ELECTIONS
AND LESSER EVILS
The
Missing Peace
It’s safe to say
that most readers of this Update are supporting Bernie Sanders for president.
Me too. At the same time, it is disappointing to observe what a weak case
Sanders has made for a radical change in US foreign policy, even as he has
focused so eloquently on the domestic politics of plutocracy that underlies it.
This was very much on display at the debate last night. A commentator at a
liberal website generally supportive of Clinton made this depressing observation in a rundown of “winners and losers” in the
debate. It’s worth quoting in full:
It's curious that
Bernie Sanders is so completely apathetic about foreign policy, since it's
arguably the issue where Clinton is most vulnerable. Sure, she's more
experienced, and sure, she will all come across as more knowledgeable, but she's
also genuinely to the right of the Democratic Party as a whole when it comes
to matters of war and peace.
There's space for a
challenger to make the argument that Barack Obama made in 2008: She's too
quick to go to war. The Libya intervention in 2011 was a mistake. So were her
calls to intervene early against Bashar al-Assad in Syria. So was her
hawkish rhetoric toward Iran, which arguably made life worse for Americans held there. She has clearly not
learned the right lesson from Iraq, and she'd repeat her 2002 mistake by
launching yet more ill-advised wars as commander in chief.
Sanders is not
making this case. He's invoking the war vote, sure, but more as a thumb in
Clinton's eye than as a pivot to explaining why a Sanders presidency would be
different and less bellicose. That's largely because it probably wouldn't be
that much less bellicose. Sanders's plans for ISIS and Afghanistan are basically
identical to Clinton's. He supports the drone war.
If Wall Street was
left without allies in the Democratic field tonight, then so were genuine doves.
Lincoln Chafee, the only Democratic candidate to make a straightforwardly antiwar
case, was treated as a punchline and dropped out early. And with two
candidates left, doves are completely without a champion.
There is little
doubt that a Sanders administration would promote a somewhat less bellicose
foreign policy than Clinton’s. But really we need much better than that. Even
more daunting is to consider what kind of “lesser evil” choice will face
progressive voters and peace advocates in the likely event that Clinton wins the
nomination and faces some Neanderthal Republican? Not a cheering
prospect.
WHAT IS
THE SANDERS FOREIGN POLICY DOCTRINE?
If
Sanders is sincere, as he may well be, it means that even if America elects a
radical candidate as president the failed war on terrorism will roll on destroying lives and
undermining the very democracy Sanders claims he wants to save and expand.
There has been a concerted effort by various forces in American politics to
bifurcate domestic concerns from the US’ sprawling global empire. But such a project is pure folly
as imperial concerns always invade domestic ones, whether they be budgetary,
military, civil liberties, or the limits of state power...
For if this truly is a radical moment, why not go all the way and fight to
liberate Americans from the sorrows of empire, as well as the precarity and
corruption of a plutocracy? More
Define ‘establishment
candidate’: Rubio and Clinton both love Netanyahu
One of the main
storylines coming out of Iowa is that two Establishment candidates won out
there. Hillary Clinton, with her razor thin margin over Bernie Sanders. And
Senator Marco Rubio, with his surprising 3d place finish at 23 percent, just
behind Donald Trump. Both are hailed as Establishment candidates, and the
mainstream press is firming up around them out of fear of the abyss that is
represented by Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump… Of course, the Israel lobby is
still such a powerful force in the Democratic Party that even the president was
fawning to the Netanyahu administration last week at the Israeli Embassy, but
the liberal Zionist branch of the Israel lobby (J Street, Beinart, Peace Now)
doesn’t like Netanyahu either. But that’s the establishment! Bernie Sanders is
an anti-establishment candidate. Shouldn’t he be running against Netanyahu right
now? He wants to expose substantive differences between himself and Clinton.
This is one of them. More
Why
Bernie Sanders Trounced Hillary Clinton Among Young Voters
Today's
Democratic Party isn't the same coalition that gave Bill Clinton the presidency
in the 1990s. While Democrats at the time savored his electoral strength, the
major elements of his governing legacy -- welfare reform, Wall Street
deregulation and tough-on-crime criminal justice policies -- were Republican
priorities… Today's Democratic base is far more skeptical of corporate power
than the party of the 1990s was. A bipartisan consensus has emerged that Bill's
GOP-backed crime bill fueled mass incarceration. Even conservative boosters of his
welfare reform have acknowledged that it fails during the recessions, hurting the poor… But Sanders'
massive 84 to 14 margin over Clinton among voters under 30 shows that the
party's future is eager to break with its past. This is a wing of the party that
wanted to see Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) run for president on an anti-Wall
Street platform, which Sanders has adopted. It's a wing of the party that is
uneasy with a candidate who served on Walmart's board of directors and made
millions of dollars giving speeches to Wall Street, even after her family had
amassed a nine-figure fortune.
