Weissman writes: "Obama's political game-playing is pathetic, as is his
sanctimonious poppycock about judicial restraint, the rule of law, and
loyalty to what the Constitution says. Charles Evans Hughes, later chief
justice, shattered those fairytales over a century ago, when he pointed out
that 'the Constitution is what the judges say it is.'"
Donald Trump. (photo: AP)
From the Supreme Court to Donald Trump, It's Time to Get Real
By Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
21 March 16
Forgive my foul mood. Like many of you, Im still brought low by President
Obamas far-from-progressive pick for the Supreme Court, Circuit Court judge
Merrick Garland. Obamas political game-playing is pathetic, as is his
sanctimonious poppycock about judicial restraint, the rule of law, and
loyalty to what the Constitution says. Charles Evans Hughes, later chief
justice, shattered those fairytales over a century ago, when he pointed out
that the Constitution is what the judges say it is.
This does not suggest that the Constitution's text and legal precedents are
irrelevant. As Ive argued before, they frame the debates and provide the
arguments and values that the justices use to convince each other and
legitimize to the rest of us whatever they decide the Constitution now says,
even if todays interpretation differs radically from what the Constitution
supposedly said last week or will say some time in the future.
We can also learn from Antonin Scalia, who proved beyond doubt that there is
no intellectually honest and anti-authoritarian way to be a Constitutional
fundamentalist. Nor should we trust Biblical fundamentalists, whether
Christian, Islamic, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, or Satanic. Nor free-market
fundamentalists. Nor Marxist, Leninist, or Trotskyist fundamentalists. Old
texts, old myths, and old ideologies cannot keep up with changing times.
They may point us in useful directions, help us hang onto basic values, or
they may not. But if progressive politics has any underlying theme, it has
to be this. That we look ahead and use our admittedly limited human reason
and hopefully unlimited human compassion ? not your old-fashioned faith or
mine ? to find workable solutions to problems old and new.
Bernie Sanders did this to perfection with Obamas Supreme Court nomination.
Appearing on Rachel Maddows show on MSNBC, he promised to support Garland
and oppose the Republican refusal to give him a hearing. But he pointedly
criticized Garland as probably not the most progressive pick. Would
Sanders, if he won the presidential election in November, request Obama to
withdraw Garlands name and make his own pick for the next justice, asked
Maddow. Yes, I would, said Sanders without the least hesitation.
I have said over and over again that I do have a litmus test for a Supreme
Court justice, he explained. That justice must be loud and clear in
telling us that he or she will vote to overturn this disastrous Citizens
United Supreme Court decision. Im very worried about the future of American
democracy, and about the ability of billionaires to buy American elections.
That is my litmus test, and thats what I would insist on.
How wonderfully refreshing! But we need to apply the same clear-headed logic
to the looming threat of Donald Trump. Most surveys suggest that either
Bernie or Hillary could defeat Trump or Cruz, though its way too early to
put much trust in such hypothetical match-ups. More disturbing is how many
of Sanders supporters break with the Bern and talk of voting for Trump
against Hillary, or simply not voting at all. And should Bernie win the
nomination against the best efforts of the Democratic Party, the corporate
media, and the super delegates, the party honchos could well sit on their
hands and let him lose the presidential election big-time. Thats what they
did to George McGovern in 1972, and the partys current ties to big money
interests offer strong incentives to let Bernie and our political revolution
go down in flames.
Letting Trump win, whoever does it, could prove a catastrophic mistake. Just
remember what happened when German Communists and Social Democrats in their
countrys 1932 presidential elections failed to make common cause against a
guy called Adolph Hitler.
Make no mistake. Trump is not Hitler, though his fascistic supporter, the
former KKK leader David Duke, thinks that any attempt to compare the Donald
to Der Führer will end up rehabilitating that fellow with the mustache back
there in Germany. Hitler was fighting to make Germany great again against
the Communists and the Jewish capitalists
who were ripping off the nation
through the banking system, Duke told his radio listeners. Trump, he
claimed, is fighting the same fight here in the US, defending the real
America and its European-American majority against Goldman Sachs and Bernie
Sanders, who is a former Communist and is a Marxist right now.
