What do you call it when you do the same thing over and over and expect different results? Oh yeah, the democratic party. 
-- Naomi Klein



Current Affairs/February 25, 2017

THEY MUST BE TRYING TO FAIL

By failing to appoint Keith Ellison to chair the DNC, Democrats have written their suicide note…

by NATHAN J. ROBINSON

At this point, one has to conclude that the national Democratic Party has a death wish. Given the opportunity to throw a minuscule bone to the Sanders progressives, the DNC declined. By giving its chairmanship to former Labor Secretary Tom Perez, instead of Rep. Keith Ellison, party leaders have shown that they must be actively desiring electoral oblivion.

The Ellison/Perez fight had been portrayed as a re-litigation of the Sanders/Clinton primary fight. It was and it wasn’t. It was, in that Keith Ellison was endorsed by Bernie Sanders, while Tom Perez had the backing of members of the party’s more traditional establishment. But that’s also an oversimplification. After all, Chuck Schumer, not exactly a socialist insurgent, had endorsed Ellison, and the political differences between Ellison and Perez were not nearly so obvious as those between Sanders and Clinton. (READ MORE)

The Did-You-Talk-to-Russians Witch Hunt

When it comes to trying to take Trump down, by this point it would seem he has provided plenty of substantial grounds even in three short weeks. However the MSM and the Deep State are concentrating on pushing the story of a connection with Russia, which allows them to kill three birds with one stone:

1) It delegitimizes the Trump presidency.

2) Shifts the blame for Clinton's loss away from the candidate and the party.

3) Opens the door for war with Russia, which Deep State seems so eager for.

Do read Robert Parry's cautions below, where he carefully puts the relationship between the US and Russia into perspective. 

But then I'm reminded that when Hillary was Secretary of State, the Clintons were connected with the sale of a company, Uranium One, which gave the Russians control of 20% of all US uranium production capacity. Because uranium is a “strategic asset, with implications for national security” the sale required oversight by the State Department. Then shortly before the sale, Bill Clinton received $500,000 for a Moscow speech from a Russian investment bank with links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock. Further, Uranium One’s chairman gave $2.35 million to the Clinton Foundation, a contribution that was not revealed despite Hillary’s agreement with Obama to identify all donors. Not that I approve of anything Trump does, but this makes vague revelations of his associates’ phone calls to unidentified Russian personages look like small potatoes indeed.

Red Square in Moscow with a winter festival to the left and the Kremlin to the right. (Photo by Robert Parry)

Democrats, liberals and media pundits – in their rush to take down President Trump – are pushing a New McCarthyism aimed at Americans who have talked to Russians, risking a new witch hunt.

By Robert Parry/Consortiumnews.com consortiumnews.com 2/18/17

In the anti-Russian frenzy sweeping American politics and media, Democrats, liberals and mainstream pundits are calling for an investigative body that could become a new kind of House Un-American Activities Committee to hunt down Americans who have communicated with Russians. The proposed commission would have broad subpoena powers to investigate alleged connections between Trump’s supporters and the Russian government with the apparent goal of asking if they now have or have ever talked to a Russian who might have some tie to the Kremlin or its intelligence agencies.

Such an admission apparently would be prima facie evidence of disloyalty, a guilt-by-association “crime” on par with Sen. Joe McCarthy’s Cold War pursuit of “communists” who supposedly had infiltrated the U.S. government, the film industry and other American institutions..(READ MORE)

Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal--New York Times, 4/24/15

The headline on the website Pravda trumpeted President Vladimir V. Putin’s latest coup, its nationalistic fervor recalling an era when its precursor served as the official mouthpiece of the Kremlin: “Russian Nuclear Energy Conquers the World.”

The article, in January 2013, detailed how the Russian atomic energy agency, Rosatom, had taken over a Canadian company with uranium-mining stakes stretching from Central Asia to the American West. The deal made Rosatom one of the world’s largest uranium producers and brought Mr. Putin closer to his goal of controlling much of the global uranium supply chain.

