Friday, December 25, 2015

BERNIE Sanders. Slate: New York Times and Washington Post are arms of Hillary Clinton (the Wall Street dinosaur) #FeeltheBern2016


History, in the guise of political reporting, is repeating itself. It’s both farcical and terrifying. 
---  Slate’s article, “Bernie Sanders vs. the world: How the political & media elite are trying to set him up to fail”

Introduction:  


The New York Times has already written more than 6 long editorials and articles propagating Spotlight for an Oscar buzz.  We wrote an article, REBUTTAL: New York Times, Gotham & L.A. Critics awards, ‘Spotlight’ 150 reviews by Americans journalists. (FYI today’s journalists write for money, for their capitalist boss’ agenda, for ratings)
http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2015/12/rebuttal-new-york-times-gotham-la.html   Americans journalists’ Oscar buzz for Spotlight is everywhere and deafening they are like Vatican locusts infesting across the USA and the Internet.

The media and journalists today are slaves of their plutocrat boss – to whom they depend for their bread and butter – and so they are using the movie Spotlight to justify their existence – and an Oscar buzz would holler for that mainstream media farcical existence..  

Today Slate affirms what we said about the mainstream media owned and paid by their plutocrat bosses.  In Slate’s article, “Bernie Sanders vs. the world: How the political & media elite are trying to set him up to fail”, it says:  History, in the guise of political reporting, is repeating itself. It’s both farcical and terrifying.

Slate wrote:

It was recently reported reported that ABC’s “World News Tonight” devoted 81 minutes to covering the Trump campaign this year compared to just about 20 seconds on Sanders. The media is unimpressed by these findings.

More than a decade ago, media credulity fomented in the jingoistic afterglow of 9/11 made the case for the U.S. invading Iraq. In one notably toxic New York Times article, Michael R. Gordon and Judy Miller reported that Saddam Hussein had sought to obtain aluminum tubes that American officials— and anonymous ones at that—believed were meant to enrich uranium, ominously warning that “the first sign of a ‘smoking gun,’ they argue, may be a mushroom cloud.”

Here’s the thing,” the Washington Post’s Callum Borchers writes. “Winning matters. While Sanders trails Hillary Clinton in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination by 23 points, Trump leads the Republican contest by almost 15. Trump looks like a real contender — maybe even the favorite. Sanders, still, looks like a long shot.”…


Nothing could be further from the truth and the New York Times and Washington Post and mainstream media are all pathological liars – because in the new Quinnipiac poll, Sanders also runs much stronger against Trump than Clinton does.
  .
See true datas in Bernie Sanders Facebook   


In the new Quinnipiac poll, Sanders also runs much stronger against Trump than Clinton does.
thehill.com  

Also, in Hill article :
Only Sanders, not Clinton or Trump, has right plan to defeat ISIS
- read below with highlights:


As for Clinton's willingness to overlook Saudi funding of terrorism, another troubling aspect of this relationship pertains to weapons deals. According to Mother Jones, the former secretary of State oversaw weapons deals to various nations shortly after they donated millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation:

In 2011, the State Department cleared an enormous arms deal: Led by Boeing, a consortium of American defense contractors would deliver $29 billion worth of advanced fighter jets to Saudi Arabia, despite concerns over the kingdom's troublesome human rights record. In the years before Hillary Clinton became secretary of [S]tate, Saudi Arabia had contributed $10 million to the Clinton Foundation, and just two months before the jet deal was finalized, Boeing donated $900,000 to the Clinton Foundation, according to an International Business Timesinvestigation released Tuesday.
The Saudi transaction is just one example of nations and companies that had donated to the Clinton Foundation seeing an increase in arms deals while Hillary Clinton oversaw the State Department. (Read more in article below with highlights)



Here are some noteworthy comments in Slate:

The entire major media is partisan to Clinton, but The New York Times is something else again.  It is, for all purposes, an arm of the Clinton campaign.  Every article about the Democratic presidential campaign in the NYT, and I mean EVERY one (I try to read them all) not only favors Clinton but actively tries to influence readers to vote for her.  

