Ocasio-Cortez upset should be a wake up call—yet probably just a snooze fest for the establishment Democrats

By SJ Otto

The latest Democratic upset—Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez beating long-time mainstream Democrat Joseph Crowley of New York, should be a wake-up call to the mainstream Democratic Party leadership—"your strategy for winning elections is not working. Try something different!"

Actually the Democrat's strategy has been losing elections for years. And yet the leadership of the Democratic Party has not given up on it yet.

Ocasio-Cortez was a former organizer for Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign. A number of politicians from the Bernie Sanders campaign last year, have formed a serious challenge to the DNC leadership of the Democrats. The DNC strategy is always the same. They raise as much money as they can, they stay as close to the middle of the political spectrum as they can and they avoid saying anything that will offend a voter. It simply hasn't worked. Democrats have lost many elections here in Kansas and they just won't give that strategy up. Ocasio-Cortez is a member of Democratic Socialists of America and she ran a campaign that made her left leaning politics in plain site. And she won.

According to The New York Times; Ocasio-Cortez:

"had declared it was time for generational, racial and ideological change."

Also:

"Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is a native of the Bronx and a Latina in a Queens and Bronx district that is majority-minority, a fact she emphasized repeatedly on the trail against Mr. Crowley, who is white. In hindsight, the seat represented perhaps a perfect brew for an upset: a rusty incumbent, a charismatic challenger and a liberal district that gave Mr. Sanders more than 41 percent of the vote against Hillary Clinton."

Not all the politicians who have taken support and backing of Sanders are committed socialists. But all of his supporters are challenging the mainstream corporatist wing of the Democratic Party. For example James Thompson is running a campaign to oust House of Representative Ron Estes, the Republican. He won't use the "S" word (Socialism. He said he thinks most people in Kansas don't like that word). He got nearly no support in his last campaign from the main-stream establishment Democratic Party here in Kansas. He is being challenged by Laura Lombard, who will probably get the support of the more traditional Democrats. But so far Thompson has raised his own money and has a committed staff of supporters that have put him out front for the Democratic Primary, August 7. He came close to unseating Estes, in the last election. Estes made little effort to meet the people in his 4th district. All he did was run some negative and misleading adds that the establishment Republicans paid for. He just figured he'd win because he was a Republican running in a mostly Republican district. He almost lost and there is a strong possibility he will lose out to Thompson this fall. Again from The New York Times:

“What I see is that the Democratic Party takes working class communities for granted, they take people of color for granted and they just assume that we’re going to turn out no matter how bland or half-stepping these proposals are,” Ms. Ocasio-Cortez said in a recent interview about why she was running."

Her remarks strike a cord with voters all across the country, especially young voters, who unlike previous generations, are turning out to vote in large numbers. The old stale establishment Democrats should be noticing that their lock on power is slipping away badly. Again:

"Ms. Ocasio-Cortez had used Mr. Crowley’s role in the leadership, and the fact that he was the head of the local Democratic Party machine, against him in her bid to upend the existing political class. She will face Anthony Pappas, the Republican candidate, in the November general election....

....Mr. Crowley is the first House Democrat in the nation to lose a primary in 2018. His loss is most significant for a congressional incumbent since Eric Cantor, then the No. 2 Republican in the House, was defeated in 2014 to a Tea Party activist, David Brat."

Last December I posted an article on the Democratic Party and their timid plans to do the same thing the party has done over the last 20 years and all of it was wrong. As Miles Kampf-Lassin, of In These Times wrote:

"There’s no shortage of ambitious programs waiting for the Democrats to embrace.

The story of the Democratic Party in 2017 has been one of timidity and stubborn resistance to real change.
In the immediate aftermath of the party’s preferred candidate facing a humiliating defeat in last year’s presidential election, questions swirled over what direction the party would take to respond to the new political reality. With Democrats at their weakest position in decades, having lost over 1,000 seats in states and Congress over the previous eight years, it appeared that a drastic shift in how the party operated was in store.
And the party was offered an early opportunity to embark on such a shift, with the campaign by Keith Ellison for Democratic National Committee chair. Ellison sported a resume as a bold progressive with popular support from rank-and-file Democrats and party activists alike. And he presented a clear break with the Democratic Party’s traditional establishment.
But rather than embrace the new direction presented by Ellison’s bid, party insiders conspired to instead elect Tom Perez, a candidate with much stronger connections to the party’s establishment wing. The result came as a dispiriting blow to many in the party’s base who hoped for a clear break in Democratic leadership."

