To those of us who canvassed and joined the Obama movement in 2007-2008, supporting a “Socialist”, “Black”, “Junior” senator from Chicago with the name Barack Hussein Obama recall being told what a crazy fools errand we we on. There was no way the country was ready for “such a person”. (Yes they slapped the “socialist” label on Obama as they do to all Democrats.) He had little national experience, and was keeping company with pastors who railed against “God Damn America” and former “Domestic Terrorist” weather underground members.
All these things were supposed to stop us from joining a small donor based grass roots political movement that valued people. We kept up, and believed, because 1) we wanted a new type of politics, 2) we could see he was the smartest guy in the room, and 3) he was right about the most critical decision any politician had faced in our lifetime (not supporting the 2 Trillion dollar Iraq boondoggle that probably created 10,000 new Bin Ladens). So when you say “but he’s a socialist, America’s not ready” I get a big ol’ belly laugh out of that shit. Saying he can’t win even though 60% of Americans want single payer already (another %20 would clearly do better under single payer but just don’t understand system) and vast majority agree higher education should be available to all, is a selling yourself short. It’s a lack of faith in your own ability to educate and effect change. So have faith in yourself. Stop hand wringing over one label and vote for the best candidate on most important issues of our day. (IMO the most important issues are the vampire squid and Financial services industry that control of our government, and campaign finance reform, 99% of our bad policy stems from these two).
So, let look at two labels you could apply to our most likely general election opponent; Donald “Creepy” & “Elitist” Trump
First there’s the “If she weren’t my daughter I’d probably date her” line :
Yikes!
The creepiness is even spilling over into his campaign events :
Then there’s “Elitist”. Poor Donald Trump only got a million dollar “loan” from his dad at 18 then of course inherited his 200 Million dollar real estate empire. The numbers suggest that if the Donald had handed over his fortune to a person with real business acumen (Warren Buffet) in 1980 (estimated 200 Million) by buying Berkshire Hathaway stock, he’d have 3 times as much money as he pretends to have now. Then there’s the private jets,
and all the speaking fees he collected : www.businessinsider.com/…
$750,000 for one speech is completely outrageous. In contrast; Bernie Sanders entire net worth prior to become a celebrity this year was $330,000 (Forbes now has his net worth near 800,000 based on rising popularity and future biography rights.) My dad is a retired bus driver living just outside Queens NY. He bought a house 30 years ago he managed to pay off that’s now worth $400,000. So my dad, a bus driver, had a higher net worth than Bernie Sanders. That’s man of the people folks, and your worried about defending him? Please.
Back to Trump; Look at the highway robbery he performs at his golf courses fortune.com/…
We gotta stop voting for, as George Carlin put it “Rich assholes that don’t give a shit about you”
https://youtu.be/-14SllPPLxY?t=94
Buck up kids “socialist” will be a god damn cake walk. Let’s put a good man in oval office. He’s not hard to defend.
Sunday, Jan 17, 2016 · 9:07:33 PM +00:00 · mtosner
Two corrections: 1) I accidentally included a picture of Hillary Clinton’s private jet instead of Trumps. His is actually bigger and more opulent. 2) I accidently quoted Bill Clinton’s speaking fee (750k) instead of Trumps $1.5 Million My Bad