You are right, Jaime Harrison and the rest of the neolibs don't own the Democratic Party: AIPAC, the tech bros, and the dark-monetarians own both parties. No election is stolen: they're all paid for by the oligarchs. For example, in the 10th NY Congressional district all the leading candidates took AIPC money.
This is so true! When we have enough Progressives in Congress there must be a Constitutional Convention to update the Constitution to make it fair, eliminate the Electoral College, fix the number of Senators to match the number of people in each state, eliminate money in politics, correct the taxation, etc. It is time to take back our Democracy!
The documents don't matter. FDR did it without changing the documents, except for repealing Prohibition to inspire confidence and decrease gang power. The key is personality and knowing how to use power. FDR came from a superwealthy elite family. His cousin had been president. He had the connections to make things happen, and the foresight to assemble a magnificent TEAM who knew exactly how to make things happen.
Why fix the Senate to match population? The House of Representatives already does that. Let’s just abolish the Senate altogether. The Senate is a millionaire’s playground. The House of Representatives is the people’s house.
The Senate has a great deal of power. They could have ended Trump's presidency twice, but surrendered to him. States that have few residents should not have the same number of Senators has vast populated states. It is a give away of power to the least of states.
First Amen to that. Secondly, I ran an extremely progressive large union for decades. We were on the ground with Bernie before Bernie even announced his campaign I believe. Only a handful of unions suppported him. It was disgraceful. I sat on the AFL-CIO exec committee and was there when we interviewed presidential candidates. They didn't endorse Bernie even though, as he put it, he was there on 99% of our issues and the 1 that he was not was Citizens United which the AFL-CIO embraced. Throughout my tenure, the greatest cover that enabled corporate control of our society was provided by many of our brother and sister Unions in DC and around the country and liberals. The way it worked was the corporate class money people would tell the Dems what to do, the Dem leadership would define "achievable" "viable", etc to the Union leadership The moniker was "don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good." Good???? Thus we consistently had the dynamic status quo with the Dems. I am so sick of them and liberal leaders who provided cover that got us here. Mamdani saw through it all, took on entrenched leadership and spoke directly to people's needs. He stands on the shoulders of so many movement builders. Real people in so many communities. On the national scene, Bernie Sanders, Ralph Nader, etc saw the Dem chatter as white noise, spoke truth to power and all of that gave rise to the Mamdani moment. RoseAnn DeMoro
I reckon that unions have been largely cowed over the decades. They collapsed under the assault of Reagan and never came back. I think there's an element of infighting, plus very much a culture of self-interest as opposed to fighting for working people across the country. Various unions fight for their membership, which makes sense, but it creates a scenario where it's hard to build massive public support or unity.
You are right on this Corbin. A simple example of this is the fight for single payer. The Canadians across the border from Detroit are able to make more money because they have a healthcare system and not a healthcare industry. Thus they don't have to beg for healthcare in contract negotiations. But we could never engage the UAW into a sustained fight for single payer. All of the union members would benefit from it. It should be a given as healthcare plans decline over the years and premiums and copays rise. But most bureaucratic union leaders see this as a benefit that they can offer to get people to join unions. If the public saw unions as fighting for it, their esteem would skyrocket yet most unions pay lip service to it.
It's my understanding that the last time we had a discussion, I believe in the 1970s, about a national health care system, it was the unions themselves that fought against it. They saw health care as one of the main sales points of union membership, as opposed to just winning that fight for everyone and moving on to more. They decided that they wanted to stick with their best wins, which at that point were gold-level health care plans.
Tragic. Truly tragic. Untold suffering of so many both physically and economically. But it is the reach of the Democratic Party and its complicit liberal parters have dictated the terms of engagement that had devastating effects. Obviously not as bad as the right but there have been so many opportunities in our history to do the right thing. I believe the day of reckoning so to speak is around the corner. I'm jazzed. Keep going Corbin. I see that you are getting to them.
