It's official

RFK Jr. is now in the primary:

Here's the full speech, from Boston, Massachusetts:

I don't really see much of a reason at this point to recap the mainstream media response to this announcement, because what I've seen is dismissive. Of course, it must be said that if the big outlets are reporting on this, that they're so starved for "safe" news that they must venture into the "unsafe," i.e. reporting on challengers to Joe Biden.

Once again, this is why my attitude toward challengers to Joe Biden is "the more, the merrier." If you care deeply about what RFK Jr. stands for, that's fine. Please post your thoughts in the comments below. What I see is that the Democratic Party, the hacks at the top and the media sycophants who do their publicity work, has nothing to stand for and so everything is riding on the mass of people who believe their cloud of hubris and garbage. Joe is totally competent and a great public speaker y'know. He's going to run on the strength of the economy and win. Ukraine is going to win the war. Everything will be totally kewl and bitchen in China. The more people we can peel off from this "consensus," the better. Marianne Williamson can peel off so many people. RFK Jr. can peel off more of them. Who would like to step up next?

Biden is going to try to defend his claim to another four years of crap Presidency, for now, by leaning on corporate-media dismissal of alternatives. Later on, I can imagine a scenario in which a whole bunch of challengers enter the race only to discover that the party hacks have canceled the primaries because, y'know, Joe is so enormously popular. So which Republican do you want for President in 2025?

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Is the "Democratic" Party even obligated to run a primary if they choose not to?

I remember some of the fallout of the insider ratfucking the DNC did to Bernie in 2016 was them arguing in court that the Dem party was a private corporation and that as such they could "nominate" whomever they wished regardless of voters wishes. If that is the case why even run primaries?

Can they be forced to hold primaries if they have already anointed the corrupt/senile one?

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Cassiodorus's picture

@BORG_US_BORG

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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

@BORG_US_BORG and state gov'ts decide whether to hold primaries and parties, at their conventions, have the final say in who is nominated regardless of popular will expressed in primary votes. Parties and states do have to abide by federal law in holding primaries, particularly the CivRts Act of 64 and the Voting Rights Act of 65.

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My first prediction was that Tulsi would run as a Republican and beat Liz Cheney. Then I picked DeSantis because of his anti Phizer stance. Then Trump said he wouldn't touch SS + Medicare. (disclosure: I am a critically hypertensive diabetic with Parkinson's - I will quickly die if Medicare doesn't cover most of my drug costs) (no, I don't trust Trump, but I doubt he has the courage or the conviction to attack "the entitlements") Of course there's always the obligatory "we are at war with X, Y, X+Y, Isis, Iran, Ming the Merciless, whoever won't actually start shooting. The American people stand with their Corrupt, warmongering racist pedophile in chief!" I thought The Gipper would go for it, but he got lost between making Hellcats Of The Navy and liberating Auschwitz and forgot to cancel the '88 election. Then I thought The Shrub would do it, but the Knights Who Formerly Said Nee! didn't support him and he lost courage. Now I assume Joe intends to do it, but John Harris (wrestler "Kamala the Ugandan Cannibal") is dead he thinks he doesn't have a VP so he can't declare a state of emergency until he finds one.
All I can be consistent on is that the Corruptocrats will after 2024 never control the Presidency or any house of Congress again, but the Republicans are so good at making themselves odious that even that's not certain.

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On to Biden since 1973

snoopydawg's picture

2nd tweet

It’s the 3rd time I’ve read that he said this and if so I don’t know if I should believe him saying that he would bring all the troops home. If he believes that we’re right in supporting Ukraine will he abandon Ukraine if Biden sends troops there?

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

Cassiodorus's picture

@snoopydawg Of course, to anyone who would argue that we were in Ukraine for the right reasons, I would ask: "and which reasons would those be?" The contest over land between competing kleptocratic oligarchies? The IMF's claim to Ukraine's debt? Raytheon's profit margins?

RFK Jr.'s announcement doesn't change a lot when taken all by itself. The great hope represented by campaign announcements -- at this point in the game -- is that somewhere down the road the rank-and-file Democrats can be persuaded to dump Biden. RFK Jr. is someone they can dump Biden for.

