Elizabeth Warren on Bill Moyers in 2004

Lest the usual suspects jump to conclusions, as they so often do, let me clear: my posting this in the Warren group does not mean that Warren is my candidate. I have no clue who my candidate will be and don't plan to hurt my eyelashes choosing one until people announce and I don't have to play games about who is running and who isn't. I simply came across this while doing some online research and thought this group might find it especially interesting. Then again, who am I kidding? Nothing I say will stand in the way of conclusion jumpers.

What I find especially interesting about it is how early on EW was making television appearances. But it is also interesting for her relatively early foreshadowing of the disaster that hit us in 2008, thanks in great part to deregulation generally and repeal of Glass Steagall in particular.

http://billmoyers.com/segment/flashback-elizabeth-warren-basically-predicts-the-great-recession/

I've been having trouble with advanced search. After typing in all the info I have,

all I get is that blessed circling that indicates "searching," until I get a message my browser telling me it cannot connect.

Anyone else having that issue?

It's no mystery. The financial reporting standards of Congress are a joke.

For just one thing, their homes need not be included and, for most homeowners, their homes are their largest assets (except when they go underwater). For another, they get to report in ranges, as opposed to hard numbers. Even with all that, over half of them show up, by their own fudge-y reporting standards, as millionaires and probably several times over.

The notions that I see get repeated over and over on this board and even by professional pundits, that the Democrats, who are supposedly the smarter of the two, are continually getting duped and gamed into benefiting themselves and their fellow multi-millionaires is charmingly naive, but silly.

How is this group a "safe haven?"

It seems as though every time I try to spend time in this group, I see the same kind of contradicting, challenging and nitpicking from posters who are not known as DU's left as I do in GD.

For their part, posters seem to feel a lot freer to contradict and challenge statements in this group than I would feel doing the same in any other group. They are not as respectful of the "safe haven" aspect of this group as members of this group have been of other groups.

Why don't these posts get deleted, as their counterparts would in any other group on this board?

If I wanted to see posters free to make leftists defend their statements, I'd stick to GD and other parts of the board. If I don't want to see it at all, I have to go to some other board, I guess.

Mario Cuomo's 1984 DNC speech, "A Tale of Two Cities."

Cuomo turned down the opportunity to run for President and the opportunity to sit on the Supreme Court.

FYI: "city on a hill" is a term from the biblical Sermon on the Mount that was used in a 1630 sermon by Winthrop. (And the concept was perfect for Boston's Beacon Hill.)

Over 3 centuries later, Winthrop's fellow Massachusetts resident, JFK, used it in the speech in which JFK first announced for the Presidency. But, of course, St. Ronnie gets more credit for the term than Jesus, Winthrop and JFK combined.

In this speech, Cuomo took the concept of a shining "city on a hill" to the "tale of two cities," foreshadowing the "two Americas" concept that figured so much in the politics of John Edwards.

My take:

Republican Lincoln helped make Democrats of a lot of proponents of slavery and a lot of conservatives in other respects. (And also helped make African Americans Lincoln Republicans, like MLK, Sr and Senator Brooke of Massachusetts).

Ergo, the Democratic Party had a strong conservative streak from at least Lincoln forward, if not earlier. (Recall, Jefferson, a slave owner, is considered the father of the Party.)

Wallace and Thurmond are 20th Century examples of "Lincoln Democrats." (My little twist on Reagan Democrats.) And a lot of them began turning Republican after integration measures by FDR and Truman. The Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, of course, began a more massive exodus.

Meanwhile, the strong conservative streak of the Democratic Party had always been struggling for more control of the Party. Wallace and Thurmond are examples of some old timers who were "Lincoln Democrats." (My little twist on Reagan Democrats.) And a lot of them began turning on the Democratic Party after integration measures by FDR and Truman. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 began a more massive exodus. It tried to move after McGovern lost, to institute super delegates and, in general, make the party less democratic. However, all it succeed in doing then officially was undoing the Democratic Party reforms that McGovern instituted. Still, it kept trying.

With Lee Atwater's help, Reagan used a lot of dog whistles as his Southern strategy. After "Reagan Democrats" and Mondale's loss, they did succeed in instituting Super Delegates, thereby making the Party less democratic. (A fair number of years later, the Republicans followed suit, but Democrats were by far the first to try to put mechanisms in place to overrule the outcomes of their own primaries, as I said, all the way back to McGovern.) (I think Lee Atwater's South

And that is about the time the DLC officially formed. If you look at the wiki of the DLC, you see the founding members were mostly white Southern males with Presidential aspirations, like Bubba, Gore and Warner, the most notable exceptions being Lieberman and Hillary.

The founding members didn't all end up running for President, but, at that time, all were considered to have that potential. And they wanted the Southern vote when they ran, especially their own states (which Gore could not carry, even with the New Democrat business). Or, maybe being raised in the South among conservatives, some of them did have a genuine fiscally conservative streak, too, quite apart from their personal ambitions. Either way, as I see it, that is how we got to the DLC and "pragmatic" Democrats, aka New Democrats.

I strongly agree with you about the yuppies. That crowd and their followers are the ones trying to tell us it's all about winning elections and only about winning elections. But I don't believe them. I think they share a lot of fiscal goals with the Republicans, but not the social goals. That simple.

