Bernie Sanders Civil Rights Record Should be Respected, Not Condemned

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Thursday October 08, 2015 · 2:49 PM PDT

2015/10/08 · 14:49

In the 1970s my wife was murdered, and my daughter – who was a toddler at the time – was kidnapped. It was the most horrifying experience I’ve ever endured. But as devastating as it was to learn of my wife’s death, my grief had to be temporarily set aside so I could stay focused on finding my daughter. Unfortunately, it didn’t take long to realize the detective who had been assigned to investigate the case was inept, so, I began searching for my child on my own. I followed every clue that seemed remotely related to my wife’s murder, and ultimately I uncovered a letter that had been stolen by a homeless man that suggested my daughter had been taken to Kansas City -- except I didn’t know if it was Kansas City, Missouri, or Kansas City, Kansas.

Unsure of what step to take next, I randomly selected, and then, called a police department in Kansas City, Missouri. Fortunately, a very empathetic and capable police officer answered. He enlisted the help of the assistant District Attorney who volunteered to help expedite the search. Within 24 hours, the assistant DA had identified and located the man who had kidnapped my daughter. The kidnapper was an ex-convict, so the police had kept him on the radar for sometime, and to make a long story short, my daughter was rescued in a midnight raid on his apartment.

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Wednesday October 07, 2015 · 3:06 PM PDT

2015/10/07 · 15:06

You’re life isn’t worth much.

That statement doesn’t reflect my personal beliefs, but rather the consensus of government and corporate leaders who have deemed your lack of value a liability.

If you don’t believe me, then read your city’s emergency plan. In the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, George W. Bush mandated that all US communities receiving federal assistance – which pretty much includes all US cities and towns – prepare an emergency management report that includes a dollar value assessment of every person living within statistical communities.

After having read the reports, most people are appalled at how little value has been assigned to their lives and the lives of their family members. But that type of corporate indifference is to be expected under the guidelines of the “new normalcy;” primarily because the reality of living in a capitalistic society -- controlled by global financiers -- is pretty frightening. Compared to the size of the global economy, you and I are just mere specs of dust. Everything we treasure, from our children to our homes, has been measured in terms of dollars, and corporations are exploiting that information. And the only winners of that game will be an elite group of billionaires who control the bulk of our nation’s wealth.

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Thursday June 25, 2015 · 11:21 AM PDT

2015/06/25 · 11:21

Dear Senator McCaskill,

Re: your appearance on Morning Joe, today: Thank you for being so candid about Senator Sander’s voting record. I think it opens up a great opportunity for Democrats to clear the air about a few troubling issues.

But, let me start by saying I’m confused. You said that Senator Sanders was “too liberal,” which is bewildering because we have been constantly assured that Hillary Clinton – the candidate that you support -- is a true liberal. And since I’m certain you have seen recent polling data that shows Democratic voters returning to their liberal roots, would you please explain the difference between being a “true liberal” and being “too liberal?” Is it a matter of degrees? If so, at what point does a true liberal become too liberal?

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Wednesday June 24, 2015 · 1:21 PM PDT

2015/06/24 · 13:21

As a result of the 2010 and 2014 midterm “sit out” votes cast by angry Democratic voters, one thing was made explicitly clear: Democratic leaders seem incapable of learning from their mistakes. No matter how unequivocally progressive members have expressed opposition to the conservative policies championed by Obama, and no matter how many elections Democratic candidates have lost, DNC leaders simply respond by blustering for the cameras and then caving in to the White House and the Republicans.

More importantly, by siding with Paul Ryan and the Republicans, they have ignored the will of the members of over 2,000 organizations – including the 8 million members of MoveOn.org. And yet, somehow they think supporting the TAA will offset the impact of their betrayal.

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Thursday June 18, 2015 · 11:57 AM PDT

2015/06/18 · 11:57

Congratulations. We’re all Republicans now.

After six years of forcing party members to support Republican and corporate drafted polices, Obama has finally made the transition complete: the Democratic Party is now an official branch of the Republican Party.

And now that Fast Track has cleared the House of Representatives and is on its way to the Senate for final approval, the president’s apologists must face a stark truth: they have been defending a neo-liberal, corporatist politician who had a secret agenda long before he stepped onto the world stage.

And as William River Pitts so eloquently stated yesterday: “…all the YEAH BUT REPUBLICANS arguments can go pound sand.”

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Monday June 15, 2015 · 10:25 PM PDT

2015/06/15 · 22:25

When grassroots activists and union leaders threatened to withhold campaign donations from Democratic Congressmen who voted for Fast Track, it should have been a wake up call for all Democrats. If party members have been reduced to threatening representatives just to ensure voter interests are protected, then you know the party has lost its way. In essence, our leaders have become nothing more than leeches feeding off the public trough, and instead of representing our interests; they have gorged themselves on lobbyist bribes and campaign contributions, while leaving us to fend for ourselves -- without adequate representation in D.C.

And for many Democrats that presents a dilemma that can have only two solutions: Either we form a new political party, or we clean house and elect people who will be responsive to our needs.

Robert Kuttner:

It's about time that the Democratic rank and file rebelled against the corporate domination of the Democratic presidential party. Last week's events should ring down the curtain on the era of "trade" deals like NAFTA and TPP.
It's fine for Republicans and their corporate allies to promote this stuff. We expect it of them. But the 99 percent deserve a party of our own. If a Democratic White House doesn't get that, this steamrolling is well-deserved.
http://www.commondreams.org/...

