We Deserve Better from the Democrats. Are We Going to Get It In Time?

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Tuesday May 10, 2022 · 8:09 AM PDT

2022/05/10 · 08:09

Yesterday, Nancy Pelosi made the news by giving a full-throated defense of…

The Republican Party

.@SpeakerPelosi: "I want the Republican Party to take back the party to where you were when you cared about a woman's right to choose, you cared about the environment. Here I am, Nancy Pelosi, saying this country needs a strong Republican Party. Not a cult." pic.twitter.com/h12SSFQKdk
— The Hill (@thehill) May 9, 2022

This is a shockingly tone-deaf reply that belies one of two things, in my view

1) Nancy Pelosi does not understand the danger of the moment the Republican Party poses as the GOP fully embraces Fascism and pushes to destroy the American Experiment, imperfect as it is, in order to pursue a totalitarian Christian Fascist state where minority rule becomes permanent, and 30% of the country has its way with the remaining 70%

2) Nancy Pelosi is one side of the same institutional coin in which the vast majority of elected Democrats have no desire to upend any of the broken and corrupted systems for which they participate in, because it might interdict their own wealth, status, and power.

Nancy Pelosi might not be a Fascist herself, but why is Nancy Pelosi claiming with zero irony that we “Need” a functional Republican Party in this country?

The same GOP that:

a) Allowed COVID-19 to run virtually unchecked, helping to contribute to 1,000,000 deaths from the virus
Staged a coup against the government on 1/6/21, a coup which, although the Capitol is not being stormed at present, is still ongoing
Stole several Supreme Court Justice positions that are poised to bring about the rolling back of virtually every civil privacy right int his country; Not “50 years”, but more like “250 years” if they have their druthers?
Lied us into a multi-trillion-dollar disaster in Iraq
Stole the presidency in 2000 which even led to point D above

And so forth.

Why is Nancy Pelosi defending *that* opposition Party?

Well, not to be outdone, the Democrats in the Senate allowed this to happen:

The Senate just PASSED by unanimous consent a bill to extend protections from the Supreme Court Police to the immediate family members of Supreme Court Justices.
— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) May 9, 2022

So, on the precipice of Roe V Wade being overturned, and unleashing a hellscape of “The Handmaid’s Tale” being brought into reality…

The United States Senate is perfectly fine funneling more funds, and effort, into providing state security apparatus for the very same SCOTUS who is about to eviscerate modern living in the United States of America.

Further,

.@POTUS calls for break up Ukraine aid and Covid relief and passing them separately after being "informed by Congressional leaders in both parties" that linking them "would slow down action on the urgently needed Ukrainian aid."

This clears a path for Ukraine $

Covid $ tbd... pic.twitter.com/lYfBUYAWXr
— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) May 9, 2022

There is plenty of appetite for funding the Ukrainians in their efforts against Russia…

Slava Ukraini! No doubt.

But does it really surprise anyone that we have unlimited political will to fund arms and zero political will to stop the still-raging pandemic?

I don’t know what Democrats are thinking, but it really seems like they either just “assume” the American Electorate is going to figure this stuff out on their own, or…

Well, if someone has a good, cogent explanation for why Democrats seem to be abdicating even the basic duties of “Please elect us so we can do X & Y for you once we win”…

I’m all about hearing it.

This website, and other left-leaning websites has done a great job with activism over the years to push Democrats in the direction we need them to go.

This would be, IMO, a great time to rev up those machines to basically say “Yo, What the Fuck?” to all Democrats.

Time is running out to stop the Fascist Takeover of the USA, and Nancy Pelosi is giving interviews defending the Fascist Party.

This is not okay.

Luke Letlow (R-LA), Congressman-Elect, Dies of COVID-19

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Tuesday December 29, 2020 · 6:52 PM PST

2020/12/29 · 18:52

Every COVID death is a tragedy, and an incoming Republican Congressman is no exception:

From the News Star

“Louisiana Congressman-elect Luke Letlow has died at Ochsner LSU Health in Shreveport with COVID-19, a family friend confirmed Tuesday night.

Letlow, 41, was transferred from St. Francis Medical Center to the Ochsner LSU Health ICU on Dec. 23 and has been treated there since then.

Letlow is survived by his wife, Julia Barnhill Letlow, and two young children.”

Young, seemingly healthy, and only contracted the pandemic virus on 12/18.

One would hope that out of such a terrible tragedy, the Congressman-Elect’s constituents, and more importantly, Republican Colleagues will begin to take the pandemic — a year and 330k+ dead Americans later — seriously.

Tragic, and awful.

Sanders' "Single Issue" Arguably Most Important Issue We Face

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Friday February 12, 2016 · 1:38 PM PST

2016/02/12 · 13:38

Some people are starry-eyed over Hillary Clinton claiming to not be a “single issue candidate” after her closing remarks during last night’s #DemDebate, and with that, implying that Bernie Sanders is a “single issue candidate”.

