Why Are Liberals Bashing Sanders in Favor of Clinton?

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The Rififi among mainstream liberals trying to stop a man who is far more a Democrat than a socialist shows how committed they are to the status quo they pretend to oppose.
By Sonali Kolhatkar 

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]s Senator Bernie Sanders continues to surge ahead of Hillary Clinton in the polls, establishment liberals are attacking the self-described democratic socialist candidate en masse.



From Paul Krugman to Ta-Nehisi Coates, a panicked slew of anti-Sanders criticism is emerging leaving Clinton off the hook just in time for the primaries.

Krugman: His mainstream corporatist slip is showing.

Krugman: His mainstream corporatist slip is showing.

With less than two weeks to go before the Iowa caucus, a collective panic seems to have set in with prominent liberal thinkers and writers over the prospect of Bernie Sanders actually winning the Democratic nomination for president. Many have responded with farfetched and hypocritical arguments to drive away voters. The fear is mounting that a repeat of 2008 may be unfolding, just as when a junior Senator from Illinois roared ahead of Hillary Clinton at the start of that primary season and went on to win the nomination and presidency. 

Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize winning economist and New York Times writer, who one might imagine would support an ardent critic of big banks like Sanders, penned a horribly titled op-ed, Weakened at Bernie's on Jan. 19. 

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Starting with an obligatory denunciation of Clinton (she "is no paragon of political virtue") in order to cement his progressive credentials, he went on to label Sanders's positions on the economy and health care as "disturbing." After critiquing the senator for having an "unrealistic" outlook on the economy, Krugman then contradicted himself, going on to write that Sanders doesn't go far enough in calling for a restoration of the Glass-Steagasl Act without addressing the shadow banking system. 
...
Nowhere in the article does Krugman criticize Clinton's economic plan, which seems to focus simply on raising wages but leaving Wall Street's power intact. Krugman has taken aim at Sanders for not going far enough, but seemingly let Clinton off the hook despite her program not being as radical as Sanders (or as Krugman himself) has recommended. 



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New York Magazine's Jonathan Chait went one step further in his Jan. 18 piece with a title that left little room for interpretation: The Case Against Bernie Sanders. In it Chait, like Krugman, struggles to make a solid case. He relies instead on vague pronouncements like, "Sanders offers the left-wing version of a hoary political fantasy." His clearest argument is that Sanders' "self-identification as a socialist poses an enormous obstacle, as Americans respond to 'socialism' with overwhelming negativity." But the poll numbers leading into the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary, and the record-breaking crowds Sanders has attracted at his events, clearly suggest otherwise. How to explain the tens of thousands of people streaming to see him speak, and that he "now has more individual donors than any other candidate in history?"
 ...
 Either his supporters and donors are self-described socialists or they don't care that he is. Either way, the "socialist" label is not hurting Sanders in the primary. Chait's most convincing argument against Sanders is on foreign policy, saying that he has "difficulty addressing issues outside his economic populism wheelhouse." And while that is indeed true, a choice between Clinton and Sanders is a choice between a candidate with little experience in foreign policy, and a liberal Democrat who has proven her hawkish credentials. Sanders has criticized the size of the military budget, while Clinton has boasted of her friendship with Henry Kissinger, a man many consider a war criminal.  ...

Progressives can decide which they prefer. Frankly neither candidate has a particularly promising foreign policy agenda.

 [dropcap]A[/dropcap]nother prominent liberal, Jessica Valenti, added her voice to the anti-Sanders cacophony in the Guardian, "Hillary Clinton supporters: it is OK to care about gender on the ballot." In it she accused Sanders's supporters of spewing "an extraordinary amount of scorn" against the idea that women might want to vote for Clinton because she is female, adding later that, "One could argue that, gender aside, Clinton’s policies are better for women than Sanders’." Valenti argued that voting for Clinton might help women stave off the "horrifying consequences that anti-abortion Republican leadership would surely pursue." But she doesn't contrast any of Clinton's pro-women policies or achievements with Sanders'. As we have found out over the past 8 years, having an African-American holding the nation's highest office has hardly brought justice for the Black community. Simply having Clinton as president is unlikely to improve women's lot unless she works hard to make women's rights a serious priority. So far we don't know that she will.