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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

@Cassiodorus see my below comment and cite. No mass of contradictions. He is saying, we may have begun with good intentions, some serving over there on the Ukr side are courageous etc, they are the underdog and we Americans tend to sympathize with underdogs, but what really seems to be the motive, Kennedy says, is that expressed later by Biden and Lloyd Austin -- undermine Russia and depose Putin. -- and for other additional reasons the US should not be waging this proxy war.

If he is contradicting himself, then I am missing something, as are Tucker and Max Blumenthal and all the other indy commenter-influencers.

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snoopydawg's picture

@Cassiodorus

The contest over land between competing kleptocratic oligarchies?

In case you have missed it Russia is in Ukraine for self defense for both the people living in the Donbas and for their own survival. The Donbas people asked to join with Russia and according to precedent set by America, Russia accepted them and saw that Ukraine had gathered forces to attack them. Plus Russia was under threat by NATO which had encroached on their borders for 30 years and they said that they had nowhere to retreat to. Anyone who says that Russia went in unprovoked hasn’t been paying attention to what Russia has been saying.

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

@Cassiodorus that you provided above a link to the entire announcement speech. For those still uncertain about his stance on Ukr, go to the 1h 15m mark in the video where Kennedy spends a good 20 minutes discussing Ukr and our 800 foreign bases and foreign wars and the cost to society for the massive Pentagon budgets.

It's about as forceful an antiwar/pro-peace stance as any American politician could make.

I notice too that Dennis Kucinich is supporting him, which is good to hear.

He's going to be ignored and smeared by the MSM for the next 12 months, plus whatever mischief (like fake bomb scares at his rallies) the establishment wants to throw in his path. But already at 14% of support among Ds, according to one poll, his candidacy can't be totally dismissed.

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@snoopydawg the second half of his remarks on Ukraine where he cites comments by SecDef Austin and Biden himself about how we are REALLY there to undermine Russia and eventually depose Putin. See this Tucker interview, just after his announcement, at 3:00 mark:

It's clear to me as RFK cites several reasons why this is not the war for the US that he would pull out any troops/special forces and stop the shipping of offensive military materiel to Ukr. And he would make sure to have a loyal SecDef, like McNamara was to his uncle, to carry out those policies.

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@wokkamile

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Note at the 4:5 minute mark that he tells them it's a One Party System.

Listening to him all those years ago when he's young tells you this guy is not corrupt, he's anti-Establishment to his bones and he was raised to be that way.

I will vote for him.

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That Breaking Points video really was my final straw with those two. "before you laugh...coded right...fringes of the political system...giggles at 14%...I'm not gonna say 'has a shot'...it's a weird poll...but he's an antivaxxer...I'm not saying he has a shot...if you want to tell him he's an idiot...very likely that Joe Biden is the Democratic nominee NO DOUBT ABOUT IT.

That's manufacturing consent on full display folks.

Fuck Crystal and Saagar.

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Cassiodorus's picture

@Battle of Blair Mountain https://youtube.com/shorts/B_IetpCCFI0?feature=share

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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

@Battle of Blair Mountain
push the establishment talking points while pretending that they are alternative media.

It's obvious that Krystal doesn't research everything she says and often sounds like she is regurgitating shit she heard without fact checking it.

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discussion a few hrs ago with Max Blumenthal and Aaron Maté on the RFK Jr announcement, what the Dem establishment might do, who they will bring out, if Kennedy catches fire, etc. Also comments by Max specifically on the objection raised above about Kennedy and Ukraine -- comments that largely track my own remarks made here before their discussion happened. Both Max and Aaron seem very favorably disposed towards Kennedy, and toss in some properly negative comments about Marianne Williamson on Ukr and Assange. RFK discussion starts around the 59' mark and goes until the end,

23 minutes well spent.

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@wokkamile But as I show in my screenplay "Saving Bobby" which was just named a Finalist in the L.A. International Screenplay Awards - judged by a list of producers, writers and directors who all have Oscars and Emmies - it was his visit to Mississippi in 1967 that transformed him and brought about his campaign against poverty and support of the working class.

Distraught by what he'd seen, he returned home and told his children "you don't know how lucky you are. DO SOMETHING WITH YOUR LIVES"

I believe RFK Jr. is trying to live up to that challenge.

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Lookout's picture

@Battle of Blair Mountain

I met RFK Jr when he was in Alabama writing his senior thesis on Judge Frank Johnson.

I have hopes he will raise a variety of important issues. We all know the media megaphone will do everything in their power to smear and suppress him. We'll see what we see.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”