[Peace-discuss] A 'progressive' Democrat

[Robert Naiman]

OK, so let's do something to help the candidacy of Chelsea Manning.

How about a fundraiser?

On Wed, Jan 17, 2018 at 10:06 PM, C G Estabrook via Peace-discuss <
peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:

> No.
>
> No.
>
> No.
>
> Regards, Carl
>
>
> On Jan 17, 2018, at 10:29 AM, Robert Naiman <naiman at justforeignpolicy.org>
> wrote:
>
> Aren't you going to denounce Manning for impurely running as a Democrat
> against Cardin?
>
> Isn't she just legitimizing the hopelessly corrupt Democratic Party by
> running in a Democratic Primary?
>
> Surely the only morally pure way for her to challenge Cardin would be to
> run as a Green?
>
> ;)
>
> […]
>
>
> On Wed, Jan 17, 2018 at 9:48 AM, C G Estabrook via Peace-discuss <
> peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
>
>> "Why Senator Cardin Is a Fitting Opponent for Chelsea Manning" –
>> Consortiumnews
>>
>>
>> *Chelsea Manning’s senatorial bid offers a contrast to the Russian
>> fear-mongering of incumbent candidate Ben Cardin, says Norman Solomon.*
>> By Norman Solomon
>>
>> The top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Ben Cardin
>> [Md.], has become a big star in national media by routinely denouncing
>> Russia as a dire threat to American democracy. The senior senator from
>> Maryland personifies the highly dangerous opportunism that has set in among
>> leading Democrats on the subject of Russia.
>>
>> Chelsea Manning confirmed on Sunday that she is challenging Senator
>> Cardin’s re-election effort in the Democratic primary this June. Her
>> campaign has real potential to raise key issues. One of them revolves
>> around the kind of bellicose rhetoric that heightens the dangers of
>> conflict between the world’s two nuclear superpowers.
>>
>>
>> *Picture: Chelsea Manning on May 18, 2017 the day after her release from
>> prison. (Twitter)*
>> In a typical foray into reckless hyperbole, Cardin told a public forum in
>> November: “When you use cyber in an affirmative way to compromise our
>> democratic, free election system, that’s an attack against America. It’s an
>> act of war. It is an act of war.”
>>
>> Cardin is far from the only member of Congress to use “act of war”
>> rhetoric about alleged Russian cyber actions. Republican ultra-hawk Arizona
>> Senator John McCain has hurled the phrase at Russia. But the most use of
>> the phrase comes from a range of Democrats, such as Connecticut
>> Senator Richard Blumenthal and the normally sensible Northern California
>> Representative Jackie Speier.
>>
>> As his party’s ranking member of the key Senate committee on foreign
>> policy, Cardin is at the tip of the anti-Russia propaganda spear. After
>> three decades in Congress including nearly a dozen years in the Senate,
>> he’s an old hand at spinning. No one has worked harder to get political
>> mileage out of “Russiagate.”
>>
>> *A Distorted Report*
>>
>> Last week, Cardin upped the ante with the release of a report that he
>> commissioned. In effect, it’s a declaration of red-white-and-blue jihad
>> against Russia.
>>
>> The report — which accuses Russian President Vladimir Putin of “a
>> relentless assault to undermine democracy and the rule of law in Europe and
>> the United States” — received massive coverage in U.S. news
>> media. Conservative and liberal punditry voiced acclaim.
>>
>> “Never before in American history has so clear a threat to national
>> security been so clearly ignored by a U.S. president,” a solo statement by
>> Cardin declares on the opening page. With the truly repugnant President
>> Trump in its crosshairs, the report’s most polemical claims — no matter how
>> debatable or ahistorical — have predictably gotten a pass from mass media.
>>
>> But the much-ballyhooed report is a carefully selective and distorted
>> version of history.
>>
>> The expansion of NATO up to Russia’s borders, the U.S. interference in
>> dozens of countries’ elections (including in Russia during the Clinton
>> administration), Washington’s support for repressive regimes in the past
>> and present — such realities didn’t merit consideration or mention. Nor did
>> facts such as the USA’s role as the world’s biggest arms merchant. Or the
>> aggressively deadly U.S. military interventions in the recent past and
>> present, from Afghanistan to Iraq to Libya.
>>
>> Such omissions are essential to the self-righteous tone of the Russiagate
>> frenzy. Only with silence about basic truths of U.S. foreign policy can
>> officials in Washington pose as leaders of an angelic nation that must
>> confront satanic Russia.
>>
>> In light of what is at stake for human survival — with the odds of
>> nuclear war shifting ominously because of the agenda that he’s helping to
>> push — Senator Cardin can be understood as someone who avidly fits into
>> patterns of nationalistic and militaristic madness. The sad fact is that he
>> has plenty of company on Capitol Hill.
>>
>> Democratic leadership used to be much saner. Five decades ago, it was the
>> fanatical Republican standard bearer Barry Goldwater who scorned reaching
>> out to the Kremlin – while Democratic President Lyndon Johnson wisely
>> sought détente with Russian leaders on behalf of peaceful coexistence and
>> reducing the risks of nuclear conflagration.
>>
>> Right after being sentenced to prison in August 2013 for heroic
>> whistleblowing that exposed many U.S. war crimes, Chelsea Manning released
>> a statement that quoted Howard Zinn: “There is not a flag large enough to
>> cover the shame of killing innocent people.” A nuclear war between the
>> United States and Russia would do more than kill vast numbers of innocent
>> people. Scientific research tells us that a nuclear holocaust would make
>> the Earth “virtually uninhabitable.”
>>
>> The extreme hostility toward Russia that makes such an outcome more
>> likely must be rejected. Senator Ben Cardin is one of the loudest and
>> most prominent voices for such hostility. He should be challenged.
>>
>> *Norman Solomon is the coordinator of the online activist group
>> RootsAction.org <http://rootsaction.org/> and the executive director of the
>> Institute for Public Accuracy. He is the author of a dozen books including
>> “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.”*
>>
>> *###*
>>
>>
>>
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