Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Clintonites draw the long knives

They've had enough of all this Sanders surging, and they're not going to take it any more.  From good old Ted's (he likes Bernie, don't forget) Facebook page, Tommy Christopher at The Daily Banter goes off his medication.

After a long summer spent feuding with #BlackLivesMatter and alienating Obama coalition voters, Senator Bernie Sanders appeared to be going in the right direction with black voters. He released a pretty decent racial justice platform, stopped telling people how his 1960s-era activism gave him a lifetime hood pass, and hasn’t openly pined for white voters in months. None of this appears to have translated in the polls, though, as Sanders’ support remains overwhelmingly white, so Bernie made some moves this week. 
First, he decided that drafting Dr. Cornel West as his most prominent black surrogate would somehow be a good idea, which would have worked if Sanders had a flux capacitor and a DeLorean set to 2007. Here in the present, Cornel West  is about as appealing to black voters as a Rand Paul lectureon black party identification. West has been among the most unhinged of Obama critics.

That's probably enough horse shit for anybody to have to consume for the rest of the week.  Christopher used to write for Mediaite, and links to himself nine times in those two paragraphs above.  Click on over to the original and you can quickly get the gist of what the Daily Banter and Christopher are all about by scrolling to the end of this frothing screed, and see what else they have been blogging about.

Whatever the Clintons are paying him, it ain't enough.

It's also pretty low-rent for one of her super PACs to have veered hard right in comparing Sanders to Venezuela's Hugo Chavez (RIP) and the UK Labour Party's Jeremy Corbyn, or for center-right Democrats to infer Corbyn is an anti-Semite in a redefinition of the term 'guilt-by-association', and conflate all of this into the usual Clinton surrogate slime-stew they are so effective at pumping out.

But hey, that's politics, as they say.  Right now these little skirmishes are just geek fights on social media and out-of-the-way places online like The DB and Brains and Eggs.  In a couple of weeks you'll start to see more of it as these smears bubble up to the various 24-7 Trump Channels (and you know which lamestream media outlets I'm talking about).

To paraphrase the name of the rabid super PAC run by the odious David Brock above, let's Correct the Record.  Here's a more even-handed interpretation of Dr. West and his motivations.  If you'd like to better understand why Clinton's cronies are so hysterically desperate to slow Sanders' growing support among blacks, here you go.  And last, the Democratic establishment has capitulated, and now wants to wade into the same plutocracy pool the Republicans have been scuba-diving in for a couple of years now.

I wrote in June that Bernie Sanders wasn't going to get the Democratic nomination unless he started to attract minority support from Hillary Clinton.  And that is precisely what her goons are now trying to prevent.  The South Carolina primary will be the ultimate test, but between now and next February -- just five months away -- the battle will be won or lost.

We just get to wait and see what develops.

Update: More on this emerging phenomenon of coordinated strikes on the Sanders campaign from Balloon Juice and No More Mister Nice Blog.

Monday, September 14, 2015

The Weekly Wrangle

The Texas Progressive Alliance knows that no one has a constitutional right to be a county clerk as it brings you this week's roundup.


Off the Kuff takes a look at the very high stakes of the voter ID appeal.

Libby Shaw at Texas Kaos, and contributing to Daily Kos, asks why the U.S. cannot have high speed rail that is common in Europe and Asia? Why? The do-nothing GOP, of course. Republican are why we can't have nice things.

Socratic Gadfly, linking to the first piece he has written for an in-depth philosophy and social sciences webzine, explores the parallels between Constitutional originalism and religious fundamentalism.

The best debate in the Houston mayoral contest happened last Thursday night, and PDiddie at Brains and Eggs blogged about it.

Texas Leftist agrees with President Obama; the economic future of the United States may soon be inextricably linked to the world's next great power player. Here's why it's time for Texas to take a new look at Africa. Plus some coverage as the Houston Unites campaign kicks into high gear.

WCNews at Eye on Williamson understands that the Texas GOP has a problem with health care. They hate it and it shows: Common sense conservatism is bad for your health.

JohnCoby at Bay Area Houston took note of Ted Cruz locking up the coveted Kentucky hillbilly vote.  "Lock up."  Get it?

TXSharon at Bluedaze caught the Texas Railroad Commission sitting on the lap of a fracker.

Egberto Willies documents more of the slow-but-steady rise of Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign.

Neil at All People Have Value was glad to see local outreach by the Harris County Green Party on Labor Day. APHV is part of NeilAquino.com.

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And here are some posts of interest from other Texas blogs.

A rally in Dallas tonight for Donald Trump will be preceded by a "Dump the Trump" protest march through downtown during rush-hour, according to Trail Blazers.

Juanita Jean unloads on Houston mayoral candidate Ben Hall.

Grits for Breakfast calls out Dan Patrick for misleading and incendiary rhetoric about crime and the police.

The TSTA Blog rebuts a Wall Street Journal op-ed on the recent SCOTUS charter school ruling.

Prairie Weather uncovers how America became the land of gross inequality and the home of dangerous coverups.

Steve Bates marvels at the self-realization of some Republicans that another government shutdown -- this time over defunding Planned Parenthood -- might not benefit their general cause.

Carol Morgan would like to know how to pronounce "Mission Accomplished" in Arabic.

jobsanger caught the YouGov poll that said 43% of Republicans would be in favor of a military takeover of the US government.

Liz Goulding looks back on three years of being a one-car household.

The Bloggess celebrated World Suicide Prevention Day.

And Fascist Dyke Motors is waiting on Alex Trebek.