Whether Biden can win the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination will largely depend on how little voters know about his actual record, writes Norman Solomon.
Biden is No Friend of the Working Class;
Solidly Backed Invasion of Iraq in 2003
By Norman Solomon
When The New York Times front-paged its latest anti-left polemic masquerading as a news article, the March 9 piece declared: “Should former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. enter the race, as his top advisers vow he soon will, he would have the best immediate shot at the moderate mantle.”
On the verge of relaunching, Biden is poised to come to the rescue of the corporate political establishment — at a time when, in the words of the Times, “the sharp left turn in the Democratic Party and the rise of progressive presidential candidates are unnerving moderate Democrats.” After 36 years in the Senate and eight as vice president, Biden is by far the most seasoned servant of corporate power with a prayer of becoming the next president.
When Biden read this paragraph in a recent Politico article, his ears must have been burning: “Early support from deep-pocketed financial executives could give Democrats seeking to break out of the pack an important fundraising boost. But any association with bankers also opens presidential hopefuls to sharp attacks from an ascendant left.”
The direct prey of Biden’s five-decade “association with bankers” include millions of current and former college students now struggling under avalanches of debt; they can thank Biden for his prodigious services to the lending industry. Andrew Cockburn identifies an array of victims in his devastating profile of Biden in the March issue of Harper’s magazine. For instance:
- “Biden was long a willing foot soldier in the campaign to emasculate laws allowing debtors relief from loans they cannot repay. As far back as 1978, he helped negotiate a deal rolling back bankruptcy protections for graduates with federal student loans, and in 1984 worked to do the same for borrowers with loans for vocational schools.”
- “Even when the ostensible objective lay elsewhere, such as drug-related crime, Biden did not forget his banker friends. Thus the 1990 Crime Control Act, with Biden as chief sponsor, further limited debtors’ ability to take advantage of bankruptcy protections.”
- Biden worked diligently to strengthen the hand of credit-card firms against consumers. At the same time, “the credit card giant MBNA was Biden’s largest contributor for much of his Senate career, while also employing his son Hunter as an executive and, later, as a well-remunerated consultant.”
Media mythology about “Lunch Bucket Joe” cannot stand up to scrutiny. His bona fides as a pal of working people are about as solid and believable as those of the last Democratic nominee for president.
Biden: Plain-talker poses as friend of workers. (Flickr/Jay Godwin)
But Biden’s fealty to corporate power has been only one aspect of his many-faceted record that progressives will widely find repugnant to the extent they learn about it.
Since the #MeToo movement began, some retrospective media coverage has assessed Biden’s highly problematic role in chairing the Clarence Thomas—Anita Hill hearings of the Senate Judiciary Committee. And in recent days, Washington Post reporting has brought into focus his backstory of pandering to white racism against African-Americans during much of his Senate career.
It Doesn’t Matter
As a 32-year-old senator in 1975, Biden commented: “I do not buy the concept, popular in the ’60s, which said, ‘We have suppressed the black man for 300 years and the white man is now far ahead in the race for everything our society offers. In order to even the score, we must now give the black man a head start, or even hold the white man back, to even the race.’ I don’t buy that.”
More attention is also needed to Biden’s role as Judiciary Committee chair pushing through the now-notorious landmark 1994 crime bill. In the process of championing the bill, Biden warned of “predators on our streets” during a 1993 speech on the Senate floor.
“It doesn’t matter whether or not they were deprived as a youth,” Biden proclaimed. “It doesn’t matter whether or not they had no background that enabled them to become socialized into the fabric of society. It doesn’t matter whether or not they’re the victims of society. The end result is they’re about to knock my mother on the head with a lead pipe, shoot my sister, beat up my wife, take on my sons.”
Now, a new Iowa poll shows Biden and Bernie Sanders neck and neck in the first-in-the-nation contest for the nomination, with the rest of the candidates far behind in the state. For quite a while, Biden has been sharpening his hatchet to swing at progressive populism in general — and Bernie in particular.
In typical Biden style, the former vice president is eager to stake out the middle of the road, between ultra-predatory capitalism and solidarity with working-class people. At an October 2017 gathering in Alabama, he said: “Guys, the wealthy are as patriotic as the poor. I know Bernie doesn’t like me saying that, but they are.” Later, Biden elaborated on the theme when he told an audience at the Brookings Institution, “I don’t think five hundred billionaires are the reason we’re in trouble. The folks at the top aren’t bad guys.”
