MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
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MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Order today at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
And some wonder why Dems keep losing. Part 2.
"Several years after private equity firm Carlyle Group LP successfully pushed the White House to relax Environmental Protection Agency rules to the benefit of two Carlyle-owned oil refineries in Pennsylvania, former President Barack Obama, as part of a series of paid speeches, made a stop at its conference last week."
Comments
Hal, if you are going to attack Obama's character because things don't look good in your eyes, you can expect people to point out that their is an FBI investigation into Jane and Bernie Sanders that does not look good.Did Jane Sanders commit fraud? Did Bernie use his position to get his wife's college a loan?
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/06/22/bernie-sanders-jane-sa...
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:01am
RMRD - you claim that I am attacking President Obama's character. All I did was link to an article which I believe explains to a significant degree why the Democratic Party is in shambles. It appears that you believe the facts reported in the International Business Times article reflect poorly on President Obama's character. Which facts?
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:12am
Wow. You are in a bubble. My statement about character attack is based on your headline that Obama is being paid now for doing something for a business three years ago. You believe that Democrats lose elections because of business ties. You also believe that Obama is in the pocket of big business. You have a right to your beliefs.
I believe that Democrats lose elections because a portion of the voting public is gullible. Hillary said that coal miners in West Virginia would have to be retrained because mining jobs were coming back. Trump lied to miners, telling them that he would bring back jobs. Trump lied. Their are more people employed in green energy in California alone than are employed in the entire coal mining industry. Democrats lose because some voters don't take the time to check the facts. People are unaware that their newly available health care is Obamacare. You can't fix stupid.
The bottom line is that a significant number of mostly white voters elected a racist conman. There is no excuse for their vote. I doubt many of them realize that Obama is giving speeches to Carlyle. I do know that a significant portion of Trump voters still believe that Obama was not born in the United States.
Instead of doing the hard work of energizing the rainbow of voters that give Hillary a three million voter lead in 2016, you want to take the lazy way out and repeatedly bash Obama. Obama is not running for office. Of the Democrats who voted for Hillary, Obama remains popular. Your rants on Obama's speaking fees may energize Bernie supporters ( (10% of whom voted for Trump), but they tick off the majority of the party. You are not winning any converts. You are not energizing the Democratic base. It seems that your goal into a party that follows the policies you want, even when,like single-payer, you have no workable way to pay for the program, I think your goal is to destroy the Democratic Party if the party doesn't bend to your will. Your attacks on Obama suggest you want to kill the party to "save" the party.
I notice that you didn't touch the FBI investigation of the Sanders. That doesn't "look good" either,
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 12:07pm
I presented an article that contain facts. Do you believe the facts reflect badly on President Obama or don't you? Specifically, do you think that it is a problem for the Democratic Party that the Obama administration accommodated Carlyle Group lobbyists by lowering the required percentage of energy our nation derives from biofuels and then 3 years later he speaks to the Carlyle Group during a speaking tour that is netting him $400K per speech.
Regarding your cite to the investigation into a loan obtained by Jane Sanders: If, as a Trump acolyte alleges, Bernie Sanders used political influence to help his wife get a loan, then he acted wrongly and this action would make it tougher for him to be elected President.
Regarding your attacks on white voters: Whites as a whole supported Trump in lower numbers than they supported Romney. It was voters of color who migrated away from the Democratic Party. From Pew Research:
Why do you think that happened RMRD?
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 3:11pm
White voters supported a racist. Democrats failed to do outreach to the black community. Hillary won the overwhelming majority of the black vote. 53% of white women voted for a sexual pervert. GW Bush got 20% of the black vote in Ohio and blacks were blamed for the loss of the Democratic candidate. If whites ever voted consistently for Democrats in a simple majority. Republicans would never win the Presidency. I put the blame on white voters because they voted for Trump whether you look at gender, or age group. Also given Obama's skill, no candidate was likely to repeat his numbers in the black community. You should remember that Hillary's popular vote number was historic.
https://www.thenation.com/article/hillary-clintons-popular-vote-victory-...
If you think that a 1% decrease in the white vote for Trump is significant, I've got some swampland to sell you. The real question is why Trump's racism didn't decrease his white vote more.
