War v. Peace, Status Quo v. Real Change and Obfuscation v. Transparency

Dear Friends,

The debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders last night could not have done a better job of highlighting the choice that we have between these two candidates and their policies, opinions and positions.

War v. Peace

On foreign policy, except for a short discussion about NATO where the candidates are in basic agreement, the Middle East was the focus.  Senator Sanders laid out a very clear and articulate position that acknowledged the right of Israel to exist in peace and security, but also acknowledged the same right for the Palestinian people.  Senator Sanders made it clear that the Israeli  response to the latest conflict in Gaza was an over-reaction by Israel.  Secretary Clinton refused to acknowledge that Israel over-reacted.  You cannot achieve peace between Israel and Palestine until you acknowledge the atrocities on both sides.  Senator Sanders' approach is the only one that has any chance of bringing peace.

With respect to Syria, Secretary Clinton, who has frequently chastised Senator Sanders for criticizing President Obama, laid the blame for the Syrian situation on President Obama because he did not take her advice to more aggressively arm the "friendly forces" fighting against Assad and establishing a no-fly zone which virtually all experts say would lead to more US troops fighting in Syria.  She also refused to take any responsibility for the debacle in Libya.  President Obama has said that one of the biggest mistakes of his Administration was not planning for what happens after Gaddafi is deposed.  Secretary Clinton refused to accept any responsibility even though she was a strong proponent within the Obama Administration for regime change in Libya.  She blamed the Libyan people for failing to take her advice and accept American troops in Libya.

We have a clear choice - Secretary Clinton, a clear hawk or Senator Sanders, a thoughtful person who will acknowledge reality, seek peace and use force only as a last resort.

Status Quo v. Real Change

On issue after issue, it is clear that Secretary Clinton supports the status quo, with only incremental changes, and it is equally clear that Senator Sanders believes we need big and substantive changes now.  This difference represents a fight for the soul of the Democratic Party.  When Secretary Clinton says that Senator Sanders is not a real Democrat, what she means is that he is not part of the move to the right, Republican light, Democratic Party establishment founded by her husband.  There is a great sentence going around the internet - "There is only one moderate Republican running in this election, and she is running as a Democrat."  I have said before that President Obama is about as far right as President Eisenhower was.  Secretary Clinton is clearly to the right of President Eisenhower particularly on the use of force.  President Bill Clinton formed an unholy alliance with big business.  Secretary Clinton will continue that alliance.  Senator Sanders will break up that alliance.

Secretary Clinton claims that she wants to get to universal healthcare coverage but has only plans to add an incremental number of people and attacks Senator Sanders' plan for Medicare for all.  She says he would throw out Obamacare which is not true.  He would keep Obamacare until the Medicare for all was in place.  She wants incremental change and calls it pragmatism.  She says she supports the movement for a $15 minimum wage, yet she refuses to support Senator Sanders' bill to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 instead she supports a competing bill to raise the federal minimum wage to $12 an hour.  She claims that she wants to protect the economy from another melt down but continues to fight against breaking up the big banks even though they are bigger now than before the great recession and the Fed and FDIC have recently called them too big.  She continues to say we should regulate them but, in an implicit criticism of President Obama, says that she would be tougher.  However, she fails to acknowledge that the big banks have successfully stalled on developing "living wills" for more than five years.  She says that she stood up to the big banks before the great recession but fails to acknowledge that she completely failed in changing their behavior.  The time has come to stop coddling the big banks and break them up.

She uses the overturning of the Citizens United case as one of her two litmus tests for any Supreme Court nominee and states that big money is corrupting our political system but refuses to acknowledge that it has any impact on her.  Apparently she is immune to all the pressures that other politicians are not immune to.  She cannot answer the simple question of why she will not release the transcripts of her paid speeches to Wall Street.  Her only response is that she will not release them unless everybody does, obviously including all Republican candidates.  Senator Sanders has not made closed door speeches to Wall Street.  The only logical conclusion that I can reach is that she would be embarrassed by those speeches if the transcripts became public.

The most important area where Secretary Clinton's incremental only approach to change cannot be accepted is with respect to climate change.  With every new report we are closer to a cataclysmic tipping point than was previously thought.  The time for incremental action has passed.  We need big change now.  Senator Sanders would ban fracking, would ban further drilling on federal lands, would place a tax on carbon and would focus completely on moving to sustainable, renewable energy.  Secretary Clinton promoted fracking around the world as Secretary of State, she refuses to say she would ban fracking, she refuses to say she would stop drilling on federal lands, and she refuses to say that she would support a carbon tax.  She says we need to move to sustainable energy but will do it in a "practical" and "possible" way, which is to say with small incremental steps.  That approach will destroy the earth for my grandchildren and is unacceptable.