As Branko Marcetic pointed out in Jacobin last summer, “at a time when left-wing populism is increasingly accepted as the antidote to Trump and the GOP’s nativist and corporate-friendly pitch, Biden stands as a remnant of precisely the sort of left-averse, triangulating Democratic politics that Hillary Clinton was relentlessly criticized for personifying.”
Biden makes clear his distaste for the current progressive populist wave. “I know some want to single out big corporations for all the blame,” he wrote in a blog post. “It is true that the balance has shifted too much in favor of corporations and against workers. But consumers, workers, and leaders have the power to hold every corporation to a higher standard, not simply cast business as the enemy or let industry off the hook.”
Supports the Business of War
Biden at Pentagon, September 11, 2011.
(White House Photo by David Lienemann)
One of the many industries that Biden has a long record of letting “off the hook” is the war business. In that mode, Biden did more than any other Democratic senator to greenlight the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.
It wasn’t just that Biden voted for the Iraq war on the Senate floor five months before it began. During the lead-up to that vote, in August 2002, as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, he presided over sham hearings — refusing to allow experts who opposed an invasion to get any words in edgewise — while a cavalcade of war hawks testified in the national spotlight.
“It is difficult to over-estimate the critical role Biden played in making the tragedy of the Iraq war possible,” Middle East studies professor Stephen Zunes wrote. “More than two months prior to the 2002 war resolution even being introduced, in what was widely interpreted as the first sign that Congress would endorse a U.S. invasion of Iraq, Biden declared on August 4 that the United States was probably going to war. In his powerful position as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he orchestrated a propaganda show designed to sell the war to skeptical colleagues and the America public by ensuring that dissenting voices would not get a fair hearing.”
Joe Biden’s friendly TV persona appeals to many. He smiles well and has a gift of gab. Most political journalists in the mass media like him. He’s an apt frontrunner for the military-industry complex and the corporate power structure that it serves. Whether Biden can win the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination will largely depend on how many voters don’t know much about his actual record.
Norman Solomon is cofounder and national coordinator of RootsAction.org. He was a Bernie Sanders delegate from California to the 2016 Democratic National Convention and is currently a coordinator of the relaunched Bernie Delegates Network. Solomon is the author of a dozen books include War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.
Like a good neighbor Creepy Joe will be there to look out for your wives and daughters. His roaming hands always on display. Another American traitor for sure. If he gets elected we will have to address him as El’ Presidente’ a leader for all illegals of the world.
Biden was also great at haranguing mobs of neo-fascists in Maidan and encouraging them to overthrow their legally elected president and launch a civil war against the Russian-speakers in the east of Ukraine who didn’t recognize their coup.
The main argument that will be made FOR Biden is that “he can STOP Trump”–but, the moment for “Uncle Joe” to step up to do that was 2016. He didn’t. His time has PASSED and–like Bill & Hillary Clinton–it’s OVERDUE for Joe Biden to GO HOME. All 3 of them have ALREADY done so much DAMAGE that LED TO TRUMP. Go home, Joe. WE DON’T WANT YOU.
I, certainly, will not vote for him.
Voters don’t exist. If Hillary is still breathing, Hillary is still the candidate. If not, Biden is the candidate.
Status quo Joe.
A reputation you can bank on.
When I went to college, do you know who my freshman English teacher held up as an example of who *not* to be?
Actually, he said if Joe Biden was his student, he’d put his foot so far up Joe Biden’s ass, they’d have to expel Joe Biden to get him to come back on campus (for the official expulsion meeting).
Joe Bden is literally the poster child for plagiarism. THE guy who most embodies this crime at the very peak of the English professor’s FBI Most Wanted List.
And yet, the Democratic party is going to do everything it can to rig the 2020 primary election for Biden, just as the party rigged their 2016 nomination election for Hillary Clinton.
The party thinks because Biden was next to Obama for 8 years, the neoliberal “magic” is on him. You see, Biden is a Clinton New Democrat, just like Obama.
But hey, anybody can beat Trump! Just ask Biden and Hillary…
https://opensociet.org/2018/12/23/anybody-can-beat-donald-trump-in-2020/
Absolutely right Norman Solomon, Biden’s best chance of winning depends on the voters not knowing his record. Biden and his backers think he has a good chance because the corporate media has a government granted lock on the means of mass communication.
If the democrats win in 2020 it will result from the left leading the center. I don’t mean the center as defined by the so called MSM, which defines everyone to the left of Attila the Hun as a radical leftist. Biden is one of those corporate right-wing democrats the corporate media turns into a centrist. The media should be held to account for its corporate/plutocratic bias.