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Perhaps the hardest to bear anti-Sanders critique has come from the hugely acclaimed Atlantic writer and MacArthur genius Ta-Nehisi Coates (above), a man who has been likened to this generation's James Baldwin and whose 2014 article "The Case for Reparations," catapulted him to fame. On Jan. 19, Coates wrote the sharply critical piece, "Why Precisely Is Bernie Sanders Against Reparations?" in which he quotes Sanders' desire to invest deeply in the African-American community and address poverty and unemployment rather than pay reparations. A cursory search reveals Clinton's response to reparations that also does not endorse reparations and instead calls for "programs and policies that have helped generations of African-Americans have a better life in this country [to] continue."



Sanders wants to increase investments, while Clinton wants to continue current policies. Instead of comparing both leading Democratic candidates' positions on reparations and excoriating both for refusing to endorse them, Coates makes a blatantly one-sided attack. His argument that Sanders's class-based critique of racism being problematic is sound. But again, there is no comparison with Clinton. I am not one to declare that I "feel the Bern." I don't generally like to get behind any presidential candidate, preferring instead to champion progressive causes that candidates need to get behind. Still, the snowball of unfounded and baseless criticism aimed at Sanders from liberal writers is disingenuous at best, and nefarious at worst. What we need are strong and fair critiques from the left of both Sanders and Clinton. Only then will the best and most progressive candidate become apparent.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Sonali Kolhatkar is the host and executive producer of Uprising, a daily radio program at KPFK Pacifica Radio. She is also the Director of the Afghan Women's Mission, a U.S.-based nonprofit that supports women's rights activists in Afghanistan and co-author of "Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence."
This content was originally published by teleSUR at the following address: "http://www.telesurtv.net/english/opinion/Why-Are-Liberals-Bashing-Sanders-in-Favor-of-Clinton---20160122-0011.html". If you intend to use it, please cite the source and provide a link to the original article.
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Politics and Anti-politics—Thoughts About Most Beloved Greek Words

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"The Fall of Icarus"

Hubris in ancient Greek referred to excessive behavior or lack of measure, transgressions for which the gods punished offenders. Hubris referred to actions that humiliated the victim for the pleasure of the abuser. In modern usage, hubris means extreme pride, a loss of contact with reality and an overestimation of one’s own capabilities, usually of persons in positions of power. Political writers apply it also to groups and in a special way to the United States of America and its leaders. Personally I try to avoid words which are being widely used, sometimes, it seems, at random. When I use the word hubris I have in mind the meaning of arrogance; in any case I intend a despicable quality.

An expressive Greek word I have come to love is hamartia. The meaning I attach to the word is a character FLAW. Though hamartia, especially in ancient Greek literature, is a negative quality that leads to tragic consequences, I also use hamartia as a character weakness such as drug or alcohol addiction, a flaw to be overcome after a life-and-death struggle, a struggle, if won, that molds and strengthens character. I conceive of hamartia as a necessary quality in a positive literary protagonist or in a hero in real life. The person you love and admire most has most probably struggled and overcome his hamartia, which most of us have somewhere in our being.

Though ancient Greeks as a rule applied these dramatic words to the individual—Antigone’s flaw was her stubborn loyalty for which she paid with her life—we today apply these words also to entire societies or nations. We can label Europe’s hubris its Eurocentrism; its hamartia (for which the ancient Greeks would perhaps punish it collectively), is its destructive nationalisms on the one hand, and its contemporary subservience to America on the other.

Today a powerful anti-political spirit is spreading across Old Europe, a Europe of old politics and old ideologies, Europe which, despite its vaunted geographical and demographical growth, is in reality shrinking. Hubristic Europe is withering away. Neo-Fascists in Hungary, right wing nationalists growing by leaps and bounds in France, Poland and Italy, Socialists who are not really Socialists or even leftists in other places, and Conservatives who claim leftist values elsewhere. All are in doubt; socio-political suspense reigns.

