#DemExit & #GreenEnter

(both by way of Black Agenda Report)

The End of Sanders, and Maybe the Beginning of a Mass Independent Left’, Glen Ford, April 16, 2020, blackagndareport.com

“Sander’s early Return of the Prodigal Son to the bosom of the Party allows him to escape the deep critique of capitalist medicine and political-economy that would be required of a “leftish” presidential candidate as this never-in-our-lifetimes crisis unfolds.” [jump]

Bernie Sanders claimed to be running against the oligarchy in his quest for the Democratic presidential nomination, but meekly surrendered to Joe Biden, the personification of the glad-handing corporate shill and champion of the status quo, once the momentum of the primaries had turned. Sanders said he would resume his duties as a full-time senator doing “the work that needs to be done to protect people in this most desperate hour.”

But the raw truth is, Sanders surrendered unconditionally to a Democratic Party that is, in the Age of Trump, the electoral representative of the bulk of a fractured U.S. ruling class – the oligarchy. Without warning, Sanders demobilized his legions, even while claiming to continue to lead “a grass-roots, multiracial, multigenerational movement which has always believed that real change never comes from the top on down, but always from the bottom on up.” Sanders thanked  his generous followers, nearly two million of whom donated at least $167 million  to his campaign. Unknown millions remain unspent, and much more could be raised from even a greatly diminished cohort of Sanders true-believers if the self-described socialist was sincere about leading a well-funded “movement” outside the corporate duopoly. But Sanders is going out as a fraud who will refuse to turn over either unspent campaign monies or precious voter lists to his “grassroots” supporters or anybody outside the Democratic Party.” [jump]

“For the second time in two presidential cycles, Sanders has lived up to Bruce Dixon’s depiction of him as a “sheepdog” for the Democrats. “Sheepdogs are herders,” wrote Dixon, the BAR co-founder who died last June, “and the sheepdog candidate is charged with herding activists and voters back into the Democratic fold who might otherwise drift leftward and outside of the Democratic Party, either staying home or trying to build something outside the two party box.” That’s Sanders to a T.

[Dixon had also called Tusli Gabbard a ‘sheepherder for the Dems’.]

“Sanders bowed out of the race the minute his momentum stalled, at the very same time that the greatest combined health and economic calamity in U.S. history was gripping the nation by the throat – a teaching moment if one ever existed, if health care and economic inequality were really Sanders’ top priority. He did acknowledge the ballooning crisis: “In terms of health care, this current, horrific crisis that we are now in has exposed for all to see how absurd our current employer-based health insurance system is. The current economic downturn we are experiencing has not only led to a massive loss of jobs but has also resulted in millions of Americans losing their health insurance.” [jump]

“A core of Sanders supporters, numbering possibly several millions, plus many others that did not consider themselves radicals until they saw how “the system” left them naked to COVID-19 and the accompanying economic immiseration, will experience a eureka moment and exit the Democrats, in body and mind. The only question is: will there be alternative, independent political vehicles for their anger and energies that are equipped to handle an influx not seen since the Sixties?

As BAR has maintained for the last two presidential seasons, the best outcome of the primaries would be a mass exit from the Democratic Party, the fraudulent left section of the oligarch-ruled duopoly. (The vast bulk of Republicans have chosen the right home for their racist ilk: The White Man’s Party.) Younger Blacks have not abandoned the historical Black consensus on social justice and peace, and some took part in renewed stirrings of “movement” politics during the “Black Lives Matter” struggles. They will have a lot to think about in the enforced relative isolation of CoronaTime – and may become the 21st century’s Black Left Generation.”

Indeed, Bruce Dixon was the radical at BAR, and as I’ve long noted, former radical Glen Ford was backing Bernie this cycle.  To say the truth, I’d been disappointed in his backing a Democrat, as I believe Bruce Dixon would have been.  So what is this new Mass Independent Left he’s touting?  Oh, rats; the banner’s already spoiled the surprise (smile).

Sanders Supporters Pledge to “#DemExit” and “#GreenEnter” to Make a Home in a Party That Shares Their Core Values’ by Independent Political Report, 15 April 2020, blackagndareport.com

“The Green Party of the United States reported an explosion of interest in their party following Senator Bernie Sanders’ announcement on Wednesday that he was officially suspending his campaign.