The main stream of a river is where most of the water is. The main stream of politics is where most of the people are. The USA does not have a mainstream media. Congress has massively abridged free speech by giving the corporate media a lock on the means of mass communication. Joe Biden the senator from Visa and Master card swims in corporate waters.
Democratic voters will have a decent field of candidates in 2020, too bad the democratic party is not democratic enough to adopt instant run-off voting ( preference voting) in its primaries.
“It is true that the balance has shifted too much in favor of corporations and against workers. But consumers, workers, and leaders have the power to hold every corporation to a higher standard, not simply cast business as the enemy or let industry off the hook.”
Damned Straight, Joe! The power to keep you out of further office being just one of those powers.
His son Hunter sure shows up in the most fortuitous of places with remarkable and unerring intuition. (Some might impute a skill-set. (lol) The credit card company gig, the board of directors of Ukraine’s National Gas Company Burisma, only one short month after the Maidan Massacre, a result of the Obama/Clinton U.S.-fomented and financed coup.
Hunter fell up pretty fast after being drummed out of the U.S. Navy for cocaine use. Thanks to “Lunchbucket Joe”
Wikipedia–
“In May 2013, Biden was selected as a direct commission officer in the U.S. Naval Reserve, a program that allows civilians with no prior service to receive a limited duty officer’s commission after attending a two-week class covering topics such as military history, etiquette, and drill and ceremony, in lieu of boot camp. Because Biden was past the cut-off age for the program, he needed a waiver. Biden received a second waiver because of a past drug-related incident.[9][10][11][12] One month after commissioning, Biden tn May 2013, Biden was selected as a direct commission officer in the U.S. Naval Reserve, a program that allows civilians with no prior service to receive a limited duty officer’s commission after attending a two-week class covering topics such as military history, etiquette, and drill and ceremony, in lieu of boot camp. Because Biden was past the cut-off age for the program, he needed a waiver. Biden received a second waiver because of a past drug-related incident.[9][10][11][12] One month after commissioning, Biden tested positive for cocaine use and was discharged from the Navy reserve in February 2014
(Looks to me like Hunter was attempting to burnish his cred for politics in his efforts do this “service.”)
And this? I’m shawckt, I tell you, Shawckt!
Burisma Holdings
On April 18, 2014, Burisma Holdings announced Biden’s appointment to its board of directors in a press release.[15] Burisma is the largest non-governmental gas producer in Ukraine; it was incorporated in 2006 and is based in Limassol, Cyprus – a European tax haven.[16][17] Burisma holds licenses covering the Dnieper-Donets Basin, the Carpathian and Azov-Kuban basins and has considerable reserves and production capability.[18] Burisma was founded by Mykola Zlochevsky, the former minister of energy minister and deputy national security council chair under Viktor Yanukovych, in 2006.[19] Burisma Holdings is owned and controlled by the Ukrainian businessman Nikolay Zlochevsky, too.[20][21] Joining Hunter Biden on the Burisma Board of Directors is Aleksander Kwa?niewski, named in January.[22] Kwa?niewski was President of the Republic of Poland from 1995 to 2005 during the G. W. Bush presidency.[23] Chairman of Burisma is the Wall Street former Merrill Lynch investment banker Alan Apter. Finally, Burisma also at the same time named to the board Devon Archer, Hunter Biden’s partner at the US investment firm Rosemont Seneca Partners.
Hunter Biden’s father Joe Biden traveled to Kiev on April 22, 2014, and urged the Ukraine government “… to reduce its dependence on Russia for supplies of natural gas.”[24] And he discussed how the United States could help provide technical expertise for expanding domestic production of natural gas.[25] Some critics accuse the United States of maneuvering the Ukraine situation so that Western oil companies have unfettered access to shale gas of “Lublin Basin” (from “fracking”) and to drill all across Ukraine. With the revelations that Hunter Biden serves on the board of the Ukrainian company Burisma, many raised concerns about Hunter Biden’s interests conflicting with official US government positions. The White House has dismissed nepotism charges against Biden’s son.[26][27] But the director of the US-Ukraine Business Council Morgan Williams pointed to an “American tradition that frowns on close family members of government working for organizations with business links to active politics”. Williams stated Biden appears to have violated this unwritten principle: “… when you’re trying to keep the political sector separate from the business sector, and reduce corruption, then it’s not just about holding down corruption, it’s also the appearance.”[28]
China’s Deal[edit]
Peter Schweizer, author of the Secret Empires: How the American Political Class Hides Corruption and Enriches Family and Friends, wrote that “In December 2013 Hunter Biden, son of Joe Biden, travels with his father aboard Air Force Two to Beijing…Shortly after they return to the U.S., Hunter Biden’s firm receives a $1 billion private equity deal from the Chinese government. Not from an American business in China; from the Chinese government itself. It later gets increased to $1.5 billion.”