BTW. Hillary trounced Sanders among black and white voters. Are you seriously arguing that Sanders would have fared better than Hillary with black voters? Rubbish? Why was Sanders not the choice of black voters? In the Georgia-6 race, there was no outreach to the black community. The Democratic candidate lost.If Democrats don't feel that blacks are important, black turnout will decrease.
Hillary won the popular vote. The electoral college put a white supremacist in office. Comey intervened in the election. Comey failed to mention that Trump was under investigation.
Bernie would not have fared better than Hillary among black voters.
Whites put Trump in office. 538 rates Trump's approval at 39.4% today. That's mostly white folks. We now see BernBros attacking Obama and Kamala Harris. I know you may get frustrated with my pointing out the racial aspect of politics, but I am trying to send a message that the optics are not good for whites who voted for Trump or BernieBros attacking Obama and Harris. All those attacks do is make Ernie even less of a factor in the black community. You see popularity polls that say Bernie is well respected in the black community and take comfort. Please realize if the black community had to chose between Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders today, Bernie would get a worse butt-whipping than he got from Clinton. BernieBros are as tone deaf as the DNC when it comes to black voters. Blacks show frustration by saying they won't vote because the Democrats take them for granted and Republicans are openly hostile and racist. Instead of doing outreach, some Democrats are angry that blacks are threatening to stay home. The hostility is counter-productive. The Democrats did a Perez-Sanders outreach tour for whites, they need to do the same in black and Latino communities. I realize my view is unpopular, but I think I am viewing the situation with 20/20 vision. The majority of whites voted for racist Trump. That is not a racist viewpoint, that is fact. Thinking that Democrats will win over Trump voters is delusional. If Trump voters abandon Trump, they will go third party before they vote for a Democrat.
Repeat Bernie would lose the African American community to Kamala Harris, Deval Patrick, and Cory Booker.
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 4:17pm
In answering your question about why the black vote was down, I forgot something obvious, voter suppression. This was the first Presidential election since the Voting Rights Act was gutted by the Supreme Court. Several states implemented voter ID criteria directly aimed at suppressing the black vote. In many cases, they were successful
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/12/12/the-real-voting-scandal-of...
The black vote could have gone down because Obama got more people out.
The black vote could have gone down because of years of Republican criticism of Hillary Clinton aided by Comey's comments coupled with lack of Democratic outreach.
The black vote could have gone down because of voter suppression
The black vote did not go down because they were looking for Bernie Sanders. Blacks voted against him in the Primaries.
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 4:38pm
You justly criticize harshly those who voted for racist Donald Trump. Don't you think those who voted for racist Hillary Clinton in the primaries should also be criticized harshly. After all, she 1) supported private prisons, 2) took advantage, while Arkansas's first lady, of free convict labor, 3) believes in the war on drugs, 4) called whites who supported her in 2008 "hard working white people" who wouldn't vote for Barack Obama, 5) stifled a minimum wage hike in Haiti that would have mainly benefited black women, 6) supports the death penalty, 6) took contributions last year from red-lining banks, 7) said that we can't reward immigrants for coming here illegally and having babies.
Wouldn't you describe somebody with those reprehensible views and who took such actions as a racist? If not, why not?
Do me a really really big favor here RMRD, don't deflect. Don't answer "but but but Bernie". Don't make your response about anyone but Hillary Clinton. Many thanks in advance.
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 8:55pm
Hal, you are stuck in your self imposed bubble.
Hillary worked for the Children's Defense Fund. She went undercover the the Deep South to investigate discrimination. She risked her life. Despite some past disagreements, Marian Wright Edelman introduced her friend Hillary Clinton when Clinton made her first public appearance after the election. Wright Edelman obviously doesn't consider Clinton a racist. Clinton had the support of the majority Congressional Black Caucus, including Civil Rights icon John Lewis. John Lewis would not support a racist. For comparison, look how Lewis was treated by Donald Trump.Trump told Lewis to go back to what Trump assumed was a poverty-stricken, crime ridden district. Trump assumed the worst of Lewis's district because Trump is a racist.
But....But....Bernie had no one in the Congressional Black Caucus who remembered meetings with Bernie. Keith Ellison did support Sanders. Sanders had no strong support in the black community. Hillary had activists who spoke up for her.
