Philly and Beyond, Fighting the Corporatists

Bernie Sanders supporters in Wisconsin passed a resolution at the 2016 Democratic Party of the Wisconsin State Convention calling for an end to super-delegates and their power to select the presidential nominee.

They did so on the weekend before Clinton and the corporate media will declare the Sanders-Clinton race over on the basis of super-delegates' perceived preference, (Johnson, Wisconsin Public Radio) (Sommerhauser, Wisconsin State Journal).

Super-delegates are Democrats in Congress and other dead-end Party functionaries, who largely toe the establishment line to curry favor with the financiers and Party minions, (Hughes and Peterson, Wall Street Journal).

Clinton's continuing her impersonation of the comically insincere Selina Meyer of Veep, (HBO), has been consistent over the last year: Hillary Clinton is entitled to the nomination because Clinton has the super-delegates' imprimatur, (Halperin, Epstein, Aug. 28, 2015; (BloombergPolitics)).

There is no need for the Democratic Party presidential primary, Clinton's campaign implied. The unmentioned corollary is that voters could have just stayed home.

This coming Monday or Tuesday, Clinton's sentiments will be joined in a definitive manner by the corporate media who have polled the same super-delegates, and will declare Hillary Clinton as nominee, echoing the Clinton campaign's oft-repeated posture of last winter and spring.

That this scheme is in violation of Party rules is of no relevancy to Clinton.

The only way Hillary Clinton is going to win the nomination is when and if the super-delegates vote for her, and that is not taking place until the end of July [at the Democratic Party Convention]. A lot has been said in the Democratic primary about 'the rules being the rules.' I agree with that.

The rules are that the super-delegates do not count until the convention. Luis Miranda of the DNC made that abundantly clear himself last month.

Anyone who 'calls the election' on June 7th, be it the Clinton campaign or television networks, is knowingly and deliberately going against the very rules of the party, (King, CommonDreams).

Clinton—with Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz working for her with virtually the entire Democratic Party establishment—was able to run up the votes in states where Bernie Sanders could not compete. This does not confer any legitimacy to the presidential primary process.

The primary process was crafted for Clinton as the establishment's favored candidate, so this week's declaration by Bernie Sanders he is taking the fight to the floor of the Democratic Party Convention should be met by all reform-minded progressives as a vow to fight a thoroughly dishonest Hillary Clinton and the retrograde forces for whom Clinton fronts.

Clinton will tell the world that there is much more that unites Sanders' voters with Clinton than what divides Sanders' voters with Clinton.

Not if Sanders' voters are working for a change in which they can believe.

Hillary Clinton, Time to Bow Out and Take Wasserman Schultz with You

It's so much better for the Party if Bernie Sanders falls in line behind Hillary Clinton, say the commissars.

Is it possible for the two major political parties to be so out-of-touch? Right.

Clinton is an annoying troll and imperils the nomination of the stronger general election candidate, Bernie Sanders, against Donald Trump.

Clinton should leave politics, and Sanders and his supporters will clean up her mess.

Trump is going to be a more difficult proposition than the Democratic Party assumes.

Plenty of Time for Queen of Chaos to Self-Destruct

The American people should know: You don't have to vote for Hillary Clinton and the neo-con, neo-lib predations against the world.

Vote Bernie Sanders.

Sanders and supporters have denied Clinton winning the Democratic Party nomination with pledged/won delegates against all odds and against a rigged system. There is no way Clinton can win the nomination with pledged delegates.

If in late July at the Democratic Convention in Philly, superdelegates are so deluded or corrupt as to install Hillary Clinton, there is a fall-back position.

"The guys running the show in the Democratic Party are basically the funders --- and that's predatory banks, fossil fuel giants, war profiteers, and insurance companies," Jill Stein tells the BradBlog. "With the Democratic Party you see basically a 'fake left-go right' situation, where they allow principled, inspired campaigns to stand up and be seen, but they sabotage them when push comes to shove. That, unfortunately, is what we see go on right now with the Sanders campaign, which is making a valiant effort here to do the right thing and change the party."

Superdelegates want to run the show in Philly, then walk out and work for a Stein-Sanders ticket.

Of course, Hillary Clinton could do the decent thing and suspend her campaign, but I would not count on Hillary Clinton doing the decent thing.

Hillary Clinton: Ready or Not, 'I'm the Nominee'

Never have I seen politician so steeped in her own sense of entitlement for nomination to public office as Hillary Clinton.

And I've seen some beauts in Wisconsin where I live.

"I will be the nominee for my party," Clinton said in an interview this week with CNN's Chris Cuomo. "That is already done, in effect. There is no way that I won't be," (CBS News).

