• About
  • Farmers

vedika

~ your forum for critical and constructive writings

vedika

Tag Archives: 2016 US Elections

ఎన్నికలలో రష్యన్ల జోక్యంపై అమెరికాలో మల్లగుల్లాలు !

20 Tuesday Dec 2016

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, History, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Opinion, RUSSIA, USA

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

2016 US Elections, Democratic National Committee, Donald trump, RUSSIA, Russian Involvement in the US Election, US Election, Vladimir Putin, WikiLeaks

Image result for Russian Involvement in the US Election

ఎం కోటేశ్వరరావు

     నిరసన తెలిపితే లేని పోని దేశభక్తి లేదనే ముద్రవేయించుకోవటం ఎందుకని గానీ లేక నిజంగానే నల్లధనంపై నరేంద్రమోడీ జరుపుతున్న పోరులో ప్రతి ఒక్కరూ ఒక సైనికుడు లేక సైనికురాలుగా భావించటం వల్లగానీ దేశంలో బ్యాంకు ఖాతాలున్నవారందరూ వంతుల వారీగా బ్యాంకులు, ఎటిఎంల ముందు నిలబడేందుకు సర్దుబాటు చేసుకుంటున్నారు. చంద్రబాబు నాయుడు పోలవరం తాత్కాలిక డామ్‌ నిర్మాణాన్నే శాశ్వత డామ్‌ అన్నరీతిలో ఏ రోజు ఎంత మట్టి తీశారు, ఏ రోజు కాంక్రీట్‌ వేయాలో చెబుతూ పెద్ద మేస్త్రీ పని చేస్తూ కాలక్షేపం చేస్తున్నారు. అర్జునుడికి చెట్టుమీది పిట్టతప్ప మరేమీ కనిపించనట్లుగా చంద్రశేఖరరావుకు కేంద్రంతో బంధుత్వం తప్ప మరేమీ కనిపించని కారణంగా మెలకువగా వున్నా మరో విధంగా వున్నా దాని గురించే మాట్లాడుతున్నారు. నోట్ల రద్దుతో తలెత్తిన సమస్యల కారణంగా ఇప్పటికైతే పార్లమెంట్‌లో చర్చ తప్పించుకోగలిగాం తరువాతేమిటిరా భగవంతుడా అని లోలోపల ఆందోళన పడుతున్నా పైకి మాత్రం ప్రతిపక్షాలపై మరింతగా దాడి చేస్తూ జనాన్ని నమ్మించేందుకు ప్రధాని నరేంద్రమోడీ ప్రయత్నిస్తున్నారు. ఇలా ఎవరి పాత్రల్లో వారు అమోఘంగా లీనమయ్యారు. పై ముగ్గురు పాత్రధారులు అర్రులు చాచే అమెరికాలో ఏం జరుగుతోందో చూద్దాం.

    వాషింగ్టన్‌ పోస్టు పత్రిక రెండు రోజుల క్రితం ఒక వార్తను ప్రచురిస్తూ దానిలో అమెరికా అధ్యక్షుడిగా ఎన్నిక కానున్న డోనాల్డ్‌ ట్రంప్‌, రష్యా అధ్యక్షుడు వ్లదిమిర్‌ పుతిన్‌ ముద్దు పెట్టుకుంటున్నట్లుగా ఒక గ్రాఫిక్‌ బొమ్మను ప్రచురించింది. వారి మధ్య సంబంధాలు అలా వున్నాయని చెప్పేందుకు అలా చేశారని వేరే చెప్పనవసరం లేదు. గతకొద్ది రోజులుగా అమెరికన్లు తమ అధ్యక్ష ఎన్నికలలో రష్యా జోక్యం చేసుకుందా లేదా అని తెలియక కాళ్లు తొక్కుకుంటున్నారు. మనం రోజూ టీవీలలో చూసే హాలీవుడ్‌ సినిమాలలో అమెరికన్‌ సిఐఏ, ఎఫ్‌బిఐ ఏజంట్లు ఎంతో తెలివిగల వారిగా, మిగతా దేశాల వారంతా వారి ఎత్తులకు చిత్తయ్యే అమాయకుల మాదిరిగా కనిపిస్తూ మనకు వినోదం అందిస్తుంటారు. వారంతా ఇప్పుడు అవుననీ కాదని చెప్పలేకపోతున్నారు. రెండు రకాలుగానూ చెబుతున్నారు. ఇంతకూ విషయం ఏమిటంటే అమెరికా ఎన్నిలలో రిపబ్లికన్‌ పార్టీ అభ్యర్ధి డోనాల్డ్‌ ట్రంప్‌ అధ్యక్షుడిగా ఎన్నికయ్యేందుకు స్వయంగా పుతిన్‌ పర్యవేక్షణలో రష్యన్లు జోక్యం చేసుకున్నారన్నది సమస్య. ట్రంప్‌ దానిని నమ్ముతున్నట్లే మాట్లాడుతున్నాడు. ఎక్కడ కావాలంటే అక్కడ అమెరికా జోక్యం చేసుకోగలదు తప్ప అమెరికాలో ఎవరూ వేలు పెట్టలేరు మనం అంత గొప్ప మేథావులం, దేనిలో అయినా అమెరికాయే నంబర్‌ ఒన్‌ అని ఇప్పటి వరకు అమెరికన్లలో వ్యాపింపచేసిన ఒక అభిప్రాయం.

   నువ్వు నీ భార్యను తిట్టటం, కొట్టటం మానుకున్నావా అని ఎవరినైనా ప్రశ్నించి సమాధానం చెప్పమని అడగండి, ఏ సమాధానం వస్తుందో చూడండి. అవును అంటే ఇప్పటి వరకు తిడుతూ, కొడుతున్నట్లు అంగీకరించినట్లు, లేదు అంటే ఇంకా కొనసాగిస్తున్నట్లు. అమెరికన్లు కూడా అదే స్థితిలో పడిపోయి అవును, కాదు అని చెప్పలేక జుట్టుపీక్కుంటున్నారు. ట్రంప్‌ అధ్యక్ష పదవి స్వీకరించిన తరువాత జనవరి 20 నుంచి ఈ సమస్య మరుగునపడి కొత్త అంశాలపై కేంద్రీకరిస్తారనుకోండి.

    సోషలిస్టు సోవియట్‌ను కూల్చివేయటంలో విభీషణుడి పాత్రధారిగా వున్న బోరిస్‌ ఎల్సిన్‌ను రష్యా అధ్యక్షుడిగా ఎన్నిక చేయించటంలో అమెరికన్ల పాత్ర, జోక్యం జగద్విదతం. అక్కడే కాదు, సోవియట్ల స్ధానంలో స్వతంత్ర దేశాలుగా ఆవిర్భవించిన ప్రతి రిపబ్లిక్‌లో తమకు అనుకూలమైన వారిని గద్దె నెక్కించేందుకు అమెరికా ప్రయత్నించిందన్నది కూడా బహిరంగ రహస్యమే. తమ దేశ అంతర్గత వ్యవహారాలలో రష్యా జోక్యం చేసుకుందని అంగీకరించటం అంటే తమ వైఫల్యాన్ని అంగీకరించటం, లేదంటే నిరూపించి జనాన్ని నమ్మించాల్సి వుంటుంది. అనేక కొత్త ప్రశ్నలకు సమాధానం చెప్పాల్సి వుంటుంది. అందుకే రెండవది అంత తేలిక కాదు.

    ఈ ఏడాది జూన్‌లో వికీలీక్స్‌ స్ధాపకుడు జులియన్‌ అసాంజే డెమోక్రటిక్‌ నేషనల్‌ కమిటీకి చెందిన వేలాది ఇమెయిల్స్‌ను బహిర్గతం చేశాడు. అది రష్యన్ల జోక్యంతో జరిగిందని హిల్లరీ క్లింటన్‌ అవకాశాలను దెబ్బతీసేందుకు ఆ పని చేశారని డెమోక్రాట్లు ఆరోపించారు. ఇప్పటికీ వారు అదే చెబుతున్నారు. సెప్టెంబరు నెలలో చైనాలో కలిసినపుడు జరిగిందేదో జరిగింది ఇంతటితో ఆపండి లేకపోతే తీవ్ర పర్యవసానాలను ఎదుర్కొంటారని పుతిన్‌ను ఒబామా హెచ్చరించినట్లు వార్తలు వచ్చాయి. మరుసటి నెలలో వైట్‌ హౌస్‌ అధికార ప్రతినిధి రష్యన్లపై ఇదే ఆరోపణ చేశాడు, రుజువులు చూపకపోయినా జరిగిందని తాము గట్టిగా నమ్ముతున్నట్లు చెప్పాడు. అదే నెలలో పార్లమెంటరీ విదేశాంగ శాఖ కమిటీ ముందు మాట్లాడిన ఎఫ్‌బిఐ డైరెక్టర్‌ ఇతర దేశాల ఎన్నికలలో జోక్యం చేసుకున్న చరిత్ర రష్యాకు వున్నదని చెప్పాడు.

