Can Democracy Withstand the Trump Administration Onslaught?

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Democracy. In the West we take it for granted that once established, the power of its values and laws intrinsically protect society from corrupt governments forming and stripping people of their rights. The Donald Trump administration has proven us wrong.

Value systems have always collided. In the West the ugly stuff was protected by legislation and social mores that gave power and freedom of expression to racists, sexists, bigots, homophobes, xenophobes, cultural persecutors, and deprived the targets of a platform if not the right to express their frustration, anger, hurt and outrage and work towards gaining equality. Gradually, though, the underdog in every sector of society has gained power. Those who were open to enlightenment embraced the concept of human rights, and legislated to protect them.

But you can't legislate what people think, what they want, what they read. Laws can't control the racism and bigotry that lurks under the surface, building momentum, lying in wait for an authority figure to grant permission to come out into the open, be vented and acted upon.

Spiteful, mean-spirited, greedy for power, panting for the right to be cruel without facing punishment and consequence.

You can't openly legislate for how those who need protection choose to vote, but you can introduce laws that make it difficult or impossible for them to even get to the polling stations. You can gerrymander districts so that those who can vote to protect decent human values don't, effectively, have a voice. You can use the written media, TV, radio stations, the church, to manipulate minds that are already leaning that way anyway, distorting truth until it's unrecognizable. Exploiting fear of change, fear of dark skins, fear of the other.

You can target those who don't have resources, who, if they could, would vote for representatives whose aim is to enfranchise everybody, create a fair society where equality and equal opportunity are the main principles of every branch of government.

In a so-called free society, even in the strongest democracies, much of the principle of do unto others has to be left to the conscience of the individual. It's constantly evolving for many, as it should. If that many isn't the majority, or the minority gets the power, society has a problem. In the West we're used to seeing corrupt leaders in  countries with no functioning democracy. We're accustomed to watching them destroy economies, commit genocide, imprison, torture and murder opposition to the government, prohibit freedom of speech.

We've believed that America was above that. It had long been the leader of the free world. Free and fair elections, freedom of speech, protection of the press, the importance of equality at least valued by one major political party which had an equal shot at gaining the power to improve society at all levels.

But now? Freedom of the press is under threat, hate crimes are on the rise alarmingly. Truth, equality and equal opportunity are not valued by the government, nor are a clean environment or international co-operation. Greed and destruction prevail in every sector of the administration, out-picturing the mind of its dysfunctional, mentally unstable leader. As for elections, was 2016 free and fair? How is possible that a man who lost the popular vote by close to 3 million votes—more than any president in history—could become president? The point is made ad nauseam that Russian interference did not affect the actual vote tally. That's not accurate; it affected the minds of far left and far right voters very successfully. It's not hard evidence, but lack of evidence doesn't equate in reality to absence of truth.

Liberals tend to believe that the search for enlightenment in every aspect of life is innate to the human race, or at least to the vast majority, that do unto others makes sense to most of us and dictates how we relate to each other.

   

But in our everyday lives, why then are reality shows that thrive on humiliation,  emotional and physical punishment so popular? What about Mad Men? It depicted the sexism, feminism, homophobia, antisemitism and racism of 1960's America. Yet it was widely acclaimed as being the greatest TV show ever. Did the majority watch to be outraged and celebrate that we've moved on? I doubt it. Was it Roman-type lust for watching Christians being thrown to the lions and torn apart? Possibly. Most likely, in the light of the 2016 election result, it was a hankering after an era where social conscience was a dinosaur.

Now a vulgarian who epitomizes that dinosaur is president of what was once unquestioningly the most powerful democracy on the planet.

The biggest mistake we make in the West is believing that democracy automatically delivers what's best for everybody. It doesn't. It doesn't even deliver what's best for the majority, when the voting system has been so eroded that a racist, bigot, con artist, arch manipulator, sexual abuser, ignoramus and compulsive liar can win an election on a minority vote, with the assistance of a foreign power whose primary objective is to undermine western democracies.

The words the American people are bandied about a lot by the current Administration. Which American people would that be? Those who support the government and the President are in the minority. Donald Trump has exploited the fears and lusts of his base and successfully controlled the narrative for them. There's no doubt in reality that he is an abuser who uses whoever he can, tossing them aside like so much detritus when they no longer serve him. Yet they mindlessly endorse his abusive behaviour, his dysfunction as a president, when the policies he pushes threaten their own lives. They believe anything he says, even when he directly contradicts himself. Blind loyalty to an abuser? It's a kind of variation on Stockholm Syndrome.

The liberal press and Democratic politicians have striven valiantly to keep truth alive and democracy functioning, but in the face of Trump's monumental lies and his determination to thwart democracy, everybody is exhausted. 

For democracy to function as a force for good in society, truth must be valued. When it's under siege and the minority has power, it spells trouble. It always has. It always will. Ultimately it seems to be true, looking at the big picture, that good triumphs over evil. That's not much consolation to the lives that are destroyed in the process. It's no consolation to the Muslim, Jewish, Latino or African American children who are targeted at school, with the upsurge in hate crimes since Donald Trump's campaigning. Whose lives will never be the same again. It's no consolation to the parents who can't protect them.

It'll be no consolation to any of us if the values that keep society intact are eroded beyond recognition and democracy rendered impotent in the country that is supposed to be leading the free world. 

Goodbye to Dignity in the White House

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President Obama & the First Lady at the 2016 CBC Foundation Awards Dinner

President Obama & First Lady Michelle Obama at CBC Foundation Awards Dinner

It's a daunting prospect, four long years without an American president and first lady who have been a joy in every way and a constant reminder of the true nature of integrity, dignity, compassion, understanding, courage, sanity, coherence, brilliance of mind.

First Lady Michelle Obama spoke to OprahWinfrey in June this year about the next generation of women. When Oprah asked what single piece of advice she could give to young women, Michelle Obama's response, and she included young men, was that "We can never be complacent... The work always continues…We have seen in recent times how quickly things get taken away from us if we aren't vigilant."

Indeed. And that was in June. From then on the nightmare has just gotten darker and darker, as every decent human value has been assaulted by Trump and his cohorts.