Of course, Clinton has acclaimed her entitlement to the nomination since at least last August when her campaign sent down the message the Democratic Presidential Primary race is over, (Halperin, Epstein, Aug. 28, 2015; (BloombergPolitics)).

Whether Clinton is so pathetically lost in ego, (I mean "Ready for Hillary," who wrote that one?), that Clinton sees herself as a historical figure without which America cannot survive or Clinton is just another power-hungry junkie looking to line her pockets installed by another corrupt political party, it may be voters in the nine primaries and caucuses left to be decided want their voices heard and their votes counted.

Americans can be funny about hanging onto the last vestiges of democracy.

It may be the $100 million-plus amassed by the Clintons about which they are close-lipped will see Hillary Clinton destroyed as a nominee in the next eight weeks. See How Hillary and Bill Clinton Parlayed Decades of Public Service into Vast Wealth, (Gross, Fortune) and (Jilana, AlterNet).

It may be Clinton's militarism will finally come to light: "From her First Lady of Arkansas days on, she has been a gung ho supporter of nearly every military adventure that the United States has undertaken – until, as always happens, they take such a sour turn that there is no percentage in continuing to defend them," notes Andrew Levine at CounterPunch.

Or Hillary's racism.

It may well be people are striving for better than let-your-children-fight-my-wars Hillary Clinton and the fix of the Democratic Presidential Primary by Debbie Wasserman Schultz, and will not vote for Clinton, should she be successfully installed as the nominee.

I am striving for better, and I won't vote for Hillary Clinton under any circumstances.

Advice to Hillary Clinton: Reign in Wasserman Schultz and Dem. Insiders

Only Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party could screw up a general election against Donald Trump.

Facing an outright fascist like Trump, Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz decided the most effective communication to emit this week is to blast Bernie Sanders and the millions of Sanders advocates without whom any Democratic Party nominee is doomed.

Sanders, a life-long civil rights activist, understands the principle that without the people, especially the under-30 folks, (aka our future), no elected representative enjoys legitimacy or delivers effective public policy.

Public policy takes on heightened significance when considered in light of the fact our planet likely has passed a tipping point in the climatic change forcing event in which we load our atmosphere with emissions from fossil fuels, (with consequences made worse by associated feedbacks), (Hansen et al, Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics).

Republicans have no regard for democratic, classical liberal niceties such as voting rights, one person/one vote principles, (Reynolds v. Sims (1964)), popular support, and open and transparent government, all of which are needed to combat suicidal special interests as a polity.

Republicans today seek at all levels of government to undermine popular influence on public policy, and at the same time voice support for a statist, authoritarian jurisprudence explicitly rejecting individual rights. And of course Republicans reject climatic science, and seek to eliminate the very mention of the topic in state government ruled by this science-adverse and corrupt Party, (Bence, WUWM Radio).

So, Hillary Clinton advocate and surrogate, DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, decided the wisest course forward is to undermine democracy in the already deformed Democratic Party Presidential Primary, and more explicitly repeat the lies coming out of Nevada in an attempt to directly undermine Bernie Sanders' run for the presidency.

That Sanders is a champion for sustainable energy is not lost on Bernie Sanders' supporters, (Sanders on Energy Policy, Sanders on Climate Change).

Anyone telling you the race for the Democratic nomination for the presidency is over is kidding you. In eight weeks anything can happen, and Hillary Clinton and the DNC would not be trying to undermine Sanders if they believed otherwise.

Clinton and Wasserman Schultz should be focusing their energies on the future of our planet, not so much on defaming supporters of the guy championing science and the biosphere against lunatic-fringe special interests.

Sanders' Movement Kills Insiders, Can Realign American Politics

Not too late for Hillary Clinton to say 'bye-bye.'

Since declaring his run nearly a year ago, Bernie Sanders proclaimed his intention to build a powerful force for change in American politics and garner the nomination of the Democratic Party.

Sanders has achieved his first objective bringing in the younger voters who must turn out if the Republicans are to be defeated in the U.S. Senate and in a long shot defy the Republican-gerrymandered House.

Against this progressive movement, Nicholas Confessore notes today:

[h]undreds of the party’s 'superdelegates' have endorsed Mrs. Clinton, a signal of her broad support among the party’s power brokers. The Democratic National Committee now relies on Mrs. Clinton’s fund-raising to provide a fifth of its monthly income, an arrangement the Sanders campaign has criticized.

And Mrs. Clinton is well positioned to block any proposals she would not want to defend in a general election. In January, the party chairwoman, Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, appointed dozens of Clinton supporters and advisers to the three standing committees of the Democratic Party convention. Of 45 potential members submitted by Mr. Sanders, she appointed just three ...

Since tying Sanders in Iowa, Clinton and her surrogates have called for her coronation in a repulsive display of the very anti-democratic, moneyed interests-rule maladies that Sanders has openly denounced.