Thanks, David Otness!
Dodgy does not get there with this biden crew-hunter is also linked up in Burisma with kolomoisky and privat group. Kolomosky is one of, if not the most, corrupt and violent oligarchs in Kiev. He has a fairly detailed history with disappearing or disappeared IMF funds.
The bidens know where the wheels are and are not shy about linking up with those wheels.
How anyone could even consider the candidature of this creep makes my already low estimation of the US people/Parties/ media/ system drop even further. 320 million people and this specimen is put forward??
Why no mention of the support by Biden and his son for avowed fascists in Ukraine? (While, of course, ripping off that country’s economy.)
Tnx CN & Norman…
While Noone but Her Jailers know Chelsea’s Physical Status… this comment speculates The FIX IS IN… Only an Operation will turn Joe & Others into Actual Frontrunners… & FITTINGLY SO!!!
I was 48 in 1991 when Joe Biden gave a “high tech lynching” to Anita Hill and then told that rapist Thomas to claim that HE was the victim of a high tech lynching. Talk about gas lighting! Right there in open session,on national TV and nobody said a thing. That poor woman. And of course, it not only put Thomas on the Supreme Court, it re-traumatized every survivor and soon-to-be survivor in America. I’ll never forgive him for that. And any woman in this country who votes for “Good Old Joe” is violating her own mother, daughter(s), sisters and friends right to live safely in our society.
It is so typical of the New York Times to approve of Biden. This is just like the days of decline of the Soviet Union. One after another, tired, old, out-of-touch party apparatchiks get the official nod. Meanwhile the country crumbles all around them.
Good catch to notice that parallel. Is Joe the counterpart to Chernenko, or is that already Trump? If only we have our own version of Gorbachev waiting somewhere in the wings to lead us towards sanity and a future that does not necessitate a hard collapse. You know, 1929 was not the absolute worst that COULD have happened, and 2008 might fondly be remembered as the good old days when the final Con-artist-in-chief is eventually led to the gallows.
The media will rally around Biden because he is far better at covering up crimes than Trump; the \real qualification for US Presidency.
Christ, it’s worse than i thought! Thanks very much for this. There are several people i need to share it with!
The Dem oligarchs know Joe probably can’t beat Donald, but Joe can at least ensure that no Dem candidate will win on the first round of voting at the convention, thus giving the “Super-Delegates” the right to choose the Dem candidate. As long as Bernie is derailed, the oligarchs will be satisfied. They would rather have Donald win than allow Bernie to upset their corporate-sponsored oligarchy.
You make some good points.
From politico: “Florida Democrats are denouncing Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders for refusing to call Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro a dictator — a politically explosive issue in the nation’s biggest swing state.”
Venezuela seems to be *the* priority right now and could continue that way, and the people who really matter (top bankers, industrialists, security/intelligence/global planners) probably see Gabbard and Sanders as potential problems – the rest can be shaped and managed easily – Biden and Trump not needing any re-shaping.
Eric, I think that the Pentagon realizes that we have lost control of middle east oil. The supply lines are just way too long and Russia and China are just too powerful and too close by.
Venezuela has a vast supply oil, it is close by and our navy can blockade it, if necessary.
I don’t like it but that is probably the reasoning behind all this.
That, plus the whole “shale oil” thing is turning out to be a bust.
Why could the USA not keep buying and using the oil it was already getting from Venezuela, without sanctions/invasions/ régime change/ cyberwar/ electrical piracy and all the rest of the normal US violence???
There are four reasons why just buying the oil does not do the trick.
One, control – plain and simple. In the 70’s the arab ‘oil embargo” against the US was devastating.
Two, reserve currency status. The more countries trade oil in “other than the dollar” – as Venezuela is doing – the weaker the dollar becomes as a reserve currency. The US economy would completely collapse if reserve currency status was lost. Both Iraq and Libya were invaded after they tried or threatened to trade in “other than dollars.”
Three, providing profits for the American companies which would take over the oil fields.
Four, sending a message that Latin American countries are not independent. They take orders from the US or they suffer the same fate which befell Chile and many other nations.