    పుతిన్‌ స్వయంగా మెయిల్స్‌ బయట పెట్టేందుకు ఆదేశించినట్లు వచ్చిన వార్తలను డిసెంబరులో రష్యా ఖండించింది. డోనాల్డ్‌ ట్రంప్‌ కూడా రష్యన్ల జోక్యం వార్తలను తోసిపుచ్చారు. ఎన్నికలలో హిల్లరీ ఓడిపోయిన ఫిర్యాదు చేస్తున్నారు తప్ప అధ్యక్ష భవనం ముందుగానే ఎందుకు చెప్పలేదు అని ప్రశ్నించారు. అందువలన బాధ్యతలు స్వీకరించిన తరువాత చర్యలు తీసుకుంటారో లేదో కూడా తెలియదు.

   ఇంతవరకు ఆరోపణలు, ప్రత్యారోపణలు, మీడియాలో విశ్లేషణలు తప్ప అధికారికంగా రష్యా గూఢచారులు, స్వయంగా పుతిన్‌ జోక్యం చేసుకున్నారనేందుకు ఒక్క ఆధారాన్ని కూడా అమెరికన్లు చూపలేదు. ఇమెయిల్స్‌ను అసలు వీకీలీక్స్‌ బయట పెట్టిందన్నది కూడా సందేహమే. రష్యన్‌ హాకర్‌ గుసిఫర్‌ 2 ఒక మెయిల్‌లో వేలాది మెయిల్స్‌, ఫైల్స్‌ను తాను వికీలీక్స్‌కు ఇచ్చినట్లు చెప్పాడు కనుక రష్యన్‌ సంబంధాన్ని వూహిస్తున్నారు. అయితే డెమోక్రాట్ల కార్యాలయంలో పనిచేసే 27 సంవత్సరాల సేథ్‌ రిచ్‌ అనే ప్రజావేగు వాటిని బయటకు పంపాడన్నది ఒక కథనం. అతన్ని జూలై 10న గుర్తు తెలియని వ్యక్తులు కాల్చి చంపారు. ఎందుకు చంపారో తెలియదు. అయితే అతని హంతకుల జాడ చెప్పిన వారికి 20వేల డాలర్ల బహుమానం ఇస్తామని అసాంజే ప్రకటించటంతో ఆ వుదంతం మరో మలుపు తిరిగింది.రష్యన్లు తమకు సమాచారం అందచేశారన్న డెమోక్రాట్ల ఆరోపణలను తోసిపుచ్చాడు. తాను రష్యా ప్రమేయం వున్న ఎనిమిది లక్షల ఫైళ్లను బయట పెట్టానని కూడా అన్నాడు. వుజ్బెకిస్తాన్‌లో బ్రిటన్‌ రాయబారిగా పనిచేసిన మురే ఫైళ్లను లీక్‌ చేశారు తప్ప హాక్‌ చేయలేదని, ఆపని చేసిందెవరో కూడా నాకు తెలుసు, అతన్ని కలుసుకున్నాను, అతను రష్యన్‌ కాదు, అక్కడ పనిచేసే వ్యక్తే అన్నాడు.

    నిజంగా హాకింగ్‌ చేసి వుంటే అమెరికా నాసాకు దానిని కనుగొని వెల్లడించే సత్తా వుందని అయితే అది హాక్‌ కాదు, లీక్‌ అయినందున ఆ పని చేయలేదని అమెరికా గూఢచార నిపుణులు భావిస్తున్నారు. రష్యా ఎన్నికలలో అమెరికన్ల జోక్యం గురించి 1996లో టైమ్‌ పత్రిక తన కథనంలో ఎలా జోక్యం చేసుకుందీ వివరించింది. దానిని అమెరికన్లు తోసిపుచ్చలేదు. కమ్యూనిస్టు అభ్యర్ధి జుగనోవ్‌పై రెండవ సారి కూడా ఎల్సిన్‌ గెలవాలని తాను స్వయంగా కోరుకుంటున్నానని బిల్‌ క్లింటన్‌ చెప్పినట్లు ఆయన దగ్గర పనిచేసి డిక్‌ మోరిస్‌ చెప్పినట్లు టైమ్‌ పేర్కొన్నది. ఎన్నికల సమయంలో స్వయంగా ఎల్సిన్‌తో మాట్లాడిన క్లింటన్‌ ఏమేమి చేయాలో కూడా సూచించారని డిక్‌ చెప్పాడు. క్లింటన్‌ జోక్యాన్ని ఆనాడు పుతిన్‌ వ్యతిరేకించాడని అయితే ఇన్ని సంవత్సరాల తరువాత ప్రతీకారం తీర్చుకోవాల్సినంత అవసరం ఏముందని కొందరు సందేహం వెలిబుచ్చుతున్నారు.

   ప్రపంచ రాజకీయాలలో అమెరికన్లకు అడ్డుకట్ట వేసేందుకు ఇటీవలి కాలంలో రష్యా తీవ్రంగా ప్రయత్నిస్తున్నట్లు అనేక వుదంతాలలో కనిపిస్తోంది. ముఖ్యంగా సిరియా విషయంలో అది బహిరంగమే. అదే విధంగా బ్రిక్స్‌ పేరుతో ఒక కూటమి, చైనాతో ప్రత్యేక సంబంధాలను ఏర్పరుచుకోవటం వంటి అనేక విషయాలను చూసినపుడు రష్యన్లు అమెరికాకు చెక్‌ పెట్టేందుకు ప్రయత్నిస్తున్నట్లు నిపుణులు వ్యాఖ్యానిస్తున్నారు. అటువంటపుడు డోనాల్డ్‌ ట్రంప్‌ను గద్దె నెక్కించటం ద్వారా రష్యా పొందే ప్రయోజనం ఏముంటుంది? ఆలోచిస్తే మరింత గందరగోళంలో పడిపోవటమే. అయితే అమెరికన్లు దీనిని ఇంత రచ్చ ఎందుకు చేస్తున్నారు అన్న ప్రశ్న వస్తుంది. ఎలక్టరల్‌ కాలేజీ ఓట్ల విషయంలో ట్రంప్‌ విజయం సాధించాడు తప్ప జన ఓట్లు హిల్లరీ క్లింటన్‌కే ఎక్కువ వచ్చాయి. తమ క్యాంపును నిలుపుకొనేందుకు డెమోక్రాట్లు రష్యన్ల జోక్యం గురించి ఎక్కువగా ప్రచారం, చర్చ చేస్తున్నారనేందుకే ఎక్కువ అవకాశాలు వున్నాయన్నది ఒక అభిప్రాయం. ఏ పార్టీ అధికారంలో వున్నప్పటికీ అమెరికన్లు సామ్రాజ్యవాదులు అయితే వారిని ఎదిరించి ప్రపంచ రాజకీయాలలో తమ ప్రాబల్యాన్ని పెంచుకొనేందుకు ప్రయత్నిస్తున్నారు రష్యాలోని పెట్టుబడిదారులు. అందువలన ఎత్తుగడలలో భాగంగాని అమెరికా రాజకీయ వ్యవస్ధను గందరగోళంలో పడేయటానికి గానీ జోక్యం వంటి చర్యలకు పాల్పడలేదని కూడా చెప్పలేము. ఏదైనా కొంత కాలం తరువాతే వాస్తవాలు బయటికి వస్తాయి. అప్పటి వరకు పండిత చర్చకు పనికి వస్తాయి.

Share this:

  • Tweet
  • More

Like this:

Like Loading...

Sanders and the Left After Super Tuesday

17 Thursday Mar 2016

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics, Opinion, USA

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

'Socialist' Bernie Sanders, 2016 US Elections, Bernie Sanders, Democratic party, U.S. president, US Left, US left politics

Why there is still hope and why the Left should rejoice and push forward

Brad A. Bauerly and Ingar Solty

While some have become skeptical, there are those – fromThe Nation
viaPolitico and Tom Cahill (U.S. Uncut) to Robert Reich – who are now saying that this is not the end of the line for Bernie Sanders U.S. presidential bid.

Not Me, Us!

And it is indeed true that we should remind ourselves that ever since the 1980s the Democratic party leadership has scheduled the primary season in ways that voters in more conservative states would go to the polls first in order to prevent leftist grassroots candidates from challenging the neoliberal party establishment. Keeping that in mind, it’s also true that pretty much all the upcoming states are way more favorable to Sanders than most of the ones that have already voted.