In hearing those closing remarks, I felt that they were truly illuminating to where the campaigns have been, and will go. Hillary might be great at name-dropping of groups of citizens who fit certain classes or statuses or occupations, but is she as great at actually representing all of those people? Also, for those concern-trolling about the details, where are all the details from Hillary’s campaign?

On Wall Street “Not being allowed to wreck the economy...again”
First off, the acknowledgement that it has happened once is a “no shit” kind of moment. We all know it happened. But the notion that Hillary, she of “I represent(ed) Wall Street” and “That’s what they offered” fame, would actually do anything meaningful to prevent Wall Street from getting a second chance to fatten their wallets at the expense of Main Street...is laughable.

Bernie Sanders has been fighting against this sort of gross inequality for many years, and though he may not have been able to stop it all by himself, his prescience when it came to blasting Alan Greenspan many years ago while others couldn’t hail him a Very Serious Person fast enough is a pretty stark contrast.

On Flint
Income inequality is just a much of a part of the Flint scandal as anything else. That the sufferers are disproportionately lower and working class, and in many cases non-white. Sad to say, but if they were in a better socioeconomic position in life, perhaps this number of citizens wouldn’t be poisoned the way they were. Of course, the corrupt Republican administration in Flint was surely bought and paid for by the mega-rich as well, once again wielding outsize influence on the lives of ordinary citizens

On “Poor miners being left out and left behind in coal country”
The world needs to move away from such dirty sources of energy as coal, but here’s Hillary giving a shout out to the poor people who have seen their economies decimated by the fall of coal. What is she planning to do to help these people out? Does she have a shovel-ready green energy program to transition these people to? Or does she plan to fire up as many coal mines as she can and get as much of that black gold out of the ground as possible? Where are the details?
Again, income inequality talk and fighting against the greed of the 1% may not solve their problems instantly, but in a system better suited to care for the individuals who do the work, perhaps coal country wouldn’t be as impoverished as it is now.

“Racism...sexism...LGBT discrimination...”
We obviously all believe these things are bad, or we’d be at RedState right now.

But let’s not gloss over just how badly income inequality has been shown to disproportionately affect non-whites and women. I’m not sure if there’s statistics out there regarding our gay friends and family members and their economic mobility, but there’s plenty of states where they can be terminated at their job just for being gay, to say nothing of the harassment they receive at work just for even being suspected of being gay.

That women still are not paid an equal amount of wage for an equal amount of work as men.

Bernie’s quest for a livable minimum wage, for example...would not automatically solve issues of systemic hatred and bigotry, I get that. Bernie’s not saying it would do that, to my knowledge.

But things like the Fight For $15 would immediately benefit many of the “oppressed” groups that Hillary checked off her checklist, and that would improve their standing in life for themselves, their children, and families. For many in these scenarios, the racism and sexism is just a vile frosting upon the cake of poverty that they may have in front of them.

On unions
It’s great that in Scott Walker’s backyard, Hillary touted her desire to strengthen unions.

Except that her questionable relationships with union-busters in Wal-Mart and others who would break up what should be a storied American tradition instead of a feeble shell of what it once was means that I can’t believe many union members — not leadership, but the rank and file — would take her seriously that she’ll do anything to benefit them and their membership.

On “Wall Street, big financial companies, insurance companies,” etc…
Hillary rattles off a list of terrible organizations and acknowledges they all have too much power.

Hurray!

Except that in her next breath, she goes on to say that even if we solved all those problems immediately, there would still be “negligence like in Flint”, “racism holding people back”, “sexism preventing women from getting equal pay...”, “LGBT people who are married on Saturday and fired on Monday”.

Well, let’s see here.

First off, if you actually were to address the massive problems of income and wealth inequality, the equal pay issue may not evaporate, but you certainly remove the stain of sexism from low paying jobs disallowing working moms from taking care of their families.

Fixing income inequality may not “solve racism”. But when non-white families have nonexistent net worth, compared to their white neighbors...that’s real progress, and a real chance for mobility when there isn’t any.

Fixing massive wealth gaps doesn’t solve LGBT issues overnight. But when power is returned to the workers, these odious policies and laws might actually change one day. Economic mobility that would come from a stronger, democratic socialist society might allow people to better move between jobs as needed, and a stronger workforce could have more leverage against the oligarchy if they are brought down a peg.

But the big thing I’d like to point out here?

Were Sanders able to achieve anything resembling his vision for restoring economic prosperity to the middle class, guess what he and other Democrats would have time and energy to focus on?

All of the other societal ills.

A prosperous society could help be a good step forward to a more social society.