Of course the debate was full of moments when Secretary Clinton obfuscated the facts while Senator Sanders was transparent about his positions.  While saying she would fight climate change, she refused to indicate immediate actions she would take that would have a significant impact, while saying she supports a $15 per hour federal minimum wage, she actually supports a move to $12 per hour, while claiming she supports Senator Sanders' policy of extending the life of the social security trust fund she refuses to support raising the income cap on social security taxes or endorsing any other particular approach, while saying she would be tough on the big banks, she refuses to support doing anything more than have the regulators be "tough" which has failed miserably so far and while saying she will work for peace between Israel and Palestine, she refuses to acknowledge the Israeli atrocities only the Palestinian ones.

She also continues to distort Senator Sanders' record.  She claimed that most of the gun deaths in New York resulted from guns from Vermont which is absurd.  While acknowledging that her statement was incorrect, she refused to apologize.  Instead she made the even more absurd statement that Senator Sanders does the bidding of the NRA in the Senate.  That statement is blatantly false as everyone including the NRA knows since it gives him a D- rating.

She claims that Senator Sanders could not answer the questions in the New York Daily News interview correctly even about breaking up the big banks.  I have actually read that interview in total and either Secretary Clinton is lying or she has not read the interview.  But you do not have to believe me, you can listen to this segment of Democracy Now today (here), it is entitled, "Juan González: Clinton Has 'Really Distorted' What Happened When NY Daily News Interviewed Sanders".  Senator Sanders answered the questions of the interviewer precisely and accurately.  The question to which he answered that he didn't know was whether the Fed has the right to break up the banks.  That is a correct statement, nobody knows for sure if the Fed does have that authority.  When asked about the President's authority to break up the banks, he correctly stated the process under Dodd-Frank by which the President can break up the big banks including that in the end the banks themselves determine exactly what assets to shed, etc.

We have a clear choice and in my opinion Senator Sanders is by far the better choice.

I should also point out that Senator Sanders will win a general election against any Republican while Secretary Clinton is quite vulnerable against any Republican other than Trump.  In the most recent polls reported by RealClearPolitics (here), both Clinton and Sanders beat Trump although Sanders beats him by quite a bit more.  The interesting results are that Clinton is in a statistical tie with Cruz beating him by 1 point in one poll and 3 points in another poll.  Sanders on the other hand defeats Cruz by 12 points in both those polls.  With respect to Kasich, Clinton loses to him by 9 and 6 points while Sanders beats him by 4 and 5 points.

Sanders is by far the better candidate both because of his positions and because of his electability.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal

Bernie, Hillary and Big Banks

Dear Friends,

I cannot believe that the media has not spent any time on the big difference between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders on breaking up the big banks.  Since the great recession starting in 2008, the five largest banks in the United States have increased their share of the total industry assets to almost 45%.  So the too big to fail banks are getting even bigger.  

Bernie Sanders is clearly for reinstating Glass-Steagall and immediately breaking up the big banks that are too big to let fail.  Hillary Clinton is for closer regulation but not for taking any action now.  Amazingly enough she actually said this during the debate:

I represented Wall Street as a senator from New York, and I went to Wall Street in December of 2007 before the big crash that we had, and I basically said, "Cut it out." 

She spoke the truth; she represented Wall Street, and she has done a good job of that.  She continues to be on their payroll in the form of political contributions.  Her approach was to tell them to "cut it out".  Well we all know how that worked, the banks ignored her and millions of Americans lost their jobs and homes and retirement plans.   Wall Street never has and never will be self regulating.  We need to break up the big banks, and we need to deal with shadow banking as well.  Bernie will do that and Hillary will not.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal

Hillary Clinton, Big Banks and Money

Dear Friends,

It should not come as a surprise to anyone that Hillary Clinton is not outspoken about breaking up the big banks that are "too big to fail".  Nevertheless, I was struck by a Facebook post by Robert Reich that read in part:

One reason the big banks are so powerful is they continue to dump big money into presidential campaigns. According [to] today's Bloomberg Politics (see below), Citigroup has been Hillary Clinton’s No. 1 contributor during her political career, and Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan are among the top 10 donors to her current presidential run. Which may have something to do with her reluctance to advocate busting up the biggest banks – even though they’ve gone from having 25 percent of the nation’s banking assets in 2007, just before the crash, to 44 percent now. If they were too big to fail in 2008, they’re far too big now. Government regulators say they’ve failed to show how they can be effectively wound down in the next banking crisis without another bailout.

If our economy and our democracy are to remain safe, the biggest Wall Street banks must be broken up. Bernie and Elizabeth Warren are pushing for this. Hopefully Hillary will see the light as well.