Among the faint signs of hope for political survival of this Europe, at least, are the decreasing number of countries with majority parties and the rise of faintly anti-systemic movements and political parties and/or leaders, such as Syriza in Greece and the Labourite Corbyn in the United Kingdom

After post-WWII Italy established the multiparty model (based on Weimar in post-WWI in Germany with its 15 parties), today we have also Spain abandoning the two-party system and the new center-left PODEMOS stepping onto front stage. Here and there across the sub-continent, populist anti-political movements are suddenly born and rapidly emerge from the debris and ashes piling up around the crumbling traditional political parties, which, in their unjustified hubris, lose once solid pillars one by one, faster and faster, louder and louder the din, as they disintegrate more each day, each week, each month, and sink deeper into a dark sticky morass.

Meanwhile, citizens who no longer feel protected—much less represented—by the political class desert the vote and the heretofore political class. Why is that? How did it come about? The English poet Percy Shelley asked the same 200 years ago: “Is public virtue dead?—is courage gone?’” One hundred years later, the German, Walter Benjamin, answered: “For never has experience been contradicted more thoroughly than moral experience by those in power.”

Or, the disoriented citizens, still brainwashed, vote, helter-skelter, at random, for the lesser evil, ALSO, and still a majority, though rapidly decreasing, we find naïvely fanatic electors who continue to cling to the electoral process like to a life jacket on a sinking ship to change things and turn out at the poll stations to vote for the new anti-politicals or the super nationalists or extremists of Right and Left as for example:

Leftist PODEMOS in Spain,

Centrist FIVE STAR MOVEMENT in Italy,

Extreme rightwing FRONT NATIONAL in France,

Leftwing GREENS or DIE LINKE in Germany

Rightwing populist FREEDOM PARTY OF AUSTRIA

Leftist GREENS in Finland

One of the several rightwing conservative parties in Poland

Neo-Fascists in Hungary

Fascists and Nazis in Ukraine

[dropcap]C[/dropcap]lear ideologies? Nada. Nineteenth and Twentieth century myths! Workers rights, heath care, care for the aged, for the unemployed and homeless, for the socially excluded classes? Zero.

Away with the old. Bring on the new.

We ask what is the new? We are right to wonder. Analysts too search for a handle. Is the politically new a party or a movement? Is it Right or Left? Populist? Apolitical?

Spaniards just turned out at the polls in record numbers—maybe in one last desperate attempt to save something of the familiar old two-party system. Or maybe to say NO to the existing system. Spain voted. No one won. The conservative Popular Party got the most votes but not enough to govern, not even in a potential coalition with the far right party of Los Ciudadanos, The Citizens. The second of the heretofore two-party tandem, the Socialist Party of Spanish Workers (PSOE), lost; that is, it got fewer votes than the Populars. And the New? Podemos, the brand new “non-ideological party” emerged as the real victor albeit with a few votes less than the “old” Socialist Party. No one party has a majority. The nearly powerless King, of all people, must now decide who to charge to search for a new kind of majority. Quo vadis, Espana? No one knows.

SO IS THE EUROPEAN UNION FALLING APART?

What with all the tensions, dissension, the many different forms of government (Or non-government) from fascist to extreme rightist nationalism to populist to moderate socialist to leftist socialist, the EU should be crumbling. Perhaps it is, but I do not believe it will happen … not yet. Europe has too much to lose by abandonment now.

However, as one of the consequences of America’s imperialistic actions throughout the world grave splits mark the European Union. These splits threaten to break up the union of 27 nations and return Europe to the confusing jigsaw puzzle of small separate nations, which in any case would be lost in the era of planetary unions, while nonetheless remaining totally subservient to America.

TWO COUNTRIES—Poland and Italy

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he extreme right government of Poland is spreading dissension in the EU. Tensions reached the culmination when the present alternating President of the EU Council, the Polish political leader, Donald Tusk, rammed through the EU extension of sanctions against Russia. Moreover, the EU Commission opposes the new Polish far-right government’s attempts to change the Polish Constitution in order to be able to enact the laws and policies it desires. Many Commission members opine that if that happens Poland’s voting rights in the EU should be suspended. With 38% of the vote the Polish Law and Justice Party won an absolute parliamentary majority. It aims at control over the Constitutional Court and the media.

Four things should be remembered: Adolf Hitler established his dictatorship with 43% of the vote, Poland borders on Ukraine, it is very hostile toward Russia and is very friendly with the USA.

Today at year’s end conflict governs relations between Italy and the EU leaders (not elected by the people) of economic Europe. A battle between Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and the EU Commission and German Chancellor Angela Merkel rages on three fronts: banks and the European banking system, state support for failing big industry and Italy’s national deficit (percentage wise similar to that of the USA). Moreover, Italy opposes military intervention in Syria.

