Some people have been thinking about returning there to write and comment again. If you're among them, or if you are like me today and in the mood for some schadenfreude, check out the two diaries linked below. They're both meetings of the Flat Earth Society. Reality never penetrates, and anyone who attempts to introduce it is called names.

DEO's Favorite Rant (from a Hollywood producer, of course)

The TOP Safe Space for Hillary addicts (the comments more than the diary)

You write that Trump's strategy was not a reaction to hers. I disagree. Hillary launched her " identity-shaming white men" strategy in 2008 against Obama. As I recall, I was a misogynist for wanting to vote for the black guy. Trump likely got his ideas from her near-success 8 years ago.

With a political system that enforces a binary choice between A & B, and with both mainstream parties equally dedicated to the subversion and undermining of the middle class and upwards redistribution of wealth, Republicans will continue to be in the driver's seat for the foreseeable future. History has shown repeatedly that when general economic insecurity becomes sufficiently extreme that it leads to widespread anger and despair, scapegoating and appeals to bigotry and intolerance will always gain more traction than will empty bromides about coming together or celebrating our differences.

It's absolutely correct that members of the Democratic Party establishment are far more comfortable with a President Trump than they would have been with a President Sanders. That's why they weren't the least bit discomfited by the knowledge that Hillary Clinton was clearly a far weaker general election candidate than was Sanders. The primary objective was not to win the presidency, it was to protect and perpetuate the oligarchy.

If things are ever to change for the better, progressives have to discontinue the futile and self-defeating strategy of trying to forge alliances with the reactionary forces within the Democratic Party whose only real allegiance is to the maintenance of elite rule at all cost. Bernie Sanders spoke to a future where ordinary people were politically empowered, and government's role was redefined so as to serve the interests of the many as opposed to the privileged few. It is literally true that those who comprise the Democratic Party hierarchy - Obama, the Clintons, Pelosi, Reid, Schumer, Rubin, Podesta, Brazile, etc.- are as implacably and unalterably opposed to this vision as are any of the most unapologetically elitist and far-right Republicans.

However the Left defines the philosophical parameters and operating model that represent the anti-oligarchy, pro people, peace and planet movement going forward, it has to be in such a way that people such as those listed above are outside it. Otherwise, it would be like going to war against North Vietnam with the Viet Cong as your putative "allies." Good luck with that.

Identity politics is an essential part of the game:

Here’s how it works. Each group of players is assigned one of three roles: Victim, Persecutor, or Rescuer. The first two roles are allowed one move each: the Victim’s move is to suffer, and the Persecutor’s move is to make the Victim suffer. The Rescuer is allowed two moves: to sympathize with the Victim and to punish the Persecutor. No other moves are allowed, and no player is allowed to make a move that belongs to a different role.

That may seem unduly limited. It’s not, because when a group of people is assigned a role, all their actions are redefined as the move or moves allotted to that role. In the Rescue Game, in other words, whatever a Victim does must be interpreted as a cry of pain. Whatever a Persecutor does is treated as something that’s intended to cause pain to a Victim, and whatever a Rescuer does, by definition, either expresses sympathy for a Victim or inflicts well-deserved punishment on a Persecutor. This is true even when the actions performed by the three people in question happen to be identical. In a well-played Rescue Game, quite a bit of ingenuity can go into assigning every action its proper meaning as a move.

What’s more, the roles are collective, not individual. Each Victim is equal to every other Victim, and is expected to feel and resent all the suffering ever inflicted on every other Victim in the same game.

Each Persecutor is equal to every other Persecutor, and so is personally to blame for every suffering inflicted by every other Persecutor in the same game. Each Rescuer, in turn, is equal to every other Rescuer, and so may take personal credit for the actions of every other Rescuer in the same game. This allows the range of potential moves to expand to infinity without ever leaving the narrow confines of the game.

http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/2016/04/american-narratives-rescu...