>Venezuela has a vast supply oil,<
It's the oil all right, it's not tropical fruit or "spreading democracy"that's behind all this.
Additionally, most of Venezuela's know oil reserves are heavy oil. The US Gulf Coast has refineries that are specialized in refining heavy oil,and they NEED heavy oil to run right without an expensive reworking.
Apparently, the Koch Bros. of political manipulation fame have a heavy stake in those refineries.
And, there are some indications of another belt of Venez. discoveries with lighter, generally more valuable oil.
The Chinese are busy setting up heavy oil refineries, so they want that oil -they want all the oil they can get. Whether the Chinese will be any better partners to the Venzuelians than the US, I doubt.
Another astute perception, Mr. Mike. Explains a lot of what’s about to go down. Not only will the goon squad try to seize Venezuela’s oil for the refineries on the Gulf Coast, but that pipeline from the tar sands of Canada is a guaranteed bet to get built under Trump. The sky above Houston and Baton Rouge will again glow red throughout the night from all the waste gas being vented and burned off during the refining process.
If the rest of the earth is lucky, the Yellowstone caldera will erupt from all the subsurface fractures created by the rampant fracking that’s not gonna stop. Moreover, American companies will continue to try to schlock that product on the international market even as shortages of natural gas inevitably appear in our domestic market. After all, we are willing to go to war with Russia for the privilege of selling overpriced American gas to the Europeans. Our energy giants would sooner allow folks in New England and the Midwest to freeze their butts off during the coming climate change rather than lose paying foreign customers for our inefficient LNG. In the future, Michiganders will simply have to become illegal aliens in Mexico to keep from freezing to death.
well said, DaoGen!
And so discouraging…..
It’s a wonder that deceptive (self-deceptive?) uncle Joe doesn’t wake up each morning hating himself for his fakery and duplicity.
From historian Dana Frank on Democracy Now 4/13/16 (I’m not including the link because this may not post here if I include a link):
“Dana Frank:
AMY GOODMAN: Your final comment, Professor Frank, in this 2016 presidential election year and in looking at U.S. policy towards Latin America and Honduras?
DANA FRANK: Well, we certainly need to hold Hillary Clinton responsible and to say how terrifying and chilling it is that she would defend a military coup. Like, who is it that we’re talking about here? And the second thing is to also see that this isn’t just about Hillary Clinton. it’s about Obama, IT’S ABOUT VICE PRESIDENT BIDEN, WHO’S IN CHARGE OF LATIN AMERICA POLICY NOW, and it’s about Secretary of State John Kerry. They are very clearly celebrating and supporting and giving increased funding to the current government of Juan Orlando Hernández, that is continuing this war against the Honduran people. I mean, he’s a dictator. He has overthrown parts of the Supreme Court and illegally named a new Supreme Court that’s full of allegedly corrupt figures. He has—he backed the coup. He illegally named a new attorney—led the illegal naming of a new attorney general. And he has admitted to stealing—we don’t know the exact amount—into the tens of millions of dollars from the national health service and siphoning off into his own campaign. I mean, this is a criminal that the United States is supporting in office.”
Biden’s idiotic suggestion for stabilizing Iraq after Shock and Awe led to its destruction was to split the country into 3 parts along sectarian lines…. Wes Clark asked at the time – exactly which street does one use to separate a country where Shia and Sunni intermarry and Kurds may share households with either or both. Joe is a “beloved” idiot who doesn’t understand the unintended consequences of making disastrous choices for people who don’t want or need his “help” in the service of the corporate machine.
How, how, how, does he look himself in the face?
I fear you’re right.
I think one of Solomon’s main points is the collaboration between Biden and the military apparatus. It’s apparent that the media, also in collaboration with the military and global finance, is pulling for Biden foremost and do their best to discredit and humiliate the two best choices, Tulsi Gabbard and Bernie Sanders.
Stephen Colbert of CBS just did what MSNBC Morning Joe did and that is to try to frame Gabbard as pro Assad, just because she met and talked with him, as she said, “in the pursuit of peace.” She held up well but it’s clear they will not be promoting real progressives to one tenth of one degree as much as they promoted Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton the last round.
We The people have to do more than come here and share our dismay, we have to actively protest and boycott mainstream news every way we can.
> collaboration between Biden and the military apparatus. It’s apparent that the media, also in collaboration with the military and global finance, is pulling for Biden foremost and do their best to discredit and humiliate the two best choices, Tulsi Gabbard and Bernie Sanders. <
I think that's whats going on. A lot of this stuff is fairly predictable.