It seems unlikely that the Democratic Party will learn anything from this humiliating defeat. They could change directions and start to embrace issues and seriously challenge President Donald Trump and the Republicans. I'm not holding my breath. The only hope for the Democratic Party are the new challengers, such Ocasio-Cortez, who represent a new bolder and liberal, left or democratic socialists who may have the nerve it takes to tell American public what these candidates really stand for. The mainstream Democrats are likely to just follow the same old lame, tired, bland strategy that has lost the Democrats election after election. With these new socialists running, there is a chance that the voters will finally have a real choice in these Fall elections.

 

Pix by Bill Clinton DNC Speech: Snooze fest or Sweet? #DNCinPHL.

Socializing at the Socialist Social, in Wichita, KS

Last night I went to a Socialist Social!  event at the Vagabond Cafe. About 20 people attended the event were we all discussed various issues connected with socialism as well as some people who discussed the principles of socialism and some common questions. We all enjoyed our favorite beverages and snacks.

Trump again mocks Sen. John McCain, brags that Republicans 'gutted' healthcare reform

One of the most unforgivable actions taken by President Donald Trump,  our idiot 'n chief, was his destruction of the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. Trump has bragged about destroying health care for a lot of people. So it is important to keep up on his actions or in-actions on health care. -SJ Otto

 

From the Daily Kos:

By Hunter 

Republican Sen. John McCain continues to remain in Arizona, battling brain cancer. National Republican leader and manifestly unfit president Donald Trump continues to mock and belittle him, this time singling McCain out in a Saturday rally in Nevada for his vote against a Republican bill repealing the Affordable Care Act, the healthcarereform law widely known as "Obamacare."

"Nobody talked to him. Nobody needed to, and then he walked in: thumbs-down. It’s alright, because we’ve essentially gutted it anyway," Trump said of ObamaCare at the rally.

Trump was in Nevada to campaign for McCain's colleague Sen. Dean Heller, who has offered no apparent public comment about his party's leader continuing to publicly sneer at McCain. Heller has also has long attempted to play both sides of the the healthcare debate hemself, so he may have been even more alarmed at Trump bragging to his Nevada constituents that the law has been "gutted."

Trump has at this point taken to attacking John McCain on a regular basis, during his public speeches. Daughter Meghan McCain responded to a similar Trump attack on her father last week as "gross."

Click here for the rest of the story.

Rock music is better than unquestioning coverage of the US military by NPR

By SJ Otto

My wife Cam got me into listening to NPR. They do have some good informative articles. They are a little less biased than the other main stream news media outlets. But their are times when I switch the channel to the hard rock station at 95.1. Yes I do like rock music. But more than that I get tired of their many interview with military leaders. They talk about the efficiency of our military, the quality of our troops and how the military maintains itself. But there are questions missing. Why do we need these troops in Yemen, Afganistan or Iraq. These questions are never asked. Aparently NPR seems to think we all agree with what our military does. As Geoff Dutton said recently in CounterPunch:

"Like other major news organizations, NPR doesn’t seem to sense just how polluted the water it swims in is. Example: Recently (6/10/18), it aired a segment on the tribulations immigrants face to join the military, specifically the Marine Corps. We learn that Hispanics, 18% of the US population, make up 25% of active duty Marines. We also learn that the Trump Administration has put up arbitrary bureaucratic barriers to immigrants who apply to serve in our military. That’s due to the fact that one must be a citizen to enlist, a process that the Obama administration simplified that has now become more complex.

Tennessee resident Arturo Solomon, 24, is a DACA recipient and martial arts expert. The gung-ho Hispanic Marine hopeful told NPR correspondent Julieta Martinelli of his frustration from being sent hither and yon to qualify for citizenship. First, NPR Defense correspondent Tom Bowman (always a reliable source for what the Pentagon says it’s thinking) opines that Hispanics such as Solomon are overrepresented in the military due to their “being courageous.”.....

