Only way we get rid of this is with Bernie Sanders type candidates.
Or (evoking an earlier incarnation) a Harry Truman type, re-minted for the 21st c.
It will certainly require a firebrand populist, whose primary (maybe ONLY) focus is on helping the working class.
I'm not sure who that person might even be, at this point.
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As I watch the Donald Trump cabinet form, I'm concerned that many of his most ardent supporters will suffer the same sense of 'buyer's remorse' that many American Blacks felt in 2012, when "America's First Post-Racial President" was finishing his first term. A good many of them expected substantive changes to happen on a dime, and were disillusioned, because their 'pie in the sky' ideals weren't met.
A substantial number of Trump supporters will most likely feel that same sense of disillusionment and un-met expectations, when Their Candidate faces the harsh realities of life in DC- and either fails to (or walks back) his campaign promises. It happens every time. With every elected official. Trump (Like Obama) will have to deal with this.
Now- I'm not talking about the died-in-the-wool, "TRUMP!!!" shouters who came to the polls. I'm talking about the voters who held their noses, and voted AGAINST Hillary Clinton. Those Midwest, rust-belt voters who held their noses, and voted for the pipe dream that "P.T. Barnum v. 2.0" was selling them. The voters who actually swung this electoral win, because they were truly hurting... and Hillary (effing) Clinton was the absolute worst candidate the DNC could have ever put up to run for the next POTUS term.
Bernie Sanders wasn't the best alternative the DNC could have put forth, either. He was too "East Coast Liberal" for most folks in Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, and Iowa to ever get behind. He spoke in High-minded generalities, and NEVER once addressed how he'd change their lives for the better. In short, he created 'sound waves' that resonated with some in the D party, but failed to create the tsunami necessary to defeat HRC (and The Machine) in the primaries.
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I said it before-right here in DT'ers: The modern Republican Party has always fit the profile of "Reduced Federal Gov't/low taxes/State's rights", while the modern Democratic Party has always been comprised of a loose coalition of disparate "oppressed, marginalized, everyday people with no voice in the national narrative."
All of this is about to change, with a Donald Trump presidency.
When those folks who voted for him 'with noses held' see the people he installs, the policies he enacts, and the lack of 'trickle-down that actually reaches them, their votes will again be up for grabs.
If they are to see themselves in a position on influence going forward, the Dems MUST pivot back to the positions that won them the working man when we were transitioning out of WWII, and into the modern era:
responsible pay for a day's labor. stability in the workplace. a fair shot at a decent life, built upon the skills they were able to attain. a chance to make their kids' lives better than the world they live in.
THESE have always been the issues upon which America's Heartland voters have always cast their ballots.
I don't blame them at all, for hiring Donald Trump over HRC. I blame the DNC for not listening to the very folks who made the a viable political party in the first fkking place.
In 2.5 years, when those West VA mining jobs haven't returned, when those manufacturing YTown jobs are being replaced by automation, and Donald Trump's promises to 'Make America great again' are ringing hollow in their ears...
...they'll be ripe for The Opposite Of Donald Trump.
Well before that point, Dems must think very carefully about who they promote, what message they send to the public... and carefuly consider the person they choose to promote their "Face of the New Democratic Party." Because that candidate has a herculean task staring him/her in the face.
__________
The day after our most recent POTUS election, I predicted: "there will be buyer's remorse." This is why I said ti:
If President-elect Trump doesn't handle his new-found position with the utmost of nuance and skill, I predict that a good number of his 'on-the-fence' voters will be up for grabs again in 2020.
Personally speaking, I've never seen him as a man for whom 'nuance' or 'vision' is even a viable option. He's always been a "Bull in a china shop" for the last 40+ years, in everything he's ever done. I expect no less from him now.... and his most recent cabinet propositions do nothing to expect that he's changed his spots.
I stand by my predictions that 'John Q' will rue the day (s)he ever voted for this person. I don't believe that he ever understood what's important to someone from Weirton, WVA, Youngstown, or Cadiz, OH. I agree that they deserved a better alternative than HRC, and that's why I believe that they're ripe for a candidate like HST.
____________
If enough of America sees 'enough of Donald Trump' in the next 2 years, I forsee a tsunami washing back the other way. It won't happen unless the Dems can produce someone who binds marginalized working-class Whites to all the other Americans who will be also screwed by the people and policies POTUS 45 installs.