But the untold story behind that story is one that involves not just the Russian president, but also a former American president and a woman who would like to be the next one...(READ MORE)

Scolding Trump voters will not carry the Democrats back to power

Lexington/The Economist

The rise of the Herbal Tea Party

AS A rule, populist insurgencies are rarely defeated with slogans in Latin. Yet there it was, swaying proudly over the protest march that filled the ceremonial heart of Washington, DC, a day after the inauguration of President Donald Trump—a handwritten sign reading: “Primum Non Nocere”. The cardboard sign, quoting the ancient medical principle “First, Do No Harm”, was held by Mike Gilbert, an epidemiologist from Boston, Massachusetts, who joined hundreds of thousands of others showing their disapproval of the new president. Mr Gilbert gave two reasons for attending what was officially the “Women’s March on Washington”, part of an internet-organised global protest that saw sister marches in hundreds of cities. He marched to show solidarity with “the women in my life” and to rally support for “sound science”, which he fears will be undermined by ideologues chosen to oversee scientific funding and regulation.

Many marchers set out to shame Mr Trump for boorishly boasting, years ago, that fame allowed him to grab women “by the pussy”. They wore knitted pink “pussy hats” with pointy ears, or carried such signs as “Viva La Vulva”. Some youngsters mocked the new president as a short-fingered nativist, chanting: “Can’t Build A Wall, Hands Too Small.” Still others said that they hoped their numbers would humiliate the president by dwarfing crowds that turned out for his inauguration. That gambit seemed to work, as Mr Trump spent his first days in office bragging implausibly about the size of his inaugural crowds.... (READ MORE)

The Elites Won’t Save Us

Posted on Feb 12, 2017

By Chris Hedges/Truthdig

The four-decade-long assault on our democratic institutions by corporations has left them weak and largely dysfunctional. These institutions, which surrendered their efficacy and credibility to serve corporate interests, should have been our firewall. Instead, they are tottering under the onslaught. 

Labor unions are a spent force. The press is corporatized and distrusted. Universities have been purged of dissidents and independent scholars who criticize neoliberalism and decry the decay of democratic institutions and political parties. Public broadcasting and the arts have been defunded and left on life support. The courts have been stacked with judges whose legal careers were spent serving corporate power, a trend in appointments that continued under Barack Obama. Money has replaced the vote, which is how someone as unqualified as Betsy DeVos can buy herself a Cabinet seat. And the Democratic Party, rather than sever its ties to Wall Street and corporations, is naively waiting in the wings to profit from a Trump debacle.

“The biggest asset Trump has is the decadent, clueless, narcissistic, corporate-indentured, war-mongering Democratic Party,” Ralph Nader said when I reached him by phone in Washington. “If the Democratic strategy is waiting for Godot, waiting for Trump to implode, we are in trouble. And just about everything you say about the Democrats you can say about the AFL-CIO. They don’t control the train.”

The loss of credibility by democratic institutions has thrust the country into an existential as well as economic crisis. The courts, universities and press are no longer trusted by tens of millions of Americans who correctly see them as organs of the corporate elites. These institutions are traditionally the mechanisms by which a society is able to unmask the lies of the powerful, critique ruling ideologies and promote justice. Because Americans have been bitterly betrayed by their institutions, the Trump regime can attack the press as the “opposition party,” threaten to cut off university funding, taunt a federal jurist as a “so-called judge” and denounce a court order as “outrageous.”

READ MORE

Loving and Hating for the Wrong Reasons

Since I can’t think of any reason NOT to hate DT, perhaps this article should be retitled, “Did we love Barack Obama for the wrong reasons?”

Because, as the article points out, the actual policies of each are not that different. The style, however, is, which makes me think that, more than anything, this election has been about class: Us, the polished, well-spoken, college-educated elite, versus Them, the rough, uneducated, uncouth Other. They hate us because, frankly, we look down on them and they know it; calling them “deplorables” was the final straw.

We loved Obama because he reflected qualities we felt comfortable with and wanted for ourselves, and most of us, including me, went to sleep for the greater part of his administration, secure in the assumption that “Dad” was taking care of things in the best possible way. We were somehow able to overlook the interventionist wars, droning of hospitals, weddings, and funerals (oops!), loss of habeas corpus (the foundation, really, of the Constitution), treatment of whistle-blowers, deportations, militarized police, police violence, surveillance, etc. because, they say, he didn’t have control over those things and besides, look at Obamacare and LGBT rights. And he’s elegant, intelligent, and has a lovely family.

My friends adore Hillary Clinton for the same reasons – they identify with her. The women of my age (and class) fought the same fight against the patriarchy; we know what it feels like to be highly-educated, take shit from white male superiors, and have to claw your way up. So, when I mention, say, Clinton’s close association with Henry Kissinger, who is generally considered a war criminal, my friends say, “Well she’s flawed.” Yet can you imagine the outrage if Trump were to take on Kissinger as a foreign policy advisor? Yikes!

