left) is what I need going into this next year.
I can't figure out how to insert a pic, but here's the link-it's worth a peek.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B4SzR2GnnVQ/?hl=en
Kevin looks like 155 lbs of pure determination. And we all know how that turned out!
I really appreciate all the info in your post & am going to share it.
My mom thinks Buttigieg is "nice", but nice isn't what we need right now. We need fighters-scappy, determined fighters. People willing to stand up to bullies and fight for what's right.
Cheers!
Reminds me of a WW II story
One of the Pacific Fleet Admirals (Arleigh Burke?) wrote a letter to the Commanding Officer of the Naval Academy regarding the teaching of sportsmanship.
It contained the summation "We don't need good losers in the Fleet. We need tough SOB's that will win!"
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Still have qualms about confiscating 20% of all stock
and giving it to the workers.
Don't think the media won't harp on this in the General Election and they would be right to say this is literally Sovietization, except that Lenin confiscated all the stock and gave it to the Soviets not just 20%.
And banning gasoline cars in ten years. This will play havoc with worker's transportation and will gut the auto industry. No one is going to buy a car that they can't get fuel for before the vehicle is paid for (7 or 8 years now). Good news for Tesla, bad news for the UAW.
How's that going to fly in Michigan, Indiana and Ohio?
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.