....That cultural value is also known as “machismo,” an attitude many Hispanic Mister Solomon wants to fight, perhaps to die, for his country for reasons NPR chose not to ask. Is it for glory, to serve the empire, or to demonstrate his manhood to impress someone? Either Ms. Martinelli forgot to inquire or her interrogation was edited. That’s too bad, because it would be great to get into those weeds. Her next interviewee, Margaret Stock (US Army Reserve, ret.), underscored that by making it onerous for immigrants to enter military service the Trump Administration is making the military “miss out on a lot of high-quality troops.” All that wasted talent. Such a shame.

Quite probably, Lt. Col. Stock, but to what ends? When was the last time the US Marines were called upon to defend the homeland, inthe homeland? Perhaps in the War of 1812 and arguably in the Civil War, but otherwise deployed abroad ever since. Missions include toppling reformist governments in this hemisphere and confronting Middle Eastern towelheads who supposedly hate our freedoms, presumably including our constitutional right to mow down fellow Americans with licensed large-caliber weaponry, just as our implacable Islamic enemies license themselves to do. Does Solomon want a piece of that? NPR could have asked."

As with me, I believe the substance of these interviews should focus on why the US needs so many people in its military? Do these soldiers realize they are fighting mainly for an empire and not as we are told, "to defend this country." Dutton scholds NPR for avoiding the truth, just has its corporate media oligarchs it competes with.

"Being nonprofit and mostly listener-supported, NPR should have an easier time telling truth to power than corporate media oligarchs do. But tell truth to NPR at your hazard. It used to solicit comments from listeners via email and on its website but gave it up several years ago, saying their comment rolls had become a troll haven that was too tedious and expensive to moderate."

As with me he has problems with the way they cover the military:

"Perhaps I’m being unnecessarily harsh, but couldn’t NPR just sometimes question what all this preparedness, both domestic and foreign, is about? On the nearer hand, we have countless numbers of our countrymen telling the government, “Don’t tread on me,” and on the farther one, our guardians aim to keep the homeland free of terrorists (of which 95% or more must be home-grown). So it goes."

And so our military leaders are given no serious questions. We spend Billions on defense world wide. Our military budget is the highest in the world and military spending dwarfs nearly all other US budgets. As Dutton said:

"Were he able to enlist, depending on his specialty and mission, Mr. Solomon might find himself billeted to any of the estimated 1000 or so US military bases scattered throughout 156 countries. Nick Turse wrote in 2009:

There are more than 1,000 U.S. military bases dotting the globe.  To be specific, the most accurate count is 1,077.  Unless it’s 1,088.  Or, if you count differently, 1,169.  Or even 1,180.  Actually, the number might even be higher.  Nobody knows for sure.

More than half of these “sites,” as DoD prefers to call them, are in Afghanistan and Iraq, plus 10 more currently squatting in Syria, unauthorized. The count excludes sites of less than 10 acres or worth less than $10M (many are likely intelligence and counterinsurgency outposts), chicken feed by DoD reckoning (even though ten million is more than enough to build a decent public school). There have been ups and downs in base construction and foreign deployments since the end of the Cold War, but the trend is decidedly upward and shows no sign of tapering off."

So it is time to hold NPR's feet to the fire. They are constantly raising money and asking people to take part in events they promote. They need to be asked why there is no debate on what our military does. As for that article click here for the rest of it. And I will feel to turn to rock music when they chose to glamorise the military.

Pix by Wikipedia

US leaves 'hypocritical and self-serving' UN Human Rights Council

From RT:

Washington has decided to walk out of the UN Human Rights Council, accusing the body of hypocrisy. The US has long cited concerns about the body’s “anti-Israel bias.”

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and US envoy to the UN Nikki Haley announced the decision at a press conference Tuesday afternoon.

“The US is officially withdrawing from the UN Human Rights Council,” Haley said, calling it a “hypocritical and self-serving organization that makes a mockery of human rights.”

