Comments on Stephens article in NYT on Democratic Party issue positions
Comments on Stephens article in NYT on Democratic Party issue positions
The practical facts about immigration is that criminalizing it doesn’t stop it.
What it does is present the United States with a conundrum; imprison, intern and/or deport tens of millions of people, many or most of whom have American citizens in their immediate families, or see the rule of law trampled through non-enforcement of an unenforceable & morally reprehensible law.
The alternative to withdrawing from Afghanistan is to keep US forces there forever. How is that in US interests? The US attempt at nation building has been such a notable failure that the US has seen fit to exclude its own puppet government from the peace negotiations.
How is a state of permanent, unwinnable war preferable to peace?
The authorization for use of military force in Afghanistan was premised on the constitutional article regarding letters of marque & reprisal, an anti-pirate clause. Well, the Al Queda “pirates” have been defeated and UBL is long gone. And so should the US be from Afghanistan.
How is it that Mr. Stephens apparently believes that free, taxpayer-supported public education for all is economically unsustainable in the US, though countries such as Germany & Sweden apparently find a way to accomplish this. How bout less spending on permanent wars & dominance of the entire world through economic & military interventions?
Regarding health care, once again, how is it that Stephens believes that the US can’t do what Europe and Canada can in providing free, quality healthcare for all?
To a neoliberal friend
Friend, you are precisely correct in identifying classical liberalism and neoliberalism as being economic philosophies and nothing but that in the strict sense of the terms.
I am using the term liberal in the American political context where liberalism is identified with FDR liberalism which is classic liberalism plus social programs borrowed from democratic socialism and new left liberalism which adds civil rights and anti-war planks to that platform.
In the US political context, neoliberalism is closely identified with the Clintons and has the following characteristics:
* Economic neoliberalsim including deregulation of the banks and industry.
* Rejecting social welfare programs “end welfare as we know it.”
* Support for the military-industrial complex and agressive use of a combination of propaganda and support for pro-American puppets through organizations such as the national endowment for Democracy plus a program of covert assassinations and multiple limited wars abroad, carried out through a combination of pinpoint air attacks and assassinations plus military, training, intel and economic aid for “moderate” terrorist militias.
* Triangulation, the political strategy of running to the left in the primary as a “progressive who gets things done” and then adopting in the general and as a governing strategy a position just slightly right of the Republicans, on the assumption that will create a solid governing majority from the center plus the left, the latter of which will be forced to take whatever crumbs they can get rather than nothing, or the worse republican alternative.
Neoliberalism failed with the Great Recession, and triangulation failed with the DNC and HC’s corrupt manipulation of the primary process.
We supported blue dog, right wing democrats for 50 years and it ended with a kick in Bernie’s teeth at the Convention. A friend of mine told me a lot of specifics about how they were spied on by infiltrators, decredentialled, had their pages taken away, were physically prevented from sitting together in blocks, were shouted down at every time they tried to speak or chant, and were physically manhandled and assaulted by HC and DNC operatives bullying them.
My delegate friend from Brooklyn said it was the saddest and most upset he has been since his father died. I heard similar stories from a number of other people who were there as Bernie delegates and whom I know and trust.
The machine right wing and neoliberal delegates aren’t getting a Mulligan for that, sorry. Not going to happen that we just say no worries well that’s just politics.
If that’s just politics then back at ya. How you liking it so far?
We will never support another Clinton or Clintonian triangulator unless we get equal support for our positions and our candidates. Yes to cooperation and alliance, but no to this entitled assumption that left wing democrats must support right wing democrats, but not the reverse.
Copyright © 2018 Henry Edward Hardy
Why I support Bernie Sanders for President
Bernie Sanders is a good man, brave, kind, compassionate, courageous, insightful, thoughtful, and honest. He is a friend to all living things. Bernie Sanders is the kind of candidate who comes along only once in a lifetime. We shall not see his like again. Vote your hopes and not your fears. Vote SANDERS FOR PRESIDENT!
If you want to understand why there are so many die-hard Bernie supporters such as myself, I offer this. It isn’t because we hate Hillary Clinton. It isn’t because we are all democratic socialists. It isn’t because we all hate all of the rich.
