Once upon a time, long, long ago and far, far away...when I was a
precinct committeeman in the Democratic Party, the Party built a Party
Platform. In those long distant days we would gather in homes and
discuss the various Planks being offered. We would instruct our
precinct representative to the district convention, which planks we
supported, along with any we added. At the District Convention we
would discuss, although never in as much depth as at the precinct
level, the approved Planks. We would send forward to the County
Convention, the ones the District members approved. The final vote
would be at the County Convention, with our agreed upon Planks being
considered by the State Convention.
Another strange practice in those Once Upon a Times, People wanting
to run as Democrats had to come before the various conventions and
present their positions. They would then receive either support or
rejection. If support, they could receive some financial aid,
depending upon the health of the local treasury. I clearly remember
the first man who came to our District convention and Told us that he
was running for the state legislature as a Democrat...whether we liked
it or not. And he would take our money, but he didn't plan to rely on
it. He was being backed by a large steel manufacturer. My dad's boss
spent $25 thousand dollars out of his own pocket to back his run for a
state representative position. That was considered a pile of money
back then. He won, as a Republican, without the approval of his
Party. Politicians began to run on whatever platform their backers
told them. To my way of thinking, that was where the beginning of the
end first began. Today's Party Platforms are just vague fluffy
promises that are impossible to keep, and soon forgotten.
Carl Jarvis
On 1/17/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I didn't read this whole article. But there is a mis-statement. Not all
Democrats blame Trump's victory on a move to the right or racism on the
part
of white workers. Many blame it on the corporate influences in their own
party on government policy. There is a split , at least one split,
probably
more, within the Democratic party.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Roger Loran
Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2017 11:43 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Panic grows on 'left' as Trump nears White House
http://themilitant.com/2017/8104/810402.html
The Militant (logo)
Vol. 81/No. 4 January 23, 2017
(front page)
Panic grows on 'left' as Trump nears White House
BY MAGGIE TROWE
One capitalist party - the Republican Party being rebuilt around
President-elect Donald Trump - pitches its appeal to working people as it
prepares a traditional pro-big business administration. The other bourgeois
party - the Democrats - are embroiled in crisis, with forces around Vermont
Sen. Bernie Sanders pushing to run candidates at every level in hopes of
taking over the party. The only thing Democrats can agree on is an all-out
effort to block Trump's cabinet nominees and projected legislation.
The Democrats, their liberal media mouthpieces like the New York Times, and
the petty bourgeois left all blame Trump's victory on a turn to the right
by
workers, especially workers who are Caucasian, smeared by Hillary Clinton
as
"deplorables."
Liberal hue and cry became more shrill after the highly politicized
"intelligence community" in Washington accused Moscow of supporting Trump's
candidacy by organizing the release of hacked emails embarrassing to
Clinton.
"Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016
aimed at the US presidential election," the Jan. 6 National Intelligence
report said. No one claims Putin tampered with ballot boxes or attempted to
fix computer tallies of the vote. Russian hackers are charged with harming
Clinton by making her own words public.
The leaked messages revealed Democratic Party leadership efforts to rig the
Democratic nomination race against Sanders, as well as Clinton's use of her
cabinet position to raise money for her family foundation.
"Donald Trump's victory and his imminent presidency are already tainted
beyond redemption," thundered Times columnist Charles Blow Jan. 9, claiming
Trump "is as much Russia's appointment as our elected executive."
Portraying
those who voted for Trump as brainwashed dupes, Blow said, "The American
people cast their ballots in the fog of fake news and under influence of
stolen property weaponized as a tool of propaganda."
Actress Meryl Streep got big applause when she mocked workers who are
sports
fans in her teary anti-Trump speech at the Jan. 8 Golden Globes ceremony.
"The most vilified segments in American society right now" are "Hollywood,
foreigners and the press," she said. "Hollywood is crawling with outsiders
and foreigners. And if we kick them all out you'll have nothing to watch
but
football and mixed martial arts."
When Trump points out that the record of the U.S. rulers' intelligence
agencies is unreliable, Democrats vigorously defend the government spies.
"The quick support for the CIA may herald a new era in the agency's
relationship with Democrats," Politico noted.
While crying "Russian interference!" liberals conveniently ignore
Washington's history of intervention in other countries' affairs.
President Barack Obama did everything he could to influence the Israeli
election in 2015, hoping Likud Party leader Benjamin Netanyahu would lose.
Jeremy Bird, a leader of Obama's 2012 election campaign, led a group called
Victory15, which spent millions running anti-Netanyahu ads.
Democrats demonize Trump's cabinet appointees, calling Alabama Sen. Jeff
Sessions, Trump's nominee for attorney general, a bigot. At his
confirmation
hearing this week, protesters against Sessions, some in mock Ku Klux Klan
costumes, shouted, "No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA!"
You'd have to look far and wide to find a U.S. attorney general who
champions Black rights, but Sessions isn't starkly different from the rest.
"I abhor the Klan and what it represents, and its hateful ideology,"
Sessions told the panel.
Democrats of all stripes are calling for efforts to block ExxonMobil CEO
Rex
Tillerson, Trump's nominee for secretary of state. Some say he's too chummy
with Putin, because of the oil behemoth's investments in Russia.
Others say it's unseemly for a corporate executive to serve as secretary of
state. Few mention that former Secretary of State Clinton had been a
Walmart
board member, and notoriously silent on the company's anti-worker labor
policies.
And, after all, the rulers have always used their State Department to
advance U.S. capital's interests worldwide.
Obama, by repeatedly bypassing Congress and implementing policy by
executive
order, has handed Trump some easy early victories. "What can be done by the
pen can be undone by the pen," wrote William McGurn in the Wall Street
Journal Jan. 3.
While Trump has promised to repeal and replace Obama's Affordable Care Act
-
claiming he will increase competition and lower costs by lifting regulation
on companies selling insurance across state lines - he has said he will
maintain the popular provisions that prevent the insurance outfits from
refusing coverage to people with pre-existing medical conditions and allow
young people to be covered by their parents'
insurance until age 26.
"Working people and our unions have a vital stake not only in defending
what
we've fought for and won from the employing class, but above all in
building
a mass social and political movement of the working class to extend these
conquests as universal rights - not means-tested charity - for all,"
Socialist Workers Party National Secretary Jack Barnes explains in Are They
Rich Because They're Smart? Class, Privilege, and Learning Under
Capitalism.
"Through our labor, the working class, in this country and worldwide,
produces more than enough wealth to provide education, health care,
housing,
and retirement to every human being on earth, for a lifetime."
Related articles:
US rulers groomed Bill Clinton to lead Democrats to 'center'
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