Clinton has moved dramatically towards the FDR-Ike-LBJ domestic policy consensus harnessed by Sanders, but Clinton remains a corporatist in her outlook.

"I think what divides us is the understanding on the part of millions of people who are supporting my candidacy that it really is too late for establishment politics and establishment economics. We have to deal in very substantive way with income and wealth inequality. We need to understand that we are the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all people, not to provide paid family and medical leave. We have to deal aggressively with a corrupt campaign finance system which allows big- money interests to buy elections. Those are areas I think of difference,” Sanders said Sunday on Meet The Press.

The argument advanced by Clinton's campaign that Sanders must now submit to the rigged Democratic Party primary is ludicrous.

To expect millions of Americans to disenfranchise their power is not only ridiculous, it is dangerous and risks a sure-thing victory of the off-the-charts Republican Party.

If come July 25-28 at the Democratic Party convention in Philadelphia and Sanders is not the nominee, Clinton will have to earn Sanders and millions of Americans' support by moving away from her neo-con and Wall Street alliances that Clinton still hides from scrutiny.

What Hillary Clinton does not get is these alliances are the problem.

Democratic Party Freezes Out Grassroots in Wisconsin, Nation

Updated - Someone should ask U.S. Rep. Ron Kind (D-La Crosse) why the national and Wisconsin Democratic Parties (DPW) are shutting out grassroots primary challenges against congressional incumbents.

WisPolitics is holding a luncheon for Rep. Kind to discuss policy issues at The Madison Club, 5 East Wilson Street in Madison at 11:30 a.m.-1:00 p.m. on March 29 next Tuesday.

Rep. Kind is facing a tough primary challenger in retired teacher Myron Buchholz (D-Eau Claire).

Kind is chair of the corporatist New Democrat Coalition and a champion of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) 'trade' agreement now before Congress.

Buchholz opposes the TPP and is making the loss of manufacturing jobs and campaign finance the centerpiece of his campaign. Buchholz launched his congressional run in February.

One would think in progressive Wisconsin, in the tradition of Bob La Follette, voters should pick their representatives, not Party bosses.

Candidate Buchholz found out the Democratic Party bosses protect entrenched incumbents like Kind, who has received over $16,000 from the Koch brothers, (Craver, The Capital Times).

Money Talks, La Follette Walks

Democratic Party of Wisconsin (DPW) Chair Martha Laning is protecting Kind and the special interests funding his six-figure gig as a nine-term member of Congress.

Laning tells the Democrat in good standing, Myron Buchholz, that the DPW's voters' list, (Voter Activation Network (VAN)), will not be made available to Buchholz for his challenge to Rep. Kind, (Blogging Blue), (Cognitive Dissidence).

It's about money.

The money from the Koch brothers is nothing compared to the top four special interest sectors forking over money to Kind—Insurance, Pharmaceuticals/Health Products, Health Professionals and Securities and Investment—who have collectively donated over $391,000 in the 2015-16 election cycle alone, (Open Secrets, Center for Responsive Politics).

As of Dec. 31, 2015, Kind had over $2 million on hand and raised well over $1 million in 2015-16.

Name of the Game Is Money from Special Interests

Kind and the DPW are not unique. Shutting out, and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) hopes shutting down, grassroots challengers is a national phenomena.

"The Florida Democratic Party will not allow me access to our party's (voters') database and software because I am running against an incumbent Democrat," said Florida congressional candidate, Tim Canova (Fulton, Common Dreams). Sounds familiar.

Canova is mounting a grassroots challenge against the six-term congresswoman and chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Florida).

Message from the DNC, Schultz and the Party insiders' favorite, Hillary Clinton, to challengers fighting special interests is clear: Get lost, (Iannelli, Broward-Palm Beach New Times).

[Note: Breaking news out of Florida: "After being denied access to an important voter file that could help his campaign, Democrat Tim Canova, who is challenging incumbent Debbie Wasserman Schultz this August, will now get access to a campaign tool called the Voter Activation Network (VAN)," (Perry, Florida Politics).]

Missouri and other states report similar challenger obstruction by the state's Democratic Party.

"(N)ews outlets in Missouri reported last month on the fight over VAN access in that state, 'several Democratic candidates—who are also Ferguson movement leaders,' were blocked from the files by the state party. As one of the candidate's campaign managers put it, 'The sign almost says, 'Newcomers need not apply.'"

The DNC has become a funnel for special interests and Myron Buchholz and Tim Canova are not the right kind of special. The kind with a dollar sign and six figures to donate for services rendered.

This begs the question of Kind, posed by Myron Buchholz, which side are you on, Ron Kind?