Countless Enemies At Home And Abroad: Dems, Awaken !
Do you dread opening your daily newspaper and internet news source each morning like I do? Ferguson, Wilmington, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and countless other hotbeds of conflict, hate and destruction. And America is at the center of it all.
We”ve managed to build a society that is earning us both disappointment and hostility across the continent and the globe. About the only undisappointed and non-hostile are the very few reaping the very rare but enormous economic benefits from the version of capitalism we are practicing as a nation. And protecting as a government.
The research I read tells me mainstream people, foreign and domestic, look upon America with skepticism and distrust and certainly do not buy the myth of American exceptionalism with the possible exception of those exploited people in this hemisphere whose local economies pay them so little they view our minimum wage jobs as a way out of their dire poverty.
The foreign hostility we”re experiencing was not created by President Obama. It is a function of post WWII foreign and economic policies built by multiple generations and bi-partisan consensus. Decades of economic exploitation and corporate plundering, with military interventions to protect those interests and the repressive dgfev online casino foreign regimes we”ve bought off to support our endeavors are the causes of the ravaging fires in the middle east and immigration crises from the south of our borders.
Our domestic focus on protecting our corporate interests at the expense of addressing the interests of our mainstream population and resulted in a massive increase in domestic poverty, joblessness and racial conflict. Where there is no current conflict, there is endemic hopelessness.
But here”s where the Democratic Party can make a huge difference. The Party can be a key vehicle for solutions by departing from the incrementalism it has been timidly offering as solutions to problems requiring much bigger thinking. Many of the big ideas are marinating in the policy prescriptions of the progressive movement within the Party.
Now is the time for the Party and its candidates to offer reforms on both our domestic and international fronts and start the national discussion. Virtually no national discussion is currently underway in spite of the very obvious state of crisis our nation is in. The DNC, our State Party organizations, President Obama and the Congressional Democrats can and should be facilitators of this discussion through neighborhood, internet and national leadership forums and meetings. It can start with this mid-term election and continue through the 2016 Presidential election.
Here”s an outline of some of the agenda as I see it:
Domestic: Climate policy, racial conflict and reparations, a redefined immigration policy, increasing electoral participation and trust, corporate regulation and discipline, restricting corporate domination of public policy and legislation, consumer rights, workers rights, full employment, fair wages, rebuilding the commons, fair share taxation, priority economic growth sectors, modernizing the Constitution, criminal justice.
Foreign: Climate collaboration, no war policy, re-thinking military facilities, restraining corporate interference with foreign societies, relationships with oppressive regimes, fair trade, international corporate reform, reforming a dysfunctional U.N., prosecuting state crime and world criminal justice.
I”m hopeful our Delaware DNC delegates and Congressional delegation might agree that patch work solutions are not getting us where we need to be and get on board with ambitious initiatives to reform and revolutionize our declining society.
If the task is perceived as too challenging, then help us retool to retire the myth of American exceptionalism and work to build a smaller, more modest and humble empire.
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I want to know what President Obama tells James Foley’s Parents when he talks to them after he called the group that beheaded James the Jay vee team back in January
Don’t come at me with your half baked nonsense. This from Huffington Post:
”
President Barack Obama sent U.S. troops to Syria earlier this summer to rescue a number of Americans held by a violent extremist group, including slain journalist James Foley, but did not find the hostages, senior Obama administration officials said Wednesday.
The officials said the rescue mission was authorized after intelligence agencies believed they had identified the location inside Syria where the hostages were being held. But the several dozen special operations troops who were dropped by aircraft into Syria did not find them engaged in a firefight with Islamic State militants before departing.”
What a nice series of pot-tinged pipe dreams you just vomited out into the screen. Yeah, those are practical.
Thanks, SW, for the great third alternative…..ignoring it all with a pot induced haze ! Which is pretty much what you’re doing. But seriously, what is it in this blog you don’t like? Activating a moribund Democratic Party? Or, taking on the issues themselves? Or acknowledging we are in both decline and crisis? Which?
SW, allow me to refer you to a brilliant take on all this from Kareem Abdul Jabbar:
http://time.com/3132635/ferguson-coming-race-war-class-warfare/
What’s this “progressive movement” of which you speak? You mean the people on this blog that threaten to vote for Republicans when a Democrat isn’t liberal enough? Or the legions of Democrats that stay home in midterms? How about the lack of progressive candidates, both locally and nationally?