We support this good man because he is kind, he is compassionate, he is a real person who has always had the same message, who doesn’t bend and blow with the breezes of popularity or the outcomes of focus groups.
We support Bernie Sanders because he is the last, best hope of leading us by the angels of our better nature, to making the aspirational America with ‘freedom and justice for all’ real, to restoring the character and standing of America to where the people of the world will thank us for our brother and sisterhood, and not hide their children in fear and curse us whenever they hear a plane overhead.
Bernie’s America is our America is the America of “This Land is Your Land.” Our America is the America of “America the Beautiful.” Our America is the America of “We Shall Overcome.” Ours is the America of “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”
Our America is the America of Abraham Lincoln and Sojourner Truth and Emma Goldman and Paul Robeson. Our America is the America of Joe Hill and Eugene V Debs and Norman Thomas. Our America is the America of Michael Harrington and Kwame Ture. Our America is the America of Malcolm X and Upton Sinclair. Our America is the America of Teddy Roosevelt and Franklin Roosevelt. Our America is the America of Smedley Butler and Abbie Hoffman.
Join us!
Deeply Moving Message from Bernie Sanders
Copyright © 2016 Henry Edward Hardy
Vote for Hillary Clinton to continue these Bush-Obama policies
Vote for Hillary Clinton to continue these Bush-Obama policies:
Eternal, undeclared, illegal, aggressive war. In Libya, Syria, Iraq, Mali, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Sudan, Chad, Somalia, Nigeria, Philippines, Honduras, and Yemen. Universal surveillance. General Warrants. Secret courts. National Security Letters. Endless imprisonment without trial or charge. Effective abolition of the writ of habeas corpus, notwithstanding that it is in the US Constitution Article I, Section 9. Black sites. Rendition. Special Ops death squads. Assassination of US citizens without trial or charge. Including juveniles. Robot bombs sent to assassinate more than 2,000 civilians so far in neutral countries with which we are not at war. Mercantilist trade policies such as TTIP, TPP, NAFTA. Okay, Hillary was for TPP and helped write it, until she was suddenly against it a few months ago. Fracking. Bailing out Wall Sreet, AIG to the tune of $318 thousand million dollars, then also bailing out big banks like Citi, who were already re-insured by AIG. But Obama could not find $20 billion to bail out Detroit’s pension funds, nor $60 million for public works to replace all the lead pipes in Flint.
Copyright © 2016 Henry Edward Hardy
Hillary Clinton is in jeopardy of felony charges
Hillary Clinton is facing possible indictment on Federal felony charges of unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents or material under 18 U.S. Code § 1924.
Clinton’s secret basement server’s sysadmin, Bryan Pagliano, has been granted immunity from prosecution by the Justice Department in order to testify against her. DOJ doesn’t grant immunity unless they feel certain a crime has been committed and there is a reasonably good chance of a conviction.
Pagliano is or was reportedly a GS-15 who was moonlighting for HC and did not report this engagement to his superiors nor did he report the income she paid him under the table.
Now they are both in deep, deep shit. But Brian has the get out of jail free card, but only if he brings down Hillary. She’s fucked, to put it bluntly. Whether she is charged, or convicted, or not.
The statute says nothing about whether the information was classified when it was first retained. If it was classified at any point, and it was on her server in her basement, and she was aware of this at any point, Clinton is in jeopardy of being found guilty of probably multiple felony counts.
Most likely scenario is HC pleads guilty to a single felony charge, and gets a non-custodial, or home-confinement sentence. As was done with General Petraeus and National Security Advisor Sandy Berger.
Her best outcome is to get a pardon from Obama before he leaves office, joining such notable patriots as Admiral Poindexter and John Ashcroft. That will still destroy her career and injure the Democratic Party.
If Clinton was someone lower in the bureaucracy she would be facing heavy time, like John Kiriakou, William Binney, Jeff Sterling, Chelsea Manning, Susan Lindauer, Barrett Brown, Thomas Drake, Stephen Jin-Woo Kim, and Shami K. Leibowitz. And others.
Pagliano is the dude on the right.
Copyright © 2016 Henry Edward Hardy
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Scanlyze is an online magazine of essays, commentary, satire, and analysis. Were we half as clever, for inspiration we would take Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, Swift, Montaigne, or Seneca.
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