It's about money, geopolitics, and sometimes Israel (destruction of its regional threat states).
Maybe it's just a matter of making educated guesses as to how the the people who really matter (top bankers, industrialists, security/intelligence/global planners) see things, and how they will respond to given situations.
Yes, it’s sad to see what’s become of Stephen Colbert following his excellent show on the Comedy Channel – now shilling for the Neoliberal foreign policy schtick at every turn it seems…I’m disappointed….
Indeed. He has become the male counterpart to Rachel Maddow. Both used to entertain me, now they each sicken me.
You can add Bill Maher to that list as well. Their arrogance is nauseating.
You are certainly right about Bill: he’s gone from a knee-jerk atheistic anti-Islamic religious warrior to a fanatical anti-Russian cold warrior. Can’t be communism he hates, so why the ethnic animus? What were Hillary’s foreign policies that so enamored Bill? We’ve all ended up getting pretty much the same warmongering deal from Trump (not surprising as both were owned by the Neocons and the AIPAC lobby), so what Doomsday policy is Bill holding out for?
The man flipped his mental circuitry like a trained seal suddenly honking out the Star Spangled Banner on a set of bicycle horns to get a tasty mackerel from the trainer. The sudden switcheroo was as stunning as Maddow going suddenly from an heroic critic of the FBI whom she (correctly) accused of murdering a potential witness in the Boston Marathon bombing, a Russian national named Ibragim Todashev from Dagastan who happened to know the Tsarnaev brothers, to the take-no-prisoners anti-Russia jihadist you see now on the boob tube. Clearly Todashev was a loose end that the intel agencies could not allow to leak the truth to the media, so his case was closed in a field action in Florida with a bullet to head just minutes after the interview with the agent commenced. Todashev’s family and the Russian government never got the satisfaction of the slightest coherent rationale for his sudden demise–not that was shared with the public.
Maddow, at the time, was perhaps the only media personality willing to pick this bone with the agencies, implying that there was skullduggery afoot and certain questions, like why was this potential witness summarily eliminated by blowing out his brain stem, why did the case draw no attention from the MSM, why did the state of Florida not investigate the killing, why was the agent not given any attention (other than perhaps a pay raise) and why did the agencies not pay any heed to the intel provided on these Islamic radicals from Dagastan provided by the FSB? Even Trayvon Martin and Caylee Anthony received a better facsimile of justice in Florida than did Ibragim Todashev in Florida during this same era.
Those were the days when Maddow, Maher, Colbert and many other p***y hat-wearing “resistance fighters” were on the side of caution, common sense, and Putin’s good governance. Hillary’s scary but lackadaisical campaign against a carnival barker like Trump caused her own defeat at the polls because the establishment was so assured she would win that they didn’t even bother to stuff the ballot boxes (enough). That plus Obama’s vexation at the man he thought he had forever put in his place at the White House Correspondents Dinner and was now going to undo his every “accomplishment” (though that portfolio was very thin indeed) is what brought us to this side of the looking glass. For that the madness continues to escalate.
Realist-
I think it’s the power of the MSM owners that has gotten to all of them. Maybe they subconsciously realize that the only way they get to stay fat and happy with their cushy jobs is to adjust their thinking. They looked at what happened to Phil Donahue and Ed Shultz and decided to take the blue pill.
Creepy Joe has not got a cellophane bats chance in hell of winning against Trump. He is deplorable and has already been eclipsed by others. The prevaricating dissembling stooge of the deep state is a bigger loser than even Hillary Clinton. Give Biden a week and he will reconsider and come up with a far worse plan. That’s who he is.
Please USA will someone put Biden out with the trash.
will someone please put the democrats and the republicans out with the trash!!!
1991 Attacked Anita Hill. (We got Clarence Thomas.)
1994 Wrote the disastrous Crime Bill. (Hello prison industrial complex.)
1995 Wrote the Omnibus Counter-terrorism Act (Later morphed into the Patriot Act).
1996 Voted Against Gay Marriage. (Leading from behind.)
1999 Repealed Glass Steagall. (World financial crisis.)
2001 Voted for the Patriot Act. (Big Biden is watching you.)
2002 Voted for Iraq War. (But it’s ok, cuz his son served.)
2005 Voted to end bankruptcy protection for students. (Endless debt builds character.)
2018 Presents GW Bush with Liberty Medal. (Finally gets a big issue right.)
Praised Bush’s handling of 9/11 when the administration totally ignored all the warnings including the CIA Daily Briefing of 6 August 2001:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Ladin_Determined_To_Strike_in_US
I would be absolutely horrified if he were the nominee.