“We knew we had to act fast to meet this moment,” said Green Party National Co-Chair Justin Beth, who served as a Sanders delegate during the 2016 Democratic National Convention before joining the Green Party. “Last time, Sanders campaigned through the final primary dateI think his ending things now took most of his supporters by surprise, and us too.”

The party responded by posting a “Green Party Message to Sanders Campaign Supporters”  on social media, offering Sanders supporters a “home” that is fully-aligned with their core issues, such as bold action to avert a climate catastrophe, implementing Improved and Expanded Medicare-For-All, and abolishing student debt. The statement also expressed sympathy for Sanders supporters who had been “abused and marginalized” by the corporate-leaning Democratic National Committee leadership and their surrogates among the pundit class.

The statement went on to assert their shared policy goals are impossible “so long as the Democrats and Republicans can operate as an anti-democratic cartel at the behest of this country’s elite” and offered Proportional Representation, Ranked Choice Voting and fully-public campaign financing as tools to make “political revolution” a reality.

Within hours of Sanders’ announcement and the Green Party’s response, “Green Party” was trending on Twitter and their tweeted statement has now garnered over 5000 “likes” and almost 2000 retweets.
“We are working overtime to connect with these passionate activists,” continued [National co-chair Gloria] Mattera. “They are asking how they can help and we want to know their interests, we want them to know this is a party that belongs to all of its members, not the 1%. They could be the seeds of the next generation of Green Party leaders and breakout candidates.” [jump]

“The Greens will focus on orienting new supporters toward connecting with state and local Green Party organizations and candidates, along with national mobilizing for the presidential general election. “We are calling on former Sanders supporters to not only Vote Green in 2020, but Register Green and prepare to run as Greens in the future. The revolution is here,” said national co-chair Trahern Crews.

“It’s time for people to see that backing progressive candidates in the ‘Democratic’ Party is a dead end, whereas building the Green Party would allow candidates we believe in to have a shot at winning general elections, running as Greens,” said Beth. “These progressive candidates can’t win their race if they’re not even allowed to get to the starting line.”

The Green Party will decide on its nominee for president at a national convention scheduled for July 11. The party has not yet officially decided on a “virtual” format for their convention but that appears inevitable amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The officially-recognized candidates for the Green Party’s presidential nomination are Dario Hunter, David Rolde and Howie Hawkins.

This article previously appeared in Independent Political Report .

Howie Hawkins had already invited Sanders to join him, and I suppose the Greens could radicalize the Sanders supporters.

RELEASE: Hawkins Invites Sanders Supporters to join his Green Socialist Presidential Campaign, April 8, 2020 [in part]:

“Bernie deserves praise for fighting for the 99% but it was not an agenda ever embraced by the leadership of the Democrats.

Voters are left with a miserable choice between the major party candidates: Donald Trump, the racist incompetent, and Joe Biden, the neoliberal hawk. To settle for Biden as the lesser evil is to join the opposition of the corporate establishment to Medicare for All, a full-strength Green New Deal, and an Economic Bill of Rights to end poverty and economic despair.

We are running out of time on the pandemic, climate, nuclear arms, and deadly poverty and economic despair. Real solutions can’t wait.

Let’s continue to fight of socialist solutions through the November election and beyond. Keep the revolution alive. We are fighting for our future.”

A few bits from his Perspectives and Policies page:

Capitalist Oligarchy

Democracy needs socialism. Progressive reforms will never be secure as long as the major means of production are in the hands of a super-rich oligarchy whose concentrated economic power translates into concentrated political power. The failure to face this reality is how the managed capitalism advanced by Democratic Party “socialists” comes up short. As Bernie Sanders said in his 2015 speech on democratic socialism, “I don’t believe government should own the means of production.” We should join with these progressives in fighting for reforms, but we should not be politically naive. Progressive reforms are not secure as long as the property-based power structure of the capitalist oligarchy remains intact.

Key Economic Sectors to Socialize: Money (and the Fed), Big Banks, Power Utilities, Health care, Big Pharma, Arms Industry, Broadband, Online Platforms, etc.

What I can’t find again concerned how to pay for his version of an ecosocialist Green New Deal: he’d included a 70% cut to the military budget; all I can find now is ‘Cuts to the military budget’, but maybe the original is on some other page (she types hopefully).

