Tag Archives: Democratic primary

Bernie, Biden and the Billionaire

Uncategorized, , ,

Democratic presidential candidates are dropping faster than the hairs in Donald Trump’s comb-over.  In the past 24 hours alone, Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar both folded their tents and departed the battlefield…and despite a recent comeback, there is speculation that money problems will soon force Elizabeth Warren to join them in retreat.  

So much for the great diversity that once distinguished our Democratic roster.

After South Carolina, middle-of-the-road Democrats are putting all of their eggs in Joe Biden’s basket, rather conspicuously empty before S.C.  Now, it’s an unveiled rush to stop Bernie.

Warren will hang-on through Super Tuesday, picking up some delegates here and there, and should have some serious clout in negotiating the platform, come convention time, regardless of whether Bernie manages to weather the anti-Bernie scrum to secure the nomination.  If the Biden Bunch freeze out both popular progressives, they do so, not just at their own peril, but at the risk of ensuring Trump’s hate agenda gets another four years.

…And, what if Biden stumbles again and they push Bloomberg into the breach?

It’s easy enough for us old-timers to see how essential it is that we hold our noses and vote for the party’s pick, regardless of whom that might be; but it is shear self-delusion to expect such sangfroid from young voters who represent our best hope of decisively defeating Donald Trump this year.

Will the successful nominee have the presence of mind to choose Kamala Harris for VP?  I wouldn’t count on it.  

Our hallowed “two party system” and the imperial presidency it has engendered, seems to be careening toward its inevitable end.                                                                                                                                  ……………………………………………………………………………….

Imagine what four more years of Trump will look like.  I have. 

Trump will adopt some kind of goofy uniform to hide his shame at being a known draft-dodger. 

Using coronavirus as a lame-brained reason to exclude non-white immigrants,  he will, by ’emergency’ decree, finally close the border with Mexico. 

He’ll print a new denomination of paper money with his picture on it. It will have to be a HUGE denomination… a billion dollar bill has a nice ring to it.   That billion dollar bill will have roughly the value of a $100. bill after he finishes manipulating the currency. That way, plenty of billion dollar bills, with his picture on them, will be in circulation.  Free advertising!

After appointing a replacement for Ruth Bader Ginsberg, he’ll finally be able to do away with Obamacare, once and for all.  Instead we will be treated to his own personal product:“Great Care,”  from the newly formed entity, “Trump Insurance.”  It will replace Medicare, eliminate Medicaid and, of course, be mandatory…for a “nominal” fee.  No prior conditions need apply.

Rape, sexual harassment and discriminatory practices will be decriminalized, because “Boys will be boys.”  Punishment for violations of what few prohibitions remain will be meted out in community service sentences, to be served by clearing trash and weeds at a ‘needy’ Trump property.

Ivanka will finally get to chair the Fed and Don Jr. can hunt freely, after hours at the National Zoo…or any other place that takes his fancy.

Liberated at last from the need to smile frozenly to ‘sell’ her husband’s humanity to the unwashed masses, Melania will ditch the White House, take a lover and move to a castle in Transylvania.

The editorial staffs of the NY Times and the Washington Post will be arrested and detained without trial, as will anyone who ever dared speak ill of the Orange Emperor. This should come as no surprise to Bill Maher!  

Finally created “Attorney General For Life”, William Barr will abandon all pretense and give his liege the “Roy Cohn” he has always pined for.

The super rich will get richer and the poor will get lots more children (after birth control and abortion are outlawed);  and minimum wage will be a thing of the past.

There will be no standards for anything.  Food safety will no longer be monitored,  infrastructure projects, housing and commercial developments will proceed without inspections or permits.  Instead, people will be encouraged to buy a whole lot of accident and injury insurance, just in case. The Trump Insurance Co. LLC. will create a product  called “Accidental Living,” for the new marketplace. 

Life will be short and brutal, but the stock market will never again have a down day.

The amazing DNC voter data machine: Who gets the profit?

Business, local/regional, National, ,

Some news just washes by like untreated sludge in the stormwater overflow, but here’s some national news with a local angle that fetched up on the shore last week.

Reports are that Democratic National Chairman Tom Perez has organized a new data-exchange operation. Perez is matching the successful GOP voter-data operation on display in the last presidential vote that is believed to have boosted their turnout. The plan is for the Democrats to do as the Republicans did and form a for-profit entity; Perez’s new organization will be gathering all available Democratic data now scattered throughout state party organizations and some non-profits.

The complex operation is coming together  after months of serious internal wrangling. Politico.com reported last December that state party officials were looking to know who exactly would stand to benefit financially from the new for profit data base entity.

Now Howard Dean, with stints as a Vermont governor, a presidential candidate, and as DNC Chairman has agreed to  oversee the new DNC voter-info project. AP reports: The arrangement would allow the national party, state parties, and independent political action groups on the left to share voter data in real time during campaigns. That means, for example, that a field worker for a congressional campaign in Iowa and another for an independent political action committee knocking on doors in Florida could update a master voter file essentially as they work. When a presidential campaign spends big money on consumer data to update voter profiles, the new information would go into the central file as well. And all participating organizations would have access to the latest information.

The new exchange will operate as an independent for-profit enterprise led initially by Democratic strategist Jen O’Malley Dillon, once a top adviser to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. [emphasis added]DNCdata

The deal worked out with the DNC chair to calm the waters among the state party officials divvies up the control over the data-exchange between former Hillary people and people seen as progressives — Howard Dean and Ken Martin (leader of the Democratic state party chairs association, a MN liberal inspired by the late Senator Paul Wellstone).

As APNews reports: Martin and Perez would chair a party committee that would license the party’s voter files to O’Malley Dillon’s group, which would establish its own agreements with PACs and other groups. Dean would chair the governing board of the new outfit, and once assembled, that board will hire staff to run the operation.

Some competition and general wrangling for resources between the national organization and state party organizations are nothing new. But a for-profit business model — copied from the GOP — stocked full of licensed DNC voter data available for a price seems designed to invite grifters up to the campaign table for a big-money feast. And as always there is the ever-present potential for hackers gaining access to all that data — all those eggs in one basket could prove an irresistible target.

By splitting up oversight Perez, Dean, and all the professional movers and shakers in the presidential election industrial complex seem to have decided for now to navigate this one with some care. Except there are still questions: 1) who keeps the profits; and 2) why should state and local volunteers provide free labor to stock a data base for sale to favored, deep-pocketed entities/campaigns, when the “profits” are not going to the parties? I’d hate to see the Democrats following the Republican-capitalist model: privatize the profits and socialize the cost and the consequences.

I hope Perez, Dean, et al., at least manage to keep the peace. After all there’s not much riding on this next election but the whole ball of wax. But let’s not lose sight of our principles in the process.