That is a pretty damning legacy.
Good list of Uncle Joe’s nefarious record of “accomplishments” EXCEPT for the LAST one. GW Bush LIED us into the HORRIBLE War on IRAQ and BROKE Domestic & International Law by TORTURING prisoners of war (don’t debate if it was torture or not: the SPANISH INQUISITION Invested WWATERBOARDING & after WWII, the U.S. tried Japanese military for WAR CRIMES for waterboarding U.S. POWs ). Bush deserved a seat in the dock at the Hague–NOT ANY kind of “medal”
Great breif article. The ruling elite may very well be able to shove Biden to the forefront, through their control of the candidate selection process. If that happens, will Mr. Soloman lead a chorus of “left” voices, just as vehemently condeming those of us, who will never vote for a ruling elite shill, as he has in the past?
Tony Sustak
Mr. Solomon starts of well enough by talking about the real problems: plutocracy, militarism, corruption–issues which affect all non-billionaires regardless of their race or “gender”. But then he strays from that by denouncing Biden as insufficiently supportive of affirmative action and the #MeToo witch hunt, which has since long come off the rails–causes which the media class loves but which other Americans mostly hate, for good reasons. Identity politics has always been at best a distraction from the real problems, and at worst a cynical game of divide-and-conquer. If you claim to oppose Hillary’s corporatism but can’t mentally extract yourself from Hillary-style identity politics–then what?
Let’s not kid ourselves: the issue of changing the Dem party has been fully litigated after the 2016 debacle. All attempts at reform have been soundly defeated, not in the last place thanks to the heavy-handed intervention of a certain Barack Obama. Pelosi and Schumer are still sitting pretty. What is their response to Trump’s reckless confrontation with nuclear-armed Russia? Howling that it doesn’t go far enough, just like with Trump opening the money floodgates to the Armies of Mordor. The coup attempt in Venezuela? The Dems like it of course. On both issues, Bernie is essentially on board, to varying degrees. Why should the Dems try to govern the US themselves if they like Trump’s job just fine? They just need to remain relevant in the eyes of their donors.
Funny also how Mr. Solomon omits Biden’s rabid Zionism as a key legitimate problem. If you truly want to expose the MAGA sham, you hammer nonstop on how Trump’s people consistently prioritize a foreign constituency over their domestic one. We all know the Dems will do no such thing, because at the hour of truth, they and their donors support the things which Trump actually does. Again, what does one need such a party for?
Add to the issues of the Dems that the superdelegate system is still in place, so that their primary election–well isn’t an election really. And in the aftermath of the Wikileaks revelations about widespread abuses in the 2016 primary, the Dems have resorted to rather openly arguing that their “party” is in fact a private corporation, which isn’t bound to any particular rules as to how it selects its candidate. I honestly fail to see why people still flatter this rotting carcass with their attention.
American Citizens vote doesn’t count? So don’t bother voting in Elections, its a complete waste of your time & trouble? The entire US Election process is a scam, a bread & circus Political infortainment show that provides the illusion that America is a functioning Democracy, which it is not! Its a Facist Oligarchy, run for the benefit of a Elite class & controlled by a unelected Intelligence & Military Deepstate! The Red & Blue, Republican & Democratic Party, 2 Party Dictatorship is also a con job that supposedly gives people a choice to choose either one party or the other one? That is also a illusion, because the reality is there is only one Party? The Corporate Party! So go ahead Biden & run but whoever is President, it doesn’t matter because the seat of power is not with the figurehead clown its with the unelected US Nazi Deepstate who controls things! Make America Facist Again or MAFA has been a huge success. That would make a great catch phrases to apply to a Political button or the Corporate Parties bumper sticker?
I hope he runs.
There are numerous vids of him at public events groping young girls with distressed looks on their faces.
I mean, the Donald only talks about doing this kind of stuff with adult chics, whereas Joe…..
Entertainment.
And if it’s between Biden and Trump, who cares who wins?
You ostentatiously triple space a post barely worthy of some fool gossip tabloid, here in this very decent news mag. You ought to be decent either up your game or step away and not bring down the quality here.
It is a decent publication, and you denigrate it by trying to stop people from raising valid points, which are readily available on youtube and will obviously be raised if he runs against a Republican.
What I raised is especially valid in the wake of the Kavanaugh hearings.