Sawant addresses Union (leadership) issues in the link below. My biggest fear is the ability of newly elected Dems being able to passionately attack oligarchy when joining a system specifically designed to neuter/co-opt them, see AOC, and, to an extent, even Bernie. The Democratic Party’s democracy rhetoric hypocrisy when trying to kill left candidates (Hoh, Ware, Sawant) instead of creating coalition allies disgusts me.
Amen to all of it. If you want to see the new candidates arrive in Washington as part of a movement instead of single voices trying to fit in to a party that won't have them (like AOC, eg), then support Corbin''s new PAC - A Fight Worth Having (afightworthhaving.com).
Wow! That was powerful. The Dems haver certainly been a huge disappointment since...well, you could say FDR. But if LBJ hadn't taken the Vietnam bait, he would have gone down as one of the greatest presidents in history for his Great Society. Carter was right about many things, but he was ultimately ineffective. Clinton did what he set out to do: grow the economy out of deficit spending. Obama brought healthcare to millions who couldn't afford it. Biden did much his first two terms until the Republicans won back the House. So the establishment Dems haven't done all bad, but they are guilty of the things enumerated in Corbin Trent's piece (and more).
But they are still the lesser of two evils, so we have to vote for them. But I completely support running FDR Democrats (let's call them) against do-nothing incumbent Dems in the primaries and voting for them.
How refreshing to hear a positive argument for sticking with a party that has cred from its roots, to overturn those who sold it out to the donor class. We don't need a third party, to start from scratch, to play spoiler. We need to be ourselves, to cast out the doubters, the safe-players, to be proud of our heritage and able to assert a proper will of the people, to update the party of FDR.
Mind you, the extent of our efforts need to be broader than this, because the entire donor class needs to be taxed and regulated out of existence, to assure that our wages stop being stolen by privileged rentiers. Otherwise, they'll be back to haunt us again, in a new guise -- guaranteed.
Evolving our constitution may be the central fight. Special interests through the rural state control of the Senate have blocked many reforms. Getting the system so that reforms supported by significant majorities can pass will be a fundamental paradigm shift. Perhaps a constitutional amendment which calls a convention every 8 years with procedures for presenting amendments. It is going to take focus and determination to build something non-partisan and truly supporting democracy. We certainly do not have that now.
A great "writing"....no question. A thing to remember is during that wonderful history when good things were done and were built, it was also a two party effort....(albeit led by democrats). The nastiness that followed was/is also a two party effort. It's all part of a larger "plan" which in effect, is to convince us democracy works and that's supposed to be validated/confirmed by us believing our voting system works. The legalized crime syndiate of the two party system is a "lock" and regardless of the hope of our vote, the entrenched wealthy are not giving it up... no-how. The recent "successes" of a few fine candidates is surely encouraging, "It’ll be loud and it’ll be ugly" is an understatement and it very well could take many good minded people putting there lives on the line. Our vote (if we ever really had it) just ain't gonna cut it (imo).
It simply isn't so, though. There was no two-party effort. It was a massive majority for Democrats, supermajorities in both chambers. For a very long time, that led to a lot of change being possible. The fact is that, while you have a divided government, massive change is extremely hard. In fact, without a supermajority change is hard.
A "divided government" is by design...intentional, always has been, so as to keep "massive change" from happening. Tho "massive majority's for democrats" have existed and significant changes have historically occurred, the wealth ( the ones) behind the two party's, have fabricated things so as "we" appear to have done things politically (that's the trap). The reality is there's NEVER been a movement to empower people in the U.S. The massive efforts of churches, govt.(the military medical industrial complex) and corp. controlled media and entertainment all aim to do quite the opposite. It's a control measure. Our "vote" that's so heavily promoted, essentially coopts our power. Fortunately with the current elected monster. there's a wake up to what our govt. (not the easily accusable "him") is all about.
