[Peace-discuss] Perfidious Democrats (in Illinois, as elsewhere)

[David Green]

Ricky, what concerns me is that there is a certain "fixed" odor to so many of these things. For example, with the TPP in Congress, you had just enough votes to allow some to oppose it without affecting the outcome. One sometimes gets the feelings that the fixed outcome is arranged in back rooms in order to mitigate the political damage to those most vulnerable to pressure from their constituents. Whether this is true for the "millionaire's tax" etc. I don't know. I heard that other members of the legislature threatened to refuse to speak to Carol Ammons (or work with her)  if she voted "against" Israel--even though her No vote wouldn't have affected the outcome. I wonder if there are any threats involved with Democrats who oppose an obvious and easy remedy to our state's cooked-up financial crisis. I mean, Madigan has an awful lot of power to punish people. DG 


     On Friday, July 10, 2015 7:22 AM, Ricky Baldwin via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
   
 

 I'm afraid that's an oversimplification.  In reality you disagree with the action (or inaction) of certain conservative Democrats, and I agree with that, as do Ammons and Bennett.  But you assign collective blame quite recklessly.  You could have pointed out, as Paul did, that not all Democrats are with us in solving this crisis in a humane, rational way.  But what he, and you, seem to profess not to understand is not hard.  The Governor is one person and therefore responsibile for that one person's actions.  "The Democrats" are many and not all alike, and voters place them in office, not their party (i.e. Madigan) alone.  Carol Ammons herself is an example of someone who was elected with popular voter effort and support, quite against the wishes and designs of the Party machinery, as was publicly obvious at the time.  Or have you forgotten?  
In fact it was some Democrats, not Greens ou say you support, but do not agree with on all points, either), who proposed the millionaires' tax and the financial transactions tax, and some worked hard for these.  The fact that some nominal Democrats ("who have a 'D' by their name, as Bennett said) wouldn't vote for them, or to override the Governor's veto, is the fault of those "blue dog" Democrats, not the entire group.
It appears that you seek to avoid agreeing with any Democrats by treating them as a group, a logical fallacy.  If one member of AWARE says one thing, and another member another, are we trying to "have it both ways"?  If a Green mishandles an election so badly as to throw any hope of winning, are Greens trying to "have it both ways" by criticizing the political system and yet doing nothing to change it? 
Just admit it.  There was nothing objectionable about the event you and I attended last night except that everyone in the state doesn't have a representative and senator like these two.  You should disagree with them on issues where you actually have a disagreement, not these.
Ricky

"Speak your mind, even if your voice shakes." - Maggie Kuhn
 


     On Thursday, July 9, 2015 9:30 PM, Karen Aram via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
   

 #yiv5566978921 --.yiv5566978921hmmessage P{margin:0px;padding:0px;}#yiv5566978921 body.yiv5566978921hmmessage{font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri;}#yiv5566978921 A perfect example as to why we need the Green Party.
 
> Date: Thu, 9 Jul 2015 21:18:03 -0500
> To: peace-discuss at anti-war.net
> CC: sf-core at yahoogroups.com; occupyCU at lists.chambana.net
> Subject: [Peace-discuss] Perfidious Democrats (in Illinois, as elsewhere)
> From: peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
> 
> I've just come from a 'Joint Town Hall' rally with Illinois state senator Scott Bennett & state representative Carol Ammons. They blamed the wretched Governor Rauner for the state's budget impasse. In fact, it's entirely in the Democrats' hands. (Bennett & Ammons are both Democrats.) 
> 
> As Paul Mueth pointed out at the meeting, the Democrats have veto-proof majorities in both houses. They could pass a budget and the taxes - primarily a financial-transactions tax (HB 106) - necessary to fund it. 
> 
> Ammons replied that not all those Democrat votes can be counted on. Thus the Democrats can have it both ways - they can say that they're in favor of the spending and the taxes, but then allow enough no votes so that they won't pass. 
> 
> The same thing happened with Speaker Madigan's 'millionaires' tax.' In both cases the Democrats can tell the public they're interested in solving the problem - and then quietly show their 1% donors that they won't do it.
> 
> —CGE
> _______________________________________________
> Peace-discuss mailing list
> Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
> https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss
 
_______________________________________________
Peace-discuss mailing list
Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss


   
_______________________________________________
Peace-discuss mailing list
Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss


 
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.chambana.net/pipermail/peace-discuss/attachments/20150710/71bc4e00/attachment-0001.html>