Do we even know how to be vigilant enough anymore? Did we ever? Conservatives are very good at vigilance because they're often driven by anger and fear, which are the most powerful motivators to action. Liberals aren't so good at the kind of vigilance that's necessary to stop sociopaths from getting into power. Too often they try to see the best in everybody, which is good as an overarching philosophy, but not if it blinds you to the reality of what people's anger and fear will drive them to. And it's not much of a motivator. Let's all try to get along. If somebody is abusing your child, do you try to get along with them?

Don't sweat the small stuff. People say it a lot, but the small stuff is the early warning signal, it's the hairline crack. Small cracks never go away, they always widen, and if you catch them early, not much damage is done. The more you ignore them, the less sensitive you become to them until you only wake up when your house has collapsed.

Throughout the lead-up to the election, every intelligent person and journalist with a conscience and the capacity to separate media-driven hysteria and fake news from reality was shouting warnings about Trump. But it was too little too late.

Where has everybody been during Obama's terms, where the GOP has done everything it could to obstruct him and not do its job? Where was the liberal media outrage at Obama's unpopularity when he was doing a sterling job despite the obstructions? Where was our outrage at the vicious racism that was directed at him and the First Lady and at the up-swelling of racism and white fear of losing status quo that led to a burgeoning of white supremacist groups?

That's not where it all started, but it's where it could have been stopped. The GOP got away with not doing its job. It got away with the gerrymandering, with targeting minority voters, making it harder for them to vote. Those were some pretty sizable cracks.

It was small step from there to a candidate who would campaign on enabling hatred and assault on human decency in every aspect and encourage Russian interference in a presidential election and was too stupid to understand how that would imperil American democracy. A small step to millions believing fake news and to the main social media platform through which it was disseminated not identifying it until it was too late. The mainstream media didn't identify it either. From there it was easy for an FBI director to 'innocently' release a statement that would sway the election and hand it to a sociopath.  

Yesterday, apropos apparently of Putin's speech to his military leadership that Russia needed to upgrade its nuclear capacity allegedly so that it could penetrate sophisticated defense systems, Trump tweeted that the US needs to increase its nuclear capacity until people come to their senses about nukes. When I saw the news last night my blood ran cold. So best buddies Putin and Trump are in stand-off already.

Two out-of-control narcissists, hungry for control and desperate for affirmation, and both with the power to set off another world war. The alarming thing is that Putin is a terrible man but he's intelligent. The same can't be said of Trump, who is frighteningly gullible and manipulable. 

This is what happens when an over-enabled cheat, obsessive liar, a racist, a sexist and a bigot with an over-sized ego is elected with the help of a partisan FBI director and Russian intervention.

From the Obama Administration to this. Pave paradise and put up a parking lot. Vigilance; we need to upgrade our idea of what it entails. I've seen a huge outpouring of frustration on Twitter and Facebook from people who were vigilant, and who did speak their mind, over and over. Who turned out for the vote. But it was too little too late. Even as a non US citizen, I could have done more. A whole lot more.

Because this isn't just America's problem. It affects all of us. The racist bigot who is about to take over the White House has enabled white supremacy in the US, which has a ripple effect around the world. He will happily screw up international trade agreements and relationships and create massive uncertainty in the global economy. It would thrill him to increase nuclear capacity and give the order to bomb the shit out of a country at three in the morning because somebody in that country told the truth about him, or because he read something on a fake news site, or because he realized that the hair he has left is thin and straggly.

Before the election, I went to a lecture given in Cape Town by a visiting US professor, a passionate Democrat, unequivocally damning of the GOP and Trump. He said that up until recently his only involvement in politics has been to vote, but it's not enough anymore. It's not enough for any of us.

How did America go from the best to the worst? While we were sleeping. We thought we were awake but we were dreaming. Now we've woken up to a nightmare. What's left to do?

#goodtrouble

— John Lewis (@repjohnlewis) November 11, 2016

A Warning From Time Magazine 2016 Person of the Year

Scrolling through Hillary Clinton's Twitter feed, looking for respite from the relentlessly depressing news, I found the above.

Pretty appropriate, given Trump's latest ranting and raving about China. I don't know what's more irritating; the stupidity of the man or how many people endlessly debate what he's done or said as if he were a sentient being when in fact most of the time there's nobody home. Evidenced by his tweet that he won by a landslide because the elections were rigged and millions voted illegally but he tried to stop the recount instigated by Jill Stein.

Time Magazine named him 2016 Person of the Year, opting for a portrait of Trump in a remarkably similar pose to that of Hitler when he won the dubious honor. The magazine had this to say about their choice: 

"It’s hard to measure the scale of his disruption. This real estate baron and casino owner turned reality-TV star and provocateur—never a day spent in public office, never a debt owed to any interest besides his own—now surveys the smoking ruin of a vast political edifice that once housed parties, pundits, donors, pollsters, all those who did not see him coming or take him seriously. Out of this reckoning, Trump is poised to preside, for better or worse."

William Saletan, writing for Slate, said of Donald Trump that he's "virtually lobotomized".

I agree. I believe that Trump is literally too stupid to understand what an average toddler can. It could explain his avoidance of intelligence briefings.

Trump ran his campaign on emotive issues which needed the intelligence of a pea-brain to see through. He's massively entitled, has a kind of lizard-brain ability to con people, and doesn't care about consequences because he's always been able to slither away from them himself and make other people pay.

Astonishingly, TV anchors, panels, some journalists, are still talking about him as if he's a normal human being, 'giving him a chance'.

You give peace a chance. You don't give a serial predator one. And it's dangerous to interpret Trump's stupidity as meaning he's ultimately harmless. He's not. His need for wealth, power and attention is the craving of an addict. He'll sacrifice the country and feed his supporters what they want to hear so they take the poison he's feeding them. He and his lovely family of mindless, soul-less daddy-clones will make a killing and when the economy tanks and the middle class disappears they'll blame Obama or Hillary Clinton.

Trump won't care. He has already broken all his campaign promises and his fans don't seem to realize it, perhaps because the reporting of it comes from the snobby elitist liberal media.

For the next four years Trump will play Republican politicians off against each other, and capitalize on their desire to have positions of power. He's already doing that. Look how he yanked Mitt Romney's chain, meeting him for dinner and getting together for talks then adding to his list of potentials for the position. As if he understood the first thing about what's needed in a Secretary of State.

Or how to govern, come to think of it. Or how to finish a sentence articulately. How to start it. How to hold a decent conversation. Or how to run a business without breaking laws, screwing decent people's lives up and going spectacularly bankrupt, there's that.