Hal, I am not going to make any further comments about whether Hillary is a racist. I am not providing links. The reason I'm stopping is that we have had this conversation on multiple occasions in 2016. I detailed reasons and provided links. Either your memory is short, or you are dismissive of what Hillary's black supporters said. Hillary got the overwhelming majority of the black vote female and male. Black turnout was lower than for Obama that is no big surprise. I will provide one article that points to the percent of the black vote received by Democratic Presidential candidates over the years. Hillary's 88% is within the normal range. Obama was the outlier.
http://blackdemographics.com/culture/black-politics/
You have repeatedly been supplied reasons why I don't consider Hillary a racist. I have told you why the "super predator" comment was not a negative for me. I have told you about her attempt to get health care passed. I told you about her relationship with Marian Wright Edelman. You have been given my rationale. Yet every "friggin' time, you come back with the same "blankety-blank" questions. You are being dismissive. You are not listening. You are as tone-deaf as "But....But....Bernie. You are not interested in dialog or compromise. You only see your position.
Black voters trust Hillary more than they trust Sanders or Trump. Sanders cannot win the the black community. Sanders has not shown up in the black community since he made a pander to them during the Primaries. Sanders accomplished nothing in the Senate. Sanders has not direct message to the black community. All that you have done is solidify my belief that Sanders is worthless when it comes to the black community. Sanders is known by his fruit, the BernieBros. The BernieBros are attacking Obama and Kamala Harris. Screw Sanders and the BernieBros.
Hillary got a normal percent of the black vote despite voter suppression.
Enjoy your bubble. Stop asking about blacks because you don't take time to listen to what they are saying. They rejected Bernie Sanders because they realized he never showed up in their communities just like he is not showing up now. Why are you supporting a man who refuses to engage with the black community?
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 10:44pm
RMRD - I have often asked you how we can work together. I have acknowledged that I disagree to an extent with Bernie on guns. I have explained in non-pejorative ways why I believe African Americans support the Clintons even though I think they have done much harm to blacks. Yet you claim that I am not interested in compromise.
Are you interested in compromise? Have you every acknowledged that Bernie has good ideas or took positions that were in the best interests of the African American community? Do you dismiss out-of-hand African Americans, including scholars like Dr. Cornel West and civil rights leaders like Ben Jealous, who support Bernie. Have you ever shown the slightest interest in a real examination into the actions that Hillary Clinton took that many African Americans decry or do you invariably deflect or make excuses for them?
I ask again RMRD - are you interested in compromise?
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 10:52pm
Hal, you focus on personality, not policy. Bernie is in a safe seat in a safe state. He can propose anything he wants. Jealous may make a good Governor but he botched the Shirley Sherri's case when he headed the NAACP. Cornel West wrote an excellent book about Martin Luther King Jr. But, after you get past his hip petty-hop verbiage, he has no practical policy. Sanders has no significant accomplishments in Congress. Single-payer couldn't work in his home state. You list a bunch of personalized with zero policy wins. Obama, the guy you call a crook in the pocket of Wall Street has actual accomplishments. The Republicans are trying to destroy what Obama put in place. That is happening in front of our eyes. Instead of addressing the Republican assault, you want condemnation of Obama and praise for people who have rhetoric and nothing else. You can't explain how single-payer is going to be sold to a voting public that chafes at the word "taxes" and will need serious convincing to give up the health care they receive from employers for a pure government based plan.
Obama is no longer President, but he is respected. Hillary Clinton lost, but she is respected. Bernie Sanders is a nice guy who is well loved in polling when he is not running against anybody for President. I I said, Kamala Harris would wallop him in a head to head political race. Blacks made their decision on Hillary in 2016. Blacks went for Hillary 8:1. Black turnout was down and voter suppression efforts were up. Bernie Sanders lost the black vote in "yuge" numbers. Cornel West is a laughing stock in the black community because he was too arrogant and stupid to admit that Hillary was the best choice. West when after Obama because of inauguration tickets. He supported Jill Stein. I acknowledge his talent in writing a great book on MLK Jr. The rest of his act is tiresome.
