Democrats

  By Robert Reich RobertReich’s Blog (8/28/17) The Democratic Party can lead the country in a new direction, but will it? Millions of Americans who are politically engaged for the first time in their lives are crying out for a bold alternative to bigoted and destructive policies. But Democrats can’t just be anti-Trump or move to the middle. To be successful Democrats must address the forces that created Trump: The toxic combination of widening inequality and racism. The richest one percent now own more than the bottom 90 percent. Corporations and the rich are running our politics. The resulting economic…

(Editor’s Note: Watch the linked video below and look at the contrast between DNC chair Tom Perez and Sen. Bernie Sanders. Where Perez slips and sidesteps questions, Sanders gives direct, unvarnished responses. Where Perez avoids issues of class and won’t say a peep against the 1%, Sanders nails the gangsters of the 1%. Can the Dems learn even when sitting next to a master teacher? – Mark L. Taylor) By Norman Soloman Nation of Change (8/2/17) Nine months after losing the presidency, the Democratic Party is in dire need of a course correction. Grass-roots enthusiasm for the party is far…

  By Steven W. Thrasher The Guardian (7/20/17) Six months into Donald Trump’s term, and Democratic politician’s ability to be an opposition party is, in a word, pathetic. When the poll came out saying that “Democrats stand for nothing more than opposing” Trump, I thought to myself, ‘If only that were true!’” But they can’t even do that well. When House Democratic Caucus chairman Joe Crowley was asked by the Associated Press just what his party’s core message was, he “hesitated” and then said, “That message is being worked on.” It was as tone deaf (but honest) an answer as when Mother Jones writer…

TheCommonerCall.org By Branko Marcetic In These Times (7/12/17) The Democratic Party remains embroiled in a tug-of-war over its future direction. Critics on the left point to the party’s recent losses at all levels of government as evidence that Democrats must embrace a commitment to economic populism in order to regain political power. But there might be more to it than that. A new study published by researchers from Boston University and the University of Minnesota Law School suggests it’s not just economic policies Democrats need to start reconsidering—their foreign policy also needs an overhaul. The takeaway is clear: Adopting a more robust…

Say No To Centrism: Time To Go Bold, Dems! By Isaac Chotiner Slate (7/12/17) In her new book, No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump’s Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need, the author and activist Naomi Klein identifies the election of our current president as the result of a number of trends in American society. Klein has long written about what she perceives to be the devastating effects of globalization and American militarism; here she presents Trump as part of a culture obsessed with branding, where honesty is irrelevant and winning is what counts. She partially blames neoliberal economics and the glorification…

  By Bob Burnett Common Dream (7/1/17) Writing in Politico, Bruce Bartlett complains the Republican Party has lost its way because it has ceased to champion ideas; he says the GOP has become the Party that panders “to the lowest common denominator in American politics.” What Bartlett says is true, but the Democratic Party has also lost its way. Not because its ceased to champion ideas but rather because Democrats have forgotten who they are, they’ve lost touch with their soul. Bruce Bartlett is a historian who served in the Reagan and George H.W. Bush Administrations. His Politico article savages Trump: “He has instituted policies…

The CommonerCall.org By Steven W. Thrasher The Guardian (5/31/17) n a widely circulated article at FiveThirtyEight, Patrick Ruffini – a digital strategist for George W Bush’s highly divisive 2004 campaign – wrote on Tuesday that while African Americans continue to vote heavily for Democrats, they are not showing up for the Democratic party in the numbers they once did. This certainly makes sense to me. Other than not being as crudely racist, xenophobic and misogynist as the Republican party, the contemporary Democratic party offers little to African Americans. Looking toward the upcoming special election in Georgia, Ruffini wrote: “Lower black…

  By Douglas Williams The Guardian (5/29/17) In normal times, the Republican disarray in Washington would have people talking about a Democratic sweep at the midterms in 2018. You saw it with George W Bush’s second midterm election in 2006, where a Republican party riven with corruption and weighed down with the Iraq albatross was decisively defeated by a Democratic party on the ascendancy. But these are not normal times. And in a Democratic party that is seeing their centrist and incoherent governing philosophy being ground into powder, the last thing that they seem ready for is taking power. The…