"Successes" we know of are actually teasers which lead many to believe "for a very long time a lot of change being possible"...(key word possible). Our "vote" is a set up so we believe we can make big changes. It does not. It never has been especially with the massive unnecessary divisions being constantly made up. They've" done a good job preventing any kind of real "super majority" from ever occurring. The life changes we desire are being accomplished in spite of an unworkable political system...and almost never done through it. More recent history (50 years?) has shown clearly, that Dems are not the way. More distant history has created the illusion, our vote can make these changes. "It simply isn't so".
Good expression :"pray tell". as praying should be on the list. I'm likin "demanding, thinking, building, and writing" as right up there. In local elections, where you can bang on a candidates door...perhaps voting. Other wise, I'd add: boycotts, stop work, not complying/obeying the onslaught of "directives" (i.e real ID's, cbdc's, medical advisories,). Most of us (as you well articulate) are being intentionally shut out of a system which no longer will provide necessities. SO, that demands each of us become more responsible/self reliant in whatever way ethically possible; creating parallel systems, community building, share living spaces, apprenticing, learning a skill, barter, living by reconnecting with the real value our eath provides....minimizing our dependence on the dying dinosaur.
The founders invisioned a Congress composed of individuals who represented each of the various states, but who also brought themselves, as independent minded people who would weigh various constituencies and their needs in deciding how to vote. They would weigh the interests of their own state and of the country as a whole, along with the conditions in the Constitution and tradition to make their decisions.
But today, we have two parties, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party and their members constitute most seats in Congress. And members of each party so often vote in lock-step according to how they are advised by their party, which is often more attentive to the needs of their deep-pocket donors.
And voters have only two choices, to vote for the Democrat or vote for the Republican. Only rarely is there any other choice, and voting for that other alternative is regarded as a waste.
Is there anything we could do to somehow re-shape our politics so that Congress can again function as it was intended, with its members bringing their own ideas and thinking into play so as to best serve their many constituencies? There may be many approaches for doing this, but my personal opinion is that bringing in a larger assortment of political parties would help greatly with this. And I think this is possible:
A lot of the founders were actually federalists and not as into states' rights as you might imagine. Obviously, many of the states' rights ideas came from the desire to maintain slavery, among other individual elements from the colonies.
Thank you for that comment. No doubt the founders were not of several minds though clearly the idea of a strong federal government was in the air then. But before the Constitution was ratified, people often thought of themselves as loyal to the smaller political units that may have since become states, with the Articles of Confederation being something just tacked on for mutual protection.
I would say that we pay for the wars with public money that belongs to all of us because they spend more than what comes in as taxes. I think that this new D party that we are working to bring forth should stop using the old terminology, like “taxpayer money”. It’s public money. All of our US money comes from our US government and it belongs to all of us even if it isn’t distributed that way. We need to understand that it’s really money that belongs to all of us.
Establishment Dems are so arrogantly ignorant and it’s pathetically sad. They, in their servitude to the oligarchs, choose not to see the will of the people; they choose to be blind… and at a time when real leadership is needed, we dare not follow the blind.
As FDR era 2.00 -ers; and stop being corporate shills and genocide enablers, pol consultant slaves, and greedy selfish non public servants, or Clintonistas. Neoliberalism is dying and should be dead; just like Thatcherism in the UK.
You are right, Jaime Harrison and the rest of the neolibs don't own the Democratic Party: AIPAC, the tech bros, and the dark-monetarians own both parties. No election is stolen: they're all paid for by the oligarchs. For example, in the 10th NY Congressional district all the leading candidates took AIPC money.
This is so true! When we have enough Progressives in Congress there must be a Constitutional Convention to update the Constitution to make it fair, eliminate the Electoral College, fix the number of Senators to match the number of people in each state, eliminate money in politics, correct the taxation, etc. It is time to take back our Democracy!
Be very careful. Don't tinker with the Constitution that way. The fascists nearly have enough States to call a Convention.