Obama is not a crook. Hillary is not a racist. You are stuck in a bubble. The rest of us are doing our best to encourage people to vote. The obstacle facing GOTV in the black community is that Democrats take the black community for granted and spend little money on outreach. Bernie Sanders polls well (this is when he is not running for anything), but dismisses the black community. I am going to continue to warn about neglecting the black community hoping somebody in the DNC pays attention. I'd can be happy with Franken, Warren, Harris, Booker, Patrick, etc. In 2020. None are pure enough to please Bernie. So once again, screw Bernie Sanders.
by rmrd0000 on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 8:31am
I set forth facts. Sometimes those facts reflect poorly on particular individuals.
by HSG on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 10:13am
Hope that you have gotten Obama and Hillary out of your system and are ready to fight Republicans.
by rmrd0000 on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 10:28am
The way we fight Republicans is by uniting in support of pro-people, pro-peace, pro-worker, pro-environment, anti-corruption politicians and policies. This is what I have been trying to accomplish for many many years. Okay time for me to move on from this after a quick response to CVille.
by HSG on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 11:05am
Bernie, Cornel, etc. are not uniters. Watch Bernie turn on Elizabeth Warren if she runs. Cornel thinks he is MLK Jr and takes on "righteous condemnation " of everybody. As I watch Republicans destroy what Obama helped create, I lose patience with the purity folks who have no successes to show.
by rmrd0000 on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 11:48am
The nonsense that "both sides do it" with it's corollary that speaking fees equals no difference in policies has to stop. Trump is a white supremacist promoting white supremacist values. Full stop. Republicans are trying to end advances put in place by Obama. Democrats are trying to save Obamacare. The reason that Democrats lost seats is that the voting public punished Democrats for passing a health care law by electing Republicans. Now the public is worried that they may lose their health care. The health care that they didn't realize was Obamacare You can't fix stupid.
Now comes David Sirota who says that Democrats are no different than Republicans when it comes to health care. Democrats want to save health care by increasing subsidies. To Sirota the Democrats are giving a payout to greedy health care industry leaders. Democrats trying TOM save health are as bad as Republicans trying to destroy health care. All Sirota focuses on is the corporate leaders will make a profit. He could care less if millions lose health care. The import thing is that the Democrats be pure and not reward corporations. This is idiotic.
Sirota is already criticizing Kamala Harris for not being pure enough. Sirota will criticize Elizabeth Warren as a corporate shill if she decides to run. No one is pure enough.
https://thedailybanter.com/2017/09/what-the-f-ck-is-wrong-with-david-sir...
The GOP is destroying the country but to Hal and Sirota, the Democrats are the problem.
Some may remember that after the Civil Rights Bill passed, the Democrats lost a section of the country as reliable Democratic voters. Before attacking Democrats, we need to remember the voting habits of some of our fellow citizens.
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 12:49pm
The Republican Party is in position to destroy the country because of the Democratic Party's broad and obvious failings.
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 8:54pm
Well, Hal, it is time to admit that you are not a Democrat. Go to Bernie's Independent party and tell them what is wrong with them, because your pie-in-the sky rantings are foolish and insulting. You really don't even make any sense.
by CVille Dem on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 9:23pm
I am sorry if you feel insulted. Still, what ultimately matters is whether what I wrote is accurate. If you believe evidence does not support my views, please adduce it and I will be happy to reconsider. I note that everything that I write is well-supported by evidence.
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 10:10pm
Tell us how Sanders will finance single-payer when it didn't work in his home state.
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 10:46pm
I'll tell you what RMRD - I'll engage in a discussion with you about the merits of single-payer if you certify that you will take my points seriously, that you will not read them with the single-minded goal of trying to find fault with them, and that you are open to modifying your views on this topic. What I will not do is waste my time arguing with somebody who will never allow himself to be persuaded.
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:02pm
Poking holes in an argument is how compromises are reached.
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:12pm
No. Compromises are reached when parties agree on a set of common goals and find ways to agree on how to get there. Have you ever compromised in any way on whether Bernie has said or done anything that you support? Have you ever compromised in any way on whether Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama acted wrongly or counterproductively?
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:17pm
Hillary didn't do as much outreach as she could have.Obama didn't improve race relations.