Now I just popped back into Howie’s Press Releases menu, and found this fukkery:

Twitter Terminates Account of Howie Hawkins, Green Party candidate for President’, April 17, 2020   [@howiehawkins20; ‘account suspended’, although his @HowieHawkins account is still up]

“(Syracuse, NY, April 17, 2020) Howie Hawkins, who is leading in the primaries for the Green Party nomination for President, has been notified by Twitter that his campaign account is terminated.

Twitter terminated the account without any notice and said that there was no ability to appeal. Twitter said that the account violated its rule on impersonation.

Besides not providing any process to appeal the termination, Twitter provided no information as to why it concluded the Howie Hawkins’ president campaign account was impersonating Howie Hawkins or his campaign.

“How do I impersonate myself? Twitter’s explanation for its censorship makes no sense,” Hawkins said.”

For more information: Howie Hawkins, 315-200-6046, howie@howiehawkins.us

Now Jack Dorsey has been increasingly suspending and shadow-bannng accounts not in keeping with conventional hegemoinc belief and Trusted Partners, such as this one from April 1:

“Broadening our definition of “harm” We have broadened our definition of harm to address content that goes directly against guidance from authoritative sources … we are enforcing this in close coordination w. trusted partners, inc’

My stars, how selfless of Howie; I just hopped on to Kevin Zeeses’ (Hawkins organizer, Popular Resistance, the Oct. 2011 movement) account and found this from March 22, 2020:

(side note: I’d remembered reading that Sanders hadn’t wanted to be labelled ‘a spoiler like Ralph Nader had been’; maybe that was referencing the reason why he hadn’t accepted two offers?)

(cross-posted from Café Babylon)

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wendy davis's picture

'the floor is yours', as once again humanity is at the crossroads (diego rivera).

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Cassiodorus's picture

the Green Party insiders are going to waste away the next three months before telling us who their nominee is. This is a major flaw in their set-up.

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

wendy davis's picture

@Cassiodorus

and 402 delegates will teleconference to vote. i'll admit that i was taken aback that someone who'd been Green only after 2016 is a co-chair already.

but july hardly gives a candidate time to raise enough funds for matching funds, ballot access, either. and the green party 2020 candidates page now has far less bio and info than two weeks ago on the three 'official candidates'. bizarro world.

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Cassiodorus's picture

@wendy davis when I say that the Green Party has accommodated itself to permanent minor party status. I remember checking in with the Greens of southern California a few years back -- they were sucked up in the same futile nonsense they were doing nearly sixteen years ago when my friend Walt Sheasby died (and with him my hopes for the Green Party).

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

wendy davis's picture

@Cassiodorus

that so visibly welcoming former sanders supporters will put them on the map? and i'm struggling not to type 'marginally better', lol. guess i can see the point, but as a force to be reckoned with...time will tell.

i'm so sad that your friend walt had crossed to the other side, and i hope it wasn't a too-early journey. but he must have been quite a key figure that caused you to lose hope for the GP.

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Cassiodorus's picture

@wendy davis Walt had broken his ankle and a doctor had malpracticed it, setting it back together wrong, and he refused to see another doctor about it -- and he had diabetes and so he didn't notice what was wrong -- and so apparently West Nile virus got into it and spread to his spinal cord, meningitis led to encephalitis. I called 911 and they picked him up and sent him to the hospital and two weeks later he was dead. So strange.

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

wendy davis's picture

@Cassiodorus

what a tragic story, cass. medical malpractice gone horror story.

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@Cassiodorus to highlight, and the second big turnoff for me, after Howie the Hawk. And it's interesting how so many principled onliners on the left can spend so much time railing against the DNC rigging its primary elections, while they then easily accept the no-primaries, insiders-only situation in the GP. Some democracy they have in the GP.

I understand for some of you that the GP is a good Plan B or even it's your Plan A. Fine. I just don't think Howie is going to remotely attract as many votes as the far more able and impressive Jill Stein, so I see the GP as a very marginal factor.

Btw, is Howie still peddling that Russiagate fiction?

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wendy davis's picture

@wokkamile

would ask. it turns out it's you, wokkamile.

'The Russiagate Obsession Is Mass Distraction', Jun 16, 2019, howie hawkins.us

as i understand it, he'd earlier charge jill stein as being a putin-puppet for dining with him in moscow (which photo we've seen endlessly). the comedy is that stein (against ajamu baracka's wishes, as well as the green party steering committee's, raised bucketsful of bucks for recounts in 3 states based on 'russian interference' (later 'foreign interference')...for hillary, because: the trumpeter.

the recounts AFAIK, never happened, as she'd said the states kept raising the price. who knows? and who knows what happened to that money? i love it on wikipedia it says: 'declined to run in 2020: jill stein.