Pravda of December 22 published an interview with an Italian politician of Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia Party, Fabrizio Bertot, about Russo-Italian relations. Bertot: the economy of Russia is perfectly complementary to our economy. Russia has a big market and large oil and gas reserves. In Italy, we know how to make many products. The ‘made in Italy’ label is respected, and we need a market like yours. At the same time we need energy, because ours is insufficient. This complementary relationship needs an incentive. Sadly, this is not in the interest of the USA. We must discuss this within the EU and maybe change completely the EU and its institutions.”

TIME IS OUT OF WHACK

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]his Russo-Italian relationship reflects the atmosphere among people across Europe. Perplexity, indecision, confusion, disorientation. Perplexity about what to do to better one’s own situation. Indecision about for whom or for what to vote. Confusion about nationality: for example, Italian first, European second? Or the reverse? Disorientation about the form of society: social or individualistic?

The chief competitions today are between system and anti-system, between nationalism and internationalism.

Consequently, planning for the future seems futile. For Europeans time in general seems out of whack. Never has the present seemed more a time of transition. For the rich and the powerful 1%, time perhaps seems to stand still. For them, the hands of the clock move slowly and sometimes action seems truant … or they wish it were, so that their good things would last forever. And fuck the rest. Nuclear war and destruction of our planet hardly concerns them, no more than Syrian children fleeing the bloody war drowning in the stormy winter waters of the Aegean Sea. In reality, we, the 99%, know it is as the song recalls: time waits for no one.

The less fortunate too stand as with one foot lifted now toward a factory gate, now to board a tram, hands frozen, afraid of touching the uncertain future. For still others, time itself is clearly the enemy. Time is filled with tension and seems ready to explode into a still unwritten direction. Everyone knows that time means change. But what change is the question.

The most problematic group are Europe’s thinking people, the people still socially and politically aware, intellectuals, academics, journalists. For they know that this is a time when anything can happen. The outrageous can occur. To think that World War III can explode in the American-created, fascist Ukraine two hours from Rome or Paris is mind-boggling.

And, as Tony Cartalucci noted on this site, beyond Ukraine similar scenarios are developing, where as USA/NATO expands closer and closer to Russia’s borders, it is finding it increasingly difficult to find allies who are not fascists or nazis. Or something worse.

Other Europeans—though their number is decreasing at an alarming rate—hold onto legality: naively some still believe that the next elections can change things. The present will end, they hope. Normal time will resume. Things will return to what they once were. A better future can begin.

The subject of America’s imperialistic footprint across the world as outlined above lends itself to a dialectical analysis, as, in an abbreviated form, I have undertaken here:

America’s hubris has spawned the thesis of the nation’s purported exceptionalism and, consequently—because of its wealth, power and way of life—its self-proclaimed god-blessed destiny to dominate the entire planet.

The antithesis of America’s over-estimation of its rights and its capabilities is the rejection of uni-polar domination by vast parts of the rest of the world. For example, the Eurasian pole of Earth’s Heartland headed by Russia and China stands diametrically (antithetically) opposed to U.S. hegemony.

The synthesis of the two variants would require America’s cognizance of the reality that the consequence of its blind insistence on world domination will be universal conflagration and the probable extinction of the human species. America must join the rest of mankind. As a first step, America must show genuine atonement for the ills its hamartia—i.e. evil conviction of its exceptionalism—has wrought on mankind.

In such a way, that is if America comes to its senses and recognizes the realities of a multi-polar world living in peace, a new synthesis of the drives and destinies of peoples of the world for a rational world order can be achieved.

As Percy Shelley at age 18 wrote in the last eight lines of his Poetical Essay on the Existing State of things, a work lost for two hundred years and re-found in 2006:

Man must assert his native rights, must say

Oppressive law no more shall power retain,

Peace, love, and concord, once shall rule again,

Then, then shall things, which now confusedly hurled,

Seem Chaos, be resolved to order’s sway,

And errors night be turned to virtue’s day.—


gaither-new GAITHER photoSenior Editor Gaither Stewart, based in Rome, serves—inter alia—as our European correspondent. A veteran journalist and essayist on a broad palette of topics from culture to history and politics, he is also the author of the Europe Trilogy, celebrated spy thrillers whose latest volume, Time of Exile, was just published by Punto Press.


