Dean Obeidallah has been hammering on this same theme, that Democrats need to get angry and stand up for the 99%. And not just advocate for the people, but actually put it into law, like FDR and LBJ did. Now, we have to push just to get our Constitution back.
Yes, and citizens united pushed Democrats to focus more on fund-raising and less on hell-raising. Therein lies the problem, and the solution is to reverse that strategy.
The very idea of democracy involves and invokes populism. Populims, populare is the voice of the people. it is how power is obtained,
But all we have seen so far is right wing populism, The Center right has stuffed down, demonized left wing populism, the real populism of the people.
Right wing populism plays to fears, anger, bigotry and you aren't disentitled they convince you that you are,... by use of lies and scapegoats.
scapegoats of races, sex, gender, religion
Clinton and his Third Way neo Liberals turned the Democratic party into the Republican Lite, and they have lost to populist outrage, and their solution is more of the same.
When you are digging your own grave....stop.
The idiots have learned nothing of the last election, it was pure Third Way neo Liberal, Kamala stayed away from cultural war issues, focused on the economy as did Biden to no avail.
There is truth in the Democratic big tent though, America has had with political correctness. Anyone notice that Trump is going after DEI with no blowback or pushback, even intruding into non governmental instutions and corporations.
The problem with the Democratic big tent, it is was full of groups and people demanding attention that their cause was paramount and all others subordinate.
It started when Fredrick Douglas told Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, that women's suffrage would have to wait, the vote of black men was more important, and liberals have been at it every since.
Meanwhile the right puts aside it's squabbles and unites for the cause and wins.
We sorely need a populist like AOC and Sanders, even Warren, but less threatening to the right and more charismatic. AOC has charisma, but she is Latina and female, and after all this is still racist,misogynistic America and we have to deal with reality, not our druthers.
I voted Democratic in the last three elections, just to vote against Trump, but Democrat is not part of my identity. I've tested those online ideological purity tests, and frustrate them every time, and the only way they can peg me is radical
For lack of a label I consider myself a progressive radical.
Take immigration, the stereotypical "liberal" version is come one, come all, welcome to America.
Not so fast I say, there are cultures, and people are viral carriers of cultures, that are inimical to and actually destructive of the liberal, open, western culture.
And they should be recognized, harmless in small quantities, like guests who respect the host until they are large enough to take over the house and neighborhood.
And then there are the Latino's. Ultra conservative, religious, misogynistic, woman demeaning, homophobes, once naturalized and assimilated they are natural conservatives and tend towards theocracy and the authoritarianism of the Republican party.
Take the case of Mayra "Flores, TX 34th, a naturalized citizen that came here illegally, an anti immigrant, misogynistic, theocratic, homophobe.
An honest discussion is needed without intranecine name calling and threats
Regardless, someone's feelings are going to be hurt, someone is going to feel left out.
Trusk controls America, and is remaking it in their own image, not because the Democratic party was too "woke". it is because it has been too timid and corporate, but not corporate enough for the corporations who support the Republican party, Heritage Foundation, Federalist Society and of course the Christian Churches from the Catholic down through 7th Mountain Dominionism, New Apostalic Reformation, to LDS and So. Baptists.
If the Democratic party continues it's Third Way bullshit, it will wind up as any second or third party in Russia, Hungary, Turkey.. for show only.
Who is rejecting potential alies Daniel? Who are these potential allies?
And is potential ally a 5th columnist
Mehmet II besieged Constantinople with the worlds largest cannons made by a Hungarian named Orban, probably Victors ancestor, to no avail. Constantinople fell because an ally did not want to die for the Emperor and showed Mehmet a secret entrance.
Babylon fell to Cyrus because the gates were opened from within.
Richard III fell to Henry VII because Lord Stanley held back his troops.
And nothing,nothing at all will happen, Trump doesn't give a crap about Signal gate, you know my opinion it was a set up a distraction, a bright shiny thing to throw at the crows.
As regards Elon Musk, he will press on doing what he wants to do, he has other plans, like using our country as an ATM to Occupy Mars.
Republicans may sound like they are pushing back , but have you ever pushed a piece of paper.
It is all performance, Trump and Musk will do what they damn well want to do, because they still have a 47% approval and that is their base.
the Nazis received 43.9% of the vote in the March 1933 election, and 92.1% in the November 1933 election. ,Trump is already 3 points ahead of Hitler, even after he has essentially destroyed the government, and maybe that is the reason.