And it’s also true that only those will now despair who had somewhat unrealistic hopes with regard to what was actually possible Tuesday night. After all, despite all the Sanders momentum etc., another historic upset like the one in Michigan was unlikely.

Regardless of how critical one is of how the corporate media prefers to talk about polls and electability instead of about actual political issues, regardless of how the 2016 U.S. presidential election is taking place in a highly dynamic and ultimately unpredictable “populist moment” and regardless also of how incredibly wrong therefore FiveThirtyEight and other influential polling institutions were when it came to predicting Michigan, one must admit that the FiveThirtyEight predictions have been quite accurate in most of the previous states so far. And despite the come-from-behind momentum resulting from the Michigan boost, one could simply not expect another upset in the states that voted Tuesday night.[1] FiveThirtyEight’s predictions of Sanders victories, just based on their polls, were <1% in Florida, <10% in Illinois, <1% in North Carolina, only 3% in Ohio and 46% in Missouri. So in a way, it was rather surprising that Sanders even came so close to winning Illinois and Missouri, beating the delegate goals of the Clinton campaign.

End of the Firewall?

All in all, Sanders’ lost by big margins only in the two states where everyone knew he would. And although those two states increase Clintons’ lead by more than 70 delegates, Reich and others are correct when they note that the Democratic primary scheduling “firewall” for Clinton has now come to an end. In the upcoming states the situation looks much better for Sanders withFiveThirtyEight suggesting a Sanders win probability – based on the previous primary elections – of 40% in Arizona, 75% in Idaho, 82% in Utah (March 22), 91% in Alaska, 81% in Hawaii and 85% in Washington (March 26), 61% in Wisconsin (April 5), 80% in Wyoming (April 9) etc.

In other words, unless the corporate media message according to which the presidential bid of the leftist candidate – against whom both theNew York Times
and theWashington Posthave been fighting tooth and nail all along – ended last night leads to disillusionment, even lower millennial and working class voter turnout in the upcoming states etc., a Sanders comeback, which equals a continued presence of his extremely popular left social-democratic message, is not that unlikely and can and should be fought for. And Reich and others are right to point out that the majority of delegates are still in play – with big prizes like California (548 delegates) and Wisconsin (96 delegates) still to come. And if the momentum is back and the movement behind Sanders continues to further effectively deconstruct Clinton’s faux progressivism, “faux feminism”[2] and her zombie-ish electability myth (polls show that the probability of a Donald Trump or Ted Cruz presidency is much higher with a Clinton nomination), etc. then also the super-delegates will find it harder to support Clinton against the popular vote. And the left may find comfort in the fact that Sanders is actually still doing better than he ought to be doing according to at least one of the comprehensive three Sanders victory scenarios outlined byDailyKoslast month.

Nevertheless, yesterday obviously made things more difficult. Sanders’ come-from-behind momentum appears to have taken a brunt. And gone is the message that Clinton can only win the solid South (which – with maybe a few exceptions like Florida, Virginia and North Carolina – Democrats are bound to lose in the federal election anyway…) but hardly anywhere else, especially not in the Midwest/rust belt hard-hit by the highly unpopular free-trade agreements like NAFTA, CAFTA and TPP which Clinton embraced until she suddenly and without further explanation changed her mind on the trade issue in a blog post(!). So a successful Sanders nomination as the Democratic candidate in the 2016 presidential elections has become even more unlikely last night, for sure.

However, here’s why beyond this type of reasoning leftists should not be disillusioned. In the very narrow sense of success, i.e. a successful Democratic nomination, a Sanders victory was extremely unlikely from the get-go. No one, not even the wildest optimists among us, expected Sanders to even get this far last year. And this also appears to have been one of the reasons why many of his radical left-wing supporters today were initially very critical of his campaign when it started, not just because of some controversial foreign-policy stances or because of real “social-democratic illusions” (especially with regard to finance and banking reform) but especially because he was considered a catalyst of left-wing, anti-neoliberal grassroots mobilization for an eventual neoliberal Clinton presidential bid.

And even when the campaign developed what Loren Balhorn would have called Sanders’ “WTF?! dynamism” (if only the German publisher had let him get away with that), only the boldest (or most clueless) leftist observers ended up saying last week that they would once and for all declare Sanders to become the Democratic party nominee. Of course, we all have hopes and dreams. We would not be leftists if we didn’t believe in the possibility of sudden unexpected change. If history was left to the pollsters and ‘pundits,’ theOctober Revolution would never have happened. Still, we must remember that only an incredible mass movement can/could bring Sanders even close to winning the Democratic nomination.

Why Should the Left Rejoice?

First of all, in terms of the narrow question of a presidential bid, there is the fact that because of the far-reaching popularity of his unique left-wing social-democratic message there’s still hope to be generated from the fact that, as the polls show, Sanders still has the capability of building majorities both within the Democratic primary as well as in the federal elections in November. And even though he has commented that he wouldn’t run as an independent candidate because of how it would split the vote and possibly hand the election to the GOP, it is still a possibility. A possibility which presumably would depend on a mixture of how the dynamism plays out in both parties’ primary elections over the course of the next months and maybe also who is pushing Sanders in which direction. Generally speaking, with Trump having moved one step further in the direction of a Republican nomination Tuesday night by winning Florida (albeit losing in Ohio against the establishment’s new favorite candidate, John Kasich, as opposed to the tea party government shutdown leader Ted Cruz…) and with the Republican party establishment apparently being dead set on preventing Trump at whatever political cost, we might even see four presidential candidates in November. And obviously such a split in both parties would be highly beneficial to such a Sanders presidential bid, because otherwise the Ralph Nader 2000 trauma would be reawakened and it would be all Clinton vs. Trump.

“

The American left … has won by how the Sanders campaign politicized the usually completely depoliticized American presidential elections of neoliberal candidates of various shades vaguely promising ‘hope’ and ‘change’ and ‘conservative values’.”

However, the point why the global left should rejoice is, secondly, that all of these ifs-and-buts questions are really not even the most important ones. The main reason why the global left should rejoice is because the left in the U.S. will not only have won in case Sanders eventually wins, against all odds, the nomination and the 2016 presidential election (which, given the popularity of his message and the widespread hatred of Trump, he then probably would). The American left has already won no matter what happens next! It has won by how the Sanders campaign politicized the usually completely depoliticized American presidential elections of neoliberal candidates of various shades vaguely promising ‘hope’ and ‘change’ and ‘conservative values’. It has won by enforcing a debate about capitalism and its surface symptomology income and wealth inequality. It has won by pulling it out into the open how this obscene inequality is corrupting liberal democracy, how it has created an oligarchic power structure and how only a comprehensive strategy of conflict-oriented social movements at all levels – the workplace, the street, and the political/parliamentary system, i.e. a revolutionary realpolitik (Rosa Luxemburg) inside and against the state, which is aimed at shifting the balance of forces between capital and labour, can undo it. And it has won by clearly demarcating the divide between the left in the U.S. and the neoliberal wing of the Democratic Party.

Despite Sanders’ recent claim that he ran as a Democrat because it would give him greater media exposure and because they had an existing institutional structure, he clearly also did so to drive home just how neoliberal Clinton was and to reveal how a left Democrat could run. A very strong reason to keep hope alive in the Sanders camp is because of how he will continue to reveal this divide in the party. It is a real victory of this campaign in exposing what Sanders, based on decades of dealings with the party knows: that the DP is the main barrier to leftward movement in the U.S. and the true source of the neoliberal hegemony. By showing that it is possible to run as a socialist Democratic candidate and have a chance, Bernie has opened up future possibilities by exposing the rift in the party. In fact, we quite possibly will look back at this as the moment of the break with neoliberalism of the party. And Sanders’ run has also put the left on solid footing of attack if Hillary becomes the president. Again, this will take future work but it will be much harder to pass off future rightward drift as inevitable or just Democratic party business-as-usual with the divide in the party exposed. The background noise of future politics will always be: we had another path but chose this one. Conversely if Trump wins the left will also have a solid foundation to argue that his victory was due to the neoliberal drift of the Democratic Party and only a left Democrat could’ve/can stop the hard right in the future.

And finally, and this may be the most remarkable achievement, the American left has won by establishing Sanders’ concrete left-wing social-democratic and/or transformative transition demands in the American political landscape and imagination: single-payer health care, free public education, a federal living wage of $15/hour, the Workplace Democracy Act facilitating unionization, fundamental banking reform (even if focused on dismantling instead of socialization…). Hence, the American populace is now much more aware about the real tertium-non-datur alternative: A left-wing Social Green New Deal as a general, inclusive and solidarity-based high-road exit strategy from the crisis, which would re-shift the relationship of forces between capital and labour and could function as the most coherent entrance project to a post-capitalist future, or the global neoliberal unity coalition’s low-road exit strategy of austerity with further immiseration, nationalist exclusion and destruction of the public good.