Public Domain The myth goes that Daedalus made the wings and warned his son Icarus to not fly too high. Icarus, in his hubris disregarded his father’s warning and fell from the sky.)


 

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Fascism in the 21st Century: Part II, A 21st Century Adaptation

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Steven Jonas, MD, MPHpale blue horiz

Special to The Greanville Post | Commentary No. 25: Fascism in the 21st Century: Part II, A 21st Century Adaptation

As I said in beginning the first column in this series, “fascism” is a term we hear from all sorts of folk these days, ranging from some of those on the Left over occasionally to some on the Right.  I then presented a “classical” definition of the term (and there surely are a number of useful ones):

“A politico-economic system in which there is: total executive branch control of both the legislative and administrative powers of government; no independent judiciary; no Constitution that embodies a Rule of Law standing above the people who run the government and the executive, legislative and judicial bodies through which they do so; no inherent personal rights or liberties; a single national ideology that first demonizes and then criminalizes all political, religious, and ideological opposition to it; the massive and regular use of hate, fear, racial and religious prejudice, the Big Lie technique, mob psychology, mob actions and ultimately individual and collective violence to achieve political and economic ends; a capitalist/corporate economy; with the ruling economic class’ domination of economic, fiscal, and regulatory policy.”

Fascism has almost always appeared in advanced or moderately-advanced capitalist countries which were hitherto ruled by some sort of “parliamentary democracy.”   Fascism has always been imposed upon a country by the dominant sectors of its capitalist ruling class when that class has come to the conclusion that it can no longer retain control of the political economy through “parliamentary” means.  Note that in the definition above I did not include as part of it the ultimate control of state power by one person, usually known as the “dictator” or “leader”.   Of course it happened that in the two principal 20th century examples of fascist states, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, there was one such person.  As noted in the first column in this series:


fuhrerWeFollow“Because of the roles that Hitler and Mussolini played in leading and ruling their respective countries it is often thought that fascism requires such a singular leader/dictator and the cult-of-personality that was built around each.  In fact Hitler and Mussolini both adopted the term ‘leader’ to describe themselves, ‘
führer’ in German and ‘Duce’ in Italian.”

Very strong cults of personality were carefully built around the two men by their respective propaganda apparatuses. For example, after 1938 or so, in Nazi Germany if one did not substitute “Heil Hitler” for the usual “Good Morning,” etc. throughout the day, one might be looked upon with suspicion.  Furthermore, a singular characteristic of 20th fascism was that its institutionalization in a given country was accomplished by the use of violence, of one form or another.

When we are looking at 21st century fascism, in the context of what is happening in certain of the capitalist states, at the present particularly in the United States, it should be noted that it is entirely possible that wholesale violence will not be required for its introduction.  Nor will a maximum leader necessarily be required.  Like the fog in the famous, ultra-short poem by the U.S. person Carl Sandburg, it may well come in “on little cat feet.”

As the history of the last 150 years or so shows us, in most capitalist countries the ruling class would much rather retain its private ownership of the means of production and control of the State apparatus through the aforementioned form of “parliamentary democracy” (as long as it can control it).  There are a variety of reasons for this, one being that it maintains the fiction that the non-owning classes have some real say in the governance of the economy as well as of the State. 

But the principal contradictions of capitalism eventually begin to settle in, as is happening right before our very eyes in the United States: the export of capital and the resulting de-industrialization; the declining rate of profit, the necessity of the creation and expansion into unorthodox profit centers like prisons and the educational system; increasing numbers of workers languishing outside of the labor market, and so on and so forth.  Under such conditions—all inherent in capitalism’s dynamics—it becomes less-and-less easy for the ruling class to maintain control.  At that point, some sort of fascism starts to become ever more attractive.  But how to get from A to B?  In a nation like the United States, with Constitutionally-split government authority, that’s easy: through the Constitution.  And so, in the 21st century, in the United States at least, I believe we will eventually arrive at what can be called Constitutional Fascism.

Prominent Repubs in 2015: they lead the charge toward "constitutional fascism" with little or no opposition. Who needs goons in the streets?