I wish, I do wish Daniel, that with all of this noise, hull a baloo something would happen, but face it almost half of America slobber over this cretin.
The institutions aren't holding anmore than than they did in Germany in 1933, and Hitler had 43.9% of the vote. Trump had 47% and still does.
The institutions are afraid, they have cowed and kissed the ring, foot or ass, even law firms, the media, corporations.
Politicians are spineless critters, the first requirment of being a politician is to be malleable as dough.
Either the system will self destruct, and that will happen but it will take time, or it will be destroyed from without, and then MAGAts will rally the nation under "patriotism" and anyone who resists will be a traitor, or it will be destroyed early on before it is really set in concrete by a mass uprising, but the days of translition, politics, change by votes are over.
yup. I agree. The human brain is perhaps the most habituated organ among Animalia. We joke about lemmings, but we are purposeless lemmings, afraid of critical thinking because it appears to be just too much effort. We are in a resurgence of the reptile brain taking over the tiny bit of fight/freeze/flee reasoning that most 'murkans are addicted to. Norepinephrine is a massively powerful narcoitc produced inside the human endocrine system. It is more powerful than Muck's obvious habituated horny impulses. As a biologist, it appears more and more each day that this is the only way the quantum field can cleanse itself of chaotic bipolarity. Evolution is not ethical or moral. There are been literally a billion different species (excluding viruses) on this planet that have come and gone. We no doubt will be next.
This is the second time this has come up today. Meidas says Fox News just attacked tthem in a media business journal called Semafor.
I see it as potential defamation of trade libel -- I advised Meidas to "sue them when they defame you." Extremely vulnerable. $787.5M in largest ever defamation settlement with Dominion Voting Systems. Must face Smartmatic $2.7 billion defamation claim.
When you sue them, you get millions in free publicity.
Meanwhile Fox shareholder derivitive suit: Plaintiffs the New York City Funds and the State of Oregon in this shareholder derivative action against certain directors and officers of Fox Corporation. In connection with Fox News’ propagation of unfounded, defamatory conspiracy theories concerning the U.S. presidential election of 2020, the action alleges breach of fiduciary duties for: (1) the adoption of an illegal business model by which Fox News pursues profits by committing actionable defamation; (2) the lack of good faith efforts to establish systems or practices for minimizing, mitigating, or monitoring defamation risk; and (3) inaction in the face of red flags of defamation risk.
"Moderate Democrat"? Joe Manchin? Kyrsten Sinema? Plenty of other examples in Washington and state houses around the country. How have they worked out for you, Third Way geniuses?
I read your piece on Ayn Rand this morning in RawStory. I remember my dad giving me a book about her. My father went from union member to sitting at the Business Roundtable for a dozen years. He built Nuclear power plants and coal refineries. It was the Reagan/Bush years. I read the first two chapters and thought what a crazy malignant narcissist psychopath. Psychopaths are calculated and charming, as they stick a knife in your chest with a smile. Sociopath are knee jerk reactors. She was fucking nuts. I think it's one in four in this country has a personality disorder.
My point is the lack of empathy you describe is pathological. What is so dangerous as we have witnessed throughout history, this cycle repeats itself. Is this a choice or organic? I don't know.
Too many humans have the attention span of a fly. I'm gobsmacked how fucking stupid humans can be. I've been screaming we have a low information voter/narcissistic problem. Republicans are bigoted, greedy, misogynistic asshats. The only religion they follow is Our Lady of Goldman Sachs. Dixiecrats never die. Strom Thurmond would be proud of today's racist motherfuckers in office.
Having been fiercely independent all my life, I cannot agree. We are not living on a coin. Earth is a sphere and has exponentially more 'sides' than a damned coin. We need to be fierce members of a conglomeration of millions of species, all of whom know much better how to survive and thrive as a unit than the addictied Homo sapiens' 'me first, me only.'
In my opinion the Democratic Party needs to let the next generation lead. Republicans should have brain MRIs and we need new party or independent choices.
Today there's an election. In the House Democrats have the capacity to take or share power. The national security issue/ Signal/ Rule of law & due process, Musk and his Muskovites affects all of us.
Many Congressional Republicans are complaining.
