Category Archives: Electoralism/Democratism

Kanye West Announces 2020 Presidential Run Reply

by • Electoralism/Democratism • Tags:

By Sharareh Drury

Hollywood Reporter

Kanye West announced on the Fourth of July that he plans to run for president in 2020 — potentially to make good on a promise he made five years before during the 2015 MTV VMAs.

“We must now realize the promise of America by trusting God, unifying our vision and building our future. I am running for president of the United States,” West tweeted Saturday evening, along with the hashtag #2020VISION.

The announcement was quickly endorsed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk who tweeted at the 43-year-old, “You have my full support!”

Having leaned more into politics in recent years, including a handful of meetings with Donald Trump, the announcement follows numerous statements by West in the past about his intentions to run for the highest office in the land — most recently last November at Fast Company’s Innovation Festival. The difference with that announcement was his presidential sights were set on a 2024 bid.

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Kanye West Tweets That He’s Running for President Reply

by • Electoralism/Democratism • Tags:

By Brian Doherty

Kanye West, the hip hop and fashion mogul whose public moves in the past few years have included a controversial flirtation with MAGA-ism and a turn toward pure Christian messaging in his music, chose the nation’s birthday to announce this via tweet:

The Federal Election Commission’s website shows no sign yet that he’s done any of the legal filings to really run for the office. But he has already cleared what may be the most important hurdle toward such endeavors: the public support of his wife, Kim Kardashian West, who retweeted his announcement with apparent approval, adding merely a flag icon to her husband’s declaration. Tech mogul Elon Musk is also already backing Kanye’s candidacy.

As I pointed out in a 2019 Reason story, despite his oft-repeated fandom for President Donald Trump, the only specific policy issues West has been public about supporting are criminal justice reform, getting more jobs into American cities, and gun control. He and Kim Kardashian West have been effective lobbyists for prison reform, both generically and in the specific matter of getting the nonviolent drug offender Alice Johnson out of prison.

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The Articles of Unity – A Patriotic Plan to Save our Republic (Bret Weinstein) Reply

by • Activism, Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Economics/Class Relations, Electoralism/Democratism, Left and Right

Bret Weinstein seems to be a guy whose “heart is in the right place,” as a sentimentalist might say.  His core idea is correct, i.e. building an anti-establishment movement that rejects incompetent/corrupt elites while rejecting dangerous authoritarians from the far-left and far-right. His emphasis on the “exhausted majority” rather than Red Tribe/Blue Tribe hardliners is correct (though I would start with the lumpenproletariat and work upward to the 46% before trying the work the exhausted majority). However, a core problem with the “Unity 2020” idea is that it fails to recognize that the US presidency is not the real power in the US but simply a senior managerial position. A US president that seriously threatened ruling class interests would be Nixoned, JFK’d, or Allende’d (the history of the US empire contains only a few hundred examples of this being carried out in other countries/colonies at the instigation of the US power elite).

Hispanic Republicans? Yep, and they’re here to stay Reply

by • Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Electoralism/Democratism, Left and Right, Race and Ethnicity

Are Hispanic the new Italians? In recent years, I’ve noticed an increased number of prominent minority conservatives/Republicans. An Iraqi immigrant woman wants to challenge Ilhan Omar. A Jamaican immigrant woman planned to challenge Alexandria Ocasia-Cortez and dropped out. A Hispanic woman running for Congress in Florida bills herself as an anti-AOC. Gay married Dave Rubin and atheist Somali immigrant Ayaan Hirsi Ali are now becoming conservative icons. Many other examples. I know a lot of Republican-voting, FOX New-watching “conservatives” and most of them seem to not have any real problem with ethnic minorities, women, immigrants, or even gays as long as they get the politics “right” (literally speaking). Some on the alt-right are now embracing Islam and/or Communism. Many people would be surprised by the number of minorities found in supposed “white nationalist” circles. And many leftists express utter hatred for minority conservatives.

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Protesters block highway as Trump makes his way to Mount Rushmore Reply

by • Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Economics/Class Relations, Electoralism/Democratism

This is kind of like Netanyahu holding a campaign rally in the West Bank or Gaza.

Trump is obviously trying to fuel “culture war” sympathy on the right because he knows he can hardly run on the great state of the nation. One reason why I think the wave of statue/monument vandalism was a mistake was that it fuels things like this, i.e. a pushback from the right-wing, led by a demagogic politician who only wants to distract attention away from everything else (mass unemployment, botched handling of the pandemic, the recent class-based insurrection, widening class divisions, the police state, etc.) by inciting some tribes against others.