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Sunday June 14, 2015 · 4:32 AM PDT

2015/06/14 · 04:32

The TPP agreement has never been about helping average Americans obtain jobs. Its overarching purpose has been to ensure US corporations gain enough power to dominate international trade markets. More specifically, it was designed to deter China’s expansionist ambitions.

As CNN noted in April:

Really, this is about China.
Remember Obama's infamous Asia pivot -- the one Hillary Clinton was spearheading as secretary of state? This deal is its economic underpinning.

China isn't involved in the Trans-Pacific Partnership. But it is working on its own trade deal in the region, with many of the same countries. And that deal won't include the labor and environmental language, or the crackdown on government-owned and operated businesses, or the Internet freedom language, that the United States is insisting on.

Proponents say the deal is the United States' chance to install itself as an economic force in the region, and to require some of the participating countries to play by its rules. The alternative is that those countries could fall increasingly into China's orbit.

http://www.cnn.com/...

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Friday June 12, 2015 · 2:03 AM PDT

2015/06/12 · 02:03

Long before the 2014 midterm-elections, I was one of the few people on this site warning members of the Democratic Party to prepare themselves for huge losses during the midterm elections. For holding that position, I was vilified. But in the end, I was proven right.

So, here is another prediction I will posit, one that will probably draw the same type of reaction, but one that I’m even more confident to make: If the TPP passes, no matter how many Democrats vote against it, the Party will suffer huge losses in 2016. And because Hillary Clinton has failed to take a forceful stand against the TPP, she will be the primary victim of voter anger, and the Democratic Party will pay dearly for supporting her candidacy. For her to say she has a few problems with the agreement isn’t the same as taking a principled stand such as the one staked out by Sen. Bernie Sanders.

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Wednesday April 01, 2015 · 7:01 PM PDT

2015/04/01 · 19:01

I think it is timely that Brooklyn Bad Boy presented an opposing view to the diary I posted yesterday. In fact, a discussion about the anger that is creating a huge rift in the Democratic Party is way overdue.

For six years the neo-liberal wing of the party has masked itself in a populist façade while pushing through corporate polices, championing cuts to our social safety net programs while enriching Wall Street criminals. Those types of policies have sent the wrong message to American voters because they do not represent true Democratic values; and all true progressives have been offended that the White House and the neo-liberal wing of the party have enacted them in our name.

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Tuesday March 31, 2015 · 7:52 AM PDT

2015/03/31 · 07:52

On March 30, 2011, an international human rights observer witnessed and reported an unusually cruel and violent confrontation between a NY police officer and an Occupy Wall Street protester. While lying on the ground, the injured protester informed approaching police officers that his shoulder had been dislocated, and that he was experiencing severe pain. The officers reassured him that an ambulance was on its way and because he had been injured, he would not be handcuffed.

But within minutes, a new group of policemen arrived on the scene and brutally handcuffed the protester, calling him a liar as he repeatedly cried out in pain, pleading with them to stop.

According to a report prepared by the Protest and Assembly Rights Project --a coalition of international human rights and U.S. civil liberties experts--the officers repeatedly pushed and pulled the protester’s injured shoulder, in essence, vindictively torturing the young man.

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Thursday March 26, 2015 · 9:31 PM PDT

2015/03/26 · 21:31

In February 2008, with only two candidates left in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, Barack Obama distributed a flier to Ohio voters denouncing Hillary Clinton’s support of NAFTA. The pamphlet was deceptive, not because the accusations he leveled against Clinton were untrue, but because it sent a message to workers that the young senator was a strong supporter of union labor and that he was a vigilant crusader against unfair trade practices.

And like so many populist ideals that Obama has championed in public, while repudiating them in private; the position he staked out in the flier was designed to mislead voters, as was evidenced by his tepid support of Wisconsin union members during the battle over Act 10, Scott Walker’s lead-in to the passage of right-to-work legislation. And Wisconsin workers are still suffering the sting of that defeat; one year after Act 10 was enacted, union membership in Wisconsin dropped from 50% to 37%. In fact, under Obama’s leadership, union membership has hit a 100-year low; just one of the many embarrassing records that will taint his legacy.

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Tuesday March 17, 2015 · 2:25 PM PDT

2015/03/17 · 14:25

In 2001, four months before the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, I moved from a small town in the Midwest to San Clemente, California. The main artery leading from the sleepy coastal town to the inland community of Irvine, where I worked, was Interstate-5, a freeway best described as a six or seven-lane parking lot on a bad day. To escape the worst part of the traffic jam, I often exited the freeway at Sand Canyon Road and turned northwest onto Irvine Blvd, which provided a quicker, more scenic route to work. The natural beauty, which included several miles of strawberry fields bordered on three sides by towering eucalyptus trees, provided my Zen moment of the day.

But one day, some years after beginning the commute, I turned onto Sand Canyon Road and discovered that many of the stately trees had been cut down, and bulldozers had uprooted the strawberry fields. Within weeks, a foundation had been laid for a large shopping center, and by early 2010; the remnants of the strawberry tracts had given way to rows of upscale homes and condos.

Large-scale construction projects of this nature are common in Southern California; in fact, due to gentrification, Hollywood as it exists today, barely resembles the Tinseltown where I worked as a musician in the 1970s. And while I’m saddened by the loss of popular Hollywood landmarks, the transformation of the Sand Canyon farmland in Irvine represents a political and financial trend even more alarming because it has resulted in the loss of American assets to foreign investors.

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