We are moved by circumstance, and we need to pressure Congressional Republicans.
Citizens United, in particular, has made cowards of Democrats: the positions they should be taking are vastly unpopular with the oligarchs who fund their campaigns.
They are programmed to blithely join knife fights . . . knifeless.
The Rs on the other hand win with crazed [drugged fueled?] ad hominem balderdash.
They use it b/c, given DJT's serial business failures, that's all their "President of Pancake Makeup" offers the world. Vomitus. Loopy personal attacks.
Rs know he's a stupid man-child. They know he's utterly incompetent. And 100% corrupt.
He is soiling America like an adult diaper after a salad rinsed in Mexican tap water.
But they also know that the "suckers and losers" of the land, will eat that anger/madness up, due to the pain they feel day-to-day. Because, finally, they get to vent, to externalize their self-hate. They can act out like their Prez [in name only.]
And so, Americans' mental health has been shredded by a gaggle of irreligious jackasses, including at church, some with suspected perverse, sexual proclivities.
Unless arrested, the GOP is going to flat destroy the homeland.
Excellent!! Thank you for shining a light on the disastrous turn of the Clinton presidency, when the Democratic Party became the party of the wealthy. The end of New Deal liberalism, the New Society. The Obamas succumbed too. So disappointing. Thanks to an 83-year-old man, the inherent value of the social contract is coming back into focus. We're on the edge of a cliff. The Third Way cannot prevent a disastrous fall. March on April 5th!
Of the innumerable wise words Hartmann has put forth, the title of this piece pretty well sums all of them: "One Party's Selling a Big Lie; the Other Can't Sell the Truth"
This either makes for a call to sober consciousness, or a damning epitaph. It's going to be one of the two - which one, is upon our shoulders. You and me. Us.
I am getting sick of people thinking that Democrats just need to go more toward the center. Unfortunately, I was probably in the same boat until I started to educate myself about what is going on a number of years ago. I think that when we say that people are uneducated, it is often in the sense of what they understand about politics and government. If more people paid attention, they might start to vote for their own interests (instead of for billionaire propaganda).
Thanks for the Truth. Just sent this to my two Oregon Senators:
"You need to read today's Hartmann Report: "One Party’s Selling a Big Lie; the Other Can’t Sell the Truth". It reflects my feeling about the Democratic Party exactly. Dems don't stand for anything people can relate to and haven't since Bill Clinton abdicated the New Deal. Bernie is trying to show us the way back, but we don't seem to be listening. Until we do, MAGA will keep winning."
Unless Citizens United gets overturned we can continue to watch our democracy get flushed down the toilet. It is getting closer. Rich donors from both parties are hamstringing any attempt to change the conversation. Almost every congressman has a boat anchor tied to his ankle.
No more money in politics- it's a simple solution but difficult to execute.
We need to ask what the average age was at that Third Way retreat. They are living in the past and must have been drinking during our last convention. The younger Dems got it together there, and it sure as hell did not look like any corporation was running that show.
Go no further than Bill Maher for a Democrat that is too smart and rich to know better. He was invited to have dinner with Trump, and he is going!
Trump is a psychopath. Maher has tangled with him before---he won in court. Now he's back for more because he wants to what? Understand something about the right? There is nothing to understand when it comes to crazy. The only thing to understand about psychos is to STAY AWAY FROM THEM.
This cult of Trump has lost it's mind and lost it's way. They F'd Around and they are Finding Out. Democrats still have a moral compass.
In the meantime, just look at the people holding the signs. We are not finished with the work we started in the 60's. That included arguing with the "old guard" THEN. Thom and Bernie know; they were there.
Ah Bill Maher, a mixed bag, personal friends with Kid Rock, calls him by his name Bob, has him stay over at his house, Liked RFK Jrs, because he is opposed to masking and COVID, whine about cancel culture when it affected him, but doesn't care about book banning and right wing cancel culture, because it doesn't affect him (said so on TV)
He is anti Trump but not wholly anti Trumpism, as he posits himself a libertarian of sorts.
The one bone he gnaws at is transwomen, almost every show he has a comment or rant against trans, could it be because his girl friend, Ann Coulter, has an Adams apple.
If one of his guests wants Bill on his side during the show, all he or she has to do is say something about men in womens sports or bathrooms or mention the word trans.