The right fixes are very different from my fixes!
We can damn well fix the Constitution. Eliminate slavery for real this time, and nix the classism and social order the Founding Fathers baked in.
The documents don't matter. FDR did it without changing the documents, except for repealing Prohibition to inspire confidence and decrease gang power. The key is personality and knowing how to use power. FDR came from a superwealthy elite family. His cousin had been president. He had the connections to make things happen, and the foresight to assemble a magnificent TEAM who knew exactly how to make things happen.
Why fix the Senate to match population? The House of Representatives already does that. Let’s just abolish the Senate altogether. The Senate is a millionaire’s playground. The House of Representatives is the people’s house.
The Senate has a great deal of power. They could have ended Trump's presidency twice, but surrendered to him. States that have few residents should not have the same number of Senators has vast populated states. It is a give away of power to the least of states.
First Amen to that. Secondly, I ran an extremely progressive large union for decades. We were on the ground with Bernie before Bernie even announced his campaign I believe. Only a handful of unions suppported him. It was disgraceful. I sat on the AFL-CIO exec committee and was there when we interviewed presidential candidates. They didn't endorse Bernie even though, as he put it, he was there on 99% of our issues and the 1 that he was not was Citizens United which the AFL-CIO embraced. Throughout my tenure, the greatest cover that enabled corporate control of our society was provided by many of our brother and sister Unions in DC and around the country and liberals. The way it worked was the corporate class money people would tell the Dems what to do, the Dem leadership would define "achievable" "viable", etc to the Union leadership The moniker was "don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good." Good???? Thus we consistently had the dynamic status quo with the Dems. I am so sick of them and liberal leaders who provided cover that got us here. Mamdani saw through it all, took on entrenched leadership and spoke directly to people's needs. He stands on the shoulders of so many movement builders. Real people in so many communities. On the national scene, Bernie Sanders, Ralph Nader, etc saw the Dem chatter as white noise, spoke truth to power and all of that gave rise to the Mamdani moment. RoseAnn DeMoro
I reckon that unions have been largely cowed over the decades. They collapsed under the assault of Reagan and never came back. I think there's an element of infighting, plus very much a culture of self-interest as opposed to fighting for working people across the country. Various unions fight for their membership, which makes sense, but it creates a scenario where it's hard to build massive public support or unity.
You are right on this Corbin. A simple example of this is the fight for single payer. The Canadians across the border from Detroit are able to make more money because they have a healthcare system and not a healthcare industry. Thus they don't have to beg for healthcare in contract negotiations. But we could never engage the UAW into a sustained fight for single payer. All of the union members would benefit from it. It should be a given as healthcare plans decline over the years and premiums and copays rise. But most bureaucratic union leaders see this as a benefit that they can offer to get people to join unions. If the public saw unions as fighting for it, their esteem would skyrocket yet most unions pay lip service to it.
It's my understanding that the last time we had a discussion, I believe in the 1970s, about a national health care system, it was the unions themselves that fought against it. They saw health care as one of the main sales points of union membership, as opposed to just winning that fight for everyone and moving on to more. They decided that they wanted to stick with their best wins, which at that point were gold-level health care plans.
Tragic. Truly tragic. Untold suffering of so many both physically and economically. But it is the reach of the Democratic Party and its complicit liberal parters have dictated the terms of engagement that had devastating effects. Obviously not as bad as the right but there have been so many opportunities in our history to do the right thing. I believe the day of reckoning so to speak is around the corner. I'm jazzed. Keep going Corbin. I see that you are getting to them.
Let's replace that Overton Window with one that achieves public goals, not the donor class.
