Kolhatkar writes: "The recent snowball of unfounded and baseless criticism
aimed at Sanders from liberal writers is disingenuous at best, and nefarious
at worst."
Senator Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton. (photo: Getty)
Why Are Some Liberals Bashing Sanders in Favor of Clinton?
By Sonali Kolhatkar, teleSUR
22 January 16
From Paul Krugman to Ta-Nehisi Coates, a panicked slew of anti-Sanders
criticism is emerging leaving Clinton off the hook just in time for the
primaries.
With less than two weeks to go before the Iowa caucus, a collective panic
seems to have set in with prominent liberal thinkers and writers over the
prospect of Bernie Sanders actually winning the Democratic nomination for
president.
Many have responded with farfetched and hypocritical arguments to drive away
voters. The fear is mounting that a repeat of 2008 may be unfolding, just as
when a junior Senator from Illinois roared ahead of Hillary Clinton at the
start of that primary season and went on to win the nomination and
presidency.
Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize winning economist and New York Times writer,
who one might imagine would support an ardent critic of big banks like
Sanders, penned a horribly titled op-ed, Weakened at Bernie's on Jan. 19.
Starting with an obligatory denunciation of Clinton (she "is no paragon of
political virtue") in order to cement his progressive credentials, he went
on to label Sanders's positions on the economy and health care as
"disturbing." After critiquing the senator for having an "unrealistic"
outlook on the economy, Krugman then contradicted himself, going on to write
that Sanders doesn't go far enough in calling for a restoration of the
Glass-Steagasl Act without addressing the shadow banking system. Nowhere in
the article does Krugman criticize Clinton's economic plan, which seems to
focus simply on raising wages but leaving Wall Street's power intact.
Krugman has taken aim at Sanders for not going far enough, but seemingly let
Clinton off the hook despite her program not being as radical as Sanders (or
as Krugman himself) has recommended.
New York Magazine's Jonathan Chait went one step further in his Jan. 18
piece with a title that left little room for interpretation: The Case
Against Bernie Sanders. In it Chait, like Krugman, struggles to make a solid
case. He relies instead on vague pronouncements like, "Sanders offers the
left-wing version of a hoary political fantasy." His clearest argument is
that Sanders' "self-identification as a socialist poses an enormous
obstacle, as Americans respond to 'socialism' with overwhelming negativity."
But the poll numbers leading into the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary,
and the record-breaking crowds Sanders has attracted at his events, clearly
suggest otherwise. How to explain the tens of thousands of people streaming
to see him speak, and that he "now has more individual donors than any other
candidate in history?" Either his supporters and donors are self-described
socialists or they don't care that he is. Either way, the "socialist" label
is not hurting Sanders in the primary.
Chait's most convincing argument against Sanders is on foreign policy,
saying that he has "difficulty addressing issues outside his economic
populism wheelhouse." And while that is indeed true, a choice between
Clinton and Sanders is a choice between a candidate with little experience
in foreign policy, and a liberal Democrat who has proven her hawkish
credentials. Sanders has criticized the size of the military budget, while
Clinton has boasted of her friendship with Henry Kissinger, a man many
consider a war criminal. Progressives can decide which they prefer. Frankly
neither candidate has a particularly promising foreign policy agenda.
Another prominent liberal, Jessica Valenti, added her voice to the
anti-Sanders cacophony in the Guardian, "Hillary Clinton supporters: it is
OK to care about gender on the ballot." In it she accused Sanders's
supporters of spewing "an extraordinary amount of scorn" against the idea
that women might want to vote for Clinton because she is female, adding
later that, "One could argue that, gender aside, Clinton's policies are
better for women than Sanders'." Valenti argued that voting for Clinton
might help women stave off the "horrifying consequences that anti-abortion
Republican leadership would surely pursue." But she doesn't contrast any of
Clinton's pro-women policies or achievements with Sanders'. As we have found
out over the past 8 years, having an African-American holding the nation's
highest office has hardly brought justice for the Black community. Simply
having Clinton as president is unlikely to improve women's lot unless she
works hard to make women's rights a serious priority. So far we don't know
that she will.
Perhaps the most hard to bear anti-Sanders critique has come from the hugely
acclaimed Atlantic writer and MacArthur genius Ta-Nehisi Coates, a man who
has been likened to this generation's James Baldwin and whose 2014 article
"The Case for Reparations," catapulted him to fame. On Jan. 19, Coates wrote
the sharply critical piece, "Why Precisely Is Bernie Sanders Against
Reparations?" in which he quotes Sanders' desire to invest deeply in the
African-American community and address poverty and unemployment rather than
pay reparations. A cursory search reveals Clinton's response to reparations
that also does not endorse reparations and instead calls for "programs and
policies that have helped generations of African-Americans have a better
life in this country [to] continue." Sanders wants to increase investments,
while Clinton wants to continue current policies. Instead of comparing both
leading Democratic candidates' positions on reparations and excoriating both
for refusing to endorse them, Coates makes a blatantly one-sided attack. His
argument that Sanders's class-based critique of racism being problematic is
sound. But again, there is no comparison with Clinton.
I am not one to declare that I "feel the Bern." I don't generally like to
get behind any presidential candidate, preferring instead to champion
progressive causes that candidates need to get behind. Still, the snowball
of unfounded and baseless criticism aimed at Sanders from liberal writers is
disingenuous at best, and nefarious at worst.
What we need are strong and fair critiques from the left of both Sanders and
Clinton. Only then will the best and most progressive candidate become
apparent.