This story's linked New York Times article is an example of this.  For those few who actually watched Saturday night's debate, it was clear that, while all three candidates gave good showings, Sanders was at his best ever.  He was particularly strong in foreign policy, and actually took a much tougher position against ISIS than Clinton did, saying that all U.S. military efforts in the Middle East should go towards defeating ISIS.  Hillary considered Assad and ISIS to be equal enemies. caleb36 2 days ago

=====

The entire major media is partisan to Clinton, but The New York Times is something else again.  It is, for all purposes, an arm of the Clinton campaign.  Every article about the Democratic presidential campaign in the NYT, and I mean EVERY one (I try to read them all) not only favors Clinton but actively tries to influence readers to vote for her.  

This story's linked New York Times article is an example of this.  For those few who actually watched Saturday night's debate, it was clear that, while all three candidates gave good showings, Sanders was at his best ever.  He was particularly strong in foreign policy, and actually took a much tougher position against ISIS than Clinton did, saying that all U.S. military efforts in the Middle East should go towards defeating ISIS.  Hillary considered Assad and ISIS to be equal enemies. caleb36 2 days ago

===

No vote for Hillary from me, if Bernie doesn't become the nominee, hello president Trump.
If Trump wins it's because stupid Democrats just had to stick to Hillary the Wall $treet dinosaur. Thunderflat 2 days ago

======
We_Need_Bernie 2 days ago

The simple question people need to ask themselves is this. If we FINALLY have a candidate that is consistent, honest, and is NOT BOUGHT and the candidate is sane and has smarts why should I NOT vote for him? You are correct, if HRC wins the White House NOTHING will change and we will be stuck with the same old same old. Wall Street running our government, banks doing whatever they want, etc. plus HRC will probably approve the TPP, which will really hurt our economy even more jobs being shipped overseas. She will also approve the Keystone XL Pipeline along with all her other baggage. I'm hoping Americans when they go out to the polls next November they vote out ALL incumbents. Both democrats and republicans as we the people need to clean house big time!

Why would ANYONE want the same shit? HRC is just a republican elite at best. #FeeltheBern2016. #BernieorBust

=====

Slate’s full article with our highlights

Monday, Dec 21, 2015 11:48 AM EST

Bernie Sanders vs. the world: How the political & media elite are trying to set him up to fail

After Saturday night's debate, it's more evident than ever that the senator from Vermont isn't getting a fair shake



Bernie Sanders speaks to reporters in the media filing center after a Democratic presidential primary debate Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015, at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, N.H. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer)(Credit: AP)

David Muir, setting up the first in an endless stream of questions about terrorism in Saturday evening’s Democratic primary debate, of which he was moderator, reminded Americans that it was “just six days before Christmas, as we all know in this country. It’s typically a joyful time, as it is this year, as well. But it’s also an anxious time.”

The question at hand was not the age-old one of war or peace, or even, for that matter, the war on Christmas. After all, as Muir noted, Americans are united by their knowledge that it’s almost Christmas. The critical uncertainty, rather, is what kind of war this country, which has been ceaselessly at war for 14 years, should fight.

“I’m going to ask the secretary [Clinton] here, because there does appear to be some daylight here between the policies, at least in respect to when you take out Syrian President Bashar al-Assad,” said Muir. “Right now or do you wait? Do you tackle ISIS first?”

More than a decade ago, media credulity fomented in the jingoistic afterglow of 9/11 made the case for the U.S. invading Iraq. In one notably toxic New York Times article, Michael R. Gordon and Judy Miller reported that Saddam Hussein had sought to obtain aluminum tubes that American officials— and anonymous ones at that—believed were meant to enrich uranium, ominously warning that “the first sign of a ‘smoking gun,’ they argue, may be a mushroom cloud.”