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@wendy davis finally decided that peddling R-gate wasn't a good idea. Good to know.

As for JS, I have read that she was persuaded to ask for recounts on the basis of concerns from legit voting analysts about vote count irregularities showing up in those states based on the discrepancies between various voting methods. I believe the Clinton campaign then decided to join the recount effort.

Wasn't aware she was asserting something about Russia interference. Do you happen to have a cite for that? Would be interesting if true and it would tend to undercut her criticism of Howie's mindlessly gullible Russiagating and reveal her as a hypocrite. But I guess I missed that story.

As for accounting for the money, I'm pretty sure a lefty who's required to file periodic disclosures to the FEC about how the money is being used is not going to get away with pocketing even a nickel left over. But there doesn't appear to be a dog barking, which I take to mean there's no there there.

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wendy davis's picture

@wokkamile

number of citations Bingling, as no: i don't have any in my back pocket.

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just like he did in 2016. Whether it's sincere or not isn't relevant. Personally, I think it's sincere. If he is sincere, neither the Greens nor Sanders would want such an arrangement, and if he is not sincere given his behavior after 2016 he can't really be trusted to be a good steward of a leftist party.

If he were serious about change, he'd have directed his efforts at helping destroy the two-party stranglehold from the bottom-up. Change isn't going to happen by taking over or reforming either of the duopoly parties. They are private corporations developed specifically for the purpose of entrenching their own leadership's power, and that same leadership will not allow them to be used for anything but that purpose.

The greens need to stop wasting their time on Sanders. His supporters who are interested are already going to support them, and the ones who aren't are not going to be persuaded to leave their veal pens in the democratic party just because Sanders does.

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snoopydawg's picture

@BayAreaLefty

Why else would he be appearing on MSDNC after their horrid treatment of him during both primaries? "I don't know, there is just something about him that makes my skin crawl."

Probably for the same reason he went on the View and let Whoopie beat him up. But hey he will get to keep his committee assignments so that is what is important. He can do all he can to get bills passed that will help us while voting for POS ones like the CARES Act.

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

wendy davis's picture

@snoopydawg

but: 04/11/2020 Bernie Sanders Proposes Emergency Version Of ‘Medicare For All’ For The Pandemic, Now off the campaign trail, the senator joined Rep. Pramila Jayapal to float a temporary universal health care program', huffpo.com

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wendy davis's picture

@BayAreaLefty

made it clear he doesn't want to run third-party, including green. when some were calling for that here i'd mused that his millions unspent might be attractive to the steering committee, though.

i suppose the questions for me around this post are: why glen ford is now touting the title of this post, and how good a match as to 'shared values' his supporters will have with any of the three 'official candidates', including hawkins (read his positions, for instance). 'his supporters', of course, not being monolithic.

for me, my key issues have long been anti-imperialism and more recently socialism, so i was adamantly against bernie sanders as far back as 2015.

but as with so many, the key issue seems to be 'trump is killing us': solidarity, although maybe i'm not being fair.

but humanity, not just amerika, is indeed at another crossroads. the coming depression will be epic, and the serfs will need to care for one another as best we're able. the Owners believe they can escape, but i'm not so sure. May Day strikes are being announced now; stay tuned, i guess.

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I believe we have to Demexit, although I would assume most of us here did that in 2016. Bernie was not an exciting candidate for me, this time around. He didn't call out the primary rigging, or the lawsuit from his supporters about that. This left me turning to Tulsi instead.

I've looked up Dario Hunter's info (of Green Party) and he seems great. A Muslim, who's also a Rabbi, and is for the BDS movement. He also wants to free Assange, so I hope that would also lead to pardoning Snowdon. He's young, intelligent, and very progressive. I will be voting Green no matter who wins. I'm so over the Dems.

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wendy davis's picture

@sarianna

running mate's, too. and i was tickled that he's living as an activist in youngstown (which i know well), too. at least the GP site links to his own page, but david holde? a facebook page. but as i remember it, he was certainly the most radical of the three, as with: end the military.

hawkin's 'disband the senate' i liked too.

i'm glad you're over the dems, but as far as i can tell, most here have said that bernie's betrayal would now cause them to DemExit. i've voted green the last three cycles, but last time ONLY for ajamu baraka (not stein) a true black radical revolutionary.

thanks, sarianna.