Edit to add:
I get that you can't come up with a way to pay for single-payer. People will balk at higher taxes and the concept of losing coverage via employers.
by rmrd0000 on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:42pm
Single-payer costs less per person than any other alternative. Countries with it pay less for health care than we do. We would save money if we implemented it. The question you should be asking is why are we paying so much more for so much less.Yes taxes would go up but out-of-pocket health care expenses, including premium payments, co-pays, etc., would go down more. Asking how can we pay for single-payer is like asking a man who is trading in his old humvee for a Prius how he'll be able to afford the hybrid vehicle?
by HSG on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 8:03am
The guy trading the Humvee wants a Surburban or Expedition SUV.
by rmrd0000 on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 8:35am
Other countries are paying much less for *every kind of system*, even ones similar to ours - 2/3 as expensive or less. Choosing the least costly system doesn't necessarily make sense - it requires evaluating costs and benefits, unsurprisingly. The cheapest option besides none is the barebones covers-nothing pseudo-insurance that's worse than useless, as it's a false sense of security.
by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 9:46am
It's a stupid article and your comment is even stupider. Most people won't even know about this speech and for those that do it won't affect their vote. The implication that Obama's epa lowered the amount of ethanol required in gasoline because Obama was going to get paid to give a speech years later is ridiculous. Drawing a causal link between these two events is idiotic. The ethanol program is bullshit, it should have been ended years ago. Maybe we should ask who is paying to continue this waste of tax dollars because Obama's epa lowering of standards is just good sense. It does nothing to deal with CO2 and it causes increased agricultural environmental damage. It was a sound environmental decision. As a hard core environmentalist I support not just lowering the ethanol standards but eliminating the program entirely.
by ocean-kat on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 3:47pm
You claim it's stupid to note that the President's administration acceded to the requests of Carlyle lobbyists and is now looking at a big fat paycheck from Carlyle. We obviously have a very different view of what's stupid. We also have a very different view of what matters to the electorate - an electorate that has relegated the Democratic Party to a nullity in much of the nation.
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 8:53pm
What do you think happened? Carlyle told Obama if he lowered the ethanol standards they'd hire him to speak at a convention three years later for 400 thousand dollars? Or Obama just figured if he lowered the standards he'd likely get a paid speech from Carlyle three years later after he left office? Yeah, I think the idea is fucking ridiculous. But whatever, you can believe that sort of nonsense if you want.
by ocean-kat on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 10:17pm
O-K - do you really think it's ridiculous for a person to believe that if he gives an incredibly wealthy and powerful institution what it wants, the instituion will provide a generous reward in the future? Do you really think it's ridiculous for people who are barely making ends meet to wonder bitterly whether there was a tacit, or even explicit, quid pro quo?
by HSG on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:00pm
Do I think Obama was sitting around the Oval Office thinking that 3 years from now I'll be giving speeches so I'll lower ethanol standards just in case Carlyle is holding a convention and I might get to give a paid speech? Yeah I really do think that's fucking ridiculous.
by ocean-kat on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:17pm
Good points OK. The EPA rule reduced corn ethanol from 13.8 one year to 13.0, and was done to save close to 1000 jobs in the Pennsylvania area, in a Dem district.
His 'evidence' for purging the Party verges on Stalinist show trial levels of credibility and obsession.
by NCD on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 12:21am
I'd have guessed it was something like that. I don't think Obama was corrupt. I definitely don't think he was making policy by thinking about speaking gigs he might get three years later. If McCain or Romney had been elected I don't think they'd be corrupt even though I'd likely disagree with most everything they did. Trump? How much money he might make while in office and after is probably always on his mind.
Obama might do something I don't like. Something he might not even like. But he wouldn't do it as a plan to get speaking gigs in the distant future. He might do it to help a vulnerable dem congress person get elected or as a trade for a vote from a senator on something he really wanted. Legislative sausage making not corruption.
by ocean-kat on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 2:20am
It may well be that policy not self-interest was behind the Obama Administration's decision. Sadly, we can never know since one of the prime beneficiaries of the decision is apparently paying Obama three years later an exorbitant fee for a short speech.
by HSG on Fri, 09/22/2017 - 8:11am
The Brits somewhat defang their disagreements by using an introductory " with respect ". or raising the ante by using "with the greatest respect" or a tongue in cheek " " with truly overwhelming " or some such florid formulation.
So
With truly awe inspiring respect I don' t think any of you are stupid or ridiculous except to the extent that you believe that calling one another that will cause them to agree with you.
I have no doubt that , perhaps with gritted teeth , Hal voted for Hillary (thanks) and of course for Barack. And the question doesn't even arise in the case of the rest of you.
Somehow I think of an old New Yorker cartoon: two debate rostrums ,in a Coliseum. A debater standing at one of them and a lion at the other, using a pointer to emphasize some item on a flip chart.
But in the stands one of the audience whispers " All in all I liked the old format better".
by Flavius on Thu, 09/21/2017 - 11:59pm