I followed the link to the Bloomberg Politics article (here).  I think that these two paragraphs summarize the article well:

From her opening speech on economic policy in July, Clinton has maintained a delicate balance between talking tough on the financial industry and staying clear of detailed promises. She said she’d appoint regulators who understand that the biggest banks are still seen as too big to be allowed to fail, and she said that individuals should be prosecuted more when they go astray within their firms. Clinton argued that the government relies too much on slapping the banks with large fines while "the human beings responsible get off.''
But nobody would mistake her views for those of Sanders or Warren—who seems to relish her role as the scourge of Wall Street. Warren said in an April speech that “if the big banks keep calling the shots, they will own both our economy and our democracy.”

On this issue as well as many, Secretary Clinton wants to have it both ways.

Just on the issue of money, here are the top five donors to Hillary Clinton campaigns for her entire career according to opensecrets.org (here).

Citigroup Inc	$824,402	$816,402	$8,000
Goldman Sachs	$760,740	$750,740	$10,000
DLA Piper	$700,530	$673,530	$27,000
JPMorgan Chase & Co	$696,456	$693,456	$3,000
Morgan Stanley	$636,564	$631,564	$5,000

Here is the list of the top five contributors to Bernie Sanders since 1989 from opensecrets.org.

Machinists/Aerospace Workers Union	$105,000	$0	$105,000
Teamsters Union	$93,700	$700	$93,000
National Education Assn	$89,242	$8,242	$81,000
United Auto Workers	$79,750	$850	$78,900
United Food & Commercial Workers Union	$72,500	$0	$72,500

In the last reporting quarter, Bernie Sanders raised $26 million just $2 million less than Hillary Clinton.  Bernie Sanders also now has over one million contributions from over 650,000 individuals.  He is ahead of President Obama  at this same point in his first bid for President.  The average contribution to Bernie Sanders' campaign is about $25.  Hillary Clinton does not provide that data.

I do not believe that corporations are people or that money is protected speech under our Constitution, but money certainly talks and influences positions.  You can see who will have Hillary Clinton's ear and who will have Bernie Sanders' ear.  

Thanks for reading and please comment,

The Unabashed Liberal

Q: Who Controls America? A: Big Business and Big Money

Dear Friends,

Recent news articles have made it very clear who actually controls America and most of its politicians from both parties.  While the following news stories are seemingly unrelated, consider them as evidence to support the fact that big business and big money control America.  While I would expect the Republican Party today to be in favor of control by big business and big money, I am dismayed at the lack of opposition by the mainstream Democrats.

Trans-Pacific Partnership
I have written before about the TPP and how terrible it is (here and here).  Each time more information is leaked about what is in this so-called trade agreement, there is another uproar about it. On March 25, The New York Times published an article by Jonathan Weisman entitled "Trans-Pacific Partnership Seen as Door for Foreign Suits Against U.S. (here).  The agreement has many advisors from big business but nobody is looking out for everybody else.  Here are a couple of the pertinent paragraphs from the article.  Keep in mind that the provision allowing suits against the US to stop the enforcement of US laws is only one of many really bad ideas in the TPP.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership — a cornerstone of Mr. Obama’s remaining economic agenda — would grant broad powers to multinational companies operating in North America, South America and Asia. Under the accord, still under negotiation but nearing completion, companies and investors would be empowered to challenge regulations, rules, government actions and court rulings — federal, state or local — before tribunals organized under the World Bank or the United Nations.
Backers of the emerging trade accord, which is supported by a wide variety of business groups and favored by most Republicans, say that it is in line with previous agreements that contain similar provisions. But critics, including many Democrats in Congress, argue that the planned deal widens the opening for multinationals to sue in the United States and elsewhere, giving greater priority to protecting corporate interests than promoting free trade and competition that benefits consumers. The chapter in the draft of the trade deal, dated Jan. 20, 2015, and obtained by The New York Times in collaboration with the group WikiLeaks, is certain to kindle opposition from both the political left and the right. The sensitivity of the issue is reflected in the fact that the cover mandates that the chapter not be declassified until four years after the Trans-Pacific Partnership comes into force or trade negotiations end, should the agreement fail.Conservatives are likely to be incensed that even local policy changes could send the government to a United Nations-sanctioned tribunal. On the left, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, law professors and a host of liberal activists have expressed fears the provisions would infringe on United States sovereignty and impinge on government regulation involving businesses in banking, tobacco, pharmaceuticals and other sectors.

Why would you require that a provision not be made public for 4 years after enactment or the end of negotiations if you were not really embarrassed about it.  Please note that the TPP has the full backing of not just big business and the Republicans but also President Obama.  Secretary Clinton was a big supporter of TPP when she was the Secretary of State, and she was an enthusiastic backer of NAFTA during her husband's administration.  The progressives in the Democratic Party including Senators Sanders, Brown and Warren are all opponents of TPP.