Although he did rake Trump over the coals on his comment about transgender mice, when they were transgenic.
And I admit that his New Rules segment is worth watching.
The reason that Maher is so anti masking, and anti medical science, is because COVID cost him money, no live audiences because of masking, thus no laughter, and that cost him the precious attention his pathetic poorly formed narcissistic personality (and pocketbook) needs.
He shares a lot of Trump, both are narcissist that need attention and affirmation, and get easily wounded by rejection.
Nothing happened to him, he is just a self centered narcissist, only COVID and some social changes brought out who he is. As Maya D'Angelou said, when a person shows you who they are, believe them.
tHIS IS ONE OF THE BEST COLUMNS YOU HAVE SENT..... Keep up the good work. And I am one of those dems who ARE FURIOUS with the party-- and its lack of leadership. We must get REALLY ANGRY AND DEMAND ACTION..... So, thank you
Thom everything you say is right on the money. Because we are a nation of stupid people, we are going from the U.S. of A., to the U.S. of Humpty-Dumpty. Examples: a guy like Ralph Nader, who got everything right regarding all the bad wars and all the bad trade deals, runs for president four times and don't get more than 2% of our vote! Sanders voted against the Iraq war, Biden voted for the Iraq war, who did we choice? Instead of funding our elections by ''We the People'', we allow rich people and rich corporations, warmongers and tax bandits, to buy Wash. D.C. We burden our children with student loans discouraging many from getting an education, if that ain't stupid I don't know what is. No universal health care. We keep the I.R.S. toothless and barefooted so the rich can rob the eyes out of Uncle Sam's head. We have met the enemy, and he is us.
Dean Obeidallah has been hammering on this same theme, that Democrats need to get angry and stand up for the 99%. And not just advocate for the people, but actually put it into law, like FDR and LBJ did. Now, we have to push just to get our Constitution back.
But all of that was pre-citizens united. It's a different playing field now.
Yes, and citizens united pushed Democrats to focus more on fund-raising and less on hell-raising. Therein lies the problem, and the solution is to reverse that strategy.
The very idea of democracy involves and invokes populism. Populims, populare is the voice of the people. it is how power is obtained,
But all we have seen so far is right wing populism, The Center right has stuffed down, demonized left wing populism, the real populism of the people.
Right wing populism plays to fears, anger, bigotry and you aren't disentitled they convince you that you are,... by use of lies and scapegoats.
scapegoats of races, sex, gender, religion
Clinton and his Third Way neo Liberals turned the Democratic party into the Republican Lite, and they have lost to populist outrage, and their solution is more of the same.
When you are digging your own grave....stop.
The idiots have learned nothing of the last election, it was pure Third Way neo Liberal, Kamala stayed away from cultural war issues, focused on the economy as did Biden to no avail.
There is truth in the Democratic big tent though, America has had with political correctness. Anyone notice that Trump is going after DEI with no blowback or pushback, even intruding into non governmental instutions and corporations.
The problem with the Democratic big tent, it is was full of groups and people demanding attention that their cause was paramount and all others subordinate.
It started when Fredrick Douglas told Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, that women's suffrage would have to wait, the vote of black men was more important, and liberals have been at it every since.
Meanwhile the right puts aside it's squabbles and unites for the cause and wins.
We sorely need a populist like AOC and Sanders, even Warren, but less threatening to the right and more charismatic. AOC has charisma, but she is Latina and female, and after all this is still racist,misogynistic America and we have to deal with reality, not our druthers.
I voted Democratic in the last three elections, just to vote against Trump, but Democrat is not part of my identity. I've tested those online ideological purity tests, and frustrate them every time, and the only way they can peg me is radical
For lack of a label I consider myself a progressive radical.
Take immigration, the stereotypical "liberal" version is come one, come all, welcome to America.
Not so fast I say, there are cultures, and people are viral carriers of cultures, that are inimical to and actually destructive of the liberal, open, western culture.
And they should be recognized, harmless in small quantities, like guests who respect the host until they are large enough to take over the house and neighborhood.
And then there are the Latino's. Ultra conservative, religious, misogynistic, woman demeaning, homophobes, once naturalized and assimilated they are natural conservatives and tend towards theocracy and the authoritarianism of the Republican party.
Take the case of Mayra "Flores, TX 34th, a naturalized citizen that came here illegally, an anti immigrant, misogynistic, theocratic, homophobe.