Sawant addresses Union (leadership) issues in the link below. My biggest fear is the ability of newly elected Dems being able to passionately attack oligarchy when joining a system specifically designed to neuter/co-opt them, see AOC, and, to an extent, even Bernie. The Democratic Party’s democracy rhetoric hypocrisy when trying to kill left candidates (Hoh, Ware, Sawant) instead of creating coalition allies disgusts me.
https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/fighting-the-corporate-duopoly-at?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=778851&post_id=203485835&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=false&r=eov1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Amen to all of it. If you want to see the new candidates arrive in Washington as part of a movement instead of single voices trying to fit in to a party that won't have them (like AOC, eg), then support Corbin''s new PAC - A Fight Worth Having (afightworthhaving.com).
That's the idea! I'm glad to see people picking up the team idea. That basketball ad was exactly what we've been talking about.
This is so good. I'm going to cross-post it to my subscribers.
Wow! That was powerful. The Dems haver certainly been a huge disappointment since...well, you could say FDR. But if LBJ hadn't taken the Vietnam bait, he would have gone down as one of the greatest presidents in history for his Great Society. Carter was right about many things, but he was ultimately ineffective. Clinton did what he set out to do: grow the economy out of deficit spending. Obama brought healthcare to millions who couldn't afford it. Biden did much his first two terms until the Republicans won back the House. So the establishment Dems haven't done all bad, but they are guilty of the things enumerated in Corbin Trent's piece (and more).
But they are still the lesser of two evils, so we have to vote for them. But I completely support running FDR Democrats (let's call them) against do-nothing incumbent Dems in the primaries and voting for them.
OK
Well said, thank you.
Amen, brother.
How refreshing to hear a positive argument for sticking with a party that has cred from its roots, to overturn those who sold it out to the donor class. We don't need a third party, to start from scratch, to play spoiler. We need to be ourselves, to cast out the doubters, the safe-players, to be proud of our heritage and able to assert a proper will of the people, to update the party of FDR.
Mind you, the extent of our efforts need to be broader than this, because the entire donor class needs to be taxed and regulated out of existence, to assure that our wages stop being stolen by privileged rentiers. Otherwise, they'll be back to haunt us again, in a new guise -- guaranteed.
Evolving our constitution may be the central fight. Special interests through the rural state control of the Senate have blocked many reforms. Getting the system so that reforms supported by significant majorities can pass will be a fundamental paradigm shift. Perhaps a constitutional amendment which calls a convention every 8 years with procedures for presenting amendments. It is going to take focus and determination to build something non-partisan and truly supporting democracy. We certainly do not have that now.
A great "writing"....no question. A thing to remember is during that wonderful history when good things were done and were built, it was also a two party effort....(albeit led by democrats). The nastiness that followed was/is also a two party effort. It's all part of a larger "plan" which in effect, is to convince us democracy works and that's supposed to be validated/confirmed by us believing our voting system works. The legalized crime syndiate of the two party system is a "lock" and regardless of the hope of our vote, the entrenched wealthy are not giving it up... no-how. The recent "successes" of a few fine candidates is surely encouraging, "It’ll be loud and it’ll be ugly" is an understatement and it very well could take many good minded people putting there lives on the line. Our vote (if we ever really had it) just ain't gonna cut it (imo).
It simply isn't so, though. There was no two-party effort. It was a massive majority for Democrats, supermajorities in both chambers. For a very long time, that led to a lot of change being possible. The fact is that, while you have a divided government, massive change is extremely hard. In fact, without a supermajority change is hard.
A "divided government" is by design...intentional, always has been, so as to keep "massive change" from happening. Tho "massive majority's for democrats" have existed and significant changes have historically occurred, the wealth ( the ones) behind the two party's, have fabricated things so as "we" appear to have done things politically (that's the trap). The reality is there's NEVER been a movement to empower people in the U.S. The massive efforts of churches, govt.(the military medical industrial complex) and corp. controlled media and entertainment all aim to do quite the opposite. It's a control measure. Our "vote" that's so heavily promoted, essentially coopts our power. Fortunately with the current elected monster. there's a wake up to what our govt. (not the easily accusable "him") is all about.