All of this will not go away. Or rather, beyond carrying on the Sanders presidential campaign, the American left now has the opportunity (and, we think, obligation) to not let the Sanders mobilization eventually dissolve but integrate the millions of enthused, but often – not least because of their extremely young age – politically inexperienced Sanders supporters into (the already existing) social movements mobilizing around those concrete demands of “Medicare for all,” “Fight for 15 and a union” etc.

And in all of that, the Sanders movement is also a historic victory not only for the American left. Rather, the American left has given the world the greatest gift. And that is that, because of U.S. hegemony, the entire world has been watching how the anti-neoliberal left is now suddenly capable of building majorities around transformative transition programs. We cannot overestimate and should take pleasure in how this fact would send shivers down the spines of current and former third way social-democratic party leaders all across the core capitalist countries if only the Clintons, Blairs, Schroeders, Jospins, Zapateros, Hollandes, Gabriels, Renzis and Sánchez’ had spines. Yes, the entire world is watching how the anti-neoliberal left is now suddenly even moving into the direction of once again and realistically posing the question of (political) power – and not only in the “imperialist chain’s weakest links,” i.e. economically devastated peripheries with very, very little room for maneuvering such as Greece, but also in the very heart of the core capitalist countries and the American Empire.

Thus, the SYRIZA-Corbyn-Sanders freedom train continues zooming down the tracks. Its path is bumpy. To every up-hill there’s a down-hill. But it’s moving forward, and, despite it all, it’s moving forward fast. •

Brad Bauerly has his Ph.D. from York University and is an instructor in Political Science at SUNY Plattsburgh. His book on agriculture and U.S. state building will be out this summer.

Ingar Solty is a Fellow at the Berlin Institute for Critical Theory and a Fellow at the Institute for Social Analysis at the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. His most recent books areThe USA under Obama: Charismatic Leadership, Social Movements and Imperial Politics in the Global Crisis(Argument Verlag, 2013),New German Foreign Policy, the Crisis and Left-Wing Alternatives(Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, 2016) andAesthetics in a Changing Capitalism: Studies on the Politics of Culture in Fascism, Fordism and Neoliberalism(forthcoming, Argument Verlag, 2016 – all in German).

Endnotes:

1. It is also unclear what impact the recent violence at Trump rallies had in the primaries outcomes. While those on the left would like to believe that seeing protesters take on and challenge the xenophobic and racist atmosphere of those events we should also be mindful that many would see that violence and the potential for more in the future and run back into the arms of the neoliberal Democrats who they see as able to protect them.

2. Liza Featherstone, Ed.,False Choices: The Faux Feminism of Hillary Rodham Clinton, Verso Books, London/New York 2016.

This article First Appeared in socialistproject.ca

Share this:

  • Tweet
  • More

Like this:

Like Loading...

Is a “Socialist” Really Unelectable? The Potential Significance of the Sanders Campaign

07 Sunday Feb 2016

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

2016 US Elections, Bernie Sanders, CAPITALISM, communist, imperialism, Socialism, US Left

 

by GARY LEUPP

  • shutterstock_267790475

According to a survey taken by Pew Research Center in late 2011, 49% of 18 to 29 year-olds in this country had at that time a positive view of socialism, whereas only 43% viewed it negatively. (For older people, the negative figure was 60%.) The same poll showed that this age group was more inclined to view capitalism negatively (47%) than positively (46%).

I have not seen an updated poll but doubt that many youth have become more supportive of the existing system in the several years since.

These figures surprised the researchers, but they should not be so hard to explain. The main reason is surely the failure of capitalism to better young people’s lives or give them hope. The collapse of manufacturing, the scarcity of good jobs, the high costs of education and crippling college loan debts, poverty that keeps them at home with their parents—that’s what capitalism means to them.

The Occupy Movement (beginning three months before this poll was released) drew dramatic attention to income inequality; its most enduring legacy is the popularization of the awareness of that staggering statistic Bernie Sanders keeps repeating: one-tenth of the top 1% controls 90% of the country’s wealth. Views are surely also affected by the receding impact of Cold War brainwashing, the sort inflicted on people of my generation from childhood via such insidious anti-Soviet propaganda as the Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons.

(I’m quite sure my first exposure to words like “capitalism” and “imperialism” were in those conversations between the animated trench coat-wearing spies Boris and Natasha. In those days, in this country, the very term “capitalism” was avoided due to its use by communist critics; “free market economy” was the preferred euphemism.)

Post-Cold War Revival of Interest

Then (when I was in my 30s) the Cold War ended, suddenly, unexpectedly, with the fall of the Berlin Wall, the collapse of Soviet client regimes in Eastern Europe, the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and dissolution of the Soviet Union. This complex series of events was, in this country, generally depicted as an “inevitable” collapse of a “system that failed.” Neocon theorist Francis Fukuyama crowed that capitalism had decisively triumphed; he even pronounced “the End of History.”

This was of course a response to the Marxist conception of capitalism as one mode of production, with an origin in time, and a terminus in time, just like other antiquated modes of production including slavery and feudal serfdom. A system that produces the basis for collective ownership of the means of production and for state planning designed to serve the needs of the masses. Marx did not think socialism would be the “end of history,” but that it would—over an indeterminate span of time—produce ever greater equality and ultimately lead to a classless society (communism). He (echoed by Lenin) envisioned the ultimate “withering away of the state” and was perhaps optimistic about the prospects of attaining that end within a century or so.

Mao Zedong more realistically suggested that the transition from socialism (in which, he emphasized, classes and class struggle continue to exist) to communism would be a tortuous path with ups and downs, including periods of capitalist restoration. In any case, in the Marxist view, the “end of history” is anything but the triumph of capitalism. It is the end of the human record as a chronicle of class struggle, which began with the emergence of class division in the Neolithic period (following at least 100,000 years in which modern humans were not divided into classes and lived in a state of “primitive communism”). It is the beginning of (and return to) classless society.

If that long-term ideal and prognosis seems unrealistic, so in Marx’s time television, nuclear weapons, space travel, the mapping of the genome, would all have seemed hard to imagine. The human mind is capable of spectacular achievements. Surely the construction of an egalitarian society is among them, and in the short term, at least, the construction of a society far less unequal, less unfair and less misery-producing than capitalism.

The cocky declarations of capitalism’s triumph have, post-2008, given way to more sober evaluations of the contradictions within the system, and at least tacit recognition that is will be crisis-prone for the foreseeable future. Youth need not be steeped in Marx or his vision of historical change to at least be attracted by this much-vilified “socialism” (of some stripe) as an alternative. As the World Social Forum organizers say: another world is possible.

The Sanders Phenomenon

Perhaps Sen. Bernie Sanders read about the Pew poll in 2011 and began to think that it might be feasible to run for president a few years later, specifically as an unapologetic “democratic socialist.” Perhaps he projected that he’d have the youth on his side. (Indeed, of the voters in the Iowa caucuses he received over 80% of the 18-29 year-olds’ votes.)

When Sanders announced his campaign for the Democratic Party presidential nomination last April, the pundits raised their eyebrows. A socialist? Interesting, they thought, mildly amused. They could not deny that Sanders was a popular senator, and for the most part mainstream politician serving in Congress for a quarter of a century; he had to be indulged, treated with a modicum of respect.

Clinton supporters in the Democratic Party however, including Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.), Rep. Steny Hoyer (Md.), and Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), by September were openly questioning Sanders’ “electability.” But as Sanders’ star rose and crowds mushroomed, he met with greater recognition as a potential threat to the system’s (favored) candidate who was expecting a coronation. Hillary Clinton started to attack the senator’s record on gun control; Sanders replied he had a D- rating from the National Rifle Association. She had her daughter Chelsea charge (in Iowa on Jan. 12) that his health care plan would “strip millions and millions and millions of people of their health insurance”—an accusation quickly and easily refuted.

A poll released on Jan. 12 showed Sanders leading Clinton in the Iowa primary 49 to 44 per cent (up from 40 to 51 on Dec. 15). So it was definitely time to make the S-word an issue. On Jan. 19 David Brock, the head of Clinton’s super-PAC “Correct the Record,” appeared on Bloomberg TV to gravely address “the elephant in the room.” “He’s a socialist,” growled Brock.  “Think of what the Republicans will do with the fact that he’s a socialist in the fall.” (The Sanders campaign responded that Brock is “a mud-slinging, right-wing extremist” who tried to destroy Anita Hill, the African-American woman who 25 years ago accused Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment as Congress considered his nomination as Supreme Court justice.)