One year prior, the media cheered on the toppling of the Taliban government in Afghanistan with even less skepticism, failing to question the justifications for or consequences of a war that has turned out just slightly less disastrous than Iraq.

The Iraq War created ISIS, and the media helped create the Iraq war. Now, the media demands to know, what are we going to do about ISIS? Obama’s relative constraint, the conventional wisdom goes, is not working. And now, as a result, the terrorists are once again at our door.

The San Bernardino massacre closely resembled the near-daily mass shootings typical to the United States. No matter. The shooting has been officially classified as terrorism so there is a general consensus that everything has now changed. Politics, reporters intone, is now all about national security. And that’s mandatory. Political figures who persist in insisting that Americans do or should care about anything else will be declared out of touch. Irrelevant.

“Bernie Sanders Falls Behind in a Race Centered on Security,” the New York Times headline announced, seemingly unaware of their pivotal role in centering the race.

Hillary Clinton is a longtime supporter of the sort of militaristic foreign policy adventures that help to foment terrorism. Nonetheless, the Times reports, “all of this plays to Mrs. Clinton’s strengthsnot only as a hawkish former secretary of state but also as a savvy politician who follows the public mood.”

This media diktat was first issued after Paris and had become conventional wisdom by the time a disaffected and ISIS-inspired county worker and his wife shot down coworkers in San Bernardino. Sanders has disobeyed orders, maintaining that poverty and global warming are the greatest threat to Americans. That this has the virtue of being true does not impress the arbiters of consensus political wisdom.

“In his opening remarks at the Democratic presidential debate on Saturday, Senator Bernie Sanders railed against ‘establishment politics and establishment economics’ and then the nation’s ‘rigged economy.’ He moved on to the ‘corrupt’ campaign finance system, then the ‘planetary crisis of climate change,'” the Times yawned. “Only after that did he say he wanted to destroy the Islamic State. It was a litany of priorities that made good sense when Mr. Sanders announced his presidential bid in April. But after the terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., he made fighting terrorism sound like an afterthought.”

History, in the guise of political reporting, is repeating itself. It’s both farcical and terrifying.

It was recently reported reported that ABC’s “World News Tonight” devoted 81 minutes to covering the Trump campaign this year compared to just about 20 seconds on Sanders. The media is unimpressed by these findings.

“Here’s the thing,” the Washington Post’s Callum Borchers writes. “Winning matters. While Sanders trails Hillary Clinton in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination by 23 points, Trump leads the Republican contest by almost 15. Trump looks like a real contender — maybe even the favorite. Sanders, still, looks like a long shot.”

Borchers justified that take by comparing presidential politics to the NFL: sure, the Eagles and the Bears have the same record but the Eagles merit more coverage because they actually have a shot at winning their division.

Politics, of course, is not football. Political reporters must no doubt look at the practical dynamics of the presidential race: Who stands a good chance at winning, and why? But that’s not close to everything that matters. The wisdom and ethics of policy proposals matter. And so does the bigger picture that a huge number of young people back Sanders while a population of older white people support Trump. Sanders represents the future of American politics. Trump represents the last gasps of the past.

This insight should not be left for historians to describe in retrospect. It matters right now.
The horse race approach blows Trump’s frightening bigotry out of proportion, encouraging
people both here and abroad to falsely conclude that Americans are far worse than they actually are. A large minority of Americans believe that Muslims should be barred from entering the country. That’s scary. But more than a third of young people, according to a YouGov survey, view socialism favorably.

As Matthew Yglesias writes,

“while the media’s priorities are comprehensible, the horse race fact that mainstream Democrats have consolidated around a single champion while the non-Trump Republicans remain badly divided is creating a distorted picture of the real state of the country. Wall-to-wall Trump coverage is, for example, helping boost morale at white supremacist groups, which are now benefiting from a newfound sense of momentum. But while there is clearly significance in the fact that a large minority of Republicans are willing to flock to Trump’s banner and the cause of ethnic chauvinism, the reality that an equal number of people are flocking to Sanders’s banner and the vision of an expansive Nordic welfare state is equally significant.”

