[Peace-discuss] Biden = business as usual...

Tue Aug 26 00:23:12 CDT 2008

Neil, 
I'm replying to you after all, but I really am just about done w/ the subject. 

All the stuff you wrote is (more or less) true but entirely beside the point re this discussion! Are you saying that you HONESTLY see no significant differences between the two (Obama and McCain) -- on choice, judicial nominations, the environment, separation of church and state?? If that's the case, I will say, with Mort, that you are dismally mistaken.
 --Jenifer 

--- On Mon, 8/25/08, Neil Parthun <lennybrucefan at gmail.com> wrote:

From: Neil Parthun <lennybrucefan at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Biden = business as usual...
To: jencart13 at yahoo.com
Cc: "Morton K. Brussel" <mkbrussel at comcast.net>, "Peace-discuss" <peace-discuss at anti-war.net>, "C.G.Estabrook" <galliher at uiuc.edu>
Date: Monday, August 25, 2008, 7:56 PM

Progressive said similar things about Clinton.

Yet, Clinton gave us multiple wars, numerous dead, 8 years of sanctions and daily bombings of Iraq, ending "welfare as we knew it", bombing factories in the Sudan and sold out health care amongst other things while in office.

Democratic candidates have played off the Boogeyman of the Republican opposition for years.  They don't actually have to stand for anything progressive -- just sheepishly point at the Republicans and once in office continue to fuck the working class beyond recognition. Remember, a Democratic regime gave us the anti-labor Taft-Hartley Act.  Democratic regimes got us into Vietnam.  Hell, a Democratic Congress was elected to get us out of the Iraq war.  They've done nothing and still expect to get our votes simply because of the specter of big bad Zombie McCain and the Republican party.

Labor and the working class has continually sold out our goals to the Democrats.

As the late, great Bill Hicks said about Clinton years ago and it is still applicable to Obama "Hope?  There ain't no fucking hope in that guy."

Its not the act of seeing with our own eyes alone; its correctly comprehending what we see,

     Neil

 We absolutely have to refuse to attribute any kind of permanency to that which is simply because it is.
[angela v. davis, 1944-]

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
[ralph waldo emerson, 1803-1882]

On Aug 25, 2008, at 6:28 PM, Jenifer Cartwright wrote:

I'll repeat Mort's words, since they seem to be falling on deaf ears:
....Obama is clearly a better choice than McCain, and WHOMEVER MAKES IT EASIER FOR MCCAIN TO WIN IS PLAYING WITH EVEN GREATER CALAMITY THAN NOW EXISTS. If you see no significant differences between the two, ---on choice, judicial nominations, the environment, separation of church and state---I can only say that you are dismally mistaken. 
 --Jenifer

--- On Mon, 8/25/08, Morton K. Brussel <mkbrussel at comcast.net> wrote:

From: Morton K. Brussel <mkbrussel at comcast.net>
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Biden = business as usual...
To: "Neil Parthun" <lennybrucefan at gmail.com>
Cc: "Peace-discuss" <peace-discuss at anti-war.net>, "C.G.Estabrook" <galliher at uiuc.edu>
Date: Monday, August 25, 2008, 12:21 AM

One does not argue for an Obama presidency, one argues against a McCain presidency.  

We can demand all the changes we want, but we won't get them in this election, or, given our electoral system,  any that I can foresee . As for me, Obama is clearly a better choice than McCain, and whomever makes it easier for McCain to win is playing with even greater calamity than now exists.. If you see no significant differences between the two, ---on choice, judicial nominations, the environment, separation of church and state---I can only say that you are dismally mistaken.  

Voting in Illinois will allow you to vote your conscience, a happy circumstance. Voting in Florida or Ohio to assuage a highfalutin conscience by voting for a candidate that can't win, is, with the present choices,  inane, and may have tragic consequences.

--mkb

On Aug 24, 2008, at 8:07 PM, Neil Parthun wrote:

With the talk about Biden, here's my opinion about Obama: 

I would appreciate it if someone could explain to me the morality of voting for Obama simply because we will have a 'haunting by the specter of McCain'.

We here in Illinois have the knowledge that we can vote our conscience for any candidate because it is certain that Illinois will go to the Democratic Party.  Looking nationally, only four states are in play -- New Mexico, Ohio, Florida and Colorado and if we want to quibble, then let's add a fifth: Virginia.  One could very realistically state that it will be these states that will tip the election to either one of the imperialists.  So, our prattling seems to be much adieu about nothing.  But alas...

How can we as progressives argue for an Obama presidency?  Let's run down the stats:

-Obama is for continued military presence in Iraq, despite Iraqi governmental forces asking us to GTFO.
-Obama is for continued and increased military presence in Afghanistan, despite the masses in Afghanistan demanding us to GTFO.
-Obama is for expanding our bombing to Pakistan in our trek to kill killers to prove that killing people is wrong.
-Obama is for the for-profit health care system that has left 40+ million people without access to adequate health care.
-Obama is not for equal rights and equal opportunities for LGBTQA people, denying them equality of marriage.  He even is washing his hands of pushing for federal protections by saying that it is an issue for individual states to handle.
-Obama sold out civil liberties and privacy rights with his FISA vote
-Obama is condoning the 'haterade' towards Russia
-Obama is condoning the first strike missile systems in Poland and the Czech Republic
-Obama speaks for the common man yet has a mansion and makes hundreds of thousands of dollars a year

....and I'd just be getting started.

McCain and Obama are nominally different. Both are ultimately beholden to corporate interests and beholden to the policies that will benefit the elite..  How can any self-described progressive vote for such a thing?  We're not voting for the lesser of two evils. We're voting for the evil of lessers.  This seems to be the act every four years.  Instead of demanding the fundamental changes that we want, we end up sacrificing that in the name of pragmatism and fearmongering that a Republican administration would lead us down the path of destruction.  What we get is more of the same that we've had.  Plus, the last time I checked, we have three branches of government.  The Democrats gave the authorization of force for the war, eviscerated civil liberties, continued funding both imperial ventures and are continuing the cadence for impending war with Iran and Russia. But it is much easier and more intellectually dishonest to put this all at the doorstep
 of the Big Bad Evil Republicans.

McCain and Obama would bring us policies that would benefit the rich, squash gay rights, eviscerate civil liberties and increase war.  Obama may be "change" but the only thing that will change is the name and appearance of the person implementing the policies for the US Empire.

Its not the act of seeing with our own eyes alone; its correctly comprehending what we see,

     Neil

 We absolutely have to refuse to attribute any kind of permanency to that which is simply because it is.
[angela v. davis, 1944-]

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
[ralph waldo emerson, 1803-1882]
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