Populist Politics: the only construct that can actually unite people against an oppressive regime that doesn't care what they think.
At this point, I have no idea who the Dems can find to galvanize such disparate folks to a common cause. It would take someone like MLK/Nelson Mandela/Vaclav Havel... and I'm not even sure how effective they'd be, in times like this.
It's the main reason why I've never seriously considered running for even a local public office. Too much BS, not enough empathy for struggling workers/'out of workers.'
One thing's certain, from my 45+ years of political observation: This will be one of the most tumultuous Presidential eras in the history of our nation... and will signal a 'pivot point' in where we go from here.
I'm reminded of that ancient Chinese blessing'curse: "May you live in interesting times"
The primary election of HRC was pure corruption, Clem. Everything from stacking super delegates before the first vote was cast to DWS rigging the debates, polling station availability, voting role purges and tainted media coverage collusion from her position in the DNC allowed HRC to be the candidate.
In a fair primary Bernie Sanders would have been the candidate, hands down, period. He would have then crushed Trump, hands down, period. So in my opinion the corrupt DNC, the Democratic Neocon Establishment, big money in politics and corrupt media cost us the President of a lifetime in Bernie Sanders.
He has big general ideas, but if you ever listen to him when he addresses the specifics, you will hear a man of the people that is purely for the middle class.
I never doubted Bernies sincerity or where his heart was. He may be the only "genuine" politician I witness in my lifetime. Even if people disagreed with him philosophically I don't think anyone could label him as a fake politician.
I never doubted Bernies sincerity or where his heart was. He may be the only "genuine" politician I witness in my lifetime. Even if people disagreed with him philosophically I don't think anyone could label him as a fake politician.
That reason alone made him the best candidate in this election, too bad the media's labeling and non-coverage kept more from seeing this side of him.
lol the government has an official corporate sponsor now.
Might as well have their suits designed by Nike.
“To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”
I think the Dems are in trouble as long as they throw Wackos like Bernie and crooks and liars like Hillary at us. I might have voted for the Democratic candidate ( naw probably not ) if they would come back to America with someone likeJFK. They have moved so far left that to a lot of us they are laughable. They get handed their butts and what do they do? They Pelosi back in.
The contradictions of Trump the nominee to Trump the President-Elect are astounding. As the nominee he railed against Clinton's Wall Street friends now, as President-Elect he surrounds himself with them.
Also, keep in mind...he championed himself as the voice of the working people. Wall Street could care less about working people. They want to make money so why would they care if things are made here or overseas? As long as things are cheap and a bigger profit can be made that is what it's all about, correct?
So, this facade of "manufacturing coming back to the USA" to help the working class people of America is, just a facade. But, it was bought hook, line and sinker.
But, as even he said today...he "doesn't need your vote anymore".
I never doubted Bernies sincerity or where his heart was. He may be the only "genuine" politician I witness in my lifetime. Even if people disagreed with him philosophically I don't think anyone could label him as a fake politician.
Maybe but he was essentially bought off by the DNC and Clinton. You can say no but I believe it to be true.
I have been thinking about this very subject a fair amount, and this is what I have concluded:
There are certain positions in government, especially those dealing with economics, that are going to be filled by someone from a really unpopular area, academia, business, and/or politics. We aren't going to bring in some guy from Main St. to run these incredibly complex and powerful positions. "Joe the plumber" isn't going to be Secretary of Labor. The baker on Main Street isn't going to head up the SBA, and my mom is not qualified, in any way, shape, or form to head up Commerce.
Wjo would people like to see in these positions, who would have enough of a big picture mentality, and enough experience to be able to handle running a massive bureaucracy?
I am curious as to who people think Sanders would have brought in who would have broken this mold, and why they would have been better?
Micah 6:8; He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.
John 14:19 Jesus said: Because I live, you also will live.
Bernie sold out and supported Hillary in the end. That tells me his presidency would have bought just like Bush/Obama/Trump.
The dude brought in Bill McKibben and Dr. Cornel West to the DNC platform drafting party. He shifted the DNC's platform so far to the left, that it's not a Republican platform anymore. He almost got the platform to state they were for a two state solution for Israel/Palestine. To think that Bernie Sanders would just be another corporate shill, is a tad baseless.