It is no doubt true that, for some voters, rising public fears over terrorism plays to Clinton’s advantage. But that narrative is also a creature of a media echo chamber that makes the Washington consensus into an historical inevitability.

Better political reporting is possible. Reporters could report on the hawkish views that prevail amongst much of the American electorate while still asking tough and objective questions about the country’s longstanding militarism. But history keeps on repeating itself, a problem for which those who write its first draft bear great responsibility.



 ===================



We're not talking in sound bites. We are talking about the real issues facing the American people. Yes, I can get up here and say "My goal is to ban this or that person from coming into America." A very simple statement. A very stupid statement. Disgusting statements that must be repudiated by every one.



0:00/5:35

128k vues




Sanders wins small donors, Trump wins endorsement from Putin




Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) announced that he has received 2 million small donations, setting the stage to probably set the ultimate record for the largest number of small donations in presidential campaign history, while Russian President Vladimir Putin announced his endorsement of Republican candidate Donald Trump, giving Trump the honor of being the first candidate for the nomination of a major party to win support from a Russian dictator.

While Sanders was announcing that he had reached the major milestone of 2 million small donations, he also received the endorsements of the Communications Workers of America union, and Democracy for America, a major progressive group whose founder, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean (D), had urged members to support the candidacy of Hillary Clinton.
While Sanders is clearly an underdog in the campaign for the Democratic nomination and has been subject to a virtual media blackout in television coverage of the campaign — compared to the media's almost complete obsession to the daily doings of Trump — it would be a huge mistake to count Sanders out in the campaign.
Sanders has a fair chance of winning both the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary and if he does, he will reap continuing and gigantic waves of small donations from a donor base that is rising every day, whose members could and, in most cases will, give recurring small donations throughout the campaign.
In contrast to the authentic populism of Sanders, Trump has often spoke well of Russian strongman Putin, and in what has to be one of the strangest and revealing moments in presidential campaign history, Putin has now reciprocated the favor and expressed his great admiration for Trump.

My guess is that GOP voters in the primaries will not take kindly to the mutual praise between Trump and Putin. If a candidate such as Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) directly confronts Trump about his bromance with Putin, he will score big.

In the end, voters will realize that this campaign involves a tale of two populists: A candidate such as Bernie Sanders, who wins huge support from small donors and who is authentic populist, and a candidate such as Donald Trump, who may pretend to be a populist but in truth is the favored candidate of a Russian strongman who is no friend of the American people.

Budowsky was an aide to former Sen. Lloyd Bentsen (D-Texas) and former Chief Deputy Majority Whip Bill Alexander (D-Ark.). He holds an LL.M. degree in international financial law from the London School of Economics. Contact him at brentbbi@webtv.net.


 COMMENTS:


Twenty reasons for supporting Bernie Sanders! Feel free to add more!
1. Bernie is an honest, decent, compassionate, practical, intelligent man, a very rare commodity among politicians!
2. He is consist e n t and does not change his position with the changes in the political wind.
3. He is not beholden to powerful corporations, special interest groups or individuals, never has been!
4. He cannot be bought and does not have or accept money from Super PACs or large corporations.
5. He has been fighting for the rights of ordinary people for over thirty years!
6. He is for fair and equal treatment of people of color and the disadvantaged.
7. He fought in the civil rights movement and marched with Martin Luther King.
8. He supports equal pay for women and a woman's right to decide for herself what happens with her own body.
9. He is in favor of increasing the minimum wage to one that is fair and livable!
10. He wants to lower the interest rate for college loans and to provide free tuition to students for public colleges and universities.
11. He is in favor of a system of universal health care for all citizens, something on the line of Medicare for all.
12. He is for expanding and simplifying the voting pro cess instead of making it more difficult and putting more barriers to voting.
13. Bernie wants to get rid of 'for profit' prisons and release many who were unjustly imprisoned for minor drug and other non-violent offenses.
14. He is for repairing the broken criminal justice system to make it more balanced and fairer to ordinary people.
15. He wants to change the idea that corporations have the same rights as people and to end the 'Citizens United' ruling by the Supreme Court that allows unlimited money to influence elections.
16. He wants to give political power back to the people rather than have it remain with the super rich, mega corporations and special interest groups.
17. He is against the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement which could have negative effects on American workers and the economy.
18. He is against the Keystone XL pipeline which could cause environmental damage and increase pollution.
19. Contrary to most republicans he believes in global warming and promotes policies that protect our water, earth and air quality.
20. He knows the real costs of war and believes it should be the very last option!