Prominent Repubs in 2015: they lead the charge toward “constitutional fascism” with little or no opposition. Who needs goons in the streets? Hitler would be envious.

[dropcap]U[/dropcap]sing the increasingly corrupt electoral system, which the Republicans have been deliberately undermining by gerrymandering, voter suppression, and outright vote-count cheating, they have been taking total control of an increasing number of state governments, upwards of 2 dozen after the 2015 elections.   For the same reasons they will control the House of Representatives for the indefinite future.  If they retain their Senate majority in 2016, they will very likely do away with the filibuster on Jan. 3, 2017.  For a variety of reasons, if they somehow manage to choose the right candidate, they could very well win the Presidency in 2016, for they have managed the very clever trick of forcing President Obama to accept many of their economic/fiscal policies and then getting to blame him for the negative outcomes of same.  Finally, the other side of the Duopoly plays right into this because the Democrats—the other face of the deep corporate state and international imperialism— rarely fight back on the real issues, the issues that matter from a class perspective.

“In the 21st century, in the United States at least…wholesale violence may not be required. Gradually, step by unnoticed step, I believe we will eventually arrive at what can be called Constitutional Fascism.”

[dropcap]S[/dropcap]o, as we have seen, in this cynical Kabuki, it is the Repubs who take the lead toward the slaughterhouse, while the Democrats simply follow, by passively assenting to most policies proposed by the “party of business.” Thus, in a systematic way, more and more, the Repubs. are running on and/or intent on implanting most of the central elements of the definition of fascism offered above, through the use of the electoral system, which they can do because A) as mentioned earlier, the limp opposition of the Democratic Party, and B) the non-existence of any sort of mass labor union movement, following the Repubs.’ successful campaign to destroy it, a process that has been going on since the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947. (Again a bipartisan project).

None of this would be so outrageously easy in the presence of a functioning, autonomous media that took its duties seriously. That, however, does not exist in the US any more, if it ever did. The American media, conceits aside, in the complete hands of the corporate plutocracy, are simply one more propaganda platform—perhaps the most effective—to bolster and disseminate the prevailing capitalist ideology.  The true left, minuscule in its media presence, forever fragmented and improvident in strategic regards, has nothing to respond with, no instruments with which to access the public debate. That is why the fascism mongers will achieve their goals “constitutionally.”  What they will do to the Constitution by amendments (that they are already talking about) once they get full control of the Supreme Court, 40 state governments, 2/3’s of the Congress, and the Presidency will then play itself out.  And the nation will have become fully fascist functionally, without violence, without a maximum leader, with, on paper two political parties offering “choice.” A perfect Orwellian democracy.

Not really needed, since the state will have the army and police on their side—and the media to cover their crimes. Still, they could be used to carry out "boutique murders" of select opposition and activists.

American Nazis. Not really needed, since the state will have the army and police in its pocket—and the media to cover their crimes. Still, they could be used to carry out “boutique murders” of select opposition activists.

[dropcap]I[/dropcap]f you would like to see how this may well play out, please see my book, The 15% Solution: How the Republican Religious Right Took Control of the U.S., 1981-2022 (Punto Press Publishing, 2013).  The original edition was published in 1996, and believe me I didn’t make up any of it.  “The 15% Solution” in the title comes from a voter-suppression program designed by an organization called the “Christian Coalition” in the late 1980s.  I just looked at what the Republicans and their soul-mates in the Religious Right were telling us, back into the 1980s, what they would do if they ever got significant control over the levers of government.  And they are doing it.  Indeed, as the overall economic conditions continue to worsen, and as racism, homophobia, and misogyny, all underlain by religious determinism continue to expand in their domination of Republican politics, fascism will creep in like Sandburg’s fog, on little cat feet.  But it will be a highly poisonous fog.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

JonasSteve-BOND1Senior Editor, Politics, Steven Jonas, MD, MPH is a Professor Emeritus of Preventive Medicine at Stony Brook University (NY) and author/co-author/editor/co-editor of over 30 books.  In addition to being Senior Editor, Politics, for The Greanville Post, he is: a Contributor for American Politics to The Planetary Movement; a “Trusted Author” for Op-Ed News.com; a contributor to the “Writing for Godot” section of Reader Supported News; and a contributor to From The G-Man. He is the Editorial Director and a Contributing Author for TPJmagazine.us.  Further, he is an occasional Contributor to TheHarderStuff newsletter, BuzzFlash Commentary, and Dandelion Salad.

