The greatest moderate of all? Hillary Clinton? Hogwash!
Hillary is a Wall Street Shill wearing the skin of a Chameleon.
This is a woman who thinks she really made a big jump from campaigning
for Barry Goldwater, to kissing the golden backsides of Wall street.
Again, I say Hogwash!
And Thomas Frank had better trade in his Leftist friends for a new
bunch. Are there really Leftists who believe Clinton will honor her
concessions to Bernie's Revolution?
Well, it's all blather. I think Thomas Frank must be paid by the word.
Carl Jarvis
On 8/14/16, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Frank writes: "My leftist friends persuaded themselves that Clinton's many
concessions to Sanders' supporters were permanent concessions. But with the
convention over and the struggle with Sanders behind her, headlines show
Clinton triangulating to the right, scooping up the dollars and the
endorsement, and the elites shaken loose in the great Republican wreck."
Hillary Clinton. (photo: AP)
With Trump Certain to Lose, You Can Forget About a Progressive Clinton
By Thomas Frank, Guardian UK
14 August 16
Come November, Clinton will have won her great victory - not as a champion
of working people's concerns, but as the greatest moderate of them all
And so ends the great populist uprising of our time, fizzling out
pathetically in the mud and the bigotry stirred up by a third-rate would-be
caudillo named Donald J Trump. So closes an era of populist outrage that
began back in 2008, when the Davos dream of a world run by benevolent
bankers first started to crack. The unrest has taken many forms in these
eight years - from idealistic to cynical, from Occupy Wall Street to the
Tea
Party - but they all failed to change much of anything.
And now the last, ugliest, most fraudulent manifestation is failing so
spectacularly that it may discredit populism itself for years to come.
Two weeks ago, I wrote in this space about how the Trump phenomenon had
reconfigured the conventional geometry of the two-party system. Trump was
riding high in the polls at that moment, and there was reason to believe
that his criticism of trade deals - one of several Trumpian causes long
associated with the populist left - might play havoc with the Democrats'
happy centrist plans.
Now let us ponder the opposite scenario. In the intervening two weeks,
Trump
has destroyed himself more efficiently than any opposition campaign could
ever have done. First, he heaped mounds of insults on the family of a US
soldier killed in Iraq, then prominent journalists raised doubts about his
mental state, and then (as if to confirm his doubters) he dropped a strong
hint that gun enthusiasts might take action against Hillary Clinton should
she appoint supreme court justices not to his liking.
His chances, as measured in the polls, went almost overnight from fairly
decent to utter crap. For much of this year, populism had the gilded class
really worried. There was Bernie Sanders and the unthinkable threat of a
socialist president. There was the terrifying Brexit vote. Just a short
while ago the American national newspapers were running page-one stories
telling readers it was time to take seriously Trump's followers, if not
Trump himself. And on 3 August, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman
actually typed the following: "It scares me that people are so fed up with
elites, so hate and mistrust [Hillary] Clinton and are so worried about the
future - jobs, globalization and terrorism" that they might actually vote
for Trump.
Yes, it scared Friedman that the American people didn't like their masters
any longer. As it has no doubt scared many of his rich friends to learn
over
the past few years that the people formerly known as middle class are angry
about losing their standard of living to the same forces that are making
those rich people ever more comfortable.
Well, Friedman need be frightened no longer. Today it looks as though his
elites are taking matters well in hand. "Jobs" don't really matter now in
this election, nor does the debacle of "globalization", nor does anything
else, really. Thanks to this imbecile Trump, all such issues have been
momentarily swept off the table while Americans come together around
Clinton, the wife of the man who envisaged the Davos dream in the first
place.
As leading Republicans desert the sinking ship of Trump's GOP, America's
two-party system itself has temporarily become a one-party system. And
within that one party, the political process bears a striking resemblance
to
dynastic succession. Party office-holders selected Clinton as their
candidate long ago, apparently determined to elevate her despite every
possible objection, every potential legal problem. The Democratic National
Committee helped out, too, as WikiLeaks tells us. So did President Barack
Obama, that former paladin for openness, who in the past several years did
nearly everything in his power to suppress challenges to Clinton and thus
ensure she would continue his legacy of tepid, bank-friendly neoliberalism.