As for sentence spacing, you do the same thing in a post above, how stupid is that?
Rude and stupid – you step away.
Close to TWO DOZEN women accuse Trump of grouping them. At his TEEN Beauty Pageants, Trump regulary “checks” on the young women CHANGING CLOTHES IN THEIR DRESSING ROOM. I’ve no interest in defending Joe Biden (though the accusations of himre: “groping young girls” are new to me) but, DONALD TRUMP is a TOTAL PIG where women are concerned…though I guess to use YOUR vernacular, “it’s OK since he does “this stuff with adult CHICS.” (sp.)
Sounds like you should ask how the adult WOMEN you know how THEY feel about being groped by powerful men.
White identity politics can go a long way in propping up Ol’ Joe in the Midwest, but he’s Motown roadkill as soon as Sanders mentions the two acronyms “NAFTA” and “TPP.”
When there is no there there then there’s no where to go …. that’s nominating Joe Biden.
Oh and about that neck and neck thing… I kind of doubt it.
Watch no one raise their hand when asked if they wanted Biden
https://youtu.be/s2mhMC5nwSE
Joe Biden.
Ugh, a man with a long record of mediocrity, lack of any real leadership, lots of stupid advocacy, and whole lot of blowhard talk.
You know, as just one of his “achievements” he pressed Obama on starting the country’s industrial-scale extrajudicial killing system.
Can’t imagine why anyone would think he’s worth a vote.
Absolutely no improvement over President Meathead.
Just a few different noises and poses.
Honest to God, American politics are just desperate.
Biden is the gift that keeps on giving
Biden Trashes Millennials in His Quest to Become Even Less Likable
“Give me a break,” he said of young people who “think they have it tough.”
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vice.com/amp/en_us/article/mbpxx8/biden-trashes-millennials-in-his-quest-to-become-even-less-likable
Ironically as unpopular as that will be with out whining youth who don’t read history, it’s probably the one time lately that Joe was right.
Thanks C.Kent but you might consider that IF he is right, then its the ONLY time he has been right. EVER
But I am backing the youth of today and I propose they have a decent idea of history and (compared to Biden) a phenomenal sense of justice such that they will p!ss on him from a great height for the next year.
I’m 63 years old and was lucky enough to leave a state college without debt. Unless your parents are millionaires, or you excel at some sport, kids today come out of college owing an average of $37,000, and face competition for good paying jobs from foreigners with H1B visas after they graduate. Many are stuck living with their parents because they can’t afford rent or the downpayment for a mortgage. I would say they do indeed “have it tough”.
Exactly…..My husband went to Harvard and MIT and got his PHD for 30k and paid it off in 3 years……even Obama didnt pay off his student loans until he was president…..This is the first generation to not be able to think of owning a home or having kids and dont even know what a pension is……never mind the climate change we have left for them to clean up if its not too late.And they wonder why they lose elections?
Once the powers-that-be discover the next big economic trend sure to come–viz., most regular folks dying in debt rather than leaving an inheritance to their kids–they will want the congress they own to pass legislation making all children responsible for every last penny of their parents’ debt. We will soon have multiple future generations slaving to work off what started out as a modest debt decades in the past… all due to the miracle of compound interest and rolling loan restructuring. And make no mistake, even fresh air will be taxed by the corporate government. At the least you’ll have to buy one of those new-fangled portable oxygen concentrators to survive the air pollution.
Realist-
Actually the new trend is to do both. First you set up a trust that makes your money inaccessible to collectors, but left to your kids. Then you max out a series of Visa cards, do the transfer debt game, the minimum payment game, and die deeply in debt. Most of the banks’ books are totally imaginary in terms of assets and liabilities. Of course they could always fix it with the right legislation, and most people don’t have enough money to bother setting up a trust.
Thanks for the REALITY Check.
Whining youth who have no jobs or healthcare and are made debt slaves to colleges and think a pension is an apt in Europe?
Not to mention the massive debt and dying planet .The boomers are the worst generation and may be the last thanks to their selfishness.
You should tell the whining decimated middle and working class to stop their winging too……oh right you did that last election and its why we have Trump…….thats a real winner.
It’s hard to fathom how this mediocre hack can still be under consideration for an office that he has so often been shunned from early in the process.
He and his small-minded politics belongs in some City Hall. Chicago comes to mind.
Thanks RnM, can I suggest Flint. As lead has a devastating affect on brain function and Biden is a case in point. And what exactly did he do about Flint in all those years??