Or:
Old Neoliberal, So-Called Progressives…Leftovers From the Clinton Days…Are Soon To Be The New Center/Right.
Watch.
And read on.
From Vox. (https:/www.alternet.org/2019/02/no-the-far-left-hasnt-hijacked-the-democratic-party-but-real-progr
essives-are-finally-being-heard)
No, the `far left’ hasn’t hijacked the Democratic Party — but real progressives are finally being heard.
(Emphases mine.)
In 2019, there is a common narrative in the United States’ right-wing media that goes like this: the “far left” has hijacked the Democratic Party, which no longer has any room for moderation. And it isn’t hard to get devotees of Fox News, AM talk radio and websites like Breitbart and Townhall to buy into that narrative if they live in the right-wing bubble, speak English exclusively, don’t own a passport and have never traveled outside the United States. But the reality of the Democratic Party in 2019 is much different from how it is depicted on Fox News, and what the right-wing media depicts as a hijacking is actually an example of liberals and progressives finally getting a larger seat at the table.
–snip–
…to understand why Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez, Fetterman, Omar and Tlaib are so shocking to modern-day Republicans–and neoliberal corporatist Democrats as well–one needs to examine history. FDR’s New Deal (which brought about things like Social Security and a national minimum wage) was the Democratic gold standard for decades, and even Republican presidents that included Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard Nixon supported elements of the New Deal. But the U.S. took a major hard-right swing in the 1980s, when Democrats lost three presidential elections in a row–and the Democratic National Committee responded with President Bill Clinton’s decidedly centrist campaign in 1992. Barack Obama, for all his populist rhetoric, was a centrist president as well no matter how much far-right media buffoons like Michael Savage, Ann Coulter and Sean Hannity laughably tried to paint him as a disciple of Che Guevara. Savage described Obama as a “bald-faced Marxist” even when he was bringing Goldman Sachs alumni into his administration.
Centrism defined the Democratic Party throughout the 1990s and 2000s, but in 2016, there was a shift when the independent Sanders ran for president as a Democrat and pulled in a shocking amount of donations. As journalist Matt Taibbi pointed out in a December 2018 Rolling Stone article, even Sanders himself didn’t expect his 2016 campaign to perform that well. A campaign the Vermont senator expected to be marginal sparked a movement that two years later brought Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Omar and others into Congress.
The Democratic Party of 2019 is not the Green Party, let alone Greece’s Syriza or Spain’s Podemos. It’s a big tent, and veteran conservative columnist George Will recently wrote a Washington Post piece explaining why he believes Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota would make a strong Democratic presidential candidate for 2020. If a possible Klobuchar campaign gets Mr. Conservative’s stamp of approval, it’s obvious that centrism has hardly disappeared from the Democratic Party.
But after decades of being marginalized by the Democratic establishment, liberals and progressives at least have a larger voice in 2019–and it’s about time.
I repeat:
“…it’s obvious that centrism has hardly disappeared from the Democratic Party.”
But it’s alive..especially at the top of the party’s food chain…and still powerful.
And…it has also quite obviously not disappeared from this site.
But its days are numbered.
Here and there.
Watch.
Here’s Arfur trying for about the zillionth time to police who’s allowed to use the term “progressive”.
Time will tell, centrist.
Time will tell…
Bet on it.
My bet?
U thru.
Bye-bye…
AG
Arthur, you not only oppose Medicare For All, you oppose the current Medicare and Medicaid programs. That is the practical effect of your opposition to Federal government programs, a position so extreme that you have repeatedly made the case that the United States should be allowed to dissolve.