  By George Zornick The Nation (5/17/17) In the battle over ideas in the Democratic party, it’s clear the moderates aren’t getting much quarter. This was on display at the “Ideas Conference” held Tuesday by the Center for American Progress, the central policy and personnel clearinghouse for Democratic administrations. Just before the event, the think tank released “A Marshall Plan for America”—an ambitious jobs guarantee via “a large-scale, permanent program of public employment and infrastructure investment.” The racially and gender-diverse main speakers ranged from the liberal to the very liberal. Senator Elizabeth Warren gave a strong lunch keynote demanding strong…

  By Rob Hunter The Guardian (5/18/17) Onward Together, Hillary Clinton’s new political organization, seeks to capitalise upon widespread opposition to the Trump administration. In announcing the group on Monday, Clinton described a vision of a clearing house for coordinating millions of people in protests, fundraising, and campaigning. In other words, it’s the latest attempt to corral mass direct action into avenues that are acceptable to the Democratic party. But Onward Together threatens to dampen efforts at building solidarity and counter-power nationwide. Partially that’s because of the likelihood the organisation will exert rightward ideological pressure on wayward Democratic candidates. Mainly,…

  By Les Leopold Common Dreams (5/8/17) Just as Donald Trump mortgages the White House to Goldman Sachs, Barack Obama does a Hillary: He agrees to take $400,000 from Wall Street to give one speech. Obama will make as much money in one hour as the average American makes in about five years. The excuse can’t be lack of money. He and Michelle are about to receive $60 million in book advances on top of the several million already in the bank plus the $200,000 pension as an ex-president. So why take the Wall Street cash? The former president’s spokesperson,…

  By Zach Carter HuffPost ((4/27/17) The rumors are true: Former President Barack Obama will receive $400,000 to speak at a health care conference organized by the Wall Street firm Cantor Fitzgerald. It should not be a surprise. This unseemly and unnecessary cash-in fits a pattern of bad behavior involving the financial sector, one that spans Obama’s entire presidency. That governing failure convinced millions of his onetime supporters that the president and his party were not, in fact, playing for their team, and helped pave the way for President Donald Trump. Obama’s Wall Street payday will confirm for many what…

  By Matt Taibbi Rolling Stone (4/21/17) There is a critical scene in Shattered, the new behind-the-scenes campaign diary by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes, in which staffers in the Hillary Clinton campaign begin to bicker with one another. At the end of Chapter One, which is entirely about that campaign’s exhausting and fruitless search for a plausible explanation for why Hillary was running, writers Allen and Parnes talk about the infighting problem. “All of the jockeying might have been all right, but for a root problem that confounded everyone on the campaign and outside it,” they wrote. “Hillary had been…

  By Scott Galindez Reader Supported News (4/8/17) Before I get going, this is not a case for a third party. I still believe we have a system that is rigged for the two largest parties and other efforts are a waste of time and energy. I believe the route to power in America is through either the Democratic or the Republican party. That being said, I do understand the principled arguments for a third party. I understand my friends and political allies who believe the Democratic Party doesn’t represent their views. The Democratic Party often disappoints me as well….

TheCommonerCall.org   By Chuck Jones Huffington Post (3/17/17) A few weeks back, I spoke to the Democratic National Committee Forum in Detroit about how the party lost a lot of Midwest blue collar voters – and with them, the presidency. My union – United Steelworkers Local 1999 ― represents the Indianapolis Carrier plant that loomed large in the presidential showdown. Our role grew even more prominent after Trump attacked me on Twitter for having called him out for lying about the Carrier jobs. But it wasn’t just Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton and Carrier that got the Democratic Party in a…

  (The Commoner Call & Lines of Resistance cartoon by Mark L. Taylor, 2017. Open source anc freee to use with link to www.thecommonercall.org )   By Rory Carroll The Guardian (2/1/17) They came with chants and songs, banners and flyers and a chicken costume, and felt it was working – that this and other grassroots protests were steeling Democratic resistance to Donald Trump. “We need to stand and fight. We are the majority. Let’s take our country back,” Mimi Fleischman told the crowd outside Senator Dianne Feinstein’s Los Angeles office on Tuesday afternoon. It was the latest anti-Trump gathering…