[Peace-discuss] In reference to comments on yesterdays News from Neptune

Sun Jul 1 18:48:16 UTC 2018

There are institutions to hold them to account on some of their domestic
economic policy stances. There's the AFL-CIO, for example. If you look at
the last House vote on raising the minimum wage, every Democrat voted for
it. If you look at the House vote on fast track trade negotiating authority
for the TPP, almost every House Democrat voted against it, even though that
was a vote against Obama, even though they hadn't finished negotiating the
deal yet and the text was not public. But everyone could see where it was
going. Most House Democrats listen to the AFL-CIO on domestic economic
policy, including on trade policy, even against a Democratic President.

Bill Clinton broke free of the AFL-CIO on trade at the presidential level.
And since then, up until the present, there hasn't been a Democratic
presidential nominee who didn't accept the Bill Clinton framework on trade.
This is a key reason that Trump got elected. A bunch of working class
Democrats in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania didn't trust Hillary on
trade so they voted for Trump to kill the TPP dead. I can't say I blame
them for not trusting Hillary on trade. The AFL-CIO claimed after the
election that they had the votes in the House to kill the TPP in the lame
duck session after the election. I'm not sure that I believe that. It's not
what the AFL-CIO was saying before the election. I'm pretty sure that was a
lie to cover up the AFL-CIO's role in the debacle. The AFL-CIO could have
killed the TPP at the Democratic Convention. The Sanders forces had an
amendment to the platform against the TPP, which amendment was supported by
the Hillary labor delegates. But Obama threatened the pro-Hillary labor
delegates, saying: if you amend the platform to oppose the TPP, I won't
campaign for Hillary. The pro-Hillary labor leaders blinked. And this left
a lot of people with the impression that if Hillary was elected, Obama was
going to push the TPP through in the lame duck and enough Democrats would
go along to make it happen.

But regardless of all that, regardless of the problems with the AFL-CIO,
etc., we have nothing like the AFL-CIO on foreign policy, war and peace,
nothing close, nothing in the same league, nothing organized at all. Just a
collection of NGOs like Win Without War which are accountable to no-one
except their funders and which are very close to the House Democratic
leadership, especially Nancy Pelosi. And that's why we haven't been able to
get a vote in the House so far on getting the U.S. out of the
unconstitutional Saudi war in Yemen. That's why I'm trying to get Ro Khanna
to challenge Nancy Pelosi for the House Democratic leadership. So we can
get votes in the House on war and peace.

Robert Naiman
Policy Director
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
naiman at justforeignpolicy.org
(202) 448-2898 x1

On Sun, Jul 1, 2018 at 12:51 PM, Carl G. Estabrook via Peace-discuss <
peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:

>
> > On Jul 1, 2018, at 12:40 PM, bjornsona--- via Peace-discuss <
> peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
> >
> > Carl, Your point is fantastic that there are no institutions to hold
> so-called progressives or so-called liberals to any of their foreign or
> domestic policy stances once elected. My Tea Party point, as I am sure you
> understand,  is that there are no institutions to hold so-called
> conservatives to their party policies either, once elected. If there were,
> we would have a balanced budget and a decreasing deficit. Facts being
> facts,  America has only One Party, no matter what label or geographic
> direction it gives itself to attempt to gaslight the gullible.
> >
> > That old saying, that a problem cannot be solved at the level of the
> mindset that created the problem in the first place, must be true here. The
> One Party that serves its education-prison- military-industrial corporate
> owners is the REAL master player of Identity Politics: splitting un-AWARE
> Americans first into Republicans & Democrats, and then into Libertarians,
> Conservatives, Christians, Deplorables, Liberals, the Left, Anti-.fa,
> millenniels, ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
> >
> > Conservative, liberal, left and right, as you and Counterpunch have
> demonstrated, no longer mean what the words meant in years past. Those few
> Americans who may believe any of the baloney being served us under those
> labels are beyond convincing or worth discussing at this point. They will
> just have to be dragged along as the rest of us change history.  A sports
> "us" vs. "them" mentality will bury all of us if the "us" and "them" remain
> fake Democrats & Republicans, liberals or conservatives. The only "us" that
> means anything are the 99% and the only "them" that means anything are the
> 8, 000 people in the world with half the world's wealth. The 1500
> billionaires . The alphabet agencies & the oil companies. I may not know
> all the "thems" - I sure know the "us".
> >
> > I had stopped watching "Real Time with Bill Maher" because he was such a
> staunch Hillary supporter. However, if you had a chance to catch his show
> last Friday, 6/29/18, it was interesting. Guest  Lawrence Wilkerson,
> debunking Russiagate, and Bill and Michael Moore begging Americans to get
> out in the streets against fascism. Michael Moore was nearly crying. There
> was such a sense of urgency and that things have gone too far.
> >
> > Needless to say- not a Happy 4th .
> > Sent from my LG Phoenix 2, an AT&T 4G LTE smartphone
> >
> > ------ Original message------
> > From: Carl G. Estabrook
> > Date: Sun, Jul 1, 2018 12:54 AM
> > To: bjornsona at ameritech.net;
> > Cc: Carl G. Estabrook via Peace-discuss;Karen Aram;Robert
> Naiman;peace-discuss at anti-war.net;
> > Subject:Re: [Peace-discuss] In reference to comments on yesterdays News
> from Neptune
> >
> > https://www.blackagendareport.com/magical-thinking-vs-sober-
> analysis-ocasio-cortez-victory-ny
> >
> >
> > "In my previous piece and Facebook posts I never touched on how
> socialist Ocasio-Cortez is or isn't nor on her foreign policy stands if she
> has any, which Berniecrats frequently don't, something that ought to make
> us a little uneasy. Bernie Sanders calls himself a socialist too, just with
> an imperialist foreign policy. I did say that progressive candidates and
> officeholders do sometimes flip, a little at a time or all at once, and
> when they do we have no institutions with which to punish them. "Feet to
> the fire" and "holding them accountable" are actually the phrases of
> magical thinkers because no means have yet been devised which enable the
> left to do those things.
> >
> > "I got in trouble for observing that while we can elect progressives
> from time to time we cannot compel them to remain that way. Until we figure
> out how to build institutions that can, we are at the mercy of their
> individual moral and political compasses. The need to develop left
> institutions to which progressive candidates can be held responsible is an
> acute one, which the Nation in its slavish devotion to the Democratic party
> predictably ignores. Noting this truth got me accused of being a petty,
> lazy purist and ultraleftist. Oh well. Sober analysis may not be what some
> people wanna hear at a victory party where everybody’s popping champagne
> corks, dancing the electric slide and toasting the universal lessons of the
> Ocasio-Cortez victory without the bother of real analysis…"
> >
> > —CGE
> >
> >
> > > On Jun 30, 2018, at 9:04 PM, bjornsona--- via Peace-discuss
> >  wrote:
> > >
> > > That Everyman article could be written exactly the same way 10 years
> ago to Tea Party Republicans.  Change "Democrat- change it to R Republican.
> > >
> > > Sent from my LG Phoenix 2, an AT&T 4G LTE smartphone
> > >
> > > ------ Original message------
> > > From: Carl G. Estabrook via Peace-discuss
> > > Date: Sat, Jun 30, 2018 6:11 PM
> > > To: Karen Aram;
> > > Cc: Robert Naiman
> > ;peace-discuss at anti-war.net
> > ;Carl G. Estabrook via Peace-discuss;
> > > Subject:Re: [Peace-discuss] In reference to comments on yesterdays
> News from Neptune
> > >
> > >
> > https://americaneveryman.com/2018/06/30/ajamu-baraka-
> pushes-dementer-with-the-ocasio-cortez-placebo-my-
> position-statement-on-ocasio-cortez/
> >
> > >
> > > It’s unclear where Ocasio is herself - but not the Democratic party.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >> On Jun 30, 2018, at 5:43 PM, Karen Aram
> >  wrote:
> > >>
> > >> Very good, thank you Stuart. Let’s all keep our fingers crossed that
> she is able to stand by her declarations. Anything David Swanson has to say
> is good enough for me.
> > >>
> > >>
> > >>> On Jun 30, 2018, at 10:38, stuartnlevy
> >  wrote:
> > >>
> > >>>
> > >>> It is there right now.
> > >>>
> > >>> The
> > antiwar.com
> >  thread quotes Ocasio on June 27th that it hadn't been deliberately
> removed, and she was looking into it.  So she did, and the statement is
> there.
> > >>>
> > >>> I haven't compared it with the previous version, but David Swanson
> says it is both lengthened and improved.  He supports it and urges his
> readers to let her know they do too.
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>  -- Stuart
> > >>>
> > >>> -------- Original message --------
> > >>> From: "Carl G. Estabrook via Peace-discuss"
> >
> > >>> Date: 6/30/18 11:15 (GMT-06:00)
> > >>> To: Robert Naiman
> > , peace-discuss at anti-war.net
> >
> > >>> Cc: peace
> > , "Carl G. Estabrook via Peace-discuss" , Karen Aram
> >
> > >>> Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] In reference to comments on yesterdays
> News from Neptune
> > >>>
> > >>> This is the piece removed from her website, wasn’t it? Has it been
> put back?
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>> On Jun 30, 2018, at 9:30 AM, Robert Naiman via Peace-discuss
> >  wrote:
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > https://ocasio2018.com/issues
> >
> > >>>>
> > >>>> [...]
> > >>>>
> > >>>> A Peace Economy
> > >>>> Since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the United States has entangled
> itself in war and occupation throughout the Middle East and North Africa.
> As of 2018, we are currently involved in military action in Libya, Syria,
> Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan, and Somalia. Hundreds of thousands of
> civilians in these countries have been killed either as collateral damage
> from American strikes or from the instability caused by U.S. interventions.
> Millions more have fled their broken countries, contributing to the global
> refugee crisis.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> This continued action damages America’s legitimacy as a force for
> good, creates new generations of potential terrorists, and erodes American
> prosperity. In times when we’re told that there’s not enough money,
> Republicans and corporate Democrats seem to find the cash to fund a $1.1
> trillion fighter jet program or a $1.7 trillion-dollar nuclear weapon
> “modernization” program. The costs are extreme: the Pentagon’s budget for
> 2018 is $700 billion dollars: to continue fighting an endless War on Terror
> and refighting the Cold War with a new arms race that nobody can win.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> According to the Constitution, the right to declare war belongs to
> the legislative body, and yet many of these global acts of aggression have
> never once been voted on by Congress. In some cases, we've even acted
> unilaterally, without the backing of the United Nations.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> America should not be in the business of destabilizing countries.
> While we may see ourselves as liberators, the world increasingly views us
> as occupiers and aggressors. Alexandria believes that we must end the
> "forever war" by bringing our troops home, and ending the air strikes that
> perpetuate the cycle of terrorism throughout the world.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> By bringing our troops home, we can begin to heal the wounds we're
> opening by continuing military engagement. We can begin to repair our
> image. We can reunite military families, separated by repeated deployments.
> We can become stronger by building stronger diplomatic and economic ties,
> and by saving our armed forces only for when they're truly needed.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> [...]
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Robert Naiman
> > >>>> Policy Director
> > >>>> Just Foreign Policy
> > >>>>
> > www.justforeignpolicy.org
> >
> > >>>>
> >  naiman at justforeignpolicy.org
> >
> > >>>>
> > (202) 448-2898
> >  x1
> > >>>>
> > >>>> On Sat, Jun 30, 2018 at 8:32 AM, Karen Aram via Peace-discuss
> >  wrote:
> > >>>>
> > https://www.antiwar.com/blog/2018/06/28/as-election-day-
> approached-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-removed-antiwar-
> foreign-policy-section-from-her-we
> >
> > >>>>
> > >>>> _______________________________________________
> > >>>> 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
> >
> > >>>
> > >>
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
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> > >
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> >
> > >
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> >
> >
> >
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