Bernie’s message resonates with so many — even conservatives at times! — because everyone at our core, if we’re not already wealthy to not have to care...we care about our day-to-day well being, our ability to make ends meet, and then to give a good life to our families and ourselves.

That’s the American Dream. And it’s restoration for the Middle Class is such a profound and overarching issue, that there should be no problem with it being Bernie Sanders’ Issue #1. Because at the end of the day, his issue affects everyone.
Well, everyone outside of the 1%, that is.

Former White Cop Indicted for Killing Unarmed Black Man in SC

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Thursday December 04, 2014 · 8:07 AM PST

2014/12/04 · 08:07

No, the title does not appear to be satire, or fake, or a cruel joke. I don't think anyway.

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Thursday December 04, 2014 · 6:38 AM PST

2014/12/04 · 06:38

It's not often I feel the need to cite The Daily Show / Jon Stewart for commentary, because Mr. Stewart is so ubiquitous to the fabric of social and political commentary...he doesn't need my help for any promotion, I guess is one way of looking at it.

But TPM shares a clip from last night's show in which Stewart says more than once he "Doesn't know what to say" regarding the Eric Garner NYPD non-indictment.

Maybe it's not "rare" for Stewart to not be as verbose, but in this context, he can't be more right.

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Friday November 28, 2014 · 8:44 AM PST

2014/11/28 · 08:44

First, please forgive me from shamelessly borrowing a phrase from John Cole's Balloon Juice regarding my feelings about the establishment media in this country. It's one of my favorite phrases, and wish it'd become a more widely used hashtag (Seriously, I think I might be the only person using it...)

...But I digress. Only a little.

No, friends I would like to talk about something that has been going on for at least as long as I've been alive (probably), but has only in the past few days really rankled me.

The coverage of "Black Friday" as a legitimate news story by our failed media (experiment).

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Martin O'Malley DQ's Self from 2016 on Fracking in MD

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Tuesday November 25, 2014 · 2:13 PM PST

2014/11/25 · 14:13

ThinkProgress has a piece up that says that outgoing Democratic Governor of Maryland, Martin O'Malley, is ready to allow Fracking in Maryland.

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Friday November 14, 2014 · 6:28 AM PST

2014/11/14 · 06:28

That was the sentiment that Senator Warren (D-MA) expressed to Huffington Post reporter Ryan Grim in regards to the new leadership position she's been elevated to by Senator Harry Reid.

In the piece here, Warren pushes back on some of the initial memes coming out of the media in the past day or so.

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Tuesday November 11, 2014 · 8:09 AM PST

2014/11/11 · 08:09

...Until a ton of problems surrounding our men and women in uniform are either solved, or seriously worked on.

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Monday November 10, 2014 · 11:01 AM PST

2014/11/10 · 11:01

Just when it seems like the rabid right wing whack job, and walking delusion that is Senator (ugh) Ted Cruz (R-TX) cannot get any dumber, he trots out the following gem on Twitter in reaction to President Obama's support for Net Neutrality:

"Net Neutrality" is Obamacare for the Internet; the Internet should not operate at the speed of government.
— Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) November 10, 2014

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Tuesday November 04, 2014 · 3:37 PM PST

2014/11/04 · 15:37

We all give crap to people like Chris Matthews and Chuck Todd for journalistic failures on MSNBC, but tonight, some stunning clarity that Democrats of all stripes would be wise to heed.

HamptonRoadsProgressive

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Monday October 13, 2014 · 6:50 PM PDT

2014/10/13 · 18:50

For those who didn't watch, Alison L. Grimes took on Mitch McConnell in the only debate that Mitch's people would agree to.

Alison Grimes provided a much clearer choice for the people of Kentucky tonight, and I am hoping that whatever undecideds remain out there strongly consider voting for her now.

Mitch McConnell? All he did was punctuate every answer with a literal or proverbial ..."Obama!!!!" and that's about it.

To me, Alison Grimes came off as someone who wants to take public service seriously...while Mitch McConnell sounded as scuzzy as the untrustworthy used car salesman who can't wait for you to sign on the line and drive that lemon off his lot.

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We Deserve Better from the Democrats. Are We Going to Get It In Time?

Luke Letlow (R-LA), Congressman-Elect, Dies of COVID-19

Sanders' "Single Issue" Arguably Most Important Issue We Face

Former White Cop Indicted for Killing Unarmed Black Man in SC

Jon Stewart Virtually Speechless Over Garner Outcome

#OurFailedMediaExperiment - "Black Friday" as a "News" Story

Martin O'Malley DQ's Self from 2016 on Fracking in MD

Elizabeth Warren: "Nobody's Clipping My Wings"

We Need to Stop Celebrating Veteran's Day, Until...

Ted Cruz: "Net Neutrality is Obamacare for the Internet"

Win or Lose: MSNBC is Right About This

KYSEN - ALG vs Mitch; Public Servant vs Used Car Salesman