His whole life this nasty piece of work has abused people and manipulated their greed. He's also created chaos around himself so nobody gets power over him. He mindlessly hurls accusations at whomever he feels like whenever he feels like it. He'll try to do the latter with foreign leaders, as he has with China, his latest stunt, of which there are so many it's hard to keep up. He'll destroy international trade agreements that benefit everybody, put his weight behind leaders guilty of horrendous crimes against humanity, incentivize and legitimize white supremacy, sexism, inequality, injustice, bigotry and lies.

America's governing business will be conducted by denizens of the swamp. 2017 will march in a new pre-Civil Rights era. The Administration and the way that the president operates will promote stupidity as an admirable trait and fake news as a mainstream source of information. Progress on climate change will be incinerated. Scorched earth policy will come to have new meaning. 

And truth? The real meaning of it and its importance to how we live our lives is already so frayed at the edges that it wouldn't be a surprise to find in four years time that it's a forgotten concept. In conclusion to their piece about the 2016 person of the year choice, Time had this to say:

"For reminding America that demagoguery feeds on despair and that truth is only as powerful as the trust in those who speak it, for empowering a hidden electorate by mainstreaming its furies and live-streaming its fears, and for framing tomorrow’s political culture by demolishing yesterday’s, Donald Trump is TIME’s 2016 Person of the Year."  

Hardly an accolade. A warning, more like. But we're not so good, as a race, at heeding warnings are we?

I’ve marched, protested, been beaten and arrested--all for the right to vote. Friends of mine gave their lives. Honor their sacrifice. Vote. pic.twitter.com/1lYp99RaOe

— John Lewis (@repjohnlewis) November 3, 2016

Missing Hillary Clinton and Mourning the Lost Opportunity

I think I'm never going to get over it, that Hillary Clinton lost to a bigot, a fraud, a man of whom the worst description you can think of wouldn't be strong or comprehensive enough. I miss everything about her and her campaign with Tim Kaine. I miss how I felt, believing that my values would be protected, that the world would be moving forward, with the US taking a stand against bigotry, racism, injustice, inequality and sexism at a time when the far right is gaining momentum everywhere.

Taking a stand for coherence, the importance of truth and unity. I saw #StrongerTogether in continual action through a wide spectrum of communities, across race, gender and economic status. I saw people caring, outraged at the same things that assault me.

I saw tremendous triumph through adversity in Hillary Clinton herself, and I saw how many people liked, admired, and loved her. And I had faith that Barack Obama's incredible legacy would live on, that he and Michelle Obama would be honored for the dignity, grace, wisdom and sheer exuberance they've brought to the White House. 

There was everything to look forward to. The US going from strength to strength, a bastion against the far-right that's gaining ground everywhere.

I looked forward to opening up the New York Times every day for breakfast, and also reading the New Yorker, Politico, Mother Jones, Salon, Vanity Fair, Washington Post, Huffpost as the transition took place, and then as the next four years unfolded. I even hoped that inroads would be made into GOP power in Congress and that Obama's pick for the Supreme Court would go through. I knew Hillary Clinton would be in for a tough fight against Republicans but I had faith that she'd prevail, as Obama has.

I craved an end to the mindless, relentless exposure of a stupid man. I never found him entertaining, I couldn't stand him from the minute I first saw him years ago on his horrible reality show. He's a nasty piece of work through and through. Revolting to look at, revolting inside and out. How I looked forward to the day he was out of the limelight. Gone!

I saw Oprah interview Maya Angelou once, and ask if the pain of her child's death had gotten any easier with time. Maya said why would I want it to? I could relate to that. I gave my beautiful son up for adoption when I was in my twenties and it was the hardest and most awful thing I've ever done. The most painful, definitely. I don't want to let go of the pain. Why would I? So I can feel better? I wouldn't be feeling better, I'd be numb.

This isn't like that, of course. Nothing will ever be like that. But there are some things that are similar. I don't want to move on. I don't want to try and find some good in what's happened. Because there is nothing good. I revile the man who won, and the means by which he did. My intelligence and my soul are assaulted every day by him, as he turns America into a banana republic.

I mourn Hillary Clinton's loss and what it means for the Obamas, for the President's legacy. For the world, for my world. As I said, I don't see myself feeling any better any time soon.

The Obamas Fought White Identity Crisis. Now It's Hillary Clinton's Turn To Do It.

Everything awful that can possibly have been said about Hillary Clinton has been said. Every sinister interpretation about her actions has been made. Every conspiracy theory has been elaborated on and substantiated by exactly nothing factual. Millions of dollars from tax-payers and wealthy Republicans have been spent trying to dig up facts that don't exist, trying to turn lies into truth. Her whole life in public office has been characterized by this battle. Notably absent has been a public willingness to penetrate the myths and their origins. Hillary met with conservative resistance in 1979, when Bill Clinton was elected Governor of Arkansas. She was interviewed on In Focus and asked if she felt comfortable in her new position, if it could be called a position, to which her response was,

"Well I do think it's a position and I do feel comfortable, but there's still a lot to learn and a lot to be done that we're just becoming acquainted with" so she couldn't really comment too much yet. When the host asked if it worried her that she didn't exactly fit the profile expected of First Ladies, she said, "No. I assess everybody by who they are, not by how they look." She might as well have added "And not by the things that are said of them," but she had no way of knowing what was in store for her.

No way of knowing that a huge sector of America was still unprepared for a woman who had the audacity to be intelligent, courageous, and outspoken.

It's been a long journey for Hillary Clinton from then to now. She was very openhearted in those days, not afraid to speak her mind. She didn't change because she became somehow untrustworthy and corrupt, or gain a reputation for being unlikeable because it was the truth about her, but because she encountered a savagery she hadn't known existed. Because it didn't exist in her family or in her. She did change her appearance, she did give people what they wanted as far as that went. But she stood her ground on her principles, and a certain misogynist element of America has never been able to forgive her. Women are not supposed to be powerful.

Or likeable. Everybody who knows Hillary Clinton likes her and not in a milk-toast way. They're enthusiastic about her. She's warm, she's funny, she has a great laugh, her smile lights up the room, she's a brilliant listener, she cares. Her 'unlikeability' has nothing to do with who she is.