Also, at some point, Republicans and Democrats will have to understand, you cannot rid yourself of bureaucrats by appointing more bureaucrats. At one point, they would have to support the common people that they disdain. But that day is still far away. America loves it's bureaucrats.
I have been enjoying reading the left's opinion of every one of Trumps nominees and found most of them to be quite funny.
They have (at least the ones I follow on social media) broken it down to where the only person qualified to fill any of these positions is a career politician.
They jump on every one of them because of the business associations.. like the CEO of Exxon for secretary of state has ties to Russia.. well he is the CEO of an oil company and Russia is the largest oil producing company in the world so... duh, of course he has "dealings" with them.
That, to me, is the big disparity this has shown.... the left absolutely loves career politicians who have never done mubh else... the right doesn't like career politicians and wants outsiders in these positions.
Bernie sold out and supported Hillary in the end. That tells me his presidency would have bought just like Bush/Obama/Trump.
The dude brought in Bill McKibben and Dr. Cornel West to the DNC platform drafting party. He shifted the DNC's platform so far to the left, that it's not a Republican platform anymore. He almost got the platform to state they were for a two state solution for Israel/Palestine. To think that Bernie Sanders would just be another corporate shill, is a tad baseless.
Also, at some point, Republicans and Democrats will have to understand, you cannot rid yourself of bureaucrats by appointing more bureaucrats. At one point, they would have to support the common people that they disdain. But that day is still far away. America loves it's bureaucrats.
Thanks for saving me the time, CHS.
Bernie radically changed the platform, prevented Howard "BBBIIIIYYYAAAAHHHHH" Dean from becoming DNC chair, and most likely will get the DNC to be run by a progressive African American Muslim.
I love it. Down with the plutocracy (Trump's furthering the American Plutocratic system), and neoliberal (liberal social policy, and economic policy that benefits the upper echelon of Americans) idiocy.
Do you mean like appointing a surgeon to be the head of HUD? Ignoring a surgeon for Surgeon General and appointing him head of housing and urban development?
Yes, that is kind of funny.
Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.
The only way to get rid of bureaucrats is to get rid of bureaucracies.
Micah 6:8; He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.
John 14:19 Jesus said: Because I live, you also will live.
“To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”
CEO's of large multinational corporations who conduct business with federal, state, local and international governments every day! Because they're not pretty much the same exact thing as a government worker. Cuz neither bureaucrats or those people are trying to get everything they can from the government while putting in as little as possible.
Micah 6:8; He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.
John 14:19 Jesus said: Because I live, you also will live.
When you have a government that is run by lawyers who make their fortunes suing people you will never end up with good results. Lawyers making the laws will always favor a burdensome amount of law that cripples and suffocates the country.
"If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send one hundred and fifty lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, and talk by the hour?"
Thomas Jefferson
The founding father knew this and still couldn't stop it from happening. This lazy generation NEVER will.
You can't fix stupid but you can destroy ignorance. When you destroy ignorance you remove the justifications for evil. If you want to destroy evil then educate our people. Hate is a tool of the stupid to deal with what they can't understand.
Donald Trump fired up campaign crowds with a promise to “drain the swamp” of Washington corruption. But former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says the president-elect has soured on that populist rallying cry now that he has won the White House.
“I’m told he now just disclaims that. He now says it was cute, but he doesn’t want to use it anymore,” Gingrich, one of Trump’s most high-profile boosters, told NPR in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
“I’d written what I thought was a very cute tweet about ‘the alligators are complaining’… and somebody [from Trump’s team] wrote back and said they were tired of hearing this stuff,” said the former lawmaker, whose conduct in the late 1990s earned him a historic bipartisan reprimand.
Trump himself had alluded to mixed feelings about the slogan during a Dec. 8 rally in Des Moines, Iowa, part of his triumphant postelection “Thank You” tour.
“Funny how that term caught on, isn’t it?” he said. “I hated it. Somebody said ‘drain the swamp.’ I said, ‘Oh, that’s so hokey. That is so terrible.’ I said, ‘All right, I’ll try it.’ So, like, a month ago I said, ‘Drain the swamp.’ The place went crazy. I said, ‘Whoa, watch this.’ Then I said again. Then I started saying it like I meant it, right? And then I said it, I started loving it.”