 

Only Sanders, not Clinton or Trump, has right plan to defeat ISIS

There's a reason Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) says "I'll be damned" if the U.S. leads the fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The repercussions of perpetual wars upon American veterans and their families have resulted in tremendous sacrifice. This sacrifice unfortunately has not led to a decrease in terror or stability in the Middle East, so before addressing why Sanders has the right plan to destroy ISIS, let's analyze the costs of war.

Because of his work as chairman of the Senate Veterans Committee, Sanders witnessed how the military conflicts espoused by President George W. Bush, and Democrats like Hillary Clinton, continue to affect American soldiers and their families. In Congress, Sanders has fought for the same people whom we send to fight America's enemies. For this reason, he recently won the Congressional Award from the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

The human cost of both the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars have been paid by a small percentage of Americans within an overstretched U.S. military. Multiple tours of duty and Americans fighting longer than ever before have resulted in a "higher than believed" suicide epidemic, as USA Today noted. Thus far, 4,494 Americans have died in Iraq, while 32,223 Americans have been wounded. Ignoring his stance prior to winning the White House, President Obama recently sent more Americans to Iraq in order help Iraqis fight ISIS.
As for Afghanistan, Obama decided to prolong the war that already resulted in 2,372 Americans dead and 17,674 wounded. Rebecca Ruiz of Forbes explains the magnitude of both conflicts in a piece titled "A Million Veterans Injured In Iraq, Afghanistan Wars."

How much did both wars cost? Both wars might easily exceed $6 trillion.

What's been the cost of fighting ISIS thus far? We've already spent $2.4 billion fighting ISIS, and now Clinton and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump both want to increase spending and resources.

Trump is open to more U.S. ground troops in Syria, but has yet to elaborate on the cost and impact upon our military. Clinton has called for America to "intensify and broaden" efforts, but ignores the legacy of her Iraq War vote or bombing of Libya.

Failed policies and tough rhetoric from Republicans and Democrats like Clinton have led to foreign policy disasters. These debacles helped foster the creation of groups like ISIS. When Clinton unveiled her strategy to defeat ISIS at the Council on Foreign Relations, she failed to mention the consequences of her Iraq vote.
As noted by the Council on Foreign Relations, "[Abu Musab al-]Zarqawi's successors rebranded AQI [al Qaeda in Iraq] as the Islamic State of Iraq and later, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) ... reflecting broadened ambitions as the 2011 uprising in Syria created opportunities for AQI to expand." Al Qaeda in Iraq was "rebranded" ISIS, and while Clinton's supporters simply point out that she's called her vote a "mistake," it's clear that our invasion of Iraq resulted in a great many unintended consequences.

Most importantly, Sanders wants to ensure that our battle against terror doesn't create even more instability, or an increase in the number of terrorist organizations. Sanders understand how ISIS and similar groups wage war. The primary goal of groups like ISIS is to lure America into asymmetric wars that mitigate our military advantages; submarines and nuclear weapons can't defeat improvised explosive devices (IEDs) or insurgents hiding in apartment buildings. The willingness of Sanders to move beyond the traditional American paradigm of continual war, in the hopes of ending continual terror, is why Sanders has the right formula to defeat ISIS.

