Brilliant does not always equal good--or vice versa. This is good.

Obama has been a boon to the GLBT community, since he announced for his second term. And that is also a good thing.

Forgot to say: Sanders founded the House Progressive Caucus and chaired it for its first 8 years.

I believe the only reason he stopped chairing it was that he moved to the Senate, although he remains a member--the ONLY Senator who is a member of what is now know as the Congressional Progressive Caucus. I imagine he remained chair because that is what the Democratic members of the Caucus wanted.

Most or all of its members were Democrats. It grew from 6 or 7 founding members to around 100 at one point. Though it shrank, it is still considerable larger than the Congressional New Democrat Caucus, which has more Senators as members. But, again, what would members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus know about Bernie or about being Democrats, when compared with a few DUers?

First, the lie was that we supposedly wanted only a candidate who

agreed with each of us on every particular. Now the lie is we must be gun enthusiasts if we support one who voted yes on even one gun vote.

The tactics are a bit transparent. Well, much more than a bit.

Online petition for more Presidential debates.

This is a link to a post in the Populist Group. http://www.democraticunderground.com/12778582

If any host of this group doesn't want this cross post here, please let me know via pm. I will self delete immediately, no problems.

Online petition to the DNC for more Presidential debates.

Cross Posted from the Populist Reform Group

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12778582

Please sign Sanders' online petition to the Democratic Party for more debates.

As you may have been reading at DU and elsewhere, for whatever reason, the DNC has limited Presidential debates. One impact of this is to disadvantage candidates with less name recognition and/or less money to buy TV time. That description covers just about every Democratic Presidential primary candidate, with the exception of Hillary, who, going into the primary, had over 90% name recognition and hundreds of millions of dollars.

Another impact of limiting debates is depriving Americans of information about candidates and their positions on the issues.

None of those impacts seems very democratic (small d) to me. Therefore, I signed the petition. I hope that others will as well.

https://go.berniesanders.com/page/s/debates?source=em150605c



Coda: As some of you may know, I believe petitions to our elected officials are literally worse than useless. "Useless" because I don't think any elected official changes a single vote based on a smattering of calls, emails and online petitions. "Worse than useless" because some people see this as activism and also as evidence that government is responsive to them. I think both illusions are dangerous to the 99%. I do engage in such activities, but without any such illusions.

However, our online "signatures" may mean something to the DNC. Even if they don't, they'll mean something to Bernie and possibly to some of the other Democratic Presidential hopefuls as well. So, I signed.

Some historical highlights relevant to Populist Reform, Part 1. American Exceptionalism

Those who don't understand their history don't understand their present, either.

(Apologies to those who, like Edmund Burke and George Santayana, expressed related sentiments about history much more elegantly.)

American exceptionalism is not a myth. For one thing, the Americas comprised an entirely almost brand "New World," at least to white Europeans (not counting Scandinavians). After all, 1492 was not so far removed from 1607 (settlement of Jamestown).

For another thing, the USA was the first nation in modern times to make a conscious decision to overthrow a monarch-type ruler, create an entirely new nation and put power in the hands of citizens. Well, a few citizens, anyway.

In any event, those two facts are indeed exceptional, though we usually take them for granted today.


The new nation had multiple personality disorder, though. While there was pride in the new nation, Americans tended to look to England and France for things they considered classy (literally and figuratively), elegant, fashionable, refined, etc. All men were equal-but not women of any kind, and some men were considerably more equal than others. Not even all white men were equal in the new nation, only those white men who owned land and could afford to pay a poll tax. In 1789, that was about 6% of the total population.

Even all that was good for only a vote for a Congressional representative, who had less power than Senators, the Framers having been quite leery of the rabble. All other votes were in the hands of the electoral college (President) and state legislatures (everything other than President and Congressional representatives, including ratification of the Constitutional and its amendments).

Moreover, land grants had originally come from the King and colonial officials who tended to end up in state legislatures had formerly been appointees of the King or of colonial Governors who themselves had been appointed by the King. Only landowners could vote, and land grants had also originated from the King. Money and class were quite meaningful. The same people often, but, not always, had both.

The best modern example of the Boston Brahmin class, for example, came to me via a story from someone I met while taking a summer course at Syracuse. He came from a blueblood family that had long since lost its money.

He had mentioned to his impoverished DAR member grandmother that he had voted for JFK. She responded: "The Kennedys are shanty Irish, with a whiskey fortune. You did not vote for him and that is that." I guess looking down on someone else is the surest sign of your own superiority/exceptionalism?

What has all that to do with Populist Reform? Well, if none of the above seems to have any bearing on the USA of modern times, we'll just have to wait until I post a few more parts of this series.

Crap. They fixed Bernie's hair. I loved the wisps and straggles!

Now, the image on my tote is not accurate reflection of the new, trimmed hair.


http://www.redbubble.com/people/jrstees/works/14122148-bernie-sanders-for-president-hair?p=mug

Someone has already posted this link to the official Bernie store, amirite?

Clinton pays $850,000.