The statue vandalism craze was a distraction from the more substantive issues (the insurrection against the state and capitalist class) and provided a vehicle for propagandists for the right-wing of the ruling class to deflect attention away from the insurgency toward the culture war by playing tribe against tribe: “Forget attacking the power elite, one of those other tribes over there is vandalizing your icons!” How the protestors play this hand will be important. It’s essential that they do not succumb to Trump’s bait. Trump would like nothing better than mayhem so he can appeal to safety-crazed soccer moms and say, “Do you want this coming to Peoria?”

By Tal Axelrod

The Hill

Protesters were seen on Friday blocking a highway in South Dakota ahead of President Trump’s appearance at Mount Rushmore for a July 4 celebration. Demonstrators were seen gathering about three hours before Trump’s appearance, sparking warnings from authorities for them to clear the way. Law enforcement was later seen putting on gas masks and launching smoke bombs into the crowd to try to disperse the protesters.

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Working Families Party breaks down TREMENDOUS success after progressive wins nationwide Reply

by • Electoralism/Democratism

The fact that progressives are a growing insurgency among the Democrats, that Qanon types are winning primaries as Republicans, and public intellectuals and celebrities are trying to launch third parties shows that a lot of folks are getting pissed off at the system.

State Director of the New York Working Families Party Sochie Nnaemeka explains how progressives developed a working relationship with voters to unseat establishment candidates in the state.

Top Biden Nastec Aide RAN THE DRONE KILL LIST under Obama Reply

by • Anti-Imperialism/Foreign Policy, Electoralism/Democratism

A Biden regime will likely be a “ruling class unity” government that includes Hillaryites, “human rights imperialists” like Samantha Power, Bush Republicans, neocons, Boltonesque hawks, and Israel-firsters, with “woke” social policies being used to pacify the left-wing of the Democratic Party and co-opt left activism while strengthening recent efforts by Barr to target genuine radicals (from Antifa to Boogaloo).

Will the Neocons Bait, Turn, Switch, and Purge the Antifa/SJWs While Suppressing the Lumpenproletariat? 1

by • Anarchism/Anti-State, Anti-Imperialism/Foreign Policy, Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Economics/Class Relations, Electoralism/Democratism, Fourth Generation Warfare, History and Historiography, Left and Right, Police State/Civil Liberties, Political Correctness/Totalitarian Humanism

This is important stuff.

I recently put a couple of questions concerning current events to a well-known intellectual historian, a Jewish man whose parents fled Hungary during the rise of Hitler, and who is a specialist in the history of 20th-century totalitarian movements.  His responses confirmed my suspicion that both the bizarre de facto alliance of the far-left, liberals, neocons, and Bush Republicans which has emerged in opposition to the Trumpists, and the seeming acquiescence of the state to both the iconoclasm spree of the far left and the lumpenproletarian insurrection, represents efforts by the capitalist class, the new clerisy, and the Deep State to weaponize both the far left and the insurrectionists against the Trumpists, subsequently purging or co-opting both, while restoring neocon dominance of the military-industrial-intelligence complex. In other words, it’s all about putting the neocons back in charge of US foreign policy. Remember that the neocons started out as Trots, and this is exactly how Bolshies do things.

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Hundreds of George W. Bush administration officials to back Biden, group says Reply

by • Electoralism/Democratism

The Neoliberal Centrist Party circles the wagon with the neocons having successfully colonized the Democrats.

By Tim Reid

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Hundreds of officials who worked for former Republican President George W. Bush are set to endorse Democratic White House hopeful Joe Biden, people involved in the effort said, the latest Republican-led group coming out to oppose the re-election of Donald Trump.

The officials, who include Cabinet secretaries and other senior people in the Bush administration, have formed a political action committee – 43 Alumni for Biden – to support the former vice president in his Nov. 3 race, three organizers of the group told Reuters. Bush was the country’s 43rd president.

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Newt Gingrich says 2020 is ‘the most important election since Lincoln’ Reply

by • Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Electoralism/Democratism, Left and Right • Tags: ,

Newt Gingrich is one of the most loathsome people in modern American political history, but he may be right that the 2020 election increasingly resembles the 1860 election in the sense of the existential questions that are involved. Newt may also be right that the victory of the Democrats may well represent the final nail in the coffin of the traditional right-wing of the ruling class (R.I.P and Rot in Hell) and the victory of the “California model” that he describes (which amounts to neoconservatism in foreign policy, neo-feudalism in economics and totalitarian humanism in social policy).