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Alligator Ed's picture

There will be a Green Party (GP) as long as there are lofty idealists. Nothing wrong with lofty ideals either. But perhaps the enormous tectonic moving of the Trumpian geologic plate will spread asunder the ossified Dem Partei like just another geologic fault line--cut here and tear at the fold please.

Thus, the wise ol' alligator (who dat?) says that there shall be minimum of two fragments of the former Blue Party after crustal subsidence returns.

These offsprings of a shattered parent will be at least corporotistic, offset by by idealistic-utopianoids. There may be other fragments as well. The GP will be little affected by the tectonic collision because being almost mass-less, it is easily displaceable without damage to self or constituents.

As long we lack a Parliamentary System, we shall be stuck with a pseudo-duopoly, replete with political barnacles like the GP. If you like being green, then you gotta like me, right? No? Okay, no. How about Kermit? The only green power now or in the future will be money.

Please realize that WE ARE THE ANT PEOPLE. Even me. You ain't dawgs, butterflies, roosters, cats, or humans. You and me is ants. Only power possessed by ants is numerical, overwhelming numbers. Absent money, there is no political power...unless accompanied by aggressive action undertaken simultaneously from ALL directions against the Oppressor, by millions. Millions. Chairman Mao was absolutely correct: "Power comes at the point of a gun". But in armed conflict, more guns are better. Power will not be given. Power must be taken. This means some kind of force, even if that force is mild but persistent nudging to initiate and then perpetuate, via constant exertion, sufficient power to overcome inertia.

Sinners make the best saints, saint Augustine or someone once said. Hallelujah, great Sobek, I have seen the light. On the eighth day, God Sobek created politics. Politics is the Garden of Eden. Beware the first bite of the apple. Irresistible to many.

Let us count the number of Saints in Political Heaven--from any Age, from any culture. Ready? Okay, you start: tell me of the political Saints that were pure, free of any sin, early or current. I am ready to hear your recitation of the hallowed Names of our Political Saints. Remember, Saints must be ideologically and morally pure, with beneficence to all persons during their terms of office. Okay. Let's continue with the list of names.

Here is an example of Political Saints. Bernard Sanders, Bishop of Burlington. Oops, he befouled his majestic robe one he slipped while attempting to kiss the Queen's Hem on the way to Her coronation. Beatifcation came early to young Bernard, erstwhile of Brooklyn. BS managed to get himself chained to some other folks in an act of truly selfless human decency. But the holiness and sanctity of the Bishop slowly eeked. Prior to his entombment at our Lady of Vermont cemetery, located on the grounds of the Jane Sanders memorial golf course and Country Club, the Bishop retired, surrounded by his family and a few million left-over contributions.

Apostles of Saint Bernard have formed a Society of Bernardines. They pray for the light to shine on those of faith. Amen, good friars. The path of the Bernadines is uncharted. Some wish for green pastures. Others prefer a more organized surrounding. And even others are unsure where they are and who they are. The Bernardines thus, like the Apostles of JC spread to the corners of the earth.

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wendy davis's picture

@Alligator Ed

way too many ideas and vectors in your comment to respond to now. two things though: yes, all capitalistic pyramids have the Enforcers with guns at the top. well, just under the bags of gold... but here's hoping that one day it may not always be so.

second: a parliamentary system, as in a unicameral legislative body where coalitions must arise to govern? if so, i guess that was why i liked that howie hawkins is calling for an end to the Senate. it used to be that the senate was a more deliberative body: no more. it takes billions to get elected to it, too many years allowed before one must leave it, and the life-time pension after 'retirement' is mammoth.

gotta go fix my cherries now.