Brock followed up on Jan. 21 by claiming ridiculously that “black lives don’t matter much to Bernie Sanders.” The same day, “Morning Joe” on MSNBC highlighted Sanders’ self-identity as a socialist, featuring a clip of Clinton-supporter Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) declaring: “I think it would be absolutely impossible for a self-declared socialist to win states like Missouri.”

But on his program, Joe Scarborough (former Florida Republican Congressman) surprisingly declared he thought it quite possible Sanders could win, to the evident consternation of a Clinton supporter among his guests firmly declaring Bernie to be unelectable. Co-host and daughter of Cold War strategist Zbigniew Brzezinsky, Mika Brzezinsky, just looked puzzled as usual.

Flipping the channel I watched Chris Cuomo, son of the New York state governor and super-opinionated co-host of CNN’s “New Day,” interrogating another Democratic strategist about the popularity of a “self-avowed socialist” and radiating indignation.

Cuomo seems even more alarmed now, after the virtual tie in Iowa. You just want to tell him: “Look at the Pew polls, you clueless child of privilege and power, who uses your cushy job as a pulpit as a ‘journalist’ to channel Clinton campaign talking points. Don’t go so apoplectic. Young people don’t share your revulsion at socialism. A lot of them like the idea.”

The South Carolina “Firewall”

But let us assume that this line of attack, emphasizing the “unelectability of a socialist in America” becomes intensified over time. It likely won’t work in the New Hampshire primary, where Sanders is better positioned to win than he was in Iowa. (And the jury’s not really even out yet on the result of the Iowa contest.) Hillary’s hurting, but her campaign posits the South Carolina primary as her “firewall”—a sure victory after a likely setback in New Hampshire.

African-American MSNBC anchor Joy-Ann Reid (and open Hillary supporter) has been opining that Sanders would have a hard time “as a white, elderly socialist from a liberal state” to win the South Carolina primary. But you have to wonder. If young whites in Iowa stunned the pundits, might not young blacks in South Carolina do it too? Is Reid suggesting that African-Americans are more disposed to love capitalism than others in this country, and to prefer 68-year-old white Wall Street women to a 74-year-old socialist white man? Because the Clintons have done so much for the African-American community?

The Sanders campaign might be able—in its direct, matter-of-fact way that strikes many as refreshingly honest—to point out that when Hillary was a Goldwater Republican (in college in 1965), Bernie was organizing civil rights protests with the Congress of Racial Equality and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. He doesn’t wear his Civil Rights credentials on his sleeve though. They were part and parcel of his youthful commitment to his particular conception of socialism.

The campaign could point out that the Clintons have hardly on balance contributed to racial justice in America, considering that the massive wave of incarcerations of young black men for victimless crimes in this country surged during the Bill Clinton presidency, leading to the current state of affairs in which there are more young African-Americans in prison, not only than young blacks in college, but more than young blacks in slavery in 1860. (It’s worth mentioning too that Hillary’s signal achievement as Secretary of State was the U.S./NATO-led destruction of North Africa’s most affluent nation, Libya, resulting in a vicious wave of racist attacks on various black African communities. She’s done so much for black people!)

One should not assume that black voters in South Carolina are so enamored of the Clintons that they will ignore such issues, while recoiling from “socialism.” The history of ostensibly socialist movements is in fact filled with African-Americans, including Harry Haywood, D. E. B. DuBois, Huey Newton, Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael and many others. The celebrated poet Langston Hughes was a self-described socialist and prophet of revolution. Dreams deferred, he wrote, might explode.

Among the most prominent and respected African-American supporters of Bernie Sanders is Cornel West, formerly a professor at Harvard and Princeton and now at the Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Author of the best-selling Race Matters (1994) and many other works, he is a Christian philosopher who studies the prophetic tradition in the African-American Church and integrates aspects of Marxism into his thought. He is a leader of the Democratic Socialists of America.

Like Sanders, he inveighs against the mainstream media, understanding this to be an arm of corporate America, leveling his sharpest attacks on the cable channel most slavishly devoted to the Democratic Party establishment.

“MSNBC and company—this is the Karl Rowanization of black journalists,” he declared recently, referring to Carl Rowan, the African-American journalist in the 1960s who had his own TV show and whom West calls “the most honored mainstream Negro of his day.” (Rowan attacked Malcolm X and disparaged Martin Luther King. He served the power structure that employed him, as does anchor Joy-Ann Reid in her unabashed allegiance to the Goldman-Sachs candidate Hillary.)

West, who on his Facebook page calls Sanders “a long-distance runner with integrity in the struggle for justice for over 50 years,” clearly believes that Sanders can win significant support among African-Americans in the South Carolina primary, maintaining momentum and defying those whistling in the dark about his “unelectability.” And one can predict that the more threatening Bernie becomes, the more raised eyebrows, knitted brows, and worried frowns will appear on the faces of media “experts,”  “news analysts” and “senior correspondents” whose training does not allow them to see things as they really are.

Let them (as MSNBC’s least-liked anchor Chris Matthews has been doing)  lecture the Bernie kids on how he’s just an idealistic “revolutionary” whereas Hillary, while sharing the same basic goals, realizes (given her maturity and vaunted “experience”) that change has to be “evolutionary”—as though there have been consistent, positive, incremental changes in the world due to her efforts over the last two decades. Let us see how effective this arrogant condescension will prove.

A Teaching Moment

This could be a teaching moment. Let us suppose that as Bernie is more and more barraged with such primitive red-baiting and the supporters simply get more whipped up. In Iowa 43% of likely voters identified themselves as socialists (whatever they meant by that) according to a January poll. When you tell people who don’t share your tired old Cold War blinders, and are attracted to a self-described socialist, that they can’t really be serious, that they can’t really expect to win, because…well, there’s just too much opposition to socialism—you just might provoke some heated debate. A national conversation about what socialism entails might finally become possible. That would be a good thing.

A lot of people on the radical left—which is where I locate myself—have focused their attention on trashing Sanders as just another bourgeois politician, not a “real” socialist but someone trying to mobilize the youth vote (as Obama did in 2008) to maintain the Democrats in power. Some argue that he’s a “sheepdog” herding his followers ultimately into Hillary’s camp. (This view presupposes of course that she is the inevitable nominee.)

Those questioning his socialist credentials (and his call for a “political revolution”) argue that he is really campaigning for the system.  He’s hoodwinking the people.

Some examples. Osborne Hart, Socialist Workers Party candidate for mayor of Philadelphia, declares, “Capitalism is the problem workers face. Sanders’ platform is for reforming capitalism. The SWP points to the example of the Cuban Revolution, where working people overturned capitalism.”

The Socialist.Worker website similarly contends: “We need to win the new left born out of Occupy, public-sector union struggles and the Black Lives Matter movement to breaking with the Democratic Party and building an electoral alternative as a complement to struggle from below. Bernie Sanders’ campaign inside the Democratic Party is an obstacle to that project.”

Steven Argue of the Revolutionary Party warns, “The left and working class in general has much to lose by backing Bernie Sanders…a scoundrel faux socialist, war monger, and supporter of America’s brutal police.”

The Revolutionary Communist Party contends: “The Bernie Sanders campaign—like those of every candidate who the ruling class allows to be taken seriously—essentially takes as its starting point stabilizing, strengthening, and ultimately enforcing the whole structure of a world dominated, exploited, and oppressed by the U.S. empire. And telling people that those interests are their interests.”

And: “Throw off your blinders and get into BA [RCP chair Bob Avakian]!  A whole better world really is possible and you need to be part of the solution and not—like Bernie Sanders—part of the problem.”

What is more important now: sectarian sniping or popularizing an ideal?

Reading these ringing declarations by left sects, I think to myself: What is more important? To broadcast to people what they already know—that Sanders’ conception of “socialism” is really Scandinavian-style capitalism (capitalism with a “human face”) and not socialism in the Marxian sense, which results from the overthrow of the capitalist class?

Or: to note and appreciate the historical significance of Sanders’ campaign in returning the very term “socialism” to public discourse and emboldening people to openly identify with a concept anathema to Wall Street, the 1%, and the entire (widely hated) political establishment?

Cornel West appears to choose the latter option. This is all the more interesting in that he has been friendly for years with the RCP that’s trashing Bernie while West stumps for him. The irony is that the above-mentioned Avakian owes West big time.

Chairman Bob left the U.S. in 1980 for Paris and was not seen again in public until, with great fanfare, his party announced in 2003 that he had given talks on the East and West Coast and that these were available for purchase on DVD. It was not clear then or now that Avakian had permanently returned to the U.S. from Paris; the RCP refuses to comment on his whereabouts. But since few had seen him for twenty-three years, his sudden reappearance if only on video was a cause of jubilation among his followers.