“American participation is the last shred of credibility the council has,” Haley argued. “That is precisely why we must leave.”

For the rest click here.

Pix by Vice.

Wichita now has to face its future, according to The Wichita Eagle, or dump its conservative ways

By SJ Otto

A recent article in The Wichita Eagle looks at the economic stagnation of Wichita and discusses what might be going wrong. Here is how the article starts off:

Amid an avalanche of sobering data that indicates Wichita's economy continues to flounder, one statement by analyst James Chung stuck with Fidelity Bank president Aaron Bastian.

"It was 'We’re starving our city,'" Bastian said. "That just hit me like a bucket of water."

Bastian and other community leaders left the analysis of Wichita's economy last week with a clear mission.

"We need to do more," Bastian said. "What we're doing is not enough."

And....

"Among the numbers:

▪ While the gross domestic product for cities across the U.S. grew an average of 16 percent this decade, Wichita's dropped a percentage point.

▪ Every city in the central U.S. comparable to Wichita grew faster than the national average since 2010. Not Wichita.

▪ The U.S. labor force grew significantly over the past decade. Wichita's shrank."

One thing needs to be pointed out and that is that the economy doesn't really need growth to be successful. At some point the US and other countries needs to examine the idea of a "no growth" or "maintenance economy."

One thing we don't need is all the urban sprawl from the poorly organized development plans (or lack of) at the edges of Wichita. The present city leaders want to see a building on every piece of land at the edges of Wichita and that has created nothing but ugly clutter.

For years I have complained that voters in the city of Wichita have been unable to elect intelligent, progressive, forward thinking people who can move the city forward. Again, quoting the article:

Alex Pemberton tweeted that he wanted to see "a more-or-less wholesale change in leadership, in both the political and civic sectors."

"Get rid of all the leaders-in-title-only who care about their legacy or job security and replace them with real leaders, who will take bold action and engage in honest, critical conversations," said Pemberton, who two years ago founded the Yellowbrick Street Team, a grassroots movement known for drawing attention to urban-living issues until it went on hiatus early this year.

Conservatives and social conservatives have held Wichita back, with their supporters wanting social controls over such businesses as strip clubs and efforts to shut down Wichita's abortion clinics. The people elected tend to be political activists with no real leadership abilities. They have been conservative dolts who can't imagine how to move the city forward. Further in the article:

Others on social media voiced support for bringing better-paying jobs to the city and expanding Wichita's public transit system so it's easier for people to get to and from work in a cost-effective way.

The buss system in Wichita is a perfect example of people who should not run anything. They have a buss system that completely shuts down at 6pm. Many people have told me they would use the  buss to go to work if it didn't shut down so early. They could get to work, but the buss shuts down before they can use it to get home. Another need is for a bus to get people home from the bars and night clubs in Wichita's Old Town development. With all the emphasis on drunk driving, in the state and city, it would make so much sense to have a buss system people could use to get home after they have been drinking to avoid getting DUIs. For a city this size, not having a working bus system after 6pm demonstrates the small minded thinking of our small minded leaders.

Again in the article:

"(Mayor Jeff ) Longwell said the city is "working on a river corridor development that will be a game-changer," though he would not offer details.

"We shouldn’t lose sight that we’ve already planted the seeds of opportunity and we haven’t yet been able to harvest them," Longwell said."

That is an interesting comment considering that the last WaterWalk deal the City of Wichita made lost millions of dollars. According to a past The Wichita Eagle article:

"After 15 years and $41 million in taxpayer subsidies to the WaterWalk, the city of Wichita has gotten no money from a profit-sharing agreement attached to the development deal.

And it probably never will, the way the deal is structured."

In one of the worst rip-offs in the history of Wichita, the city council literally gave all that money away and the developers did absolutely nothing to justify that give-a-way. It was a disgrace. While conservatives wine about poor people getting welfare, a few developers got free money for doing nothing.

Longwell and any other council member who can't manage to do better than that should never be anywhere near a leadership position.

The Wichita Eagle earlier article mentioned one problem the city has and that is a fair and equitable system that pays men and women at the same pay:

One was business consultant Jill Miller, who was upset by research showing the pay gap for women is worse in Wichita than it is nationally.