I think the same was true of the Bernie/Hillary divide. My friends who loved Hillary and hated Bernie (although would have ultimately voted for him) were constantly dumping on his style, his voice, his age (although he appeared to have more energy than 10 millennials) and how he reminded them of their old Jewish uncle. They didn’t want someone who travels in coach (in the middle seat, yet) because that’s not what they aspire to. It wasn’t that he was too idealistic (they would have accepted that from a Jack Kennedy) but his style grated on them. Too straightforward. No polish.

And that’s exactly why Bernie was able to cross party lines and appeal to independents and moderate Republicans, because, besides his obvious integrity (“trustworthiness” having been a big issue in this election), he doesn’t act like he’s better than anyone else but is someone with whom, if he were campaigning at your county fair, you could walk up to and shake hands.

So, what’s the answer? Get off the personalities! Stop it with the Trump caricatures, cartoons, jokes about his hair, gold drapes, and impersonations, because by doing so you’re also insulting a wider group, or at least they could take it that way. Put the emphasis of our protests on specific issues where we can come together, because all of us want health care, jobs, a workable infrastructure, a sustainable environmental future, and an end to the continuous fucking wars that are eating all our money.

We could even carry American flags – no reason why the right should entirely co-opt that symbol – to show that we’re working for more than just our own elite selves, but in the national interest. (I couldn’t carry one, but I’d be fine with it if you did.)

Since we’ve got Trump, I'm hoping that his function is to shine a light on policies which, by being promulgated by the Other, are revealed in their full malevolence, causing those who think of themselves as liberal to finally take action against them.

I believe we can all be brought together, but whether the best way is through a reformed Democratic party or a new third people’s party, remains to be seen. Checking our attitudes, however, is one of the first steps.

The Uncomfortable Truth: Are We Hating Donald Trump for the Wrong Reasons? 

By Ramzy Baroud / Feb 10, 2017 / Foreign Policy Journal

The hypocrisy of criticizing Trump on the axiomatic assumption that that the war makers who preceded him were peacemakers is simply too much to bear.

Ifear that many of us are hating Donald Trump for the wrong reasons.

Multitudes are being swayed by mainstream media-inspired demonization of the new US president based on selective assumptions and half-truths.

The US mainstream media, which rarely deviates from supporting the American government’s conduct, however reckless, is now presenting Trump as if an aberration of otherwise egalitarian, sensible, and peace-loving US policies at home and abroad.

Trump may be described with all the demeaning terminology that one’s livid imagination can muster: evil, wicked, tyrannical, misogynist, war-mongering, rich buffoon, ‘insulting our allies’, infatuating with ‘dictators’, etc.

But do not miss the point.

If you chant in the street: ‘I am with her’, with reference to the defeated Democratic presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton, it means that you are entirely missing the point.

To reminisce about the days of Barack Obama, his oratory skills, clean diplomacy and model, ‘relatable’ family, means that you have bought into the mass deception, the intellectual demagoguery, stifling group-think that pushed us to these extremes, in the first place.

And, within this context, ‘missing the point’, can be quite dangerous, even deadly....(READ MORE)

Okay, now that we're sure the world is ending, I hope you're ready for a hopeful viewpoint! Caitlin Johnstone is one of my favorite writers, but the last time I posted one of her articles, an otherwise astute FB friend pooh-poohed it immediately because the site didn't "look authentic" (this after another usually smart friend wouldn't even open an article in Consortiumnews because he hadn't heard of what happens to be the oldest investigative journalism site on the Web). Obviously all that "fake news" propaganda worked, so that now progressives are questioning their own best sources. The answer to all this is, use your brain! Trust me, you can tell. If it reads like bullshit, it probably is, and if it doesn't read like bullshit, it probably isn't--and if still in doubt, use Google. Anyway, here's Johnstone's dose of optimism:

Believe It Or Not, This Is What The Great Awakening Looks Like

There is a massive shift happening in human consciousness, and it may just be enough to save the world.

We’re headed straight for a cliff. If humanity continues on its current course, we’ll either wipe ourselves out via nuclear holocaust or die off in natural disasters, droughts, famines, plagues, food riots and predation when global warming-induced climate chaos and temperature extremes collapse industrial agriculture.

Anyone who thinks humanity can keep going the way it’s been going for even one more generation is either ignorant, delusional, or both. It is unquestionably evolve-or-die time for our species. We will go extinct if we do not drastically change our collective behavior, and in order for that to happen we’re going to have to drastically change our consciousness. For whatever reason, the ruling elites of our society have been using our fear, insecurity and inertia to keep manipulating us into marching in this same omnicidal direction, and we will not be able to collectively overcome those manipulations without a drastic shift in collective consciousness.

Luckily for us, this is precisely what is happening.... (READ MORE)

Caitlin Johnstone

2/10/17

Glenn Greenwald: Tom Perez Apologizes for Telling the Truth, Showing Why Democrats' Flaws Urgently Need Attention

THE MORE ALARMED one is by the Trump administration, the more one should focus on how to fix the systemic, fundamental sickness of the Democratic Party. That Hillary Clinton won the meaningless popular vote on her way to losing to Donald Trump, and that the singular charisma of Barack Obama kept him popular, have enabled many to ignore just how broken and failed the Democrats are as a national political force.

An endless array of stunning statistics can be marshaled to demonstrate the extent of that collapse. But perhaps the most compelling piece of evidence is that even one of the U.S. media’s most stalwart Democratic loyalists, writing in an outlet that is as much of a reliable party organ as the DNC itself, has acknowledged the severity of the destruction. “The Obama years have created a Democratic Party that’s essentially a smoking pile of rubble,” wrote Vox’s Matthew Yglesias after the 2016 debacle, adding that “the story of the 21st-century Democratic Party looks to be overwhelmingly the story of failure.” (Read more)

THE INTERCEPT 2/9/17
The Intercept is dedicated to producing fearless, adversarial journalism. We believe journalism should bring transparency and accountability to powerful governmental and corporate institutions, and our journalists have the editorial freedom and legal support to pursue this mission.

Managing political stress

                                Photo: Carol Diehl (c) 2017

It’s clear from posts on Facebook that people are freaking out. One friend writes, “I just feel so anxious, depressed, and terrified that I emotionally eat, crawl into bed and nap, or start buying rations so we can shelter-in-place for six months to a year.” Another dreads being asked how she is. “I need a new response” she says, “that concisely conveys ‘miserable but we don't have to talk about it’”.

Well the bad news is that nothing in the political realm is going to change any time soon. The good news, however, is that you don’t HAVE to feel miserable. I think a lot of people think anyone who isn’t anxious and depressed doesn’t understand the gravity of the situation. Or that the way to have compassion is to feel as bad as possible about, say, the immigrants who have been mistreated or turned away. You are not doing anyone any good, including yourself, releasing cortisol with all that worry. This is a time like no other to learn how not to be buffeted by external events but to be in the present moment–which is not a cliché, but an achievable state of mind. It IS possible to be informed and concerned without going down the tubes; you could even take enjoyment from life—which means you could bring enjoyment to others, and what we need more than anything right now is uplifters.

You cannot get sick enough to help sick people get better. You cannot get poor enough to help poor people thrive. It is only in your thriving that you have anything to offer anyone. —Abraham.

The answer is meditation, and I wonder how anyone functions without it—or would want to. Most people are ruled by their thoughts, which in turn fuel their emotions. They don’t realize that these thoughts are simply random impulses from the brain, thousands every minute, which carry no import unless we attach ourselves to one or the other, and in this we have a choice. It’s not a matter of stopping thoughts—this will never happen—but observing them as they pass and letting them go, like waves on an ocean. With practice, you get good at recognizing the thoughts that serve you and dismissing the ones that don’t, a kind of “curation” of the mind, so to speak.

Long before I learned to meditate, I had a lesson in this when I was climbing a mountain tunnel and found myself teetering at the top of a long rickety ladder with no way back down, the only thing to grab to get out the top seemingly way out of my reach. I was paralyzed with fear until I realized that fear was not going to help me, and I’d have to banish it if I was going to save myself. I did. I simply decided not to have the fear and somehow scrambled out—I still have no idea how I did it.

So yes, our thoughts are optional. Imagine if we knew this as children, how different our lives would be.

There are many forms of meditation, and you can find one that works for you. It helps to have a teacher, but I know some who have learned from books and tapes. I started with t’ai chi, later chose Transcendental Meditation (TM) because I knew people who were still doing it after 20-30 years—and the understanding it gave me enhances my current practice of kundalini yoga. Once you make your choice, make a reasonable commitment. In kundalini, we make our commitments in 40-day increments, which makes them doable and gives us enough time to see the results.

Perhaps the push to go to the next level of personal consciousness is what this is all about.

Carol Diehl (c) 2017