Dr. Jonas’ latest book is The 15% Solution: How the Republican Religious Right Took Control of the U.S., 1981-2022: A Futuristic Novel, Brewster, NY, Trepper & Katz Impact Books, Punto Press Publishing, 2013, and available on Amazon.






Who killed Jesus?

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By Steven Argue
opeds

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(CLICK ON IMAGE FOR BEST RESOLUTION)

Dispelling idiotic myths and legendary stigmas

EditorsNote_White[box] The Internet has served as a magnifier for the proliferation and distribution of all sorts of idiotic images and theories (many ludicrous conspiracies) about some secret society of powerful individuals taking over the world.  Among these, the one about the Illuminati stands out, if for no other reason that it upends the history and purpose of the organization, surely the product of a mass public that senses the usurpation of power by the world’s elites, but lacks a correct, class-based analysis of political reality. The result is a thick mumbo jumbo of pseudo explanations and vague warnings that prove impossible to prove and remain worthless as political tools to organize the masses. Below a sampler of images denouncing the Illuminati.—PG[/box]

 

illuminati03021012

This vision of the Illuminati conjures up a semi-demonic or monkish society, with some of its inspiration probably traceable to freemason rituals. The masons, too, were anti-clerical and thereby persecuted by the Church. This forced a measure of secrecy, including special gestures to recognize one another. Nothing sinister about that, just sensible precaution in an era of fanatical religiosity and wildfire suspicion. Many of the most progressive intellectuals and political figures of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries were freemasons. There were 9 founding fathers that were Freemasons. Benjamin Franklin, William Ellery, John Hancock, Joseph Hewes, William Hooper, Robert Paine, Richard Stockton, George Walton and William Whipple. George Washington was also a Freemason, and so were Simon Bolivar, Francisco Miranda, Bernardo O’Higgins, and Jose de San Martin, all great liberators of South America from Spanish rule. (Click on image for best resolution)

 

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This image conflates celebrities (comedians, hip hop artists and pop like Bob Dylan, Jay C, and Beyonce, etc.), with political notables, including the Queen, Obama, and a recent Pope. Obviously the unanchored idea here is that “those with money and power” are screwing everyone else, which is good enough for a superficial approximation to the real problem, the global plutocracy and its henchmen and front figures.

illuminatiPuppetteerRobot

The Illuminati as a puppetmaster robot. Again, an approximation with no real political grounding to effect change.

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The obsession produces some remarkable activist art. At least they are doubting the government, a first step toward a broader and deeper understanding of the real issues (and culprits).

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The anti-Illuminati believe the Illuminati rule the world. Who the Illuminati are, however, seems to be a bone of contention. The anti-Illuminati have differing “theories” of how the Illuminati are Jews, Satanists, atheists, extra-terrestrials (with reptilian DNA), or Catholics based in the Vatican. Some just combine it all together and inexplicably have no problem dealing with the contradictions.

“The problem with Zionism is not its connection with Judaism. The problem with Zionism is its belief in the right to gain a homeland by brutally robbing another people of theirs…”

Most capitalist conspiracies are hiding in plain sight. For instance, take a look at the money in any bourgeois election and one can see how the capitalists own this system. Or take a look at who owns the major media and one can see who runs the American propaganda machine. It is wealthy capitalists who censor the news, produce lies, and otherwise distort public thinking through their ownership of the media in favor of their projects. Fake conspiracies distract from the real ones.

Anti-Semitism is even worse. The genocide currently being carried out against the Palestinian people does not in any way justify crimes against Jews. Leninist-Trotskyists like myself entirely dismiss the idea that there are good and bad nationalities. To write off a whole people reeks of the kind of nationalism found in Nazism, American “exceptionalism”, some of the genocidal “morality” of the Bible, and in Zionism itself. It is through the unity of the Hebrew speaking and Palestinian working class that Zionism will be defeated and equality won. On the other hand, antisemitism actually plays into the hate on which Zionism feeds to survive.


 

Steven Argue for the Revolutionary Tendency

Revolutionary Tendency
https://www.facebook.com/RevolutionaryTendency/


 

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