More
Highlighting
Bernie's Broad Appeal, Former NAACP Head Readies Key Endorsement
Adding
to a growing list of prominent African American voices backing Bernie
Sanders in his presidential bid, former NAACP head Ben Jealous will
reportedly endorse the Vermont senator and campaign with him this weekend in New
Hampshire… "The endorsement is a potential boost to Sanders who has struggled to
gain traction among African-American voters," wrote CNN… Michelle Alexander
wrote in a Facebook post last week: “If anyone doubts that the mainstream
media fails to tell the truth about our political system (and its true winners
and losers), the spectacle of large majorities of black folks supporting Hillary
Clinton in the primary races ought to be proof enough. I can't believe Hillary
would be coasting into the primaries with her current margin of black support if
most people knew how much damage the Clintons have done—the millions of families
that were destroyed the last time they were in the White House thanks to their
boastful embrace of the mass incarceration machine and their total capitulation
to the right-wing narrative on race, crime, welfare and taxes.”
More
CARPE
DIEM, SENATOR WARREN
If
destiny offers someone like Warren the opportunity to swing the tide of the
nation toward a more honest and just governance and they hesitate, well then
ultimately they weren’t the leader we hoped for. Warren has had this
opportunity served up to her by Bernie Sanders in the most admirable way. There
is no room for her to pretend the moment of decision is not upon her… The
progressive movement widely and justly recognizes that Elizabeth Warren can be a
great president. Her own judgment has left that prospect to the future. In the
present moment, however, she is called to recognize she can be a great
leader now in a moment in our history that may not come again for a planet
imperiled by climate change and an accelerating concentration of wealth… This
partnership between Sanders and Warren is an obvious step so easily available to
bringing exponentially increased momentum to a movement that is on the cusp of
making history. More
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Clinton
blasts Wall Street, but still draws millions in contributions
Even
as Hillary Clinton has stepped up her rhetorical assault on Wall Street, her
campaign and allied super PACs have continued to rake in millions from the
financial sector, a sign of her deep and lasting relationships with banking and
investment titans. Through the end of December, donors at hedge funds, banks,
insurance companies and other financial services firms had given at least $21.4
million to support Clinton’s 2016 presidential run — more than 10 percent of the
$157.8 million contributed to back her bid, according to an analysis of Federal
Election Commission filings by The Washington Post. The contributions helped
Clinton reach a fundraising milestone: By the end of 2015, she had brought in
more money from the financial sector during her four federal campaigns than her
husband did during his quarter-century political career.
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Billionaire
Israel Supporter Funneling Millions Into Clinton Campaign
Recent
disclosures show media mogul and controversial Israel supporter Haim Saban is
pouring millions of dollars into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s
presidential bid. Haim Saban and his wife Cheryl together contributed $5
million to the Hillary Clinton Super PAC—Priorities USA Action—between 2015 and
2016 alone, according to disclosures available on OpenSecrets.org, affiliated with the Center for
Responsive Politics. While the contributions are not surprising from long-time
Clinton-backers, $3 million of them notably poured in after the presidential
hopeful authored a letter to Haim Saban in July of 2015, seeking advice on "how
we can work together” to defeat the growing movement to Boycott, Divest from,
and Sanction (BDS) Israel. More
Adding
Up the Costs of Hillary's Wars
Would
Hillary be more inclined toward an aggressive foreign policy? Certainly more
than Obama’s—Clinton pressed the White House to directly intervene in Syria and
was far more hard line on Iran. More than the Republicans? It’s hard to say,
because most of them sound like they have gone off their meds. For instance, a
number of GOP candidates pledge to cancel the nuclear agreement with Iran, and,
while Clinton wanted to drive a harder bargain than the White House did, in the
end she supported it. However, she did say she is proud to call Iranians
“enemies,” and attacked Sanders for his remark that the U.S. might find common
ground with Iran on defeating the Islamic State. Sanders then backed off and
said he didn’t think it was possible to improve relations with Teheran in the
near future. The danger of Clinton’s view of America’s role in the world is
that it is old fashioned imperial behavior wrapped in the humanitarian rationale
of R2P and thus more acceptable than the “make the sands glow” atavism of most
the Republicans. In the end, however, R2P is just death and destruction in a
different packaging. More
A Libya
Call That Still Haunts Hillary Clinton
When
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton walked into the gilded Elysee Palace
in Paris on March 14, 2011, she found a fired-up French President Nicolas
Sarkozy eager to launch military strikes in Libya… A few hours later, after
consultations with British and Arab allies and a leader of the Libyan opposition
all demanding action, Clinton joined a White House meeting of President Obama’s
National Security Council by phone and forcefully urged the president to take
military action… Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, national security adviser
Thomas E. Donilon and others were against military action, contending that the
United States had no clear national interests at stake and that operations could
last far longer and cost more lives than anyone anticipated. But Clinton joined
U.N. Ambassador Susan E. Rice and White House adviser Samantha Power in pressing
Obama to back a U.S.- and NATO-led military campaign, arguing that the United
States could not let Gaddafi butcher his citizens. More
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