An honest discussion is needed without intranecine name calling and threats
Regardless, someone's feelings are going to be hurt, someone is going to feel left out.
Trusk controls America, and is remaking it in their own image, not because the Democratic party was too "woke". it is because it has been too timid and corporate, but not corporate enough for the corporations who support the Republican party, Heritage Foundation, Federalist Society and of course the Christian Churches from the Catholic down through 7th Mountain Dominionism, New Apostalic Reformation, to LDS and So. Baptists.
If the Democratic party continues it's Third Way bullshit, it will wind up as any second or third party in Russia, Hungary, Turkey.. for show only.
Why reject potential allies?
Who is rejecting potential alies Daniel? Who are these potential allies?
And is potential ally a 5th columnist
Mehmet II besieged Constantinople with the worlds largest cannons made by a Hungarian named Orban, probably Victors ancestor, to no avail. Constantinople fell because an ally did not want to die for the Emperor and showed Mehmet a secret entrance.
Babylon fell to Cyrus because the gates were opened from within.
Richard III fell to Henry VII because Lord Stanley held back his troops.
One has to carefully vet their allies.
Republicans' calls for probe of Trump officials' Signal chat grow
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3r8d7q0200o
Senate Republicans want Elon Musk to stop talking about Social Security, and the Department of Government Efficiency to leave it alone.
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5204263-senate-republicans-elon-musk-social-security/
DOGE cuts spur more Republican pushback
https://www.axios.com/2025/03/12/house-senate-republicans-trump-doge
And nothing,nothing at all will happen, Trump doesn't give a crap about Signal gate, you know my opinion it was a set up a distraction, a bright shiny thing to throw at the crows.
As regards Elon Musk, he will press on doing what he wants to do, he has other plans, like using our country as an ATM to Occupy Mars.
Republicans may sound like they are pushing back , but have you ever pushed a piece of paper.
It is all performance, Trump and Musk will do what they damn well want to do, because they still have a 47% approval and that is their base.
the Nazis received 43.9% of the vote in the March 1933 election, and 92.1% in the November 1933 election. ,Trump is already 3 points ahead of Hitler, even after he has essentially destroyed the government, and maybe that is the reason.
Forest for trees. The point is that these people have had it......Besides the interest in patriotism, they hear it from constiuents and donors.
I wish, I do wish Daniel, that with all of this noise, hull a baloo something would happen, but face it almost half of America slobber over this cretin.
The institutions aren't holding anmore than than they did in Germany in 1933, and Hitler had 43.9% of the vote. Trump had 47% and still does.
The institutions are afraid, they have cowed and kissed the ring, foot or ass, even law firms, the media, corporations.
Politicians are spineless critters, the first requirment of being a politician is to be malleable as dough.
Either the system will self destruct, and that will happen but it will take time, or it will be destroyed from without, and then MAGAts will rally the nation under "patriotism" and anyone who resists will be a traitor, or it will be destroyed early on before it is really set in concrete by a mass uprising, but the days of translition, politics, change by votes are over.
yup. I agree. The human brain is perhaps the most habituated organ among Animalia. We joke about lemmings, but we are purposeless lemmings, afraid of critical thinking because it appears to be just too much effort. We are in a resurgence of the reptile brain taking over the tiny bit of fight/freeze/flee reasoning that most 'murkans are addicted to. Norepinephrine is a massively powerful narcoitc produced inside the human endocrine system. It is more powerful than Muck's obvious habituated horny impulses. As a biologist, it appears more and more each day that this is the only way the quantum field can cleanse itself of chaotic bipolarity. Evolution is not ethical or moral. There are been literally a billion different species (excluding viruses) on this planet that have come and gone. We no doubt will be next.
This is the second time this has come up today. Meidas says Fox News just attacked tthem in a media business journal called Semafor.
I see it as potential defamation of trade libel -- I advised Meidas to "sue them when they defame you." Extremely vulnerable. $787.5M in largest ever defamation settlement with Dominion Voting Systems. Must face Smartmatic $2.7 billion defamation claim.
When you sue them, you get millions in free publicity.