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wendy davis's picture

@Alligator Ed

Rise, like lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number!
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you:
Ye are many—they are few

~Percy Byshee Shelley, the Masque of Anarchy

but no, it doesn't necessarily mean violent revolution, but other stressors we can put on the Elites who govern us, oppress us, and keep us in a constant state of precarity. shelley's theme has been used many times since 1819, even in passive resistance movements.

as to political gods, you mention only in the USA; globally there likely have been some who were game-changers, even if the changes hadn't lasted, yes? mohandas gandhi, socialist leaders in the global south, the anglos who advocated for great changes to apartheid south africa...off the top of my head.

now it may come to an armed rebellion in the US, but i'm really not expecting it yet. Enforcement in amerika is epic, let's say; the VZ military hugo chavez and nicolas maduro; in bolivia, they turned away from socialist evo morales (no doubt w/ the aid of the CIA and special ops) . amerikans have learned to be the proverbial boiling frogs, which could change when the depression hits deep, and the banks and elites are bailed out again...with nothing left over the serfs. what role would the enforces play?

just a few thoughts; i'm weary.

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Alligator Ed's picture

@wendy davis @wendy davis I like frogs uncooked. Great hors d'ouvres but I gotta eat so many.

Besides, why do you refer to Sud Amerika and Europa. Don't you value our domestic oppressors as much as you should? Sounds like a re-education camp referral might be necessary here.

Biological footnote: the gross weight of the world's ant population, not counting us two-legged ones, far exceeds the entire bulk of lions and tigers and bears, oh my.

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wendy davis's picture

@Alligator Ed

but then i et some barbecued muskrat, too (ish, double ish) as a kid. but i was definitely riffin' off your Political Saints naming only being amerikan contenders, ya great idgit!

so...i take it you won't be voting Green, then, Kermit? ; )

well, when people are starving all over the wold, the WHO suggest they eat fried ants, grasshoppers, and whatever proteins they can find under rocks.

O/T, but a may day strike newsletter came in from popular resistance yesterday, and apparently kali okuno, cooperation jackson is big into it, and on the related hashtags is blaming the $4 trillion corporate bailout whoCARES? stim package on...'the right', fer crissakes. wtf? yeah, if dems are the right...and most are. duopoly rules!!!!!

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Alligator Ed's picture

@wendy davis But 96 - 0 tells me lotsa Demorats voted aye, aye Commander Cheeto.

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1, Bernie did not give up "when his primary momentum changed" he surrendered when the Democratic Party announced that they were henceforth going to announce the result they wanted regardless of the truth.
2, Bernie is not stupid. He has a safe space in Vermont and Washington and may be unwilling to risk it, but he knew what would happen and how it would happen, indisputably after 2016. I believe he was intending to martyr himself all along. If he had fought he would have lost and his supporters would have become disenchanted with a failed leader. By refusing to fight he hopes that we will rise up without a leader to fail us. Few people are willing to risk their lives for someone with a job title - just ask Kerry and Gore. People stand up for themselves only when they cannot stand up behind someone else.

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On to Biden since 1973

Alligator Ed's picture

@doh1304

People stand up for themselves only when they cannot stand up behind someone else.

Clapping

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wendy davis's picture

@Alligator Ed

witty snagging one line...

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wendy davis's picture

@doh1304

even though the way i read it you've offered opposing arguments. i) that he was beat by the lying fixeers in the D party; and ii) that he believed his revolution would continue without him; and iii) that had he fought, he would have lost, this: failed leader.

some here had posited that he wanted to effect major changes as a senator because: poverty of the rise, and coronvirus on the rise. but AFAIK, the only call for a legislative change is the one i posted above to snoopy dawg, although there may have been others.

apologies if i've missed your meaning, doh1304. i do be exhausted already, and read/decode even at the best of times... ; )

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boriscleto's picture

We have people like Jim Hightower and Bill McKibben telling the Green Party to give up because Trump.

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" 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 "

wendy davis's picture

@boriscleto

links, i'm going to assume both are so. 'in these times' hightower? well, anyway, please allow me to say that Rockefeller foundation-funded Green Capitalist big bill mcKibben (as is naomi klein) can go fukkk himself, and i say that in the kindest possible way. and i doubt it's just: because trump. he wouldn't want any competition from eco-socialists in the end, not that howie's or the GP's plans are all that more feasible than aoc's et.al's, but less capitalistic.

thanks for getting my blood to boil, though. i loathe both of them, klein esp. for smearing julian assange in a dance with glenn greenwald at the Intercept. ; )

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I've seen a little buzz about the "People's Party" (peoplesparty.org). I think it's new enough that it's hard to assess it's credibility. In interestingly there was a party of the same name back in the 1800s that was related to left wing populism.