Trump used the refrain throughout October, and has reprised it at every stop on his “Thank You” tour. His critics have taken to repurposing it to attack the president-elect’s choices of prominent bankers for his Cabinet, arguing that he is not draining the swamp so much as bringing in different alligators.
Gingrich told NPR that Trump was shedding some of his campaign language — including a prominent threat to jail Hillary Clinton — now that he has won.
“I’ve noticed on a couple of fronts, like people chanting ‘lock her up,’ that he’s in a different role now and maybe he feels that as president, as the next president of the United States, that he should be marginally more dignified than talking about alligators in swamps,” the former lawmaker said.
Gingrich said he himself was fond of the imagery, but “he is my leader and if he decides to drop the swamp and the alligator, I will drop the swamp and the alligator.”
While it’s closely associated with Trump, the phrase appears to have entered the 2016 presidential lexicon in October 2015 via a campaign commercial for Ben Carson.
But it has bipartisan pedigree. Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi promised in the run-up to the November 2006 midterms that she would “drain the swamp” if her party won.
Two decades earlier, then-President Ronald Reagan invoked the image in a Jan. 20, 1982, speech, promising to “drain the swamp of overtaxation, overregulation and runaway inflation that has dangerously eroded our free way of life.”
In those same remarks, Reagan warned supporters about the risk of contagion with “Potomac fever” and told them not to fall back into business as usual.
“Don’t let the Washington whirl or the Washington morass let you lose sight of why we came here and what it is that we’re all trying to do. I know it isn’t always easy,” Reagan said. “As the old saying goes, ‘When you’re up to your armpits in alligators, it’s sometimes hard to remember that your original intention was to drain the swamp.’”
And just like Reagan, Trump isn't gonna make good on the promise to stop increases in government spending, and just like Reagan, we can expect the federal budget to not be balanced.
awesome.
“To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”
And just like Reagan, Trump isn't gonna make good on the promise to stop increases in government spending, and just like Reagan, we can expect the federal budget to not be balanced.
awesome.
I pretty much expect the self-proclaimed 'king of debt' to put the U.S. further into debt.
_______________________________
Donald Trump: 'I'm the king of debt'
Donald Trump isn't afraid of debt.
"I'm the king of debt. I love debt," Trump told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Wednesday, seemingly trying to explain the comfort level he has with debt after a long business career that included four bankruptcy filings by his companies.
Did you know that the world total debt is 200 trillion?
Like, who the hell do we owe? Is there a mob boss on one of saturns moons I'm not aware of? Is there a loan shark in the andromeda galaxy that keep hitting us in the knees with bats every time we miss a payment?
I don't get it.
“To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”
Did you know that the world total debt is 200 trillion?
Like, who the hell do we owe? Is there a mob boss on one of saturns moons I'm not aware of? Is there a loan shark in the andromeda galaxy that keep hitting us in the knees with bats every time we miss a payment?
I don't get it.
Can you explain further what you mean/are getting at?
You mean like the conservative babies wanting to increase military spending all the time?
Omg we need to make our military bigger!! Even though we spent a trillion on some damn jets, it's not enough!! We need mooooore!!!
“To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”
Where's that deflection shield picture? Swish needs to wear it around his neck.
Unlimited spending is ok for liberals though right? It doesnt matter that that the united states credit rating got downgraded does it? On Obamas term? Keep putting your head in the sand.
Did you know that the world total debt is 200 trillion?
Like, who the hell do we owe? Is there a mob boss on one of saturns moons I'm not aware of? Is there a loan shark in the andromeda galaxy that keep hitting us in the knees with bats every time we miss a payment?
I don't get it.
Can you explain further what you mean/are getting at?
I think what he's wondering is: Who the hell owes who and how much do they owe?
Did you know that the world total debt is 200 trillion?
Like, who the hell do we owe? Is there a mob boss on one of saturns moons I'm not aware of? Is there a loan shark in the andromeda galaxy that keep hitting us in the knees with bats every time we miss a payment?
I don't get it.
We owe each other.. it's a weird dynamic but just as we are $20+ trillion in debt to our own people and other governments, there are other nations who owe us a considerable amount of money.
are you making things up again hoping it sticks? no wonder you roll with Diam and Squires.
“To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”