Meanwhile Fox shareholder derivitive suit: Plaintiffs the New York City Funds and the State of Oregon in this shareholder derivative action against certain directors and officers of Fox Corporation. In connection with Fox News’ propagation of unfounded, defamatory conspiracy theories concerning the U.S. presidential election of 2020, the action alleges breach of fiduciary duties for: (1) the adoption of an illegal business model by which Fox News pursues profits by committing actionable defamation; (2) the lack of good faith efforts to establish systems or practices for minimizing, mitigating, or monitoring defamation risk; and (3) inaction in the face of red flags of defamation risk.
BTW Newsmax had to pay $40 million to. Smartmatic
"Moderate Democrat"? Joe Manchin? Kyrsten Sinema? Plenty of other examples in Washington and state houses around the country. How have they worked out for you, Third Way geniuses?
I read your piece on Ayn Rand this morning in RawStory. I remember my dad giving me a book about her. My father went from union member to sitting at the Business Roundtable for a dozen years. He built Nuclear power plants and coal refineries. It was the Reagan/Bush years. I read the first two chapters and thought what a crazy malignant narcissist psychopath. Psychopaths are calculated and charming, as they stick a knife in your chest with a smile. Sociopath are knee jerk reactors. She was fucking nuts. I think it's one in four in this country has a personality disorder.
My point is the lack of empathy you describe is pathological. What is so dangerous as we have witnessed throughout history, this cycle repeats itself. Is this a choice or organic? I don't know.
Too many humans have the attention span of a fly. I'm gobsmacked how fucking stupid humans can be. I've been screaming we have a low information voter/narcissistic problem. Republicans are bigoted, greedy, misogynistic asshats. The only religion they follow is Our Lady of Goldman Sachs. Dixiecrats never die. Strom Thurmond would be proud of today's racist motherfuckers in office.
So very well said. We don’t need to be “Repugnican lite”, we need to be Democrats.
Having been fiercely independent all my life, I cannot agree. We are not living on a coin. Earth is a sphere and has exponentially more 'sides' than a damned coin. We need to be fierce members of a conglomeration of millions of species, all of whom know much better how to survive and thrive as a unit than the addictied Homo sapiens' 'me first, me only.'
In my opinion the Democratic Party needs to let the next generation lead. Republicans should have brain MRIs and we need new party or independent choices.
Today there's an election. In the House Democrats have the capacity to take or share power. The national security issue/ Signal/ Rule of law & due process, Musk and his Muskovites affects all of us.
Many Congressional Republicans are complaining.
We are moved by circumstance, and we need to pressure Congressional Republicans.
https://jerryweiss.substack.com/
Absolutely agree with all that!
Citizens United, in particular, has made cowards of Democrats: the positions they should be taking are vastly unpopular with the oligarchs who fund their campaigns.
April 5th is the day when everyone gets in the street and demands Democrats start telling the truth about this fascist regime!
Ds do not know the 1st rule of boxing. To wit:
- PROTECT yourself at ALL times.
They are programmed to blithely join knife fights . . . knifeless.
The Rs on the other hand win with crazed [drugged fueled?] ad hominem balderdash.
They use it b/c, given DJT's serial business failures, that's all their "President of Pancake Makeup" offers the world. Vomitus. Loopy personal attacks.
Rs know he's a stupid man-child. They know he's utterly incompetent. And 100% corrupt.
He is soiling America like an adult diaper after a salad rinsed in Mexican tap water.
But they also know that the "suckers and losers" of the land, will eat that anger/madness up, due to the pain they feel day-to-day. Because, finally, they get to vent, to externalize their self-hate. They can act out like their Prez [in name only.]
And so, Americans' mental health has been shredded by a gaggle of irreligious jackasses, including at church, some with suspected perverse, sexual proclivities.
Unless arrested, the GOP is going to flat destroy the homeland.
Excellent!! Thank you for shining a light on the disastrous turn of the Clinton presidency, when the Democratic Party became the party of the wealthy. The end of New Deal liberalism, the New Society. The Obamas succumbed too. So disappointing. Thanks to an 83-year-old man, the inherent value of the social contract is coming back into focus. We're on the edge of a cliff. The Third Way cannot prevent a disastrous fall. March on April 5th!
Of the innumerable wise words Hartmann has put forth, the title of this piece pretty well sums all of them: "One Party's Selling a Big Lie; the Other Can't Sell the Truth"
This either makes for a call to sober consciousness, or a damning epitaph. It's going to be one of the two - which one, is upon our shoulders. You and me. Us.
