It’s been on my mind for some time to write down some thoughts on the race within the Democratic Party for some time. So here are some thoughts.
There are just three candidates in the race who might make a reasonable claim to being progressive or left. They are Bernie Sanders, Tulsi Gabbard and Elizabeth Warren. As such, and because that’s the direction of travel in the world today, they’re really the three nominees worth any focus. Biden’s only worth mentioning, and only in passing, because he’s cutting such a tragic figure. He really needs to be instructed to stand down. Hell – he makes even Donald Trump look to be wrapped tight.
The majority of the rest of the candidates are just entrenched centrists or establishment figures like Biden. Some of them are simply using the nomination to raise their political profile for whatever other political goals they have. And, of course, there are a couple of atypical candidates in the shape of Yang and Williamson.
So need it be said that mainstream/corporate media has been rubbish in presenting the nomination process to the public at large? Besides waxing lyrical over initial and decidedly sketchy polls that gave Biden a huge lead over the rest of the field, they have tried and failed in turn to talk up and propel establishment types like O’Rourke, Harris and Buttigieg, while ghosting, gas lighting and smearing the likes of Gabbard and Sanders.
Of the three progressive candidates, Gabbard resigned her chair on the DNC in 2016 to endorse Sanders, while Warren, possibly because she had her sights set on being Hilary Clinton’s pick for VP didn’t. It’s worth noting that Sanders only ran in 2016 after failing to convince Warren that she should.
I’ll cut to the chase here. Warren is the dead rat the establishment are willing to swallow if that’s what it takes to avoid the possibility of a Sanders Presidency.
Now, I don’t believe they’ll get the chance to experience that gastronomical delight, because Sanders is going to be the nominee. Tulsi Gabbard’s stated intent is to stay in the race until the convention, (then endorse Bernie?) but the DNC have lumped her with dead weight through their arbitrary and opaque use of “DNC recognised” polls to exclude her from the debate stage.
Putting aside any possibility of their being a grand strategy playing out between the progressive candidates, the question to be asked is whether Warren fancies her chances.
I’d guess she does, or she wouldn’t be talking to the ‘Clinton machine’ – presumably to secure the nod of Super Delegates should they come into play. Here’s the thing though. They say you should have a long spoon when you sup with the Devil. But I’m not sure Warren has any kind of a spoon at all. What payment might Clinton and her cohorts extract from Warren for helping her bid to be the Democratic nominee? They’re certainly not in the business of doing things for free. And it’s worth remembering that Clinton played Warren right out of the game back in 2016 by simply suggesting she might be a VP pick.
That aside, Warren has stated (from 3:38 in the linked vid) she’ll be taking corporate money and PAC money and any ‘dark money’ she can get her hands on should she be contesting the Presidency. That simply isn’t going down with the burgeoning progressive base of Democratic voters.
Should Warren’s possible optimism not be misplaced, the question is whether the US needs an Obama Presidency redux – one that leaves the left stonewalled for the duration of a President’s term in office? Because that’s what a Warren Presidency would probably be. And beyond that, the world doesn’t need Trump 2.1.
Looking further afield than just the borders of the US, the world certainly doesn’t need the US intelligence and foreign policy establishment continuing to run amok and filling peoples’ heads with bullshit through its mainstream propaganda outlets. And while Sanders has said he will take on the fossil industry, the pharmaceutical industry and Wall Street, he remains decidedly patchy on foreign policy. As is Warren. Gabbard is the only nominee who has their head screwed on when it comes to US foreign policy/relations and the US intelligence community. But besides being marginalised by the DNC, when not being ghosted by msm she’s been relentlessly vilified (variously and interchangably) as an Assadist/a Putin Puppet/a Hindu Nationalist/a Trump 2.1/a homophobe… and that’s been by both msm and more than a few fauxgressive news sites.
When all is said and done, I’m optimistic that something not too far removed from a Sanders/Warren/Gabbard triumvirate will come to pass in 2020. Certainly, barring a catastrophe, Sanders will be President. And it’s worth noting that besides Warren and Sanders ‘tag teaming’ on the debate stage, when it comes to foreign policy, it’s been very much the case that Gabbard has been the ice breaker clearing a passage for Sanders to safely speak up on aspects of US foreign policy. Gabbard would make a fantastic Foreign Secretary in a Sanders cabinet, just as Warren would do great things were she to be empowered and unleashed on Wall Street and corporate monopolies.
In the meantime, we’ve got – how much longer!? – msm dispensing nothing but garbage and rubbish – of illustrating how it’s just another wagon in a long train of various liberal, corporate and establishment wagons that have stopped forging on and begun circling.
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