The following needs little comment.
Read on. (Emphasis mine.)
Can’t Hit the Snooze Button No More by Mark Salomon
In 1980, when I turned 18 and first voted, John Anderson sounded the alarm about the duopoly rot. The Democrats hit the snooze button and Reagan won.
In 1984, Gary Hart sounded the alarm and the Democrats slapped him down, again in 1988, and hit the snooze button, nominated the execrable Mondale and Reagan won.
In 1988, Jesse Jackson sounded the rainbow alarm, the Democrats hit the snooze button, nominated the hapless Dukakis who ran with the odious Bentsen and Bush I won.
In 1992, Jerry Brown v1.5 sounded the alarm, the Democrats hit the snooze button and nominated Bill “Rapey Bubba” Clinton who won but rammed NAFTA through and forfeited the Congress to the Republicans.
In 1996, Nader sounded the alarm. the Democrats hit the snooze button. The Republicans impeached Rapey Bubba. As a parting shot of gratitude, Clinton I deregulated Wall Street.
In 2000, Ralph Nader sounded the alarm, the Democrats hit the snooze button and lost to Bush II (the previous Hitler on the Potomac) and instead of taking stock of their failure, raged at Nader.
In 2004, Howard Dean sounded a weak alarm, the Democrats hit the snooze button and nominated the patrician Kerry who lost to Bush II, blaming the Greens again.
In 2008, Obama sounded the alarm as a trojan horse, got in running center-left and governed center-right, throwing away historic strong majorities in the Congress to the Republicans.
In 2016, Bernie Sanders sounded the alarm and the Democrats hit the snooze button so hard that they broke the alarm clock and nominated a neoliberal warmonger candidate who was as unpopular with the electorate as she held them in contempt ushering in Obama’s true legacy: Donald Trump. And here we are.
Do you want to know why there is a Justice Kavanaugh? That’s why.
These Democrats are not stupid. They claim that they represent the meritocracy. Yet in what meritocracy do losers like this rise to the top and stay there after losing election after election?
This “meritocracy” selects for those able to appeal to and manipulate the elites into being allowed to be temporary custodians of power on their behalf.
Their reward is a lifetime of sinecure and wealth.
—snip—
When Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party arose, the Republicans welcomed the Tea Party into their midst while the Democrat big city mayors, coordinated by the Obama Department of Justice brutally and violently repressed the encampments.
Politics in this model is not symmetric.
—snip—
If people with access to many fewer resources than we, facing death squad governments and apartheid, can organize to win, then we have no excuses.
Our primary impediment in this task has been the Democrat Party which views its base, not the Republicans, as its opponent, and leverages its patronage network against independent popular organizing.
The veil of delusion is strong with the Democrat base, they are at a point where they have been made as impervious by MSNBC to logical arguments as any Fox [sic] News addict.
We are going to need to pierce that veil to shake some sense into them and more importantly organize outside of our usual comfort zones where the Democrat spell is weak, where people are wise to their bait and switch and have voted with their feet by staying home.
None of this will be easy, but it is not rocket science, others who have come before us have made these heavy lifts.
We have no excuses.
I repeat:
We have no excuses.
You loyal Dems who expect anything different from the DNC after almost 30 years of neocentrist failure should be ashamed of yourselves. But on plentiful evidence…including on this supposedly “progressive” blog…many of you are not.
Is this the result of stupidity? In some cases, yes.
Is it the result of media addiction? I think so, myself. In my estimation, well over 90% of the U.S. mass media coverage of the Republicans and Donald Trump has been negative…and deservedly so. But…how much of that anti-Trump 90+% has been harshly critical of the Dems as well? Maybe 2%? Probably less. So loyal Dems steep themselves in this media broth until they are throughly cooked and then plod on into the next DNC morass.
A new DNC!!!???
Just like the old DNC except for a few newish faces.
Is it the result of laziness? Of surrender to habit? In some cases, certainly. Mom and Dad/Grandma and Grandpa were Dems, so we should be Dems too.
And of course in some cases it is purely profit-driven.
Swamplings and their subordinates, doin’ a’what comes natcherly.
On the DC swamp hustle.
I have taken a lot of heat on this blog for using the term “Wake the Fuck Up!!!”
So it goes.
The end result of all of this DemRat “failure?”
Donald Trump.
And one way or anther…unless a true sea change occurs in the U.S. and probably necessarily most of the rest of the developed world…we are going to pay a heavy price.
Environmental catastrophe?
Nuclear war?
Economic collapse?
Some sort of collapse of the tech infrastructure…probably due to hostile forces…that now supports the entire society?
Take your pick.
Or…
WAKE THE FUCK UP!!!
Like the man said…”Can’t hit the snooze button no more.”
Bet on it.
Later…
AG