I am getting sick of people thinking that Democrats just need to go more toward the center. Unfortunately, I was probably in the same boat until I started to educate myself about what is going on a number of years ago. I think that when we say that people are uneducated, it is often in the sense of what they understand about politics and government. If more people paid attention, they might start to vote for their own interests (instead of for billionaire propaganda).
Thanks for the Truth. Just sent this to my two Oregon Senators:
"You need to read today's Hartmann Report: "One Party’s Selling a Big Lie; the Other Can’t Sell the Truth". It reflects my feeling about the Democratic Party exactly. Dems don't stand for anything people can relate to and haven't since Bill Clinton abdicated the New Deal. Bernie is trying to show us the way back, but we don't seem to be listening. Until we do, MAGA will keep winning."
Unless Citizens United gets overturned we can continue to watch our democracy get flushed down the toilet. It is getting closer. Rich donors from both parties are hamstringing any attempt to change the conversation. Almost every congressman has a boat anchor tied to his ankle.
No more money in politics- it's a simple solution but difficult to execute.
We need to ask what the average age was at that Third Way retreat. They are living in the past and must have been drinking during our last convention. The younger Dems got it together there, and it sure as hell did not look like any corporation was running that show.
Go no further than Bill Maher for a Democrat that is too smart and rich to know better. He was invited to have dinner with Trump, and he is going!
Trump is a psychopath. Maher has tangled with him before---he won in court. Now he's back for more because he wants to what? Understand something about the right? There is nothing to understand when it comes to crazy. The only thing to understand about psychos is to STAY AWAY FROM THEM.
This cult of Trump has lost it's mind and lost it's way. They F'd Around and they are Finding Out. Democrats still have a moral compass.
In the meantime, just look at the people holding the signs. We are not finished with the work we started in the 60's. That included arguing with the "old guard" THEN. Thom and Bernie know; they were there.
Each one teach one, people.
Ah Bill Maher, a mixed bag, personal friends with Kid Rock, calls him by his name Bob, has him stay over at his house, Liked RFK Jrs, because he is opposed to masking and COVID, whine about cancel culture when it affected him, but doesn't care about book banning and right wing cancel culture, because it doesn't affect him (said so on TV)
He is anti Trump but not wholly anti Trumpism, as he posits himself a libertarian of sorts.
The one bone he gnaws at is transwomen, almost every show he has a comment or rant against trans, could it be because his girl friend, Ann Coulter, has an Adams apple.
If one of his guests wants Bill on his side during the show, all he or she has to do is say something about men in womens sports or bathrooms or mention the word trans.
Although he did rake Trump over the coals on his comment about transgender mice, when they were transgenic.
And I admit that his New Rules segment is worth watching.
The reason that Maher is so anti masking, and anti medical science, is because COVID cost him money, no live audiences because of masking, thus no laughter, and that cost him the precious attention his pathetic poorly formed narcissistic personality (and pocketbook) needs.
He shares a lot of Trump, both are narcissist that need attention and affirmation, and get easily wounded by rejection.
Good take on Maher. I used to like him, I wonder these days what in the hell happened to him.
Nothing happened to him, he is just a self centered narcissist, only COVID and some social changes brought out who he is. As Maya D'Angelou said, when a person shows you who they are, believe them.
tHIS IS ONE OF THE BEST COLUMNS YOU HAVE SENT..... Keep up the good work. And I am one of those dems who ARE FURIOUS with the party-- and its lack of leadership. We must get REALLY ANGRY AND DEMAND ACTION..... So, thank you
Thom everything you say is right on the money. Because we are a nation of stupid people, we are going from the U.S. of A., to the U.S. of Humpty-Dumpty. Examples: a guy like Ralph Nader, who got everything right regarding all the bad wars and all the bad trade deals, runs for president four times and don't get more than 2% of our vote! Sanders voted against the Iraq war, Biden voted for the Iraq war, who did we choice? Instead of funding our elections by ''We the People'', we allow rich people and rich corporations, warmongers and tax bandits, to buy Wash. D.C. We burden our children with student loans discouraging many from getting an education, if that ain't stupid I don't know what is. No universal health care. We keep the I.R.S. toothless and barefooted so the rich can rob the eyes out of Uncle Sam's head. We have met the enemy, and he is us.