It's not just an American thing. Julia Gillard, Australia's first female prime minister, learned it the hard way too. When she was first elected, she said she expected the supportive and the negative rhetoric but believed it would dissipate after a while and that she would be treated as any normal prime minister. It didn't happen. The misogyny she encountered, such as the Leader of the Opposition's comment "If it's true that men have more power generally speaking than women, is that a bad thing?" and "what if men are by physiology or temperament, more adapted to exercise authority or to issue command?" The misogyny ramped up over time until Julia Gillard had had enough and said so.

Her 'misogyny speech' went viral. Recently on GPS she said it probably resonated with every woman who has ever met with misogyny and longed to speak out but missed the opportunity as it arose. Fareed Zakaria also asked her if she thought Hillary Clinton was being held to a different standard. Her answer was a categorical yes.

President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama have been exposed to the same bullying, spite, murderous persecution driven by white male identity crisis—although the role played by conservative women in supporting it shouldn't be underestimated. For the last eight years it's been like the Civil War take 2, except that the first was never really won. The Obamas have triumphed with tremendous dignity and in doing so have renewed, strengthened and invigorated all that's good about America.

Now it's Hillary Clinton's turn. She too has survived everything that's come at her and never let it thwart her and now that she's running for president she's looking the monster right in the eye. By standing her ground against the worst she's exposing it in all its glory for sane Americans and the world to revile.

The first presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and the GOP candidate had the most viewers in US history. More than 80 million watched Clinton behave like an outstanding president. Close to 70% saw her as a winner.

They saw that she was ultra-prepared, which telegraphed that she respected them enough to do her homework well. They saw her confronted with bluster, lies, misogyny, rank stupidity, horrific racism, disrespect—bullying of every kind. She didn't once lose her composure but more than that, she knew how to deal very effectively with it without returning kind for kind. Hillary Clinton conducted herself with humor at times but never stooped to being snide. She was graceful throughout but there was never any doubting her steel, which Trump, for all his puerile and disgusting but considerable arsenal, couldn't get past. It showed what she'll do when she encounters that same behavior as president, which she will, in Congress and internationally. It also showed that she learns through challenges—referring to decades of facing the same kind of obstacles—without a hint of bitterness.

About 66 million watched the second debate and saw the same woman. When asked questions her answers were, as always deeply thoughtful and insightful. Her opponent's were incoherent, as always. 57% saw Hillary Clinton as the winner.

At least 50 million people for the 1st debate and 37 million for the 2nd got and believed the message that Hillary Clinton respects them, takes her task seriously, has the capacity to overcome barriers, and can be trusted with the job as president. I think the tide finally turned with this debate, not because her opponent had a meltdown—which he did—but because she rose to a very challenging occasion in a big way, which she has done her whole life.

It's no surprise that the NYT puts Hillary Clinton's chances of winning at 90%. Talk about triumph through adversity. Which is what America is really about.

The photo is from the video of Hillary Clinton's interview on In Focus in 1979.
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Is Bernie Sanders Attracting Racists? Is Hillary Clinton Evil?

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The primaries have been a steep learning curve, especially around expectations. It's common news that Trump and his supporters thrive off racism, which is loathsome and worrying, but predictable. What hasn't been predictable is the way Bernie Sanders' campaign has developed.

From early interactions between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, it doesn't appear as if he believes she is evil. It looks as if he likes her. And yet his campaign is painting a very black picture of her these days. That was unexpected, but then I once didn't expect Bernie's supporters to engage in hate and vitriol and climb on the back of the years-long GOP attacks on Hillary that weren't fact-based. Then when they did I was sure it wasn't behavior that Bernie would endorse.

Mind you, who ever expected him to attack the Democratic Party? Or to be disingenuous in saying that he and his campaign have nothing to do with Hillary's increasing unpopularity.

It brings to mind a SkyNews anchor drily commenting on how, when the Panama Papers scandal broke, public opinion about whether David Cameron was corrupt or not swung heavily into "Yes he is!" after a week of screaming tabloid headlines promoting the idea.

Hillary Clinton isn't evil, and for all the accusations, there's never been a shred of evidence to prove that she is. Talking about dates, people, events, those pesky, inconvenient details without which a crime can't be solved and a person can't legitimately be pronounced guilty. Ironically, I kind of expected to learn that I was wrong about her. It hasn't happened. 

We've probably all had to constantly adjust expectations. Hillary Clinton supporters didn't expect to be called Clintonistas, or attacked and abused online for supporting a woman who they truly believe is the better candidate and who I certainly don't believe has been bought by anybody. They didn't expect for her to be compared to Hitler and for all the suffering and lives lost at his hands to be used in a cheap joke to promote an untruth and elevate Bernie Sanders by comparison. 

They couldn't predict that the "Corrupt Hillary" campaign would morph into "Corrupt Democratic Party", or that so many conspiracy theories and unsubstantiated accusations would flood the internet.

But, speaking for myself, no matter how frustrating the misinformation about Hillary has been, I've never for a minute entertained the idea that Bernie would attract racists. Never! Today a comment on NYMag was shocking and troubling. Somebody calling themselves weekhauken360 said this:

"Bernie plus Trump is a super super majority of the white eligible voters in the USA which represents 77% of the electoral college. The largest turnout of white voters in USA history is in motion. Read it and weep! Hillary represents the majority of the black and brown vote - her core - that's it - no more no less."

It's not true that Hillary only has the "black and brown vote" but the first two sentences really hit home. I thought weekhausen360 meant weep for the tragedy of it. But then I read an earlier comment and realized that he/she said it in triumph.

Shock and disgust, fear and trembling. However, one swallow doesn't make a flock or something. I went to Google and found a Daily Kos article stating that Bernie Sanders attracts racist voters, and quoting Patrick J. Egan, an Assistant Professor of Politics and Public Policy at NYU, as tweeting the following graph:

But then I saw that at the top of the page was a notice from the Daily Kos referring to the writer of the article:

Kudos to the Daily Kos team. That was enough evidence for me. I don't need or want to amass "evidence" against Bernie Sanders or do to him what people are doing to Hillary Clinton. It's ugly and promotes the worst part of life, where there's no love, no light, no truth, no joy. No peace. No real social progress.

I prefer Hillary in most ways and I feel safer around a person who doesn't portray themselves as a saint. I respected her but didn't much like her before, but I do now and my respect has grown. 