"I knew that things were hard for women in business in Wichita, but that data smacked me in the face," Miller said. "The numbers are the numbers. It wasn't just a perception. It is the data."

While there are many solutions to Wichita's economic problems, the main one I see is getting rid of all the conservative dolts that keep holding the city back. As The Wichita Eagle articles says:

"Friends University political science professor Russell Fox says Wichita, with its conservative mindset, has "a 'no' mentality" that has limited what the city could have done.

"The truth of the matter is, Wichita is a city caught in the middle," Fox said. "It's a city that looks like it ought to be doing what other cities are doing but isn't."

Residents must ask themselves whether they want Wichita to remain a "steady state" city — not growing, not dying — or whether they want the city to reach the potential so many envision, Fox said.

Voters will say at the polls whether they want to keep things as they are, Fox said, or prefer a different future. To get that different future, he said, residents have to send the message to officials "they should be spending more, risking more, investing more."

And the main message I find useful is to vote out the dolts.

 

Pix by Me.me.

The Neo-Liberal Plan To Bring Down Venezuela

Here's Trump putting his hand in female reporter's face to quiet her

From Daily Kos:

Earlier today, Donald Trump was fielding questions from reporters. Trump is standing by what looks like a row of golf carts, which … well, he probably is. 

Trump: We’re building a military so strong, nobody’s gonna mess with us; but you know what? I never want to have to use it.

Reporter: Can you tell us about the verification process—

It is at this point that others try to ask questions, specifically CBS News’ Weijia Jiang, who tries to break through the softball question-fest to ask Trump how and why he has declared the nuclear threat from North Korea “over.” Trump puts his hand up in her face, saying “Quiet!” He turns to someone else and exclaims:

Trump: She’s so obnoxious.

He proceeds to put his hand back in her face so he can talk about how he’s creating an amazing “verification” process that’s going to make other verification processes seem like small verification processes, or whatever dumb lie is about to come out of his mouth. Watch for yourself below.

For the rest click here.

The wonders of nature—and there are those who hate it

By SJ Otto

As I get older I do what I have always done to relax myself—No! Not going to the bar for beer—OK I do that also, but this is something else. I go out to a park in the country were I can be with nature. I like to swim in the Walnut River. And I've heard from a few friends and relatives: "You want to swim with fish poop?!"

The water in that river, and many other Kansas rivers, is fairly clear. I take into consideration that fish can't walk out of the water and use a porta potty. Pooping in the water is their only option. I personally enjoy watching the smaller fish swim around, as well as crayfish, cranes, ducks and other forms of water wildlife.

There is something about being one with nature that I really enjoy. After all, most fish don't have police or foremen to tell everyone what do and how to think. There are natural things all around and none had to be manufactured and paid for. It is all free. The fish and other animals seems to find food on their own and no one sells it to them.

I often get the felling that most people hate nature. Many people I know never venture out into a wooded area that doesn't have toilets and bottled water. Most people kill some kinds of animals, at least insects if nothing else. I kill some insects, such as mosquitoes and roaches, but I don't kill anything that leaves me alone.

Snakes are a real problem for people. I know a lot of people who say they "hate snakes." They don't usually say they hate lizards or turtles. We could assume that part of this is because some snakes are poisonous. But so are a few poison lizards. Maybe most people don't realize that the overwhelming majority of the snakes in this area, in this state, are not poisonous. After all it was a snake that tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden, and I think that has a lot to do with people's fear of snakes, even for atheists.

And that brings to another reason people seem to hate nature. I constantly hear of men (mostly white guys) who always kill snakes when the find them. They often chop their heads off with a shovel. Maybe they think the woods is safer without snakes, but that just isn't so.

According to Dr. James Carpenter, professor of zoological medicine at Kansas State University,

"Several types of snakes live in the area. The only venomous types, copperheads and Massasauga rattlesnakes, are usually found around limestone outcropping and ledges and in fields when they are seeking food or trying to get some sun, he said, and most are just trying to get warm.

The water snakes in this area are not venomous."

