How Democrats Win -- Quit Voting for Wars
I supported Bernie Sanders during the 2016 primary. I turned around and supported Hillary Clinton when she won the nomination. I fought tooth and nail on Twitter against people who decided otherwise, blocking hundreds. However, from that experience, I have come to realize that creating a permanent progressive majority requires us to elect candidates who are not beholden to the Military Industrial Complex.
The most common reason that I heard for not voting for Hillary was her support for a no-fly zone in Syria and for her support of war in general. Libya and Honduras were other instances where Hillary Clinton chose conflict over peace. We could elect someone like Joe Manchin for President in 2020, but it won't do us any good -- the GOP will come right back in 2022, elect a congress to obstruct him, and then fatigue will kick in and the GOP will come back in 2024 or 2028.
In certain respects, Lyndon Johnson was one of our best Presidents and was also one of our worst -- he drastically expanded the welfare state, but he also took us on a path to perpetual warfare by our involvement in Vietnam. In so doing, he permanently split the Democratic Party and it has never healed.
In 2008, Barack Obama won over John McCain and got 78 million votes. Since then, Democratic support in Presidential elections has eroded to 65 million. The Russians didn't make us lose this support. Where did the voters go who were so enthusiastic about Obama the first time? I submit that Barack Obama was doing exactly what he was not elected to do -- bomb and drone people. He did keep his campaign promise to get out of Iraq. But he bombed Libya, turning it into a failed state; he escalated Afghanistan and it is becoming a failed state. He bombed seven different countries during the course of his administration, secretly expanded our military involvement in Africa, and laid the groundwork for Trump's ICE by deporting 2.5 million Latinos.
For many of us on the left, bombing and killing people is a dealbreaker. I know certain Democrats don't want to hear it, and I know it doesn't seem rational to them, but that's just a fact of life. But the Democratic Party is tone-deaf. Dozens of so-called Democrats have co-sponsored Senate Bill 720/House Bill 1697. This bill criminalizes protest in the name of supporting Israel, which normalizes Trump. What's next? If Trump's SCOTUS reverses Roe and millions of women take to the streets in protest, will Trump try to criminalize protest altogether? 74 House Democrats have co-sponsored House Bill 1697. And 11 Senate Democrats have co-sponsored the companion bill, Senate Bill 720.
To her credit, Senator Elizabeth Warren did not sign on to this horrible piece of legislation. But she is still too beholden to the Military Industrial Complex. Yesterday, the Senate voted 92-4 to break a filibuster on HR 5515, another horrible piece of legislation that is only good for the Military Industrial Complex. It gives a $717 billion blank check to Donald Trump to wage wars as he sees fit. Furthermore, it allows Trump to arm submarines with "low-grade nuclear weapons." Yet for all her powerful speeches against Trump, and for all the tweets she has posted getting under his skin, Warren voted to end debate on this bill. And another darling of the progressive movement, Beto O'Rourke, voted for HR 5515 in the House. To his credit, Bernie Sanders voted to filibuster HR 5515, being one of only four Senators to do so. You can see the Senate vote here. You can see the House vote here. 131 Democrats in the House voted for this monstrosity.
The following Democrats did not vote for either HR 5515 or to co-sponsor SB 720 or HB 1697. I note that at least two of them are facing strong challenges from the left this year. If that helped them to suddenly remember that they are beholden to their constituents and not the Military Industrial Complex and the 1%, good for them.
US HOUSE
Bass
Blumenauer
Bonamici
Capuano
Chu, Judy
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Cleaver
Cohen
Crowley
DeFazio
DeGette
DeSaulnier
Doggett
Doyle, Michael F.
Ellison
Eshoo
Gabbard
Grijalva
Gutiérrez
Huffman
Jayapal
Johnson (GA)
Khanna
Kildee
Lee
Lewis
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Matsui
McCollum
McGovern
Moore
Nadler
Nolan
Payne
Pocan
Polis
Raskin
Schakowsky
Serrano
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Velázquez
Walz
Waters, Maxine
Watson Coleman
Welch
Yarmuth
US SENATE
Sanders
Merkley
Comments
Obama never got us out of Iraq.
I took shit for voting for him in the Army. Yes, we talked about it, in full violation of regs. And guess what. My Army buddies were right.
He didn't get us out of Iraq, we're still there and next door. To paraphrase George Carlin,
"Course, Now we're Leaving Iraq... Snicker... Yeah, we're leaving through Syria, Turkey and Lebanon... It's The overland route. It's the long way out. Gotta go through Russia to get out that way. What'll we tell them? Only be here six weeks, just looking for the terrorists who ran this way! Maybe they'll go for it..."
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
Thanks for the essay!
That is indeed one major manifestation of the pathology infecting the party/policy/politics overall.
Unfortunately, the corporate/military war on the world includes everyone and everything, from the ecology supporting our very existance, to the American citizens to whom the US belongs; a war waged against the very concepts of civilization/democracy and of humanity in both senses.
My personal belief is that we are up against an encroaching pathology, against the obsessively ruthless clawing power and wealth from others to use exclusively for themselves, under whatever 'political' label they may select as being most expedient, rather than even those of any real ideology beyond that of 'I want what I want, I'll kill for whatever you have that's worth taking - and all that could possibly matter is The Exceptional Me.'
And that we have to quit rewarding the psychopathic by permitting them to profit from the destructive effects of their 'success' in damaging and draining any and virtually all others, including the global life support system, in order to use the excessive financial gains from such profiteering to purchase/install those able to politically steal ever more power from the public for their further and increased abuses, toward the goal of personally owning and controlling 'it all'.
We cannot forget that the destruction of lives encompasses not only direct and immediate murders such as those of military attack and invasion and those of police routinely killing those perceived as being more vulnerable of their own citizens, but also more gradual ones, from industrial/military dispossession/pollution/destruction/monopoly, unsafe/inadequate food/water/air, stress overloads, greed/'strategically'-inflicted poverty and the imposed lack of basic human rights/personal control over personal lives/decisions, etc.; the destruction of human/environment potential and futures in so many ways.
Life does not only matter regarding its loss, but in the ways it's possible to live. Where life is made a misery by any person(s) or group(s) to serve the purposes of micro-managing others, this is also a crime against humanity/animals/ecologies, one also used toward incrementally gaining public acceptance or even propaganda-driven support of other abuses, such as the appalling war-crimes forming the subject of the essay, and the converting of the planet into a heavily surveilled factory floor to serve the immediate interests of what's intended to be a very, very (cannibalistic) few.
It seems evident to me that anyone incapable of ethics and empathy is unqualified for public office, or for any position where they can exert power over others to their detriment.
The public is supposed to win elections by voting into public office those who serve the public interest, and I strongly believe that we, the people of the world being warred against, have to quit thinking in terms of political parties and in terms of supporting individuals likely to best serve that public interest, while the chance still potentially exists to fight toward achieving that goal.
My 2 cents, anyway. YMMV.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.