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Why does it seem like both parties are trying to lose in 2020? 1

by • Electoralism/Democratism

Krystal and Saager point out something that is really important in this, i.e. that the two parties’ leadership is more concerned about deflecting “radicals” in their own party than actually winning elections, which is consistent with my view that we really have three parties: The Neoliberal Centrist Party (with two factions, moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans), the Trumpist Party, and the Social Democratic Party.

This week on #RisingQs hosts Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti answer Rising fans’ questions on the ideological diversity of Congress, why both parties seem like they’re trying to lose on purpose, and the importance of authenticity versus platform.

Where does the 2020 election stand — and how might it turn out? 1

by • American Decline, Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Electoralism/Democratism, Left and Right

What I find most interesting about the upcoming election is the way that the two sides now view each other as existential enemies. Whichever side wins, I’m positive the other side will challenge the legitimacy of the results. For any kind of parliamentary state to function, the losing side has to be willing to lose gracefully on the notion that they will get another chance.

When no less than Noam Chomsky, the Left’s leading intellectual, considers Trump “the greatest criminal in history” and the Right considers Trump their “Flight 93” plan, it’s clear the two sides view each other as the equivalent of enemy nations.

As a political atheist, I personally view all of this the same way I view the Shia vs. Sunni rivalry in the Middle East or Protestants vs. Catholics in Northern Island or Hindus vs. Muslims in South Asia, i.e. no horse in the race. I used to think Americans were too lazy to actually fight a civil war but with the recent state-induced depression and medical martial law, that may be changing.

 

Trump Will March Us Toward Fascism By Any Means Possible Reply

by • Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Electoralism/Democratism

I agree with much of the content of this video, but I don’t think this kind of rhetoric is helpful. One thing one of the speakers in this mentions is a “generational divide.” That is correct on many levels, and one level is that those who consider Trump to be a “fascist” apparently have no knowledge of what the America of Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, or even Bill Clinton was like. It’s obvious who Trump’s political influences are. Nixon and Nelson Rockefeller, who would have been President and Governor of New York respectively when Trump was a young man; Ed Koch, who was Mayor of New York City when Trump was first becoming a professional celebrity; Bill Clinton, the playboy President; and his friend Rudy Giuliani. You see traces of all of these in Trump. The idea that Trump is some new or unique existential evil is absurd.

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After weeks of protests, meaningful police reform appears unlikely Reply

by • Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Electoralism/Democratism, Law/Justice, Left and Right, Police State/Civil Liberties, Race and Ethnicity

You don’t say? Imagine that.

Analysis by Josh Campbell, CNN Security Correspondent

The dramatic images rocked the nation — hundreds of thousands of people from all races taking to the streets across the United States, demanding an end to excessive police force against people of color.

What began as local outrage in response to George Floyd’s death following an encounter with Minneapolis police officers soon spread throughout the country.

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GOP Senator Questions if Fox News Even Wants Donald Trump Re-Elected Reply

by • Electoralism/Democratism, Left and Right

They don’t. The Trumpism that is on FAUX News is merely raw meat being thrown to the Republican “base” (i.e. useful idiots for the right-wing of the ruling class). FOX is the voice of the neocons. To a person, they hate Trump in what is a major heel vs. heel match.

By Benjamin Fearnow

Newsweek

Republican Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley on Saturday questioned if Fox News even wants to see Donald Trump get re-elected in November, criticizing a Friday town hall interview the president did with host Sean Hannity.

Grassley echoed one of Trump’s frequent criticisms against Fox News by asking if the cable news network has any loyalty to the president. The Iowa GOP senator’s challenge comes hours after Trump and his longtime supporter, Hannity, conducted an interview taped Friday in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

The senator particularly complained that Hannity allowed Trump to “digress,” which prevented him from touting his efforts to stack the U.S. Supreme Court with conservative justices.

“Does FOXNews want Trump Re-elected? Watched Hannity/Trump interview/KEY QUESTION “What goals in next term?Trump starts answer/gets off point and Hannity helps digress and that’s end of the most important Q to get FOUR MORE YEARS OF DRAINING THE SWAMP &Justices,” Grassley tweeted Saturday morning.

Newsweek reached out to both the White House and Grassley’s Washington office for additional remarks Saturday morning.

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