And there is this:

“There are good things about snakes,” Charles Lee, extension wildlife specialist at K-State, said. “They are important in the ecology of our world. They do a little bit of feeding on critters like rodents or other small mammals that people may consider undesirable. All species have a value.”

I've noticed fewer snakes in the places I go in the last few years. I appreciate snakes. I like to see and watch them. It is too bad so many people kill them and kill them for no reason.

Snakes aren't the only problem. Many men I know won't swim in a muddy pond because of snapping turtles. Many women I know just won't swim in dirty water. But at least most of these people don't kill the turtles.

There are a lot of white rural men who enjoy going on a so called "coyote hunting." They don't eat these animals and the just want to see how many they can kill in one day. It really isn't hunting at all. It is mass slaughter. I listened the other day to an NPR story about coyote calling/hunting:

 " AL MORRIS: They don't want me to hunt. And I want to tell them to go to hell. The reality of it is we're good people. And whether you understand or not, I'm doing something legal. And I really don't care if you like it or not."

As CAMILLA FOX said, in that same article,

"It's gratuitous slaughter, and that's precisely what cockfighting and dogfighting were. And it was up until not too long ago that both those practices were still legal in the U.S."

My question is why are rural white people, or maybe white people in general so attracted to killing things with guns. I can understand hunting a deer and eating it. But for many of these white red-necks It is as if they want to go around killing anything that moves, that they can kill legally. I think many of these people follow a culture of death that goes right along with hating nature. If man doesn't control something, many people hate it.

I for one value my time in the forests. I don't need to kill the animals I find in order to enjoy myself. And I think it is a sickness that so many people are attracted to killing things. Living things and the places they like to live have a great beauty that does not need to be killed.  

Pix by El Dorado, KS.

WSU students and faculty fight back against backward conservatives

By SJ Otto

Just last week students and some staff persons put out a full page ad in The Wichita Eagle called; "Wichtia State University, It's Time To lift the shade."

The add asked a lot of questions, such as, "When the WSU Administration sold the idea of the YMCA Wellness Center on the Innovation Campus to the Student Government Association and did they explain how many years the student annual commitment of $5 million would apply?"

There were a lot of questions as to how the school administrators ran things and how they used student money. They questioned gifts from the Kochs and asked why they have so much authority to run parts of the university.

The ad questioned President John Bardo when he said creating “an elite little liberal arts college” at WSU “ain’t gonna work.”

“Do we wish we were an elite little liberal arts college?” Bardo said. “That’s not who we are."

The ad said; "failing to recognize that Liberal Arts and Sciences has provided the foundation for every educated student who as attended since 1895."

The main point of all of this is that the faculty and many students are not going to roll over and let a conservative clique destroy our educational system. They are fighting back.

Emily Glass is a victim of deceit

By SJ Otto

I realize that some people do bad things, such as murdering a child, but I doubt if any person deserves what Emily Glass is going through. She has been harangued by the press, by the police and by people interested in the case who follow her around.

Even when a person is bad, that does not entitle the police to lying, deceit and manipulation of a persons emotions.

That appears to be what was done to get Glass[1]

to tell a Private Investigator David Marshburn were Lucas Hernandez's body was. According to The Wichita Eagle:

"Marshburn told Grace the approach he took with Glass was to accuse her. He said he "basically went at her as, 'I know you did it. I'm here. I can help you. What can I do for you?'" He also told (Crime Stories with Nancy)Grace that Glass admitted to using methamphetamine while Lucas and her 1-year-old daughter were at home and that she let a homeless man spend the night at her house just before she reported Lucas missing to police."

Also:

"Marshburn describes Glass as "cold and callous"

Maybe he felt that way towards her. But manipulating her and pretending to befriend was not the way to go about it. The ends don't justify the means. We need to trust the police and those who do their bidding. Lying and deceiving us is not the way to earn that trust. They  may solve this case a little sooner, but they have lost my respect and the respect of others.

Pix from missing children news portal.

[1] For background information, Lucas was reported missing now for three months. His stop mother, Emily Glass has been in and out of jail and court for suspected child abuse. Lucas' body was found just a few days ago.