Trump isnt even Mussolini, though the similarities are striking, as Dana
Milbank and others have suggested. Trumps chin-out toughness, sweeping
right-hand gestures, and talk of his huge successes and his stupid
opponents, recall Il Duces mannerisms. So does his spreading a pervasive
sense of fear and overwhelming crisis, portraying his backers as victims,
assigning blame to foreign or alien actors and suggesting only his powerful
personality can transcend the crisis. Trumps encouragement of violence and
use of violent imagery is also similar.
But, at least so far, Trump remains less the ideological leader than the
seasoned salesman and TV performer who is still feeling out his supporters
to see how he can best ride them to personal power. Think of him as a
Fascist in waiting. Hes clearly a racist and bigot, and has been for years,
as I reported last September in A F***king Jew Thanks Ann Coulter. Her
remarks suggested he was at the least a closet anti-Semite. He has since
been more open in his Jew-bashing.
He also has been brilliant in winning support from Christian Evangelicals,
even though hes as far from pious as he could be. And, like Bernie, he
quickly appealed to white blue-collar workers who had seen neo-liberal
economics and trade deals like NAFTA send American jobs overseas. Why has it
taken the corporate media and even such savvy observers as Thomas Frank so
long to see how his leftist-sounding economic critique fits with his
right-wing Fascist appeal? Hes doing exactly the same as Marine Le Pen in
France, trying to replace a flaccid Left and poseurs like Hillary Clinton as
the true enemy of global capitalisms failures.
Whether Trump wins or loses this years race for president, dont expect him
to go away. He will almost certainly build on his similarities with Europes
neo-Nazis. The only question is whether he will build his Fascist movement
faster than progressives can build a serious alternative following in Bernie
Sanders footsteps.
________________________________________
A veteran of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement and the New Left monthly
Ramparts, Steve Weissman lived for many years in London, working as a
magazine writer and television producer. He now lives and works in France,
where he is researching a new book, Big Money and the Corporate State: How
Global Banks, Corporations, and Speculators Rule and How to Nonviolently
Break Their Hold.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission
to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader
Supported News.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid. Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Donald Trump. (photo: AP)
http://readersupportednews.org/http://readersupportednews.org/
From the Supreme Court to Donald Trump, It's Time to Get Real
By Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
21 March 16
orgive my foul mood. Like many of you, Im still brought low by President
Obamas far-from-progressive pick for the Supreme Court, Circuit Court judge
Merrick Garland. Obamas political game-playing is pathetic, as is his
sanctimonious poppycock about judicial restraint, the rule of law, and
loyalty to what the Constitution says. Charles Evans Hughes, later chief
justice, shattered those fairytales over a century ago, when he pointed out
that the Constitution is what the judges say it is.
This does not suggest that the Constitution's text and legal precedents are
irrelevant. As Ive argued before, they frame the debates and provide the
arguments and values that the justices use to convince each other and
legitimize to the rest of us whatever they decide the Constitution now says,
even if todays interpretation differs radically from what the Constitution
supposedly said last week or will say some time in the future.
We can also learn from Antonin Scalia, who proved beyond doubt that there is
no intellectually honest and anti-authoritarian way to be a Constitutional
fundamentalist. Nor should we trust Biblical fundamentalists, whether
Christian, Islamic, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, or Satanic. Nor free-market
fundamentalists. Nor Marxist, Leninist, or Trotskyist fundamentalists. Old
texts, old myths, and old ideologies cannot keep up with changing times.
They may point us in useful directions, help us hang onto basic values, or
they may not. But if progressive politics has any underlying theme, it has
to be this. That we look ahead and use our admittedly limited human reason
and hopefully unlimited human compassion ? not your old-fashioned faith or
mine ? to find workable solutions to problems old and new.
Bernie Sanders did this to perfection with Obamas Supreme Court nomination.
