Saturday, September 3, 2016

Your Choice: Deranged Trump or Warmongering Clinton? And, Yes, They're Both Liars





“…A triumphant Hillary, more ‘rational’ and ‘savvy’ than the looney and unpredictable Donald Trump, could well have a freer path to emboldened superpower moves not only in Europe but the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Pacific. While the candidate has not revealed much lately, she is on record as vowing to ‘stand up’ to Russia and China, face off against Russian ‘aggression,’ escalate the war on terror, and militarily annihilate Iran the moment it steps out of line (or is determined by ‘U.S. intelligence’ to have stepped out of line) in its nuclear agreement with global powers.   

“Under Clinton, the Democrats might well be better positioned to recharge their historical legacy as War Party. One of the great political myths (and there are many) is that American liberals are inclined toward a less belligerent foreign policy than Republicans, are less militaristic and more favorable toward ‘diplomacy.’ References to Woodrow Wilson in World War I and Mexico, Harry Truman in Korea, JFK and LBJ in Indochina, Bill Clinton in the Balkans, and of course Barack Obama in Afghanistan (eight years of futile warfare), Libya (also ‘Hillary’s War’), and scattered operations across the Middle East and North Africa should be enough to dispel such nonsense… 

“In something of a political twist, the ‘deranged’ Trump candidacy – with its almost daily flow of bizarre utterances and proposals – actually serves Clinton’s neoliberal/neocon mission nicely, providing a foil to her outwardly more sane persona. Trump, of course, is far too irrational, too narcissistic, too unstable to assume the role of Commander-in-Chief. Who knows what might happen once his shaky hands get near the ‘nuclear trigger?’ 

“Worse yet, here is a bona fide challenger for the White House who has reportedly cozied up to that imperialist dictator, that great enemy of national sovereignty, Putin!   No need for any discussion or debate here. It follows that Hillary will be more reliable (even if more ‘untrustworthy’), more in command – clearly the best option to manage imperial affairs. Why else would all those neocons and Republican super-hawks be so happy to sign on to the Clintonite project…  

“A new Clinton presidency can be expected to further boost the U.S./NATO drive to strangle and isolate Russia, which means aggravated ‘crises’ in Ukraine and worrisome encounters with a rival military power in a region saturated with (tactical, ‘usable’) nuclear weapons.  

“Regime change in Syria? Hillary has indeed strongly pushed for that self-defeating act of war, combined with an illegal and provocative no-fly zone — having learned nothing from the extreme chaos and violence she did so much to unleash in Libya as Secretary of State. There are currently no visible signs she would exit the protracted and criminal war in Afghanistan, a rich source of blowback (alongside Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, and Israel). Increased aerial bombardments against ISIS in Iraq, Syria, Libya, and elsewhere? More deployments of American troops on the ground?   

“Such ventures, with potentially others on the horizon, amount to elaborate recipes for more blowback, followed by more anti-terror hysteria, followed by more interventions. Uncompromising economic, diplomatic, and military support of Israeli atrocities in Palestine?   Aggressive pursuit of the seriously mistaken ‘Asian Pivot,’ strategy, a revitalized effort to subvert Chinese economic and military power – one of Clinton’s own special crusades? No wonder the Paul Wolfowitzes and Robert Kagans are delighted to join the Hillary camp.

“No wonder, too, that billionaire super-hawk Haim Saban has pledged to spend whatever is needed to get the Clintons back into the White House, convinced her presidency will do anything to maintain Palestinian colonial subjugation. Meeting with Saban in July, Hillary again promised to ‘oppose any effort to de-legitimate Israel, including at the United Nations or through the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement.’ She backs legislative efforts begun in several states to silence and blacklist people working on behalf of Palestinian rights. For this her celebrated ‘pragmatism’ could work quite effectively.

“Democratic elites say little publicly about these and other imperial priorities, preferring familiar homilies such as ‘bringing jobs back’ (not going to happen) and ‘healing the country’ (not going to happen).   Silence appears to function exquisitely in a political culture where open and vigorous debate on foreign-policy is largely taboo and elite discourse rarely surpasses the level of banal platitudes.   And Hillary’s worshipful liberal and progressive backers routinely follow the script (or non-script) while fear-mongering about how a Trump presidency will destroy the country (now that the Sanders threat has vanished)…

“Trump is of course no great bargain, a combative warrior looking to slay dragons lurking about in a dark, menacing world – something of a high-level Rambo figure – and this he happily and repeatedly advertises. Like the mythic Rambo, he is also an uncontrollable maverick, eccentric, prone to hare-brained ‘solutions’— much to the dismay of even Republican officialdom. And he is emphatically and unapologetically Islamophobic...   

“Against this corporatist and imperialist backdrop, the ‘deluded’ and ‘unhinged’ Trump becomes far too unreliable for entrance to the Oval Office; he could too easily bungle the job of managing U.S. global supremacy. In March 121 members of the Republican ‘national security community,’ including the warmongers Wolfowitz, Robert Kagan, and Brent Scowcroft, signed a public letter condemning Trump for not being sufficiently dedicated to American (also Israeli?) interests. 

“Trump compounded his predicament by stubbornly refusing to pay homage to the ‘experts’ – the same foreign-policy geniuses who helped orchestrate the Iraq debacle. A more recent (and more urgent) letter with roughly the same message has made its way into the public sphere.   Predictably, Trump’s ‘unreliability’ to oversee American global objectives has been an ongoing motif at CNN, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal…

From Hillary and the War Party by Carl Boggs 


Henry A. Giroux on Trump in two sentences: 

“Trump is a real danger to the species, the country and the world in general. His views on war and climate change -- along with the promise of violence against his enemies and his unapologetic racism, bigotry and hatred of constitutional rights -- pose some of the greatest dangers to democracy and freedom the US has ever faced.




5 comments:

  1. “…The case against Trump does not rest, ultimately, on his family life, his divorces, his casinos, strip clubs, bankruptcies, and lawsuits. It doesn’t rest on his personality: his generally mean-spirited demeanor, his lack of polish, his erratic temperament, weird hair, or vulgarity. Nor does it even rest on policy differences—his past support for Democrats, gun control, abortion, Planned Parenthood, or his generally awful foreign policy.

    “All these things are true, and some are good reasons for conservatives not to vote for him. A vote for Trump is a vote against the principles that Republicanism and conservatism are built on. But I believe the case against Trump should go even further. I believe no American, conservative or liberal, should support Trump. He doesn’t simply violate conservative principles. He violates American principles. Donald Trump is a danger to self-government, civil liberties, the culture of democracy, and the ideals of a free and open society… 1. Donald Trump Admires Tyrants… 2. Donald Trump Encourages Violence… 3. Donald Trump Wants to Police Speech… 4. Donald Trump Does Not Believe in Equality Under Law… 5. Trump Is an American Fascist…”—Paul David Miller.

    “…A Hillary Clinton presidency… would face a national majority of citizens in open rebellion. Either intuitively or consciously they are incensed with the dominance of corporate political power. This is the template of governance Ms. Clinton helped create, the one in which she is historically and demonstrably comfortable, and the one which finances her campaigns for elected office. Wed to those donors, and locked into this mindset of the New Democratic Party, her presidency could not and would not alter significantly the status quo. Proudly she claims as much: ‘Let’s not start from scratch,’ she says. Corporate dominance would remain unchallenged, the rebellion ignored…”—Richard Behan.

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  2. “…Of course I find Trump a vile and disturbing and disgusting figure, but I don’t believe that voting for the Democratic establishment—and remember that this—the two insurgencies, both within the Republican Party and the—were against figures like Hillary Clinton, who spoke in that traditional feel-your-pain language of liberalism, while assiduously serving corporate power and selling out working men and women. And they see through the con, they see through the game…

    “When you dispossess that segment, as large as we have—half the country now lives in virtual poverty—and you continue to essentially run a government that’s been seized by a cabal, in this case, corporate, which uses all of the machinery of government for their own enrichment and their own further empowerment at the expense of the rest of the citizenry, people finally react. And that is how you get fascism. That is what history has told us. And to sit by—every time… you do exactly what Trump does, which is fear, fear, fear, fear, fear…

    “I don’t think it makes any difference. The TPP is going to go through, whether it’s Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. Endless war is going to be continued, whether it’s Trump or Clinton. We’re not going to get our privacy back, whether it’s under Clinton or Trump. The idea that, at this point, the figure in the executive branch exercises that much power, given the power of the war industry and Wall Street, is a myth…”—Chris Hedges.