Sure, there are lots of progressives in the intelligentsia that can wax poetic about workers’ rights and climate change, but I’ve yet to see the PDD take any sort of real leadership role in changing the dialog that our state legislature has. See: Minimum wage, death penalty repeal, corporate taxes, gun control, etc….
Until we start putting actions to words in a big way, I wouldn’t call this a “movement”.
Taking a page from Kareem Abdul Jabbar:…. change will only come when we can put 4 million students on the streets.
I don’t like your wish list of meaningless phrases dumped out on to the screen, and how you and your lemmings think that cliches stiched together can somehow pass for policy prescriptions. That clear enough for you?
“I don’t like your wish list of meaningless phrases dumped out on to the screen, and how you and your lemmings think that cliches stiched together can somehow pass for policy prescriptions. That clear enough for you?’
Do you feel the same way when Republicans/conservatives do it, which is oh, constantly?
Insightful question there
I think that the thing that Democrats can do is to return to working on issues that are most vital to the people they keep asking to vote for them. Even though Dems are better at bread and butter issues, that doesn’t say much, really, given how focused they are on their special interests. Elizabeth Warren is doing about the best out there in articulating the key financial issues. The financial issues are what people confront every single day, and that seems to be the place where hearts and minds can be won. But that’s not going to be won by people who are clearly captured by the interests that have something to lose if inequality lessens.
“But that’s not going to be won by people who are clearly captured by the interests that have something to lose if inequality lessens.”
It’s only going to be won by putting forward credible candidates and working our asses off to unseat those who are already captured by such interests. So… what’s the plan, gang?
Well, now you’re speaking my language — and I think that *credible* candidates is the first challenge. Followed closely by decent funding and competent campaign staff.
Related to this subject: Rahm Emmanuel’s Special Interest governing of Chicago doesn’t seem to be going over so well. Teacher’s union president Karen Lewis is currently polling 4 points ahead of Rahm.
Geezer – Yes, but that doesn’t make as much of a dent. I don’t expect much from conservatives, and not much is what they deliver. I expect more from the left side of the aisle. I expect good policy, full proposals, clear thinking and prior planning, not a bunch of buzzwords thrown around with a generic call to action that will do nothing. That’s some intellectually lazy weak-ass shit right there.
SW, there are a myriad of well thought out policy proposals already on the table from numerous progressive/Democratic Party leaning advocacy groups/movements out there awaiting action by the DNC as well as State Party organizations. I have been a part of a number of these movements on the ground at the grassroots for 45 years and perhaps you have also. Not blogging as I am now, but leading in movements, working for candidates standing for reform policy, reforming party organizations, organizing and citizen lobbying. But for the several years before and now after the Howard Dean era of the DNC, once again they have gone moribund. You utterly miss my point. IMO, The party is the vehicle to turn this thing around with recruiting of good candidates, disciplining and pressuring Dem officeholders to get off their asses and messaging to an electorate to inform, motivate and offer hope. You don’t have a clue as to what I’ve spent a lifetime doing on ground, seeing it as a duty to try, so you not so subtle, ill informed insults are repulsive.
It was a simple question. Yes or no?
You know what, I have probably switched back and forth between parties more times than I can count. Why does it always have to be “us” vs “them”. Why do you have to stand by party lines for something you personally don’t believe in? We know this happens all the time. We have a moral responsibility as human beings to do what is right, and what is best for children.
And when I see Democrats and Republicans alike voting for educational reform that is losing support on a daily basis, it disgusts me. When I see children suffering in schools because of the “rigor” demanded of them, and children and teachers being used as mere data props for the glory of standardized testing, it disgusts me. When I see all the Wall Street Ponzi Money shenanigans that comes with it, it disgusts me.
If you are making money off Common Core and Vision 20Whatever, shame on you. If you think test scores and data are more important than children, shame on you. If you want to do something right, and win votes, support what people are really talking about, not your peers in Legislative Hall and DC. Don’t be afraid to take a stand.
I answered yes. Can you not read?
@SW:Apparently not. Sorry. That comment was addressed to AGTI, who didn’t make the original comment. My bad.
😉