On the other hand, I don't much like the person Bernie seems to have become. But no matter how much I've had to adjust my expectations around him and his campaign, I don't believe I'll ever have to adjust this one: that he would be absolutely distraught at the idea that racists are celebrating white supremacy and supporting him because they believe he is the ticket to the realization of that terrible ideal. 

Bernie Sanders is not that man. And he never will be.  

Why Is Hillary Clinton So Unpopular With #FeeltheBern Supporters?

Election campaigns. They can get so ugly. They stir passions, unleash old frustrations. Test your commitment to seeking truth. Illustrate how out of control your need to vent can get. They're a breeding ground for conclusions based on the unsubstantiated. A case in point is the Bernie Sanders supporters' demonizing of Hillary Clinton. The internet is inundated with memes carrying derogatory statements about her. 

The wonderful thing about memes is that you can take something from a person’s history that looks terrible on its own and leave out the broader context or even the truthful elements that will exonerate the alleged criminal. 

Hillary Clinton was on the board of Wal-Mart! Bad, bad, bad! She’s taken money for speaking to big banks, which categorically and indisputably means they own her! Evil, evil, evil!

She’s accumulated a lot of money: Corrupt capitalist! She’s changed her mind and become more left-leaning: she’s just manipulating people, she’s a terrible human being! She’s made mistakes! There is nothing good about her. She’s unpopular, unelectable, untrustworthy, a corrupt soul through and through.

Yet, to quote Frank Newport writing for Gallup in 2012, “Clinton's favorable ratings have been above 60% in all five Gallup readings since January 2009, including the two 66% readings over the last two years—thus representing the longest period of high ratings she has received since entering the national spotlight.” It is true that her ratings went up and down but it’s also true that in 2012 “Clinton received a 91% favorable rating among Democrats, 65% among independents, and 41% among Republicans.” 

At that point she was well known. People knew about her and they liked her. 91% favorable rating among Democrats. I wonder how many Democrats who decry Clinton today as the worst of the worst kind of human being were part of that 91%? And how many Independents were part of that 65%?

Statistically… 

I know, you get it. In 2013 her ratings were plummeting. What happened then? Did she suddenly change into the monster that she allegedly is today?

Well, not quite. What happened was the GOP campaign against her which was part of the broader campaign against President Barack Obama. Because of Clinton’s high profile the campaign against her got a lot of media attention.

  

Some Democrats are fond of saying that Republicans are brainwashed by Fox News and some Republicans swear that Democrats are brainwashed by the liberal media. I think we’re all brainwashed to some extent and our shorter concentration span, together with social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, has created a culture of sharing bits of information taken out of context. They spread like wildfire and before you know it they have become accepted truth.

Take the Wal-Mart story. Yes, it’s a hideous company that has traditionally discriminated against women and paid terrible wages. Yes, Hillary Clinton did agree to be the first and only woman on the Board. And yes, she got paid for it. I went to Google for more information. It was in 1984. Thirty-one years ago. Show me the wise man or woman who has not made mistakes.

But was she so bad that her mistakes are unforgivable? I found a Huffpost article with a short bit about her time on the Board saying simply that she stayed silent re the unions. It was written in 2008. There's nothing about what she did achieve. I recognized a whole slew of blogs post as originating from that Huffpost article. That’s how it works. An ill-researched article masquerading as truth is nothing more than an ill-researched opinion piece, no matter where it’s placed. But it’s repeated as truth if printed in a respected news outlet.

I found a 2007 New York Times piece that told a wider story. Hillary Clinton wasn’t totally silent about Wal-Mart’s anti-Union stance. She didn’t avidly fight for them but she wasn’t silent. And by 2007 she had recently brokered a meeting between a Wal-Mart exec and a union. Why didn’t the later Huffpost article state that?

In her time on the Board Clinton did fight for women—and was overridden. She pushed Wal-Mart to be more environmentally conscious, introducing recycling for consumers, reduction in suppliers’ packaging, and stores with skylights to reduce the need for artificial lighting.

That was in the 1990’s, an era singled out by history so far for corporate consciousness of the environment. Or not.

Why didn’t Clinton fight for the unions? I don’t know, I haven’t had the opportunity to talk to her. The NYT contributor surmised that it was because even back then she was the kind of person who preferred to participate in a contentious environment and do some good. If she had defended the unions she might have weakened her standing on the Board so she couldn’t be effective at all. Or she might have tried and been shut down.

So the ‘fact’ that she just took money to be on Wal-Mart’s Board but did nothing is an outright lie. But the Facebook memes keep coming and not from Republicans. From Bernie Sanders supporters.

Who also accuse her of not writing about this Wal-Mart episode in her autobiography and deducing it’s because she’s guilty. Except that she isn’t. In any case people often don’t write about everything in the account of their life. It wasn’t a history book; she was allowed to write whatever she wanted. And let’s face it, Bernie Sanders didn’t broadcast certain things in his life that would make people think less of him.

Of course it would be nicer and cleaner if Clinton had fought Wal-Mart tooth and nail. But it was 34 years ago! She was a young woman amongst a bunch of powerful, chauvinist, conservative men. That she did anything in that time and that environment is remarkable.

That she is not being remembered and respected for what she did achieve doesn’t say anything about her then or now. It says a lot about those who uncategorically slam her. 

Frank Newport ended his article in 2012 with “The fact that Clinton is almost universally known and at this point well-liked by Americans suggests that she would be a formidable contender were she to decide to run. At the same time, the history of Americans' ups and downs in their ratings of her raises the possibility that if she were to jump back into the political fray, her image would have a significant probability of becoming more polarized and more negative once again.”

No kidding. Hillary Clinton is flawed. Of course she is. She’s a human being. Bernie Sanders, for all his saintly status, is also flawed and for the same reason, oddly. For what it’s worth, I suspect that he wouldn’t be looking so cool and saintly right now if he had had her exposure and if he had been targeted the way she was and still is by Conservatives.

Here's a novel idea. Wouldn’t America be best off if Democrats all worked together towards unity and Clinton and Sanders worked together in the election? I reckon if they did they would get the outcome of Bernie Sanders' revolution if it was really cooking—which it isn’t.

There's irony for you.

Could Trump Really Ever Be President?

Click here to buy "Trump: An American Presidency"

Democrats keep saying that Trump can't win the general election. I hope he won’t but I don’t think it’s a slam dunk.

In fact I think I think that this terrible man with zero self control who despises the poor, tramples over anybody in his path, misrepresents his wealth, trashes women, quotes Mussolini, does not denounce the KKK, stirs paranoia, racism and hatred, embraces conspiracy theories, lies pathologically and has positive support from one foreign leader—Vladimir Putin—actually has quite a good chance of being America’s Next President.

I wonder what Hitler looked like to the masses when he was on the rise and before he gained absolute power. Possibly not that dissimilar to Trump at the moment.

Apart from giving racists and bigots permission to voice their hatred he gave ordinary people permission to voice their frustration and they’re the ones he cleverly manipulated and who ended up handing him his power on a plate. But how many of them would have supported him if they had known the trajectory he was on? Probably not so many. The signs were there but they didn’t want to look. And they were carried on the wave of his peculiar kind of personal power. Look how that ended, for Jews, for the world. And, let's not forget, for Germany.

Trump is telling his supporters to raise their right hand in salute to him. He has a vitriolic hatred for poor people, is a pathological liar and a misogynist, encourages racism and bigotry, whips up anger, promotes violence, calls for curtailing freedom of the press, permits and even encourages the beating up of protesters, is running on an anti-Muslim platform if you can call what he's doing a platform. Now he's anti-Islam. It’s beyond believable.

No, beyond believable is that he had brought a bunch of his Trump Wine and Trump Water and Trump Steaks to one of his rallies. He made a big deal about the steaks. But Trump Steaks doesn’t exist as a business anymore and those steaks were from Bush Brothers’ Provision Company. Oh the irony.

How can a single thinking adult in the world support him? I decided to write to all the delegates who have endorsed him so far and beg them to see the reality and think long and hard about what they’re doing. Wiki has a page on Trump's delegates.

I started with Jeff Sessions, US Senator from Alabama. From his photo on Wiki he looks like a sensible guy. Then I read a little.

Ah. On February 28 this year he endorsed Trump. On March 3 Trump picked him as chairman of his National Security Advisory Committee.

And not such a sensible guy after all. Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III was born in Selma in 1946. He doesn’t appear to have been much moved by Civil Rights activities. He referred to the NAACP and the ACLU as communist-inspired and un-American because “they forced civil rights down the throats of people”. He also called African-American Assistant US Attorney Thomas Figures “boy” and said “be careful what you say to white folks.”

He said once that he thought the Klan was okay until he found out they smoked pot. He was joking of course. The Klan is something to joke about?

He was a big Bush legislation supporter, including for the 2001 and 2003 tax cut packages. He’s against same-sex marriage and opposed the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Repeal Act. He also voted against adding violent acts based on sexual orientation and gender identity to federal hate-crimes law. 

He’s anti-immigration reform. And he voted for expanded construction of a Southern border fence. Of course he did.  

I guess I won’t be writing to Jeff Sessions. Not much point. Moving along, the next guy on Wiki’s alphabetical list was former US Senator Scott Brown. 

He looks like a nice guy too. I looked him up on Google images. Oh. Very nice guy. Once a model, he posed nude for a centerfold. Not surprising, given that body. His story is pretty moving, though. He had a difficult childhood. His parents divorced when he was a year old and his mother lived on welfare, then he was abused by his stepfathers and a camp counselor who threatened to kill him if he told anybody. He got into politics and not everything he did was bad. A moderate Republican, he was the first GOP Senator to support a federal ban on assault weapons after Sandy Hook..

I could write to him, I thought. I looked for more about him and found an article on abcnews.go.com.

He said “I know all of the candidates and I respect the hell out of each and every one of them” and that he endorses Trump because “I know he’ll surround himself with people who want to do it for the flag. But, no disrespect to any of the other candidates because I truly love them. Chris and Marco? I love them like brothers from another mother.”

Cross Scott Brown off the list. Two down and four hundred odd to go… Maybe it was a bad idea. But I tell you what’s a good idea, and that is to read Trump: An American Presidency by seasoned journalist Steve Majerus-Collins.

“A fictional oral history of the administration of President Donald Trump. The book examines what might really happen if Trump were to come out on top in November. Would he build his wall? Defeat ISIS? Make America great again or destroy it? It's a quick read but one that offers some perspective on a candidate like none before.”

The introduction is amusing and I thought great, I’m in for a riotous read. I was. But it was one of those books where your blood runs cold while you’re laughing because the picture the author paints should just be absolutely fantastical but it isn’t; it’s absolutely and horribly possible.

This gem of a book is only 99c. Buy it because you're worth it! Trump: An American Presidency. I hope not. For the sake of America. For the sake of the world.

Wisdom from Civilized Men for an Era of Growing Intolerance

In 2008 I was enthralled, dazzled and inspired beyond words at the tectonic shift when Barack Obama was elected President. What a tremendous achievement for a society, for African Americans, for people of all races, what an example for the whole world! From slavery to this! From a silly-minded President beholden to the military industrial complex who let the country slide into the toilet to a man of depth, hope, faith and vision and the knowledge of how to stop the hemorrhaging and repair the damage. 

I felt certain that those who voted for Obama would stand by him through the harshest of obstacles, would take arms against a war of misinformation if it was leveled at him. Defend him to the death.

They had every reason to. And in the post election euphoria it was easy to believe that everybody heard him when he said he couldn’t rescue America on his own. Everywhere I went I saw and heard “Yes we can!” We, not I. It was a magnificent time in history and to be part of it in any way was thrilling, an honor.

What happened? Did Obama turn out to be less of a man than everybody thought? Was he less intelligent, less committed, less courageous, less capable of making rational decisions? Less able to understand the complexities of how to recover from economic melt-down? Did he, with his thoughtlessness and spinelessness, throw away this precious opportunity? Did he abandon the people who had trusted him enough to vote for him?  

No he didn’t. Too many of them didn't have his strength of mind, his vision. They abandoned him, even turned on him. And opened the doors and windows to the ill-wind that has always hung in the air, occasionally blowing at gale force but more often dropping to a noxious evil whisper. Now it blew across the country right out in the open and with a vengeance.

Aah. It’s painful to think about. Obama did and does his job anyway, and superlatively. He is appreciated by many but not as many as he deserves considering what he's given and accomplished. America is better off for his policy direction and so is the world. He was and is an honest man doing an honest job particularly well. And despite the obstacles thrust in his path, the hatred and the vitriol and the sheer, mindless racism sometimes overt often covert but just as recognizable, he maintained his commitment and his dignity and even his sense of humor. And grew in stature. Most of all his respect for Americans, regardless of their political affiliations and beliefs, remained the same.