Cornel West wrote words of praise for Avakian (as a “long-distance runner in the freedom struggle against imperialism, racism and capitalism”) that appeared as a blurb on the cover of his autobiography published in 2005. (Notice the similarity to his recent description of Sanders.)

He signed a statement in 2007 that appeared in the New York Review of Books—“Dangerous times demand courageous voices. Bob Avakian is such a voice.” The expensive ad was essentially designed to show anyone interested that Avakian had lots of well-known friends and that if the state went after him, they would have his back.  Many intellectuals asked to sign, including Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky (not to mention myself), politely declined, noting that Avakian was under no specific legal threat and that the ad seemed designed to imply that he was in order to get signers to publicly aver that they “have come away from encounters with Avakian provoked and enriched in our own thinking,” declare that his “ability…to freely function” was “a concern,” urged that people “engage with the thoughts of Bob Avakian and bring them into what needs to be a rich and diverse dialogue,” and “[serve] notice to this government  that we intend to defend” Avakian’s rights “to freely advocate and organize for his views.”

West was one of the signatories. West also urged support for RCP bus tour in 2012 designed to promote Avakian and interviewed him for a PRI radio program in 2013.

But the slowly resurfacing Avakian hadn’t given a public talk since 1980. As I understand it, the plan was for a dramatic Second Coming at a prestigious venue in the company of well-known public intellectual. Thus in November 2014 West joined Avakian for a “dialogue on revolution and religion” at the historic Riverside Church in Harlem. An overflow crowd heard the long-winded Avakian preach for two hours, interrupted increasingly by calls from the crowd for him to wrap up and let West take the podium. West spoke about half an hour, and then there were questions from the audience.

It wasn’t really a dialogue, and had little analytical content, but that was probably not the point. “BA”—as he’s affectionately called by adherents of his cult (officially, the “culture of appreciation, promotion and popularization” of a man the RCP officially describes as “a rare and precious leader” who as “as simple fact” is the only person who could have developed Marxism such that “today being a communist means following Bob Avakian and the new path that he has forged”) had shown that he was real and ready for prime time.

In sum: West has helped midwife the public rebirth of BA, who thinks Sanders is in the enemy camp. But West is a far firmer ally of Sanders than he is of “the rare and precious leader.”

Who’s got blinders on?

What does it tell us that even the public intellectual closest to the RCP—someone who longs for a revolutionary uprising as much as Avakian—is implicitly denounced by the RCP as “part of the problem” by supporting Sanders? It shows that the party is totally out of touch with reality. All it can do is say “drop your blinders and get into BA!”

And the other radical left sects tend to similarly dismiss or attack the Sanders campaign as being short of really revolutionary, really socialist. As though there’s any party out there really rooted in the masses, able to develop what Mao called the “mass line”—any party whose burning potential is being stymied by Bernie’s sudden popularity!

West’s endorsement of “Brother Bernie” is in his words “not an affirmation of the neo-liberal Democratic Party or a downplaying of the ugly Israeli occupation of the Palestinians” (which Sanders has not significantly opposed). Of course not. It’s a gamble that Sanders’ ongoing attack on Wall Street and open acknowledgement of a “democratic socialist” identity will lead to an electoral victory that will curb the power of the top stratum of capitalist parasites and diminish the prospects for more imperialist war.

Such a result would not (of course) constitute socialism. It would not mean a real “revolution” in the Leninist sense. It might be a replay of Roosevelt and the New Deal (a series of measures largely designed to prevent a revolution in this country in the 1930s). But should we prefer to that outcome a victory of a Clinton or Cruz—-on the premise that such a presidency would exacerbate social contradictions to the point where the people (under the leadership of rare and precious leaders leading tiny sects whose rank-and-file members spout rhetoric they themselves hardly understand) will rise up in a repeat of the Bolshevik Revolution?

In 1980 at age 24, already filled with contempt at the whole U.S. electoral process and viscerally opposed to any participation in it, I compared Carter and Reagan and hoped Reagan would win. Because I thought Reagan would so provoke the masses by his vicious cuts in social spending and his crazed Cold War mentality that his election would hasten the day of the needed revolution. I was overly optimistic and badly mistaken.

These days I think that the election of a Cruz or Rubio—idiots who could easily trigger more war in the Middle East, North Africa or Ukraine, while abetting the further concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, immiserating more millions—could possibly produce a revolutionary situation, where (to paraphrase Lenin) the old system can’t continue in the old way, the masses can’t live in the old way, and there is revolutionary leadership. But I don’t hope for the election of either; the prospect indeed fills me with dread.

Because I see no genuinely revolutionary party on the horizon remotely capable of effectively communicating with, much less leading the masses. I only see left sects trailing after each new mass movement, like Occupy or Black Lives Matter, striving to lead, recruiting a few new followers here and there, but more often than not alienating those they seek to influence by their wooden dogmatism, antiquated rhetoric, personality cults, lack of strategy and (often) the haggard zombie-like affect of their members trying to recruit.

On the other hand there is Sanders, a European-style social democrat calling for a “political revolution” and energizing the young generation to support him. In U.S. political history, this is not insignificant. Nor is it principally a bad thing. The Sanders campaign, whatever else it is, is a sign that young people are becoming okay with (some concept of) socialism. That can only be good for those seeing themselves as advocates of “real” socialism.

Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University, and holds a secondary appointment in the Department of Religion. He is the author of Servants, Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan; Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan; and Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900. He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion, (AK Press). He can be reached at: gleupp@tufts.edu

This article First Published in counterpunch.org

Share this:

  • Tweet
  • More

Like this:

Like Loading...

Win or lose, the campaign is an opening for movements fighting inequality

05 Friday Feb 2016

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, International, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Readers News Service, USA

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

'Socialist' Bernie Sanders, 2016 US Elections, Bernie Sanders, Democratic party

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY NOMINATION RACE

Why the Bernie Sanders insurgency matters

Michal Rozworski, Derrick O’Keefe

Bernie Sanders’ achievement in Iowa, a virtual tie with Hillary Clinton, was one of the most remarkable electoral results in recent memory. Just as noteworthy as Sanders’ rise in the polls — he closed a 50-point gap in Iowa in just over six months — is the way his campaign’s themes and issues have resonated with a mass audience.

The core messages of the Sanders campaign, once scoffed at or derided when they were expressed by Occupy Wall Street, have become common sense for millions of people.

This is especially true among young people. Sanders won a staggering 84 per cent of Democrats under 30 in Iowa.

For some time now, mainstream political commentators have been throwing everything but the kitchen sink at Sanders to dissuade primary voters from taking his campaign seriously. These pundits, presenting themselves as hard-headed realists while wagging their fingers, try to explain away Sanders’ growing public appeal. They are unwilling, and seemingly unable, to look fairly at what the campaign is proposing and how that might relate to people’s lives.

In other words, the pundits’ job is to distract from the things that really matter: the series of concrete ways that people’s lives could be be improved. Sanders’ meteoric rise, whatever else has helped bring it about, is a response to real inequality, stagnant incomes and bleak prospects for many Americans.

For an example of myopic punditry, take a look at how Canadian writer Stephen Marche described a Sanders rally in Iowa late last year:

“Sanders’s exasperation was the principal fact to be communicated, more than any political content. Trump was about winning again. Sanders was about having lost. The vagueness of American politics is what astonished the outsider. It’s all about feelings and God and bullshit. Sanders actually uttered the following sentence out loud: ‘What we’re saying is when millions of people come together to restore their government we can do extraordinary things.’ Nobody asked what he meant. Nobody asked for numbers. They applauded. Better to take it in the spirit in which it’s given, like a Catskills resort comedian.”

You have to work pretty hard to so completely miss the content of a Bernie Sanders stump speech. The same core issues are there every time. And yes, policy proposals, granted ones presented in broad brushstrokes, are clearly enumerated. Even his triumphant speech in Iowa late Monday night relentlessly went through the issues, one by one. Each of these key points highlights ways in which real inequality manifests, and points (albeit in some cases not far enough) toward reform and remedies that will benefit real people. On all these issues, Sanders is offering more than the corporate money supported Clinton.

If the pundits and ideologues weren’t sowing so much confusion, it wouldn’t even be necessary to point this out.

$15 minimum wage

While some cities in the United States have recently raised their minimum wage, with some even planning to get to $15 within a few years, the inflation-adjusted minimum wage across most of the country is lower today than it was in the 1970s. Consider that. Four decades of economic advance have left the lowest paid worse off. Minimum wage workers today may have iPhones, but too many are barely making ends meet for themselves and their families.

Of course, simply raising the minimum wage won’t be enough.

Sanders’ call for a nationwide $15 minimum wage is an integral part of his message that inequality is not natural but the result of policy choices and power. Raising the minimum wage is not only about restoring something ephemeral like dignity, but also about slowly swinging the pendulum of power back towards workers.

Of course, simply raising the minimum wage won’t be enough. Less than 10 per cent of U.S. workers are members of a union today. Reinvigorating the labour movement in a way that brings power back to the grassroots will have to happen for more substantive change. Bernie’s push for a $15 minimum wage across the United States and his focus on the need for greater participation and democracy could help push this more transformative change forward.

Universal health care

At the surface, the U.S. health care system is marked by a huge contradiction: the country manages to both spend the most on health care among developed countries and do very poorly on a raft of health measures.

Bernie Sanders’ championing of universal public health care exposes the simple cause of this disparity: the network of private health insurers, private health providers, pharmaceutical companies and army of consultants who all profit from the unequal and rationed delivery of what should be a human right.

Universal health care would immediately impact the lives of millions of people. The drama of not having coverage or having the wrong kind of coverage or not having enough to pay for a deductible or even just the small dramas of navigating the maze of forms, payments and providers — all of these would be alleviated with the social democratic cure of a universal public service.

When the media reduces Sanders’ program to economic inequality, it glosses over the many social and other inequities that are deeply intertwined with economic inequality. Poor health, for example, is a highly racialized issue. Just look at the enormous gaps in life expectancy and other measures.

Health and economics aren’t separate, and one can’t be reduced to the other, but a system where income and wealth go disproportionately to the 1 per cent while tens of millions don’t have access to health care at all and untold millions have inadequate care only reproduces and deepens deep divisions.

Free public college

Maybe it’s not such a mystery why young people overwhelmingly prefer Sanders to Hillary Clinton.

It might have something to do with his key campaign proposal of abolishing tuition fees at all four-year public universities and colleges in the United States. In fact he’s already put the idea forward, introducing legislation in the Senate for new federal spending on postsecondary education, to be supplemented by state-level funds.

When faced with accusations that free college is unrealistic, Sanders blasts back by listing all the European countries where free tuition has already been introduced. He also calls for relief of student debt, which has become a nationwide crisis. (Even 40-something Republican presidential contender Marco Rubio talks about how he only recently paid off his student loans.)

Students, and the many young workers who can’t afford to be students, would appear to be perfectly rational political actors in flocking to Sanders.

Progressive taxes

Sanders’ pledges to expand and universalize services are matched by his willingness to talk about paying for them. If inequality has grown and public services have deteriorated, it is because money has been flowing upwards and sticking rather than being redistributed.

Delivering a full range of universal services will require more people to pay more in taxes.

New income and wealth do go disproportionately to the top 1 per cent and less of the population, as Sanders doesn’t shy from repeating. Any social democratic program will need to reverse this flow. Sanders has proposed higher income taxes on the wealthy, closing loopholes for investment income and taxes on Wall Street speculation to this end.

The senator from Vermont has broken the consensus on the anti-tax, pocketbook rhetoric that has dominated politics in the United States and elsewhere — rhetoric that is the home turf of everyone from Hillary Clinton to Ted Cruz. Delivering a full range of universal services will require more people to pay more in taxes and a redirection of resources away from waste such as the military and corporate subsidies.

A truly different economy will require far more democratic participation. Talking about the wealthy paying more, saying that it is “too late for establishment economics” and inching towards greater contributions from most for social(ized) goals, Sanders has opened an important debate.

Taking climate change seriously

It’s one of the most repeated applause lines of Sanders speeches: Climate change is real, humans are causing it, and we have a moral responsibility to act to mitigate it.

Sanders has one the support of many prominent activist campaigners including 350.org’s Bill McKibben.

This statement is maddeningly obvious, but it’s a direct response to the ongoing climate denialism of the Republicans, a party that is one of the last bastions of this retrograde nonsense on the planet.

But as an early champion of climate issues, however, Sanders has one the support of many prominent activist campaigners including 350.org’s Bill McKibben. What’s more, his general rhetoric is matched by leadership in opposing specific fossil fuel megaprojects. Whereas Clinton waited years to take a position against the Keystone XL tar sands proposal, Sanders took a strong stand against it early on, helping push the Obama administration to their eventual rejection of the pipeline.

Political revolution

These measures, and other needed measures that go beyond the limits of Sanders’ campaign, require deep political transformation. Contrary to the typical rhetoric of presidential candidates, Sanders has made this reality central to his campaign.

His campaign is not a manicured, media-driven effort to sell a progressive product.

Sanders’ call for “political revolution” is the glue that holds his program together and differentiates him from other upstart Democrats of the last decades. His campaign is not a manicured, media-driven effort to sell a progressive product. He seems to genuinely understand and want to inspire grassroots political mobilization. He will not turn decades of economic degradation into engagement for a truly democratic economy over the course of a presidential campaign, but it is hard to say that his campaign cannot bear fruit for the U.S. left.

Two moments stood out from Bernie’s speech in Iowa Monday night. The first was his finger pointed at the camera early on, calling out the media for willfully misrepresenting his campaign. Then there were his closing remarks, which echoed the common theme of political revolution, imploring those interested in his campaign to join actively.

These simple messages are the stuff to build off on in his campaign: we have to take on powerful interests and we have to do it actively.

Far from being just a lament for what has been lost, Sanders’ campaign has stoked new hopes and energized new political constituencies. Millions of people can see that there is, as the campaign slogan says, “a future to believe in.” But this future won’t be delivered by one politician; this future can only be fought for and won by millions.

This article first appeared in ricochet.media

Share this:

  • Tweet
  • More

Like this:

Like Loading...

Why People Around the World are Rooting for Bernie Sanders

01 Monday Feb 2016

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Opinion, USA

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

2016 US Elections, Berni sanders, Democratic party, Populists

BY PARMINDER JEET SINGH
The United States is as good a democracy as any other in formal terms but there has been a great amount of despair about the actual control its citizens exercise over the country’s political institutions and policies. Between them, two political parties divide up the US political spectrum, creating a narrow zone of elite consensus within which politics is allowed to play. The stranglehold of big business over election finance, aided by some significant court decisions, helps fix the boundaries of this elite consensus.But then democracy has a way of throwing up surprises. The 2016 presidential election is different from earlier contests because of the way in which this widely resented elite consensus is being challenged from left and right. In this sense, both Donald Trump, the by-now famous Republican hate-monger, and Bernie Sanders, the challenger to Hillary Clinton’s bid for the Democratic Party’s nomination, represent a similar political impulse. A huge public sentiment, in its primordial form, is trying to defy the limits that the elite consensus affords people – turning the primaries into a battle between elitism and populism.

Populists appeal directly to strongly felt hopes and fears. And it is here that the resemblance between Trump and Sanders ends abruptly. Trump is seeking to make capital of people’s deep fears and anxieties. Sanders, on the other hand, is appealing to what remains of the American people’s hopes of getting a fair and just deal in society.

Sanders presents a simple pitch based on three clear socio-economic issues, and a political one. He promises free healthcare, free higher education (primary education being already free) and a decent minimum wage, for all. He is unhesitant in saying that for achieving these he will indeed raise taxes, though the bulk of the money will come from taxing the top fraction of a percent. And he provides figures to back his proposals. The core political element of his programme is that he promises to ‘really’ clamp down on corporate influence over politics and political funding. The fact that he takes no funds from the big corporates makes his claim credible among voters.

What makes Sanders’ programme attractive to poor and middle class America is the growing inequality in the country. But the humanistic logic of his four key demands is winning him a following even among those who may not be the ‘biggest gainers’ of his proposed reforms – eg. white, college-educated, young men.

If the rest of the world is waiting eagerly for the results of the first Democratic Party primary in Iowa on Monday, it is because of this humanist and idealist content of Sanders’ campaign. The next primaries are in New Hampshire, where the polls show the ‘socialist’ Sanders leading Clinton. Although these are the only two states yet where Sanders is giving such a strong challenge to Clinton – and the latter stays comfortably ahead in country-wide  opinion polls – the results of these first two states have historically given an important boost to whoever wins them.

What Sanders means to the world

Apart from the economic and political influence that it exercises globally, the US has a strong ideological impact on the world too. American soft power has been especially devastating in terms of its export of neoliberal ideology, wherein corporates are the preferred vehicle for economic activity, even in the social sector, with the role of governments relegated to smaller and smaller niches.

If Bernie Sanders becomes the next president of the United States, free health, education, and a decent minimum wage – and a clear message to big business to rein in its economic greed and political aspirations – can be expected to become strong elements of US national policy. This will hit at the very heart of the neoliberal global establishment. It could significantly weaken this establishment’s ideological strength, which it currently packages so well that it has been able to sell it successfully to a very big part of the global population, especially the middle and aspirational classes.

Now, if a font of such an alternative discourse, as anchored by Sanders’s campaign, erupts from the very epicentre of the global neoliberal order, it could have a strong cascading effect. What Sanders demands may already be standard fare in many European countries but social services there are wilting under the pressure of austerity.  For developing countries, making free health and education and decent minimum wages for all the responsibility of the state can become the cornerstone of a new politics.

Of course, the fate of Sanders is not known and one ought not to give the possible result of the presidential election in the US any disproportionate or implausible weight in term of our political futures. Even if it comes to pass, such a favourable result will be the child of its times – with its complex social and political realities – and its possible global impact would also be tempered by that context. But we must remember that politics and history do not follow linear logics. Iowa on Monday may well open a new chapter in the global struggle for a more just and equal world.

Parminder Jeet Singh is with IT for Change, a Bengaluru based NGO

This article First Appeared in The WIRE.in

Share this:

  • Tweet
  • More

Like this:

Like Loading...

Recent Posts

  • బికినీతో చేతులు కాల్చుకున్న కాషాయ దళం : రు.600 కోట్ల క్లబ్బులో బ్లాక్‌బస్టర్‌ ” పఠాన్‌ ” సినిమా, కంగన , అసోం సిఎం పైసా ఖర్చులేని ప్రచారం !
  • దేశమంతటా మోడీ డాక్యుమెంటరీ ప్రదర్శనలకు పిలుపు, ఏక్షణమైనా నిషేధం విధించే అవకాశం ?
  • జిన్‌, జియాన్‌, ఆజాదీ – నాడు షా, నేడు అలీ ఖమేనీ పట్ల వ్యతిరేకత, ఇరాన్‌లో చరిత్ర పునరావృతం కానుందా !
  • చివరకు మిగిలేది ఆయాసమే : నిషేధంతో మరింత కిక్కిస్తున్న బిబిసి డాక్యుమెంటరీ, రంగంలో మోడీ సేన !
  • సంచలనాత్మక బిబిసి డాక్యుమెంటరీ – బ్రిటన్ను ఖండించలేని నిస్సహాయ స్థితిలో నరేంద్రమోడీ !

Recent Comments

raghuveer on తైవాన్‌కు మరిన్ని అమెరికా అస్త…
Raghuveer on గుజరాత్‌ ఘనత మోడీదైతే హిమచల్‌…
Raghuveer on అమెరికా సబ్సిడీలు – ఐరోప…
Raghuveer on అదానీ కోసం కేరళలో బిజెపితో సిప…
Hanumantha Reddy San… on ప్రపంచాధిపత్యం కోసం అమెరికా త‌…

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015

Categories

  • AP
  • AP NEWS
  • BJP
  • CHINA
  • Communalism
  • Congress
  • COUNTRIES
  • CPI(M)
  • Current Affairs
  • Economics
  • Education
  • employees
  • Environment
  • Farmers
  • Filims
  • Greek
  • Gujarat
  • Health
  • History
  • imperialism
  • INDIA
  • International
  • INTERNATIONAL NEWS
  • Japan
  • Latin America
  • Left politics
  • Literature.
  • Loksabha Elections
  • NATIONAL NEWS
  • Opinion
  • Others
  • Pensioners
  • Political Parties
  • Politics
  • Prices
  • Readers News Service
  • RELIGION
  • Religious Intolarence
  • RUSSIA
  • Science
  • Social Inclusion
  • Sports
  • STATES NEWS
  • Telangana
  • Telugu
  • UK
  • Uncategorized
  • USA
  • WAR
  • Women
  • Women

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Recent Posts

  • బికినీతో చేతులు కాల్చుకున్న కాషాయ దళం : రు.600 కోట్ల క్లబ్బులో బ్లాక్‌బస్టర్‌ ” పఠాన్‌ ” సినిమా, కంగన , అసోం సిఎం పైసా ఖర్చులేని ప్రచారం !
  • దేశమంతటా మోడీ డాక్యుమెంటరీ ప్రదర్శనలకు పిలుపు, ఏక్షణమైనా నిషేధం విధించే అవకాశం ?
  • జిన్‌, జియాన్‌, ఆజాదీ – నాడు షా, నేడు అలీ ఖమేనీ పట్ల వ్యతిరేకత, ఇరాన్‌లో చరిత్ర పునరావృతం కానుందా !
  • చివరకు మిగిలేది ఆయాసమే : నిషేధంతో మరింత కిక్కిస్తున్న బిబిసి డాక్యుమెంటరీ, రంగంలో మోడీ సేన !
  • సంచలనాత్మక బిబిసి డాక్యుమెంటరీ – బ్రిటన్ను ఖండించలేని నిస్సహాయ స్థితిలో నరేంద్రమోడీ !

Recent Comments

raghuveer on తైవాన్‌కు మరిన్ని అమెరికా అస్త…
Raghuveer on గుజరాత్‌ ఘనత మోడీదైతే హిమచల్‌…
Raghuveer on అమెరికా సబ్సిడీలు – ఐరోప…
Raghuveer on అదానీ కోసం కేరళలో బిజెపితో సిప…
Hanumantha Reddy San… on ప్రపంచాధిపత్యం కోసం అమెరికా త‌…

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015

Categories

  • AP
  • AP NEWS
  • BJP
  • CHINA
  • Communalism
  • Congress
  • COUNTRIES
  • CPI(M)
  • Current Affairs
  • Economics
  • Education
  • employees
  • Environment
  • Farmers
  • Filims
  • Greek
  • Gujarat
  • Health
  • History
  • imperialism
  • INDIA
  • International
  • INTERNATIONAL NEWS
  • Japan
  • Latin America
  • Left politics
  • Literature.
  • Loksabha Elections
  • NATIONAL NEWS
  • Opinion
  • Others
  • Pensioners
  • Political Parties
  • Politics
  • Prices
  • Readers News Service
  • RELIGION
  • Religious Intolarence
  • RUSSIA
  • Science
  • Social Inclusion
  • Sports
  • STATES NEWS
  • Telangana
  • Telugu
  • UK
  • Uncategorized
  • USA
  • WAR
  • Women
  • Women

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Social

  • View mannem.koteswararao’s profile on Facebook
  • View mannemkoteswara’s profile on Twitter

Recent Posts

  • బికినీతో చేతులు కాల్చుకున్న కాషాయ దళం : రు.600 కోట్ల క్లబ్బులో బ్లాక్‌బస్టర్‌ ” పఠాన్‌ ” సినిమా, కంగన , అసోం సిఎం పైసా ఖర్చులేని ప్రచారం !
  • దేశమంతటా మోడీ డాక్యుమెంటరీ ప్రదర్శనలకు పిలుపు, ఏక్షణమైనా నిషేధం విధించే అవకాశం ?
  • జిన్‌, జియాన్‌, ఆజాదీ – నాడు షా, నేడు అలీ ఖమేనీ పట్ల వ్యతిరేకత, ఇరాన్‌లో చరిత్ర పునరావృతం కానుందా !
  • చివరకు మిగిలేది ఆయాసమే : నిషేధంతో మరింత కిక్కిస్తున్న బిబిసి డాక్యుమెంటరీ, రంగంలో మోడీ సేన !
  • సంచలనాత్మక బిబిసి డాక్యుమెంటరీ – బ్రిటన్ను ఖండించలేని నిస్సహాయ స్థితిలో నరేంద్రమోడీ !

Recent Comments

raghuveer on తైవాన్‌కు మరిన్ని అమెరికా అస్త…
Raghuveer on గుజరాత్‌ ఘనత మోడీదైతే హిమచల్‌…
Raghuveer on అమెరికా సబ్సిడీలు – ఐరోప…
Raghuveer on అదానీ కోసం కేరళలో బిజెపితో సిప…
Hanumantha Reddy San… on ప్రపంచాధిపత్యం కోసం అమెరికా త‌…

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015

Categories

  • AP
  • AP NEWS
  • BJP
  • CHINA
  • Communalism
  • Congress
  • COUNTRIES
  • CPI(M)
  • Current Affairs
  • Economics
  • Education
  • employees
  • Environment
  • Farmers
  • Filims
  • Greek
  • Gujarat
  • Health
  • History
  • imperialism
  • INDIA
  • International
  • INTERNATIONAL NEWS
  • Japan
  • Latin America
  • Left politics
  • Literature.
  • Loksabha Elections
  • NATIONAL NEWS
  • Opinion
  • Others
  • Pensioners
  • Political Parties
  • Politics
  • Prices
  • Readers News Service
  • RELIGION
  • Religious Intolarence
  • RUSSIA
  • Science
  • Social Inclusion
  • Sports
  • STATES NEWS
  • Telangana
  • Telugu
  • UK
  • Uncategorized
  • USA
  • WAR
  • Women
  • Women

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • vedika
    • Join 234 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • vedika
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

    %d bloggers like this: