Issues raised by Sanders are not dead
Readers of the Observer-Reporter July 3 found an unfavorable take on the Revolution of 2016 by Kent James in his essay, “Sanders’ idealistic run for president raised the right issues.” Past tense means those issues are dead, and according to James, the revolution is to blame. Why? Talk about revolution “scares people.” They are more comfortable with reform. “It is hard to control a revolution – just ask the French.” Capitalist control of government? Oui, oui!
James has some advice for U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont – he “should seek to make (capitalism) more inclusive.” Too bad Donald Trump thought of it first. His “demonization of Wall Street, while gratifying in some ways, became conflated with an attack on capitalism generally,” for which James faults Sanders rather than the conflaters.
It’s easy to make fun of crude propaganda, the bait-and-switch technique that praises Sanders then undermines his issues. Health care for all, “a marginal gain” over Obamacare not worth the fight. To whom is it not worth the fight? Thirty-three million Americans without health care, everyone else preyed upon by the medical and pharmaceutical industries, malnourished children, obesity, nicotine addicts, alcoholics, not to mention illegal drugs and gunshot wounds? Status quo, go, go go!
“Trump is offering solutions,” Gerald Fontana writes in his July 3 letter to the editor, not “bait-and-switch tactics to gain the favor of voters.” Trump’s solutions are the things he is not talking about, “adding more federal agencies,” job-killing trade deals, “central planning of public education,” and so on. The rejection of Trump by columnist George Will earns Fontana’s ire as a betrayal of conservative Republican solidarity, but Will is not the only remorseful right-wing commentator.
Fontana speaks for many people in the region. Too many support Trump for president, some as a protest. Confession: I voted for Republican Barry Goldwater in 1964, a U.S. Army veteran’s protest of the war in Vietnam. Whereas Hillary Rodham was a young volunteer working for Goldwater’s election, I was certain President Lyndon Johnson would easily defeat the hawkish, anti-communist Arizona senator.
President Trump would sell more countries nuclear weapons on the National Rifle Association principle of safety. He also hates China and Mexico and is not overly fond of Muslims or anyone outside his family. Trump’s perceived success as a capitalist is the basis of his campaign, and the reason Reform Party candidate H. Ross Perot got 19 percent of the vote in the 1992 presidential race. Nelson Rockefeller, appointed vice president by Gerald Ford, was the last capitalist with a shot at the presidency, but Trump’s exposure of capitalist control of government through corrupt politicians and bureaucrats, perhaps the extent of his knowledge, can get him elected.
Otherwise, the Revolution of 2016 will claim victory when Clinton declares herself the Democratic nominee and ticks off four or five of Sanders’ main issues she is now adopting. Socialism versus capitalist control of government is what this election is all about.
Socialism in the 21st century, is well-defined and distinctly New World. It is based on historical cause and effect, however attenuated by ignorance.
For instance, Goldwater was crushed in 1964 and increased Democratic control of Congress produced voting rights and immigration legislation in 1965. It is built on the bones of Native Americans and the disappeared in Latin America. Socialist history is long, inclusive, and continuous.
Like Goldwater, Trump could lead the Republican Party to a crushing defeat, something a few Republican pundits are encouraging, at least for now. Have corporate media’s writers and talking heads joined the revolution? Count me among the skeptics.
Jim Greenwood is a Washington resident.