My leftist friends persuaded themselves that this stuff didn't really
matter, that Clinton's many concessions to Sanders' supporters were
permanent concessions. But with the convention over and the struggle with
Sanders behind her, headlines show Clinton triangulating to the right,
scooping up the dollars and the endorsement, and the elites shaken loose in
the great Republican wreck.
She is reaching out to the foreign policy establishment and the neocons.
She
is reaching out to Republican office-holders. She is reaching out to
Silicon
Valley. And, of course, she is reaching out to Wall Street. In her big
speech in Michigan on Thursday she cast herself as the candidate who could
bring bickering groups together and win policy victories through really
comprehensive convenings.
Things will change between now and November, of course. But what seems most
plausible from the current standpoint is a landslide for Clinton, and with
it the triumph of complacent neoliberal orthodoxy. She will have won her
great victory, not as a champion of working people's concerns, but as the
greatest moderate of them all, as the leader of a stately campaign of
sanity
and national unity. The populist challenge of the past eight years, whether
led by Trump or by Sanders, will have been beaten back resoundingly.
Centrism will reign triumphant over the Democratic party for years to come.
This will be her great accomplishment. The bells will ring all over
Washington DC.
In this ironic and roundabout way, Trump may prove to be a disaster for the
reform politics he has never really believed in. Indeed, it would be
difficult to find a leader who could discredit populism more thoroughly
than
this compassion-free billionaire. For Friedman's beloved "elites", I
predict
that Trump will come to serve an important symbolic purpose. Trump loves to
boast that he is immune to the scourge of money in politics, that he's
nobody's puppet, and from his coming ruin and disgrace we will no doubt be
told to draw many lessons about how money in politics actually helps
prevent
the rise of people like Trump and makes the system more stable.
For decades, the Davos set have told us that doubt about "globalization"
was
a species of racism, and soon Trump, as a landslide loser, will confirm
this
for them in overwhelming terms.
My friends and I like to wonder about who will be the "next Bernie
Sanders",
but what I am suggesting here is that whoever emerges to lead the populist
left will simply be depicted as the next Trump. The billionaire's scowling
country-club face will become the image of populist reform, whether genuine
populists had anything to do with him or not. This is the real potential
disaster of 2016: That legitimate economic discontent is going to be
dismissed as bigotry and xenophobia for years to come.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid. Error! Hyperlink reference not
valid.
Hillary Clinton. (photo: AP)
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/13/trump-clinton-election
-chances-moderate-policies-economyhttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/
2016/aug/13/trump-clinton-election-chances-moderate-policies-economy
With Trump Certain to Lose, You Can Forget About a Progressive Clinton
By Thomas Frank, Guardian UK
14 August 16
Come November, Clinton will have won her great victory - not as a champion
of working people's concerns, but as the greatest moderate of them all
nd so ends the great populist uprising of our time, fizzling out
pathetically in the mud and the bigotry stirred up by a third-rate would-be
caudillo named Donald J Trump. So closes an era of populist outrage that
began back in 2008, when the Davos dream of a world run by benevolent
bankers first started to crack. The unrest has taken many forms in these
eight years - from idealistic to cynical, from Occupy Wall Street to the
Tea
Party - but they all failed to change much of anything.
And now the last, ugliest, most fraudulent manifestation is failing so
spectacularly that it may discredit populism itself for years to come.
Two weeks ago, I wrote in this space about how the Trump phenomenon had
reconfigured the conventional geometry of the two-party system. Trump was
riding high in the polls at that moment, and there was reason to believe
that his criticism of trade deals - one of several Trumpian causes long
associated with the populist left - might play havoc with the Democrats'
happy centrist plans.
Now let us ponder the opposite scenario. In the intervening two weeks,
Trump
has destroyed himself more efficiently than any opposition campaign could
ever have done. First, he heaped mounds of insults on the family of a US
soldier killed in Iraq, then prominent journalists raised doubts about his
mental state, and then (as if to confirm his doubters) he dropped a strong
hint that gun enthusiasts might take action against Hillary Clinton should
she appoint supreme court justices not to his liking.
His chances, as measured in the polls, went almost overnight from fairly
decent to utter crap. For much of this year, populism had the gilded class
really worried. There was Bernie Sanders and the unthinkable threat of a
socialist president. There was the terrifying Brexit vote. Just a short
while ago the American national newspapers were running page-one stories
telling readers it was time to take seriously Trump's followers, if not
Trump himself. And on 3 August, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman
actually typed the following: "It scares me that people are so fed up with
elites, so hate and mistrust [Hillary] Clinton and are so worried about the
future - jobs, globalization and terrorism" that they might actually vote
for Trump.
Yes, it scared Friedman that the American people didn't like their masters
any longer. As it has no doubt scared many of his rich friends to learn
over
the past few years that the people formerly known as middle class are angry
about losing their standard of living to the same forces that are making
those rich people ever more comfortable.
Well, Friedman need be frightened no longer. Today it looks as though his
elites are taking matters well in hand. "Jobs" don't really matter now in
this election, nor does the debacle of "globalization", nor does anything
else, really. Thanks to this imbecile Trump, all such issues have been
momentarily swept off the table while Americans come together around
Clinton, the wife of the man who envisaged the Davos dream in the first
place.
As leading Republicans desert the sinking ship of Trump's GOP, America's
two-party system itself has temporarily become a one-party system. And
within that one party, the political process bears a striking resemblance
to
dynastic succession. Party office-holders selected Clinton as their
candidate long ago, apparently determined to elevate her despite every
possible objection, every potential legal problem. The Democratic National
Committee helped out, too, as WikiLeaks tells us. So did President Barack
Obama, that former paladin for openness, who in the past several years did
nearly everything in his power to suppress challenges to Clinton and thus
ensure she would continue his legacy of tepid, bank-friendly neoliberalism.
My leftist friends persuaded themselves that this stuff didn't really
matter, that Clinton's many concessions to Sanders' supporters were
permanent concessions. But with the convention over and the struggle with
Sanders behind her, headlines show Clinton triangulating to the right,
scooping up the dollars and the endorsement, and the elites shaken loose in
the great Republican wreck.
She is reaching out to the foreign policy establishment and the neocons.
She
is reaching out to Republican office-holders. She is reaching out to
Silicon
Valley. And, of course, she is reaching out to Wall Street. In her big
speech in Michigan on Thursday she cast herself as the candidate who could
bring bickering groups together and win policy victories through really
comprehensive convenings.
Things will change between now and November, of course. But what seems most
plausible from the current standpoint is a landslide for Clinton, and with
it the triumph of complacent neoliberal orthodoxy. She will have won her
great victory, not as a champion of working people's concerns, but as the
greatest moderate of them all, as the leader of a stately campaign of
sanity
and national unity. The populist challenge of the past eight years, whether
led by Trump or by Sanders, will have been beaten back resoundingly.
Centrism will reign triumphant over the Democratic party for years to come.
This will be her great accomplishment. The bells will ring all over
Washington DC.
In this ironic and roundabout way, Trump may prove to be a disaster for the
reform politics he has never really believed in. Indeed, it would be
difficult to find a leader who could discredit populism more thoroughly
than
this compassion-free billionaire. For Friedman's beloved "elites", I
predict
that Trump will come to serve an important symbolic purpose. Trump loves to
boast that he is immune to the scourge of money in politics, that he's
nobody's puppet, and from his coming ruin and disgrace we will no doubt be
told to draw many lessons about how money in politics actually helps
prevent
the rise of people like Trump and makes the system more stable.
For decades, the Davos set have told us that doubt about "globalization"
was
a species of racism, and soon Trump, as a landslide loser, will confirm
this
for them in overwhelming terms.
My friends and I like to wonder about who will be the "next Bernie
Sanders",
but what I am suggesting here is that whoever emerges to lead the populist
left will simply be depicted as the next Trump. The billionaire's scowling
country-club face will become the image of populist reform, whether genuine
populists had anything to do with him or not. This is the real potential
disaster of 2016: That legitimate economic discontent is going to be
dismissed as bigotry and xenophobia for years to come.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