In contrast, Clinton helped further the structural roots of regional instability by accepting $10 million to $25 million from Saudi Arabia for the Clinton Foundation, even with the country's human rights abuses and Saudi links to terror groups. What's even more baffling is that Clinton herself has already acknowledged the Saudi links to funding terror. According to a CBS News article, "WikiLeaks: Saudis Largest Source of Terror Funds," Clinton clearly acknowledged Saudi support for the same groups we've been targeting for years:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged U.S. diplomats to do more to stop the flow of money to Islamist militant groups from donors in Saudi Arabia.

The Saudi government, Clinton wrote, was reluctant to cut off money being sent to the Taliban in Afghanistan and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) in Pakistan.

"More needs to be done since Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al Qaeda, the Taliban, LeT and other terrorist groups," according to the memo signed by Clinton.

Although Clinton supporters will no doubt ignore the relevance of this State Department memo, the fact remains that the Clinton Foundation accepted millions from Saudi Arabia. These donations were accepted, even as Clinton believed Saudis had a link to funding terrorist organizations.

As for Clinton's willingness to overlook Saudi funding of terrorism, another troubling aspect of this relationship pertains to weapons deals. According to Mother Jones, the former secretary of State oversaw weapons deals to various nations shortly after they donated millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation:

In 2011, the State Department cleared an enormous arms deal: Led by Boeing, a consortium of American defense contractors would deliver $29 billion worth of advanced fighter jets to Saudi Arabia, despite concerns over the kingdom's troublesome human rights record. In the years before Hillary Clinton became secretary of [S]tate, Saudi Arabia had contributed $10 million to the Clinton Foundation, and just two months before the jet deal was finalized, Boeing donated $900,000 to the Clinton Foundation, according to an International Business Timesinvestigation released Tuesday.
The Saudi transaction is just one example of nations and companies that had donated to the Clinton Foundation seeing an increase in arms deals while Hillary Clinton oversaw the State Department.

While the FBI's investigation of Clinton’s emails has dominated news, it's the curious timing of donations to the Clinton Foundation (as well as subsequent weapons deals) that undermine her overall plan to defeat ISIS. Defeating ISIS can't be done when a president has financial ties to a country that's linked to its creation. The Guardian's Patrick Cockburn explains Saudi links to ISIS in "Iraq crisis: How Saudi Arabia helped Isis take over the north of the country." Former MI6 agent Alistair Crooke also explains the Saudi/ISIS link in his piece titled "You Can't Understand ISIS If You Don't Know the History of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia."

In contrast, Sanders calls for Middle Eastern nations to lead the fight against the terrorist groups in their backyard. Sanders is also the only presidential candidate to criticize Saudi Arabia for suggesting U.S. troops against ISIS and states, "With the third largest military budget in the world and an army far larger than ISIS, the Saudi government must accept its full responsibility for stability in their own region of the world."

Focusing the responsibility of destroying ISIS upon regional powers is the right thing to do, especially since American wars have resulted in numerous unintended consequences.

After the horrific attacks in Paris, Sanders explained that "the fight against ISIS is a struggle for the soul of Islam, and countering violent extremism and destroying ISIS must be done primarily by Muslim nations." While Hillary Clinton echoed the same talking points (in a slightly less bellicose tone) as Trump, Ben Carson and other Republicans candidates, Sanders focused on long-term strategy.

As for Syria, the same people who advocated the Iraq War are at it again. Clinton and others have called for the ouster of Bashar Assad in Syria, but nobody has explained who will replace Assad once he's gone. In addition, nobody has explained why we've sent Americans to Syria, even though America has recently scrapped a $500 million program (that Clinton once supported) to arm the Syrian rebels. Like Iraq after Saddam Hussein, and Libya after Moammar Gadhafi, Clinton continues to ignore the lessons of history.