Geez, maybe I should make this an OP somewhere

She did not only allow it to be run. Both Bill and, finally, Hillary herself, participated in it.

At first, yes, the dog whistles were only leaks and plants with media, like the Wright "black liberation theology" tapes and the photos of Obama in traditional Kenyan clothing.

Then, it went to surrogates, including Bill, dog whistling about drugs, black liberation theology, Jesse Jackson, and "shuckin' and jivin' (as if that would be something that just naturally rolled out of the mouth of Cuomo!).

Then, it went to surrogates being explicit, like Geraldine Ferrara saying flat out that the only reason that Obama was succeeding was that he was "black." (Because more Democrats are black, like Obama, than are female, like Hillary?)

However, as Hillary's chances got dimmer and dimmer, she finally identified her constituency as "hard working white people," which went well beyond dog whistle, though it certainly encompassed the "lazy" and "welfare" dog whistles. (This, from a woman who had earlier "tone deafly" compared being a United States Senator in a Republican majority Senate to being a slave on a plantation!)

After Bill's "casual" comment about Jesse Jackson, I had heard that Kennedy had warned that one more "racially tinged" campaign move would cause him (Kennedy) to declare openly for Obama (instead of allowing the primary to play out). Then, after Game Change came out, I read the bit about the private conversation between Bubba and Ted. Supposedly, Bubba said that, a couple of years ago, Obama would have been bringing them both coffee and the only reason that Ted was supporting Obama was because Obama was "black."

Aside from the racism, I had a hard time believing that Bubba, whom I see as one of the smartest people and best politicians on the planet, could be that clumsy and miss it by that much, both as to the "racially-tinged" campaign in general and how to win over Kennedy specifically. And, I think just "allowing" a racially-tinged campaign, especially one so transparent and clumsy, speaks volumes about America's alleged "First Black President" and his First Spouse.

If there is a real, hard-fought Democratic primary, these things will be raised against Hillary again and again. If there is a coronation or a dog-and-pony show aimed at convincing Democrats they are getting a primary when they are actually getting a coronation, Hillary will not be hit with these things again and again. So, I'll be watching. Meanwhile, Democrats, both PTB and rank and file, need to consider carefully what a Hillary nomination, despite her "racially-tinged" campaign against Obama, might do to one of their heretofore most steadfastly loyal constituencies.




Speaking of "racially-tinged," I never heard that term before the Hillary campaign. Until then, as far as I knew, something was either racist or it wasn't. Maybe the racism was subtle, or clumsy dog whistle, or blatant, but, in any event, it was either racist or not racist.

Was "racially tinged" invented to avoid accusing the Hillary campaign of being racist, or did I just miss it before Hillary's campaign? (Candidly, I think I am as capable of guessing as the next DUer, but does anyone know for sure when that term first hit our common lexicon?)

Police violence. We must do what we can to help prevent it.

Even if you are in a blue town in a blue state, let your Mayor and town or city council members and town meeting members know that you want police trained differently and will hold local leaders accountable for how police behave. (Cambridge is a blue town in a blue state, and look what happened to Professor Gates, an older man who walks with a cane, guilty of returning home tired--and at the hands of the cop who teaches classes on racial sensitivity, no less.)

Write your newspapers, too, whatever is left of them.

Organize a peaceful demonstration outside your city hall.

If your city or town has a local cable access station, see if you can get on one of the shows to urge people in your area to contact their local government to insist on different kinds of training for law enforcement.

I am having trouble thinking of more suggestions right now.



Here is a link to an organization that is active and will remain active around the issue of police killing people of color.

http://www.handsupunited.org/join-the-movement/

On edit: Michael Brown's mom asks that we join the Brown family to fight for every cop in the country to wear a body camera.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/us/ferguson-darren-wilson-shooting-michael-brown-grand-jury.html?_r=0

I would still push for re-training, too, because a film of a dead person is not ideal. Though it should help bring the trigger happy to justice, preventing a death is preferable.

It also occurs to me that you can contact a state legislator that you think will be friendly to the causes mentioned in this post and ask him or her to sponsor a bill. And/or, you can google how to file a citizen's bill in your state.

If you know of other organizations working on this, please post the links on this thread. Please also post your suggestions for ways to be pro-active to prevent more deaths.

Jon Stewart on the nexus between Keystone and politics--and a human easel.

Yep. People tend not to mention Perot, who was a factor in both 1992 and 1996.

Between them, Roosevelt and Truman won an astonishing five Presidential elections in a row and had Democrats winning House and Senate seats for decades.

DLC founding member Clinton, helped by Perot, won before most voters had heard of the DLC or were aware of any schism in the Party (Many still are not.)

DLC founding member Gore lost (or won, depending on your perspective), but not by a landslide, either way, shall we say.

DLC founding member Lieberman couldn't make it deep into the primary.

Senate New Democrat Caucus founding member, Kerry lost.

Obama, who did not mention his New Democrat status until after the election and ran to DLC founding member Hillary's left won the primary and the general.

Still, the New Democrats took over the Party. And the Party seldom, if ever, has done worse than it did in 2010 and this month.

Yet, we are told again and again, that the only electible Democrats are New Democrats. Go figure.