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wendy davis's picture

@MinuteMan

endorsements, esp. for those who like nick brana, the jimmy dore show and old sourpuss chris hedges. ; )

peoples party.

thanks for the tip, minute man; one if by land, two if by sea....

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@MinuteMan How about we start up a new one and call it e pluribus unum with the idea being we're not building it all from scratch but simply trying to rope in every political third party we can get our hands on. That way all that's got to be done is dope out a platform and come up with some kind of rules committee. Hey, the name's still available ever since it got tossed out in favor of in god we trust; in fact I think some Portuguese soccer club is using it for their promotional campaigns so it would be legal I'm pretty sure. What I'm saying is absorb the Greens, Peace and Freedom, Socialist Workers Party, all the lefties and maybe even a couple of righties wouldn't hurt. My thinking is we're kind of running out of time, if you know what I mean, and we best be trying to glop together some kind of coalition concept if there's going to be any chance at all of pulling out of the disaster we're currently in.

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wendy davis's picture

@jejune harpoon

simple, as in: 'all we need to do'...and all that follows. now i'm far from an expert, but the Greens are already an established party, the amerikan version started by howie hawkins in NY long ago. what you're talking about is sincerely starting from scratch, imo.

now this is from former black panther (1969 and '79)(May he rest in power) on april 4, 2019: Tulsi Gabbard Is A Sheepdog, Greens Howie Hawkins Is 2020's Only Real Peace Candidate

"The Hawkins vision includes a yearlong grassroots organizing campaign to overcome the profoundly unjust legal barriers which Republican and Democratic politicians together have erected in almost half the states to prevent the Greens from competing against them in national and local elections. Unlike the regulations pertaining to Republicans and Democrats, these arbitrary, anti-democratic and unjust laws require Green Party candidates to present more than 800,000 voter signatures on paper petitions just to allow Green candidates for local, state and national office to appear on the ballot in about a third of the states.

Texas requires 85,000 petition signatures,

Georgia 65,000 signatures,
Tennessee, 56,000 signatures,
Alabama demands 51,000 signatures
Ohio, 43,000
Indiana, 44,000|
Illinois, 25,000
Oklahoma, 34,000
Minnesota requires an outrageous 147,000 signatures

just to name a few.

Many of these legal barriers to third parties appearing on the ballot have been in place for a century, and raised even higher whenever insurgent parties threatened to overcome them. What we were all taught in school to call “the two party system” is nothing more than the product of the two capitalist parties colluding with each other to continuously tweak the laws in such a manner as to protect themselves against competition. Competition from parties funded by people instead of billionaires, Competition from socialist and eco-socialist parties, competition from parties who stand for economic and racial justice at home and for peace abroad.

The latest legislative tweak aimed at kneecapping the Green Party was buried in the Democrats HR1, a provision that raised the amount Green presidential candidates needed to raise per state to qualify for matching funds from $5000 in small donations from each of 20 states to $25,000 in 20 states was endorsed and voted for by supposed socialist Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and every other Democrat in the House of Representatives. Curiously none of the so-called progressive Democrats, nobody in the media, in civil rights industrial complex, none of our friends in DSA and certainly not Tulsi Gabbard or even Bernie Sanders have ever bothered to mention this cynical and longstanding piece of voter suppression. These unjust legal barriers to third parties on the ballot are the main reason most US voters don’t get to see Green candidates on the ballot for state legislature, for governor or local offices, or for president.
.......................
Our future, the future of our children and grandchildren, of our planet is too important to trust either of the two capitalist parties. It’s time to make a longer term plan than the next election, time to organize and build for the long fight ahead. It’s not a time to let sheepdogs herd us into doing what we’ve done so many times before. Instead of giving to sheepdog Tulsi Gabbard, we should be lining up with Howie Hawkins to build the kind of fighting ecosocialist party the times require.

Howie needs $5,000 in donations $250 and under in each of 20 states for his campaign to receive federal matching funds that will enable us to launch the yearlong ballot access campaign that will put the Green Party on the ballot in every state, and put us on the road to building a fighting party sustained and run by its members. Go to HowieHawkins.US to volunteer, and to give what you can now. The clock is ticking.

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wendy davis's picture

many of you are night owls; i'm a morning meadowlark. tongight's closing song will be karine polwart's hymn to the occupy movement. (she's playing an harmonium.)

thanks for the great conversation; good night.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21IbgTewrMs]

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