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In reply to the discussion: Vote for whomever you want [View all]delrem
(9,688 posts)I think suggestions otherwise are slanderous. Just my opinion, mind you, and I'm not a US citizen so have no vote and no substance. An onlooker only. But as an onlooker I don't see that kind of thing (DUers working for the GOP) going on in this debate, not at all, not from any "side".
What I see is a "progressive/populist" movement wanting change from what they see as a corporatist/militarist lock on both parties, where too many Dem politicians are virtually indistinguishable from the Reps on these huge (economics/military) issues. So they point out the similarities and focus on the fact that the Third Way *exists*, neo-liberalism *exists*, and on what it is, on who the leaders are, where the money comes from and who profits. I find it a bit odd that many Dems who oppose the progressive/populist wing on these matters actually deny the existence of Third Way, of neo liberalism, or deny awareness of it, or deny the relevance to anything that matters in current US politics. In my opinion (again, as a non-voter, non-US-citizen) I find such denials bizarre. Ostrich-like, and not a good sign at all.
Here's an example of what I, even as a foreigner lightly scanning the issues, see as an under-examined fact regarding the corporatist/militarist identity between the two parties.
Victoria Nuland. a synopsis from wiki:
"During the Bill Clinton administration, Nuland was chief of staff to Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott before moving on to serve as deputy director for former Soviet Union affairs.
She served as the principal deputy foreign policy adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney and then as U.S. ambassador to NATO.
Nuland became special envoy for Conventional Armed Forces in Europe and then became State Department spokesperson in summer 2011.
She was nominated to serve as Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs in May 2013 and sworn in to fill that role in September 2013. During her confirmation hearings, she faced "sharp questions" about a memo she had sent outlining the talking points that would be used by the Obama administration in the days shortly after the 2012 Benghazi attack."
Nuland's husband, Robert Kagan, was cofounder of PNAC. The happily married couple are neo-con/neo-lib through and through. Totally unrepentant of any wrongdoing, which they would deny anyway. Moving from Dem to Rep to Dem admins, serving at the right hand side of Dick Cheney, she was lauded by John Kerry - who laughed at her detractors from the left.
That isn't just a simililarity, it's a cross-administration identity - one that's definitive of US foreign policy.
IMO it isn't a good identity and it ought to be examined and shown in the clear light. To do so isn't "doing the GOP's work", it's doing the work of anyone who takes the responsibility that should belong to voting
seriously.
Nowadays Robert Kagan and Victoria Nuland are vocal Hillary Clinton supporters. They've re-branded themselves from being self-described neo-con PNACers to being self-described liberal-interventionists, and there are plenty of pundits who advance the proposition that the rebranding marks some kind of "evolution" or "rehabilitation". It doesn't.
Pointing out or learning about any of this stuff doesn't help either the Dems *or* the Reps, it helps the voting public. Likewise pointing out the funders and operators of the Third Way, of the Brookings Institution (I believe that Robert Kagan now earns $$$ there), etc., and their political objectives and their go-to politicians, doesn't help the Dems or the Reps, it helps inform oneself and the voting public.
I don't look forward to watching a farce of an "election" pitting Hillary Rodham Clinton vs. John Ellis "Jeb" Bush, because they are very very similar. They are family friends. To be sure, Jeb is probably the most "moderate" and "centrist" of the lot in the Rep camp. So it could be worse. But I'm hoping that the Dems wake up and put forward a strong progressive candidate - because (again underlining that I'm speaking merely as an observer with no immediate stakes in the game) I think the people of the US are ready and waiting for that. Polling on individual issues suggests that to be true. Referendum results suggest that to be true. And if the Democratic Party is too afraid to take the chance, offering lame "what would the Republicans say!" as excuse for capitulating to a bi-partisan status quo, I think they will be routed. I think it'll be rout of historic proportions.
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