Imagine being strong enough to rise above all of that. I think about how hard it is for me when spite is directed at me or I’m judged; how deeply frustrated I get when a person who condemns me doesn’t know the truth and doesn’t want to know, even though it’s not that complicated. The pain of it defies description and it rocks my foundations.

Obama has had millions of people doing that to him for over seven years. Even though he’s a really great President. I stop and think about that for a minute. The quintessential civilized man, the modern day hero. 

Six months ago I was sure that the next President would be a Democrat who would build on all the great things that Barack Obama has initiated. There’s plenty to still build, which he has always acknowledged, but he’s left a legacy, laid down a path into a good future. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders would do the Presidency very differently but neither would tear up that path and build one in a completely different direction. Definitely, I thought, Americans will vote for another Democrat. So even if Barack Obama didn’t get the kudos he deserved, at the least the good that he achieved would be honored and sustained.

Now I’m not so confident. This era is fast turning into one where intolerance is burgeoning like a grotesque, rotting, foul smelling fruit on a deadly poisonous weed that’s reproducing as weeds do—in a manner that’s getting out of control.

Presidential candidates are growing in popularity the more foul-mouthed, intolerant, pro-violence and fascist they are. What has happened to America, the land of the free, home of the brave? Well it always was the home of many brave people and it still is, but it was never the land of the free for everybody. Maybe it’s really time to face that and say out loud that it’s also the land of the intolerant, the coward, the bully, the land of the still terribly disenfranchised…  

On December 10 2013 Barack Obama spoke eloquently at Nelson Mandela’s memorial service. You can see his whole speech in text here. Or watch it on YouTube here. I recommend it.

One of the things he said that stayed with me was, “The struggles that follow the victory of formal equality and universal franchise may not be as filled with drama and moral clarity as those that came before, but they are no less important.”

He wasn’t just referring to South Africa, but to corrupt leaders throughout the world. On the books America has [kind of] achieved equality but the moral clarity has been/is being smothered. We can point fingers at the Republican candidates and the right wing media that promotes them and we’ll be justified. Their ideas and beliefs are unconscionable. But the biggest danger lies with the conservative voters who will work hard to elect one of them—because they're driven by anger, hatred, fear and paranoia which are all very powerful energizers—and with Democrat voters who might not bother to vote at all.

Embed from Getty Images

On April 16 1963 Martin Luther King Jr. wrote from the Birmingham jail, “More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of good people.” You can download the full letter or listen to the audio here.

What he predicted has come to pass. His words apply to fighting intolerance of every kind, to the 
nurturing and then preserving all that is good. And to ensuring that democracy creates a world where everybody's rights are respected. 

Ban Donald Trump from the UK and St. Petersburg Florida

Like many around the world, I’m stirred by people fighting for what’s meaningful for them. When a country is engaged in a battle to preserve all that is good, as America is now, it’s usually pretty moving. But when that battle is against transparent inanity it’s more depressing than anything else.

The subject for the day is Donald Trump, aka DT, which I think is by far the best name for him. Punch drunk on his own bloated ego. All the media coverage of him has been enough to drive anybody nuts.

But look at it this way; his popularity soared but so did the revulsion. I have to remind myself that not getting exposed to the revulsion as frequently as the popularity skews your perception of what’s actually happening overall. So this NYT article was a relief to read, with its comments from sane Americans and foreigners. I’m glad the latter don’t see Trump as representative of America. He's everything that the world loathed about the US before President Obama, thanks to whom foreigners see America in a different light now. Well, some do. It's a start.

Any of the Republican candidates will destroy that fragile momentum but Trump would do it the most effectively, as he would the economic and social momentum that are the result of Obama’s leadership.

He would destroy America in every conceivable way and contribute substantially to decimating the whole world. ‘World peace’ would be a phrase devoid of meaning. Fortunately Trump is already losing ground. And he’s made sure that the beady eye of the world’s media will be on him as it happens! There will be rejoicing in my house when he goes down, that’s for sure.

People are definitely becoming more vocal in their disgust. Rick Kriseman, Democrat Mayor of St. Petersburg in Florida, has this pinned to his Twitter page. 

On a more serious and potentially impactful note, a petition has been started in England to ban Trump from entering the UK because of his hate speech. 10,000 signatures are needed for the government to consider the petition and 100,000 for it to get Parliament’s attention. At 08:30 GMT today about 42,252 had added their names. In three and a half hours In two hours that figure was over 100,000 and increasing at a rate of about 280 per minute. By the end of the day the rate was 400 a minute and total number of signatures was over 370,000. That's a lot of revulsion and a lot of people willing to do something about it.  

The petition, started by Suzanne Kelly from Scotland who is very vocal in her condemnation of this American bigot, states:

The UK has banned entry to many individuals for hate speech. The same principles should apply to everyone who wishes to enter the UK. 

If the United Kingdom is to continue applying the 'unacceptable behaviour' criteria to those who wish to enter its borders, it must be fairly applied to the rich as well as poor, and the weak as well as powerful.

Click here to sign the petition if you're a UK citizen or resident, and/or to share.

In 2013 Pamela Geller was barred from entering the UK because of her anti-Islam activism and this year the rapper Tyler the Creator was banned for his violent lyrics and had to cancel four concerts. So the petition to block Trump could succeed. With the UK being such a big US ally it would put the Republican Party in an embarrassing spot. And what would Trump do? Behave like Robert Mugabe and rail against colonial powers, perhaps.

Or he could buy an island somewhere and offer all his bigoted adulants a free ticket and a job—building a wall to keep out Mexicans and Muslims. He could take Fox News with him. America would be so much better without them all.

Seriously, my bet is that DT will find a [transparently dumb] justification for giving up his candidacy. Then TC, BC, J!B et al can have their moment in the sun. Great Gods. 

Update: The UK petition has 376,076 signatures, with people still adding theirs. SkyNews, BBC World News and CNN are all giving coverage. Robert Gordon  University in Scotland, which gave Trump an honorary degree, has stripped him of it. Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has withdrawn Trumps's status as Business Ambassador to Scotland.