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  3. Differences between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump:

    “What cannot be ignored is that Hillary Clinton has supported a war machine that has resulted in the death of millions, while also supporting a neoliberal economy that has produced massive amounts of suffering and created a mass incarceration state. Yet, all of that is forgotten as the mainstream press focuses on stories about Clinton's emails and the details of her electoral run for the presidency. It is crucial to note that Clinton hides her crimes in the discourse of freedom and appeals to democracy while Trump overtly disdains such a discourse. In the end, state and domestic violence saturate American society and the only time this fact gets noticed is when the beatings and murders of Black men are caught on camera and spread through social media…

    “Much of the American public appears to have forgotten that totalitarian and white supremacist societies are too often legitimated by a supplicant mainstream media, cowardly politicians, right-wing and liberal pundits, academics and other cultural workers who either overlook or support the hateful bigotry of demagogues, such as Trump. What is also forgotten by many is the racist legacy of policies implemented by the Democratic Party that have resulted in a punitive culture of criminalization, incarceration and shooting of untold numbers of Black people.

    “Rather than engage in the masochistic practice of supporting Trump's nativism, ignorance and bigotry, and his warlike fantasies of what it will take to make America great again, white workers who have been driven to despair by the ravaging policies of the financial elite and their shameless political and corporate allies should be in the streets protesting -- not only against what is called establishment politics, but also the rise of an unvarnished neo-Nazi demagogue…

    “Does it matter that Trump supports violence with a wink of the eye and is unapologetic about his huge following of neo-Nazis who are enthusiastic about waging a war against Black and Brown people? How is it possible to forget that, overall, Trump is a demagogue, misogynist, racist and bigot who is unequivocally dangerous to the promises and ideals of a democracy? Apparently, it is possible. Yes, the fascists and Nazis were also efficient, particularly in the end when it came to building a war machine and committing acts of genocide. So much for pragmatism without a conscience.

    “Trump is a real danger to the species, the country and the world in general. His views on war and climate change -- along with the promise of violence against his enemies and his unapologetic racism, bigotry and hatred of constitutional rights -- pose some of the greatest dangers to democracy and freedom the US has ever faced”—Henry A. Giroux.

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  4. Differences between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump:

    “As Adam Gopnik says in an excellent article in The New Yorker, democracies do not simply commit suicide, they are killed by murderers, by people like Trump. Most expressions of support for Trump vastly underestimate the immediate danger Trump poses to the world and minorities of class, race and ethnicity. In contrast, while Hillary Clinton is a warmonger, a cheerleader for neoliberalism and a high-ranking member of the Democratic Party establishment, she is not threatening to take an immediate set of actions that would throw people of color, immigrants and working-class people under the bus.

    “Instead, if she wins the election, she should be viewed as part of a corrupt financial and political system that should be overthrown. While posing danger on a number of economic, political and foreign fronts, Clinton would also expose by her actions and policies the mythological nature of the idea that democracy and capitalism are the same thing. Hopefully, all those young people who followed the dead-end of a Bernie Sanders movement -- and the false suggestion that a political revolution can be achieved by reforming the Democratic Party -- would seize on this contradiction. Sanders revitalized the discourse about inequality, injustice and the need to break down the financial monopolies, but he failed in choosing a political avenue in which such real and systemic change can come about”—Henry A. Giroux.

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  5. “…The Republican Party has actually nominated for president an irresponsible, unrealistic, naïve, petulant, childish, vindictive, prejudiced, bigoted, racist, Islam-o-phobic, anti-Semitic, misogynistic, fascistic, authoritarian, insensitive, erratic, disturbed, irrational, inhuman individual named Donald John Trump. This is madness! Any questions?”--Keith Olbermann

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