Bush-Clinton Is Not Inevitable
Note: IMO "bubba" is a class-based impulse, and writers should just shitcan it. Also, such a match-up would likely lead to the lowest voter turnout in an open presidential year in recent memory.
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/07/31/bush-clinton-not-inevitable
For going on thirty years now, Republicans have been using wedge issues, fear, bigotry, jingoism, and religious zealotry to appeal to the limbic lizard brain in all of us, in an effort to vilify government, glorify the free market and get people to vote against their own interests, while fat cats and plutocrats converted our Republic into an oligarchy.
It’s worked pretty well. A full-scale assault, including caging voters, radical gerrymandering of districts, outright purchase of the media, and complete neutering of campaign finance laws has changed the terms of the national debate; marginalized and frightened liberals; and given Republicans an outsized roll in state governments, the legislature, and the judiciary.
Ah, but he who lives by the lizard brain, dies by it. The Party has become an anti-enlightenment caricature that appeals mainly to old white Bubbas – a diminishing breed that is fast losing its grip on power. And now along comes Trump, speaking with heinous clarity that strips away any veneer of respectability, revealing the dark reptilian evil that has taken over the Party, and the Banksters and Wall Streeters –and all those who used these wedge issues to enrich themselves and screw the Bubbas -- are losing ground in the Party they bought and paid for.
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It’s coming as a surprise to many mainstream pundits that a Socialist with a progressive message is doing so well. But the best-kept secret in politics is that, on an issue-by-issue basis, the American people are well left of center. A massive investment by conservative billionaires over the past 40 years may have rebranded “liberal” to be some despised political label, but the voter’s have strongly supported the individual positions Sanders is advocating all along. All it took to reveal their liberalism was someone with the courage and integrity to confront the oligarchs and plutocrats and give them a real choice.
What’s amusing, in a twisted way, is to watch Hillary try to catch some of the progressive headwind, without actually being progressive. For example, her announcement about tackling climate by putting up half a billion solar panels on rooftops was a cynically designed ploy, announced to head off the palpable skepticism generated by her unwillingness to take a stand on the XL, back off an all-of-the-above energy policy, or commit to reigning in the use of fossil fuels. But fostering clean energy without also cutting carbon emissions is like trying to eat the sizzle while the steak’s still in the fire.
None of this should be too surprising. Hillary get's a lot of money from fossil fuel interests. So positing solutions while she ignores the source of the problem makes sense. She hopes it will appear responsive to those criticizing her about her lack of a serious climate policy, while leaving her free to do what she wants if elected, and most importantly, to keep getting that money.
= new reply since forum marked as read
.... I suppose you could take some comfort in that whoever wrote this is probably at least half right.