Appearing on Rachel Maddows show on MSNBC, he promised to support Garland
and oppose the Republican refusal to give him a hearing. But he pointedly
criticized Garland as probably not the most progressive pick. Would
Sanders, if he won the presidential election in November, request Obama to
withdraw Garlands name and make his own pick for the next justice, asked
Maddow. Yes, I would, said Sanders without the least hesitation.
I have said over and over again that I do have a litmus test for a Supreme
Court justice, he explained. That justice must be loud and clear in
telling us that he or she will vote to overturn this disastrous Citizens
United Supreme Court decision. Im very worried about the future of American
democracy, and about the ability of billionaires to buy American elections.
That is my litmus test, and thats what I would insist on.
How wonderfully refreshing! But we need to apply the same clear-headed logic
to the looming threat of Donald Trump. Most surveys suggest that either
Bernie or Hillary could defeat Trump or Cruz, though its way too early to
put much trust in such hypothetical match-ups. More disturbing is how many
of Sanders supporters break with the Bern and talk of voting for Trump
against Hillary, or simply not voting at all. And should Bernie win the
nomination against the best efforts of the Democratic Party, the corporate
media, and the super delegates, the party honchos could well sit on their
hands and let him lose the presidential election big-time. Thats what they
did to George McGovern in 1972, and the partys current ties to big money
interests offer strong incentives to let Bernie and our political revolution
go down in flames.
Letting Trump win, whoever does it, could prove a catastrophic mistake. Just
remember what happened when German Communists and Social Democrats in their
countrys 1932 presidential elections failed to make common cause against a
guy called Adolph Hitler.
Make no mistake. Trump is not Hitler, though his fascistic supporter, the
former KKK leader David Duke, thinks that any attempt to compare the Donald
to Der Führer will end up rehabilitating that fellow with the mustache back
there in Germany. Hitler was fighting to make Germany great again against
the Communists and the Jewish capitalists
who were ripping off the nation
through the banking system, Duke told his radio listeners. Trump, he
claimed, is fighting the same fight here in the US, defending the real
America and its European-American majority against Goldman Sachs and Bernie
Sanders, who is a former Communist and is a Marxist right now.
Trump isnt even Mussolini, though the similarities are striking, as Dana
Milbank and others have suggested. Trumps chin-out toughness, sweeping
right-hand gestures, and talk of his huge successes and his stupid
opponents, recall Il Duces mannerisms. So does his spreading a pervasive
sense of fear and overwhelming crisis, portraying his backers as victims,
assigning blame to foreign or alien actors and suggesting only his powerful
personality can transcend the crisis. Trumps encouragement of violence and
use of violent imagery is also similar.
But, at least so far, Trump remains less the ideological leader than the
seasoned salesman and TV performer who is still feeling out his supporters
to see how he can best ride them to personal power. Think of him as a
Fascist in waiting. Hes clearly a racist and bigot, and has been for years,
as I reported last September in A F***king Jew Thanks Ann Coulter. Her
remarks suggested he was at the least a closet anti-Semite. He has since
been more open in his Jew-bashing.
He also has been brilliant in winning support from Christian Evangelicals,
even though hes as far from pious as he could be. And, like Bernie, he
quickly appealed to white blue-collar workers who had seen neo-liberal
economics and trade deals like NAFTA send American jobs overseas. Why has it
taken the corporate media and even such savvy observers as Thomas Frank so
long to see how his leftist-sounding economic critique fits with his
right-wing Fascist appeal? Hes doing exactly the same as Marine Le Pen in
France, trying to replace a flaccid Left and poseurs like Hillary Clinton as
the true enemy of global capitalisms failures.
Whether Trump wins or loses this years race for president, dont expect him
to go away. He will almost certainly build on his similarities with Europes
neo-Nazis. The only question is whether he will build his Fascist movement
faster than progressives can build a serious alternative following in Bernie
Sanders footsteps.
A veteran of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement and the New Left monthly
Ramparts, Steve Weissman lived for many years in London, working as a
magazine writer and television producer. He now lives and works in France,
where he is researching a new book, Big Money and the Corporate State: How
Global Banks, Corporations, and Speculators Rule and How to Nonviolently
Break Their Hold.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission
to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader
Supported News.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