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Senator Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton. (photo: Getty)
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/opinion/Why-Are-Liberals-Bashing-Sanders-in
-Favor-of-Clinton---20160122-0011.htmlhttp://www.telesurtv.net/english/opini
on/Why-Are-Liberals-Bashing-Sanders-in-Favor-of-Clinton---20160122-0011.html
Why Are Some Liberals Bashing Sanders in Favor of Clinton?
By Sonali Kolhatkar, teleSUR
22 January 16
From Paul Krugman to Ta-Nehisi Coates, a panicked slew of anti-Sanders
criticism is emerging leaving Clinton off the hook just in time for the
primaries.
ith less than two weeks to go before the Iowa caucus, a collective panic
seems to have set in with prominent liberal thinkers and writers over the
prospect of Bernie Sanders actually winning the Democratic nomination for
president.
Many have responded with farfetched and hypocritical arguments to drive away
voters. The fear is mounting that a repeat of 2008 may be unfolding, just as
when a junior Senator from Illinois roared ahead of Hillary Clinton at the
start of that primary season and went on to win the nomination and
presidency.
Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize winning economist and New York Times writer,
who one might imagine would support an ardent critic of big banks like
Sanders, penned a horribly titled op-ed, Weakened at Bernie's on Jan. 19.
Starting with an obligatory denunciation of Clinton (she "is no paragon of
political virtue") in order to cement his progressive credentials, he went
on to label Sanders's positions on the economy and health care as
"disturbing." After critiquing the senator for having an "unrealistic"
outlook on the economy, Krugman then contradicted himself, going on to write
that Sanders doesn't go far enough in calling for a restoration of the
Glass-Steagasl Act without addressing the shadow banking system. Nowhere in
the article does Krugman criticize Clinton's economic plan, which seems to
focus simply on raising wages but leaving Wall Street's power intact.
Krugman has taken aim at Sanders for not going far enough, but seemingly let
Clinton off the hook despite her program not being as radical as Sanders (or
as Krugman himself) has recommended.
New York Magazine's Jonathan Chait went one step further in his Jan. 18
piece with a title that left little room for interpretation: The Case
Against Bernie Sanders. In it Chait, like Krugman, struggles to make a solid
case. He relies instead on vague pronouncements like, "Sanders offers the
left-wing version of a hoary political fantasy." His clearest argument is
that Sanders' "self-identification as a socialist poses an enormous
obstacle, as Americans respond to 'socialism' with overwhelming negativity."
But the poll numbers leading into the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary,
and the record-breaking crowds Sanders has attracted at his events, clearly
suggest otherwise. How to explain the tens of thousands of people streaming
to see him speak, and that he "now has more individual donors than any other
candidate in history?" Either his supporters and donors are self-described
socialists or they don't care that he is. Either way, the "socialist" label
is not hurting Sanders in the primary.
Chait's most convincing argument against Sanders is on foreign policy,
saying that he has "difficulty addressing issues outside his economic
populism wheelhouse." And while that is indeed true, a choice between
Clinton and Sanders is a choice between a candidate with little experience
in foreign policy, and a liberal Democrat who has proven her hawkish
credentials. Sanders has criticized the size of the military budget, while
Clinton has boasted of her friendship with Henry Kissinger, a man many
consider a war criminal. Progressives can decide which they prefer. Frankly
neither candidate has a particularly promising foreign policy agenda.
Another prominent liberal, Jessica Valenti, added her voice to the
anti-Sanders cacophony in the Guardian, "Hillary Clinton supporters: it is
OK to care about gender on the ballot." In it she accused Sanders's
supporters of spewing "an extraordinary amount of scorn" against the idea
that women might want to vote for Clinton because she is female, adding
later that, "One could argue that, gender aside, Clinton's policies are
better for women than Sanders'." Valenti argued that voting for Clinton
might help women stave off the "horrifying consequences that anti-abortion
Republican leadership would surely pursue." But she doesn't contrast any of
Clinton's pro-women policies or achievements with Sanders'. As we have found
out over the past 8 years, having an African-American holding the nation's
highest office has hardly brought justice for the Black community. Simply
having Clinton as president is unlikely to improve women's lot unless she
works hard to make women's rights a serious priority. So far we don't know
that she will.
Perhaps the most hard to bear anti-Sanders critique has come from the hugely
acclaimed Atlantic writer and MacArthur genius Ta-Nehisi Coates, a man who
has been likened to this generation's James Baldwin and whose 2014 article
"The Case for Reparations," catapulted him to fame. On Jan. 19, Coates wrote
the sharply critical piece, "Why Precisely Is Bernie Sanders Against
Reparations?" in which he quotes Sanders' desire to invest deeply in the
African-American community and address poverty and unemployment rather than
pay reparations. A cursory search reveals Clinton's response to reparations
that also does not endorse reparations and instead calls for "programs and
policies that have helped generations of African-Americans have a better
life in this country [to] continue." Sanders wants to increase investments,
while Clinton wants to continue current policies. Instead of comparing both
leading Democratic candidates' positions on reparations and excoriating both
for refusing to endorse them, Coates makes a blatantly one-sided attack. His
argument that Sanders's class-based critique of racism being problematic is
sound. But again, there is no comparison with Clinton.
I am not one to declare that I "feel the Bern." I don't generally like to
get behind any presidential candidate, preferring instead to champion
progressive causes that candidates need to get behind. Still, the snowball
of unfounded and baseless criticism aimed at Sanders from liberal writers is
disingenuous at best, and nefarious at worst.
What we need are strong and fair critiques from the left of both Sanders and
Clinton. Only then will the best and most progressive candidate become
apparent.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