"Successes" we know of are actually teasers which lead many to believe "for a very long time a lot of change being possible"...(key word possible). Our "vote" is a set up so we believe we can make big changes. It does not. It never has been especially with the massive unnecessary divisions being constantly made up. They've" done a good job preventing any kind of real "super majority" from ever occurring. The life changes we desire are being accomplished in spite of an unworkable political system...and almost never done through it. More recent history (50 years?) has shown clearly, that Dems are not the way. More distant history has created the illusion, our vote can make these changes. "It simply isn't so".
Well then, Tom, what, pray tell, do you suggest if not:
- elections
- voting
- organizing
- protesting
- demanding
- thinking
- building
- writing
Good expression :"pray tell". as praying should be on the list. I'm likin "demanding, thinking, building, and writing" as right up there. In local elections, where you can bang on a candidates door...perhaps voting. Other wise, I'd add: boycotts, stop work, not complying/obeying the onslaught of "directives" (i.e real ID's, cbdc's, medical advisories,). Most of us (as you well articulate) are being intentionally shut out of a system which no longer will provide necessities. SO, that demands each of us become more responsible/self reliant in whatever way ethically possible; creating parallel systems, community building, share living spaces, apprenticing, learning a skill, barter, living by reconnecting with the real value our eath provides....minimizing our dependence on the dying dinosaur.
Progressives is the new Socialists moniker
Let’s go with that and continue the good fight
We will prevail
Our country deserves better for ALL!
I think "progressive" gets tossed around. You got a whole lot of people that claim to be progressives that couldn't be further from it.
The founders invisioned a Congress composed of individuals who represented each of the various states, but who also brought themselves, as independent minded people who would weigh various constituencies and their needs in deciding how to vote. They would weigh the interests of their own state and of the country as a whole, along with the conditions in the Constitution and tradition to make their decisions.
But today, we have two parties, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party and their members constitute most seats in Congress. And members of each party so often vote in lock-step according to how they are advised by their party, which is often more attentive to the needs of their deep-pocket donors.
And voters have only two choices, to vote for the Democrat or vote for the Republican. Only rarely is there any other choice, and voting for that other alternative is regarded as a waste.
Is there anything we could do to somehow re-shape our politics so that Congress can again function as it was intended, with its members bringing their own ideas and thinking into play so as to best serve their many constituencies? There may be many approaches for doing this, but my personal opinion is that bringing in a larger assortment of political parties would help greatly with this. And I think this is possible:
https://www.opednews.com/populum/page.php?f=Can-We-Reform-our-Polarize-Reform_Reform_Two-party-System_Voting-240206-3.html
A lot of the founders were actually federalists and not as into states' rights as you might imagine. Obviously, many of the states' rights ideas came from the desire to maintain slavery, among other individual elements from the colonies.
Thank you for that comment. No doubt the founders were not of several minds though clearly the idea of a strong federal government was in the air then. But before the Constitution was ratified, people often thought of themselves as loyal to the smaller political units that may have since become states, with the Articles of Confederation being something just tacked on for mutual protection.
I would say that we pay for the wars with public money that belongs to all of us because they spend more than what comes in as taxes. I think that this new D party that we are working to bring forth should stop using the old terminology, like “taxpayer money”. It’s public money. All of our US money comes from our US government and it belongs to all of us even if it isn’t distributed that way. We need to understand that it’s really money that belongs to all of us.
Establishment Dems are so arrogantly ignorant and it’s pathetically sad. They, in their servitude to the oligarchs, choose not to see the will of the people; they choose to be blind… and at a time when real leadership is needed, we dare not follow the blind.
And yet beating them isn't as easy as it would seem like it should be.
As FDR era 2.00 -ers; and stop being corporate shills and genocide enablers, pol consultant slaves, and greedy selfish non public servants, or Clintonistas. Neoliberalism is dying and should be dead; just like Thatcherism in the UK.