GOP Debate, Bernie Sanders, Barack Obama & the Power of Integrity

Last night I switched on CNN before the Republican ‘debate’ and listened to Anderson Cooper and a couple of other CNN bods discussing the GOP candidates as if they were expecting a real, live, politically authentic debate to happen. I felt a sense of unreality cloud my vision and my mental processes. Lethargy enveloped my body.

After a couple of minutes I switched channels. I had intended to watch the debate but I couldn’t stomach it. This morning, reading the NYT account of it, I’m glad I didn’t. As it happens, The Good Wife had more political heft to it than the GOP reality show.

A good antidote to the circus that would be entertaining if it wasn’t so scary is to read or listen to somebody who actually is engaged intelligently in the political process. Like Bernie Sanders. I still don’t like that he teamed up with Cornell West, or that he said he wouldn’t make the big mistake Obama made, but he’s a good courageous man and his words are such a relief in a world where so many manipulate to get an angle, to grab a bit—or a lot—of power.

I think he’ll win the Presidency, because he’s galvanizing the middle class, just as Barack Obama did. But whether he can continue to galvanize them once he’s in, and especially when everybody realizes that they need to be consistently galvanized, especially for the mid-terms, is anybody’s guess.

I hope he can. But that’s a long way ahead. For now what’s true and clear about him is that at age 74 he’s found his voice; he’s got a lot to say and all of it relevant and that’s the only reason he’s doing so well. Nothing got handed to him on a silver platter. He’s not a billionaire, he doesn’t lust after money. He hasn’t been elevated by anything that’s plastic in this world. He hasn’t pushed other people out the way to get ahead, hasn’t been a bully, has refused to insult other candidates. Hasn’t had clever PR agents with degrees in psychology and mass manipulation paving the way for him.

It’s funny, how easily we fall for the plastic stuff and for what glitters but isn’t gold. But when the real thing comes along we can still recognize it. It makes me think of when I worked for the city orchestra. I used to go to all the concerts, and they always brought in international soloists and conductors whose standard was always brilliant. Sometimes the soloists played note perfect; made no mistakes at all. That in itself was mind boggling and delicious to hear and watch. They’d always get standing ovations.

But one night the soloist was a violinist. I don’t remember his name but the conductor was Victor Yampolsky. Russian, I believe. I also don’t remember what concerto they played but I still remember my heart catching fire.

The music wasn’t note perfect. But it was enthralling, heart-stopping. And the audience leaped to their feet, exploding in applause. I realized kind of viscerally that people can recognize technical brilliance when they see it but aren’t always conscious of how much they crave the pure heart stuff.  But when they get it they respond to it, without everybody necessarily even understanding what has moved them.

It feels like that’s how it is with Bernie Sanders. As a soloist he’s not note-perfect. His appearance isn’t plasticized, he’s not rehearsed or polished in the way he speaks. But he’s getting a standing ovation that is straight from the heart. And people are definitely very consciously responding to the content of his message so I’m not saying there’s no conscious appreciation of that.

But I think there’s something more, something less easily definable. He defies the terrifying culture that is driven by the idea that the better you can con people the more likely you are to be successful. Not to mention the idea that by the time you’re 74 your life is over, Jack, and you’ll have to just roll on down the hill towards a quality of life that’s less and less rewarding, becoming more disempowered and increasingly inarticulate until you fade into sad oblivion.

Bernie Sanders has gained a lot of wisdom in his life and now is exactly the right time and the right age for him to be sharing it. Mazel tov to you Mr. Sanders.

I still feel sad that right in our midst is another man of the same kind of towering integrity, who has laid the foundation for much of what Sanders might be able to achieve as President, whose message is and always has been the same, and who has achieved a huge amount for Americans but who isn’t getting the recognition I think he deserves. 

He's also up against something more sinister than Bernie Sanders will ever have to deal with. 

The overt racism is awful enough but the stuff that flows under the surface is still a very powerful river. It's sinister, it's ugly, it's soul destroying. Yet Obama, and Michelle, have not just remained intact but they've grown in every way despite it. Or because of it. They've remained committed and clear in their hearts, minds and souls. Obama has achieved great things as a President in spite of it. That takes remarkable strength of character. 

But that’s no reason why Sanders shouldn’t get his.

Rest in Peace Walter L. Scott

At about 9:30 pm on Saturday North Charleston police officer Michael T. Slager shot and killed an unarmed African American Walter L. Scott (pictured above) while he was running away.

The North Charleston police statement’s version of the events was that Slager pulled Scott over for a broken tail light. Scott ran, so Slager used his Taser to try and stop. That didn’t work and a scuffle ensued, during which Scott grabbed the Taser and tried to use it on the officer, who was forced to resort to his service weapon. He shot Scott dead. That was the official original police report.

It’s clear from the police statement that something isn’t true. First Scott tries to run away. Then Slager Tasers him. The statement indicated that that didn’t work, which would mean that Scott was still running away so how could a scuffle ensue?

But the inconsistency didn’t bother the North Charleston PD; nor was anybody particularly interested in the fact that Slager had, by his own later admission, had quite a few beers before coming on shift but he wasn’t tested until 5 hours later. So that’s where the story would have ended. Another unarmed man killed in cold blood by a police officer. This time for a broken tail light.

Except that the truth was captured on video by a bystander, who gave it to Scott’s family. They brought it to the New York Times who published it today. The footage shows an unarmed Scott running for his life from Slager, who fires repeatedly at Scott’s back, hitting him 7 times until he drops dead. The autopsy report showed that the last three killed him. Another officer at the scene doesn’t try to resuscitate Scott, he simply turns his body over and examines something. At that point he’s handcuffed and clearly dead. I guess the handcuffs were to ‘prove’ that Slager hadn’t killed him.

Slager appears to plant something next to Scott’s dead body then stands casually over him, dusting his hands, showing no remorse at all for the fact that he just took his life—for no reason at all other than because he could—and tried to cover up his crime.

His version of the events, accepted originally by the North Charleston Police Department, is a lie from start to finish. And for once, justice might be served. Slager has been fired and charged with murder. The thin blue line, which is increasingly more like a very thick blue fortress wall, can't withstand the power of a bystander with a smart phone. Times are a-changing.

Walter Scott’s brother Anthony issued a public statement saying that he and his family don’t believe all police officers are bad; just that some are. His dignity was awe-inspiring as he called for prayer. 

Rest in peace, Walter L. Scott.