It’s no surprise you oppose Medicare and Medicaid; your hero Ron Paul hated the programs. Look to Pages 8, 37, 45 and 52 for these quotes from a summary of statements made by President Johnson as he was campaigning for Medicare:
“…In the hills of eastern Kentucky, one of the 13 States that I visited in a
program to meet the people and to know the country and to do
something about the problems–in that program I sat next to a father
that had 11 children, that had worked 4 days last month, that had
made $4 a day and had had to feed those little hungry mouths largely
from surplus commodities. And he told me because he believed in the
admonition of “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” that he had been over
and sat up with an 85-year-old man until 4 o’clock the night before
the President visited him. Why? Because there was no hospital for him
to go to and there were no resources to pay the hospital bill…
…
…I am not 65 yet, but I have known a good many people in my lifetime
that were 65; and they have been mighty close to me. And I have
seen the skim over their eyes when they looked at me, wondering
whether they were going to be welcome in their sister-in-law’s home,
or whether their brother-in-law would be happy when they are all
there using the one bath, or how they were going to pay the doctors or
for the medical services–and how grateful they were for the
consideration that the preacher and the women of their church had
extended to them in times of illness, and how they loved the doctor
that could come anytime in the night, who gave his whole life, even
away from his own family, and waited to have his bills paid year after
year after year, in drought or insects or too much rain or too little!
And I know that those people over 65 know that this is really heaven
itself that they no longer have to wonder how their son-in-law or their
brother-in-law or their sister-in-law is going to feel, that they have
some little hope that they can get into a nursing home, or if the pain
gets in the right place they can go to a hospital where they can get
some care–not with a tin cup in their hand saying, “Please, ma’am,”
but because their Government has provided for it as it has social
security…
…
…It used to be, in many places in our land, that a sick man whose skin
was dark was not only a second-class citizen, but a second-class
patient. He went to the other door, he went to the other waiting room,
he even went to the other hospital.
But tonight that old blot of racial discrimination in health is being
erased in this land we love. Under this administration’s Medicare
program, the hospital has only one waiting room; it has only one
standard for black and white and brown, for all races, for all religions,
for all faiths, for all regions. And I think that is a victory for all of us;
that is a victory for America.
The day of the second-class treatment, the day of the second-class
patients is gone. And that means that we are reaching a new day of
good health for the people of America.
So I have come here tonight to say that we are ready to practice what
we have preached so long. And that is this: that good medical care,
good medical attention is the right of every American citizen…
…
…I had a friend who came over from a rural section of this area of the
United States, not from this State. He was riding around with me
about sunset a few days ago. He said, “Mr. President, the most
wonderful thing that we have done in this whole country is all my
lifetime is Medicare.
“But,” he said, “I want to beg of you and plead of you, as the leader of
our Nation, please ask all of our people not to let it become a racket,
because it is too good a thing to be abused.” It is too good a thing to
chisel. It is too good a thing to bring in scandal and disgrace. It is too
good a thing to fudge on.”
On Pages 46-47 of the linked summary of Presidential statements. we also find Lyndon Baines Johnsone summarizing Medicare’s accomplishments on its first anniversary:
* In the past, many aged Americans received the medical care they
needed as ward patients or on a charity basis. Today they receive care
on a private patient basis, with the dignity and freedom of choice that
goes with the ability to pay provided by Medicare.
* Millions of aged Americans now have the peace of mind that comes
from the knowledge that health care will not entail deep financial
distress. They know they will not have to ask their children or other
relatives to assume the responsibility of their medical bills. Before
Medicare only a little over half of the aged had any health insurance,
and less than one-half of those had broad protection against hospital
costs.
* As a result of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act as applied to Medicare,
members of minority groups in many communities have access to
quality hospital care previously barred to them. Over 95 percent of the
Nation’s hospitals are now in compliance.
* Medicare has been a powerful force in upgrading the level of health
care available to all Americans. Today, 6,800 hospitals, containing
98.5 percent of the bed capacity of nonfederal, general care hospitals
in the United States; meet the quality standards of Medicare. For
several hundred of these hospitals considerable upgrading was required in order to participate. In addition, the participation of 320
psychiatric institutions, 4,000 extended care facilities, and about 1,800
home health agencies is also conditioned on their ability to provide
quality care.
* Medicare has stimulated the development of alternatives to hospital
care: hospital outpatient services, post hospital extended care, home
health care, as well as physicians’ services in the hospital, office, or
home. This wide range of Medicare alternatives makes it possible for
the doctor, patient, or family to make a realistic choice of the service
which best meets the patient’s needs. In 1963, only about 250 home
health agencies in the country could have met Medicare standards.
Today 1,800 agencies are certified for Medicare participation.
* The comprehensiveness of Medicare coverage sets a standard
against which all age groups measure the scope of their health
insurance coverage. Medicare is stimulating improved health insurance
coverage in the private sector for the entire population.