 Shell Oil Arctic Drilling

Shell Oil is already moving a large drilling rig to the Arctic even though it has not yet received the approvals needed from the United States government.  Shell ran into big problems last year when it began its program and had to stop drilling operations.  The Obama Administration is about to grant approval for it to start drilling.  One paragraph from an article in The New York Times on August 28, 2014 (here) summarizes Shell's demonstrated ability to drill in the Arctic.

Over the last eight years, Shell’s Alaskan Arctic efforts have been plagued by blunders and accidents involving ships and support equipment, reaching a climax with the grounding of one of its drilling vessels in late December 2012 in stormy seas. Environmental groups seized on the episodes as evidence to support their claims about the risks.

It is not only President Obama that is ignoring the pleas of environmentalist to stop the drilling.  Recently the Port of Seattle (a separate governmental unit from the city of Seattle) entered into a contract with Shell to permit Shell to use the port to service its rigs that will be used in the Arctic drilling.  As soon as that agreement was made public, the outrage began in force from environmental groups and the city of Seattle.  Why is it that all these agreements are kept quiet until they are done?  An article in The New York Times on March 13, 2015 (here) makes the issue clear in the first two paragraphs.

SEATTLE — The environmental messaging never stops here, whether from a city-owned electric utility that gets nearly 98 percent of its power from sources untainted by carbon (and is not about to let residents forget it) or the fussy garbage collectors who can write tickets for the improper sorting of recyclables.
So when a lease was signed allowing Royal Dutch Shell, the petrochemical giant, to bring its Arctic Ocean drilling rigs to the city’s waterfront, the result was a kind of civic call to arms. A unanimous City Council lined up alongside the mayor to question the legality of the agreement with the Port of Seattle, a court challenge was filed by environmental groups, and protesters, in bluster or bluff, vowed to block the rigs’ arrival — though the exact timetable is secret, for security reasons — with a flotilla of kayaks in Elliott Bay.

The fight to stop Shell from drilling in the Arctic is not over but clearly so far big business is winning.

Big Banks

In a moment of amazingly transparent honesty, the big banks have made it clear that they expect to get a huge return on their investment in buying politicians.  It has been widely reported that big banks intend to withhold contributions to Democrats if Senators Warren and Brown do not tone down their rhetoric about "too big to fail" legislation.  This action by the big banks is a clear statement of what they expect in exchange for their political contributions.  They are buying support for their policies which are not good for America.  They are only good for the banks.  The following is Senator Warren's response as quoted tin the Boston Globe on March 27 (here):

WASHINGTON -- Senator Elizabeth Warren took aim at Wall Street on Friday after two banks reportedly decided to halt campaign contributions to Senate Democrats unless Warren and Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio tone down their rhetoric on breaking up large financial institutions.
“They can threaten or bully or say whatever they want, but we aren’t going to change our game plan,” Warren wrote to her supporters. “We do, however, need to respond.” 

Secrecy of Corporate Contributions

There was a great editorial in The New York Times on March 27 entitled "Which Companies Are Buying the Election? (here).  The impetus for the editorial was a recent Congressional hearing with the head of the SEC as the witness.  For the first 3.5 hours there were no questions about forcing disclosure of corporate political contributions from either the Republicans or the Democrats.  Eventually there was a question and the response was that the SEC does not have the time.  There are more pressing needs.  Once again clearly the Republicans do not want corporate or individual donors to be disclosed.  The Koch Brothers have done an incredible job of putting together a network of big donors that can contribute through all kinds of charades without having their names disclosed.  The response from the corporate wing of the Democratic party has been to remain silent.  Despite pressure from numerous advocacy groups President Obama is not taking any action to increase the transparency of political contributions.  Once again only the truly progressive Democrats including Senators Warren and Sanders are pushing for full disclosure of political contributions and limits.

Senator Reid and Senator Schumer

I have seldom praised Senator Reid as the Senate Majority Leader although he clearly did a lot of good things.  I recently listened to an interview of Senator Sanders who said that Senator Reid was a true progressive.  That is high praise coming from Senator Reid.  What worries me is that Senator Schumer is the heir apparent to Senator Reid as Majority Leader.  This CNN headline (here) tells you all you need to know:  "Wall Street welcomes expected Chuck Schumer promotion".

I could go on and on but I think these examples are enough, and I am sure that you can think of plenty of your own.  The United States of America is our country and our democracy is clearly in crisis as we become a plutocracy.  We, as individual citizens, are the only ones who can get our democracy back.  Get involved.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal