Tuesday, November 24, 2020

Only A Fool...


Only A Fool...

by Coast Watcher

There’s an old adage: Be careful what you wish for, it might come true.

So it is with all those who fervently hoped Joe Biden would win the 2020 US presidential election. Although Trump is still contesting the result, it’s clear that Biden is now president-elect. It’s possible that Trump and the Republican Party are dragging their feet over conceding the election because contractual debts to their hired media outlets will be lower if they can hold out until January 1, 2021. Otherwise, the debt-ridden Republican Party will have to shell out over $100 million it owes.

As I pointed out as the election results began to come in, Trump set the bar so low, and yet Biden failed to clear it easily. Says it all. Even a record high voter turnout failed to produce the clear winner people expected. Nobody except his ardent fans could get excited about the so-called Democrats’ latest nominee. The man who said "Nothing fundamentally would change," to a bunch of wealthy donors and offered nothing but the qualification that he’s "not Trump" doesn’t exactly set the world alight with his dynamism. And yet those who had such a dreadful fear of Trump can’t intuit that his replacement isn’t someone who’ll care much more about them, either.

As his veep, Biden has chosen Kamala Harris, a person with an equally appalling record when it comes to law and order issues in her home state of California. It was Harris who turned a blind eye to police brutality while she was the state's Attorney General. She happily used  underpaid felon firefighters to combat the deadly wildfires that afflict California every year. These prisoners risk their lives, yet are not even allowed to use their hard-won experience to get a firefighting job when they leave jail.

(But of course, the Dems squeal like a stuck pig if anyone dares to criticize Harris because, "She’s a woman and a person of color!" Seemingly the act of being female and non-white automatically nominates you to sainthood in the DNC. And yet, when Tara Reade accused Harris' running mate of sexual assault, the neolib #MeToo crowd becomes sadly silent or rudely declares, "She's making it all up. Joe wouldn't touch any woman against her will." A sexual assault charge obviously doesn't deny male Dems a sainthood.)
Biden’s transition team is already loaded with people who shouldn’t be trusted anywhere near public office, including a raft of lobbyists. He has spoken openly of choosing Republicans for his cabinet. (Remember Republican John Kasich at the Dems' convention?) What more proof does anyone need to show that the duopoly is nothing more than two wings of the same bird?

This so-called "democratic" party still feels it’s entitled to every vote from anyone with any shade of left-leaning politics, yet the party itself occupies the same political territory the Republicans held in the 1950s. It may make nice by throwing a few crumbs to its supporters, such as forgiving a few thousand dollars’ worth of student debt and making the ACA more palatable, but expect any such concessions to be abandoned or clawed back in short order at the request of big moneyed donors.

Remember, Mitch McConnell is still squatting in the Senate like a poisonous toad, ready to negate any attempts the Biden administration makes to pass legislation. This is because although the parties are a cigarette paper’s thickness apart when it comes to ideology, and the Republican faction really doesn’t care about public opinion. Perhaps being obnoxious in this way is their true function within the larger duopoly? They're the convenient excuse Biden will give when nothing his faction has promised happens?

It’s a common perception that this is a term when the so-called Democrats have to get things right, to show that they do care about  ordinary Americans, or they might as well abandon any pretense  and officially merge with the Republican Party. At that time, when all the wished-for Biden administration’s grand schemes fall apart, I shall tell all who wept with relief at Biden's election, "Only a fool believes everything coming out of the mouths of the Democrats. It's time to stop fooling yourself."

As Nick Brana from the Movement for a People's Party says:

It's only been a week and a half since Joe Biden was declared the winner and he has already packed his transition team with more than 40 current or former lobbyists. His chief of staff, Ron Klain, is a former asbestos industry lobbyist. His leading cabinet picks include fossil fuel lobbyist Ernie Moniz as Energy Secretary, Booz Allen Hamilton board member Michele Flournoy as Secretary of Defense, and Republican venture capitalist Mitt Romney for Health and Human Services Secretary. Biden hasn't even been sworn in and Wall Street already runs his administration.

Democrats re-elected Chuck Schumer as Senate Minority Leader. Nancy Pelosi is poised to become Speaker of the House again. Biden's likely pick for DNC Chair is former Podesta Group lobbyist Jamie Harrison. It’s clear that Biden and the Democratic Party have learned nothing from this election, just like they learned nothing from 2016, and that working people are in for four more years of the same heartless neoliberalism that gave us Trump in the first place. Except this time it's happening in the middle of a pandemic and the worst recession since the Great Depression.

Even with this mounting evidence, some will still claim that the Democrats are our "friends"? I say with friends like these who needs enemies? Only a fool denies the reality of the evidence. Big Business lobbyists are considered friends to the Biden  administration--and he's not denying this to be the case (more examples in the links below). 

True progressives know who their real enemies are and wisely learn to trust themselves above all others.

 

BIO: Coast Watcher sees the writing on the wall. It ain't pretty. Lots of folks are going to be disappointed in Biden, but a whole lot more people are going to be hurt by his neoliberal austerity policies and coddling of the fossil fuel industry. The "Not-Trump" option forced upon the voters this past election isn't going to pay off for anyone but the billionaires, so it's time for all good patriots to sharpen their pitchforks and get ready to march in the streets until things turn in our favor.

Lee asks Biden simple questions like, "We're in a pandemic, so what about Medicare for All?" and "Why not stop fracking, Joe?" and "Aren't you for the Green New Deal?" and gives us the answers straight from the horse's (or is it donkey's?) mouth. https://youtu.be/apiR4k-S_6k

Related links: 

Biden's Pick for Secretary of State (Tony Blinken, a conservative warhawk who supposedly influenced Biden to support the Iraq War.)  https://youtu.be/kdZWpmPEOuw 

Billionaire Charles Koch Congratulates Biden And Says He Wants To Work Together "On As Many Issues As Possible"

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/11/13/daily-202-charles-koch-congratulates-biden-says-he-wants-work-together-many-issues-possible

Biden Just Appointed His Climate Movement Liaison. It's a Fossil Fuel Ally

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2020/11/joe-biden-climate-fossil-fuel-industry-cedric-richmond

Are You Kidding Me? (Erin Brokovich addresses the horror of Biden's EPA transition pick -- a DuPont Chemicals consultant)

https://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/66303-focus--dear-joe-biden-are-you-kidding-me

 No Good Choice: How The Two-Party System Fails Voters

https://www.leftvoice.org/no-good-choices-how-the-two-party-system-fails-voters

The Last Thing the Economy Needs is Joe Biden's Austerity

https://jacobinmag.com/2020/11/joe-biden-austerity-coronavirus-fiscal-conservatism-deficit-reduction 

Marijuana Reform Omitted From Biden Transition Plan on Racial Equity Despite Campaign Pledges

https://www.marijuanamoment.net/marijuana-reform-omitted-from-biden-transition-plan-on-racial-equity-despite-campaign-pledges/

 "What Was Your Normal?": Black Activist Goes Viral After Rejecting CNN Commentator's Claim That Things Will Go Back To "Normal" Because Biden Won The Election 

https://atlantablackstar.com/2020/11/10/we-still-have-to-do-the-work-black-activist-challenges-cnn-commentators-claim-that-things-will-go-back-to-normal-because-biden-won-the-election/

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You've gotta have 20/20 vision to see who's  in charge nowadays!

If you agree that we can't just sit back, fall asleep, and let the neolibs/neocons destroy our country, our lives, and the planet, then please make a donation to keep The Revolution Continues going.  Donate via the Paypal.me link below. Thank you and Power to the People!

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Make sure you send your email to the Biden team today. If you are a member of an organization that would like to sign on as a partner, please email me at cburris@networkforpubliceducation.org

Thank you for all you do!

Carol Burris

Executive Director, Network for Public Education

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Bank of America is continuing to fund the destruction of the Arctic Refuge. It must stop financing oil drilling, now!
 
Sign Now

Right now, Bank of America remains the only major American bank that has not refused to fund dangerous oil drilling in the Arctic Refuge. The Arctic Refuge's vast coastal lands, boreal forests, and alpine tundra are home to a diverse array of species including polar bears, musk oxen, Arctic foxes, and the iconic Porcupine Caribou Herd. It's also vital to Indigenous communities who have made their home on these sacred lands for thousands of years. Drilling in the Refuge is a violation of Indigenous rights and an assault on the irreplaceable wildlife that rely on these lands for survival.

As we face the increasingly horrific impacts of climate change — unprecedented wildfires, hurricanes, droughts, and floods — we have to face the facts. We are causing climate change, and we need to be transitioning over to clean, sustainable energy sources in order to reverse this trend. That's why every other large American bank, including Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, and Morgan Stanley, has changed their lending policies to exclude new drilling in the Arctic. Now we need Bank of America to do the same. Tell Bank of America that fossil fuels are a bad investment and to stop funding the destruction of the Arctic Refuge.

Thank you for all that you do,


 

Miranda B.
The Care2 Petitions Team


P.S. Any expansion in the production of climate-torching fossil fuels is simply outrageous and reckless — especially in a sacred place like the Arctic Refuge. It's time for Bank of America to turn off the funding tap for these dirty energy corporations!

 

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