 Bernie Sanders rightfully states that Americans shouldn't continue to be sent to "quagmires in the Middle East." In terms of overall strategy, only Sanders demands that Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries intensify their fight against ISIS. It's this road map that will defeat ISIS, not the hawkish rhetoric of Clinton or Trump, and Sanders is once again on the right side of history. It's time to let Middle Eastern nations lead the fight against terror, and with Sanders as president, America won't repeat the mistakes of the past, or succumb to a reactionary foreign policy. After all, the primary goal of ISIS, al Qaeda and other terrorists is to lure us into endless Middle Eastern quagmires.

Goodman is an author and a journalist.
  1. If Congress does not act, we will use the executive authority of the president to stop the dividing up of families.
  2. You want to keep the minimum wage low, and give tax breaks to millionaires. , that is not what makes America great.


 

Millennials have gotten royally screwed: That’s why they’re voting for Bernie Sanders

The newest generation of adults are demonized by older generations, all the while suffering our brave new world







In recent years, it seems like a cottage industry of sorts has formed around bashing the Millennial generation as a bunch of narcissistic, lazy, entitled, coddled, uninformed digital junkies who just can’t deal with the real world. Though older generations have always complained about youngsters being in trouble, this animus towards Millennials seems rather unique, especially because, well, Millennials are rather unique.


They are the first generation to grow up in the digital era, and technology has advanced at breakneck speeds during their lifetimes. Older Millennials were just children when the internet was in its infancy, and have grown up with it, from AOL to Myspace to Facebook and the iPhone. It is the first generation that cannot imagine a time when there was no internet or GPS or cell phones to assist you in everyday life. (Certain Seinfeld episodes may even confuse younger Millennials, as they revolve around characters trying to find each other without cell phones or any other digital technologies.) The Millennial generation is also the generation that received those much-lamented participation trophies, and has apparently been so coddled by their parents and teachers and guidance counselors that they simply are “not ready for the real world,” which involves rejection and tough breaks.

With all that hate, it’s easy to forget sometimes that the Millennial generation is also the one that faces staggering levels of debt, a bleak job market (even when one does get a college degree, which has become ever more important), and the overall prospect of having a less prosperous future than one’s parents. While today’s 18 to 34 year olds are the best-educated generation in American history — 22.3 percent with a bachelor’s degree — they also have lower median earnings (inflation adjusted) than 18 to 34 year olds did in 1980, when just 15.7 percent had a bachelor’s degree. Furthermore, becoming the best-educated generation has made Millennials the most indebted generation. Back in 1993, while the oldest Millennials were busy playing Sega Genesis, the average debt per borrower in the graduating class was under $10,000; by 2015, that number had more than tripled to about $35,000 — earning the class of 2015 the honor of being the most indebted ever.

Even worse, choosing to avoid higher education and all the debt that comes with it makes one’s future prospects that much worse. The unemployment rate for high school graduates aged 25 to 32, for example, is about three times that of those with bachelor degrees. The rate of high school graduates living in poverty is likewise high, at 21.8 percent, compared to 5.8 percent for those with a bachelor’s degree or more.

A lot of the aforementioned Millennial critics tend to be particularly critical of political correctness in higher education. But political correctness is hardly the biggest problem in academia. Over the past few decades, higher education has been almost completely corporatized. As retired Adjunct Professor Joseph A. Domino puts it in The Huffington Post, there has been a “Walmartization” of our colleges and universities.

In plain English, college has gone from being a place where young adults go to learn how to think critically and question things — including authority — to a place where young adults go to find careers and monetary success (which explains why “business” is the #1 degree). In the process, universities seem to have shifted their focus towards everything but education in the hopes of attracting students from wealthy backgrounds. Sports arenas, food courts, athletic facilities, and an army of bureaucratic administrators to go along with it. “These amenities are extremely expensive and contribute to the escalating cost of college,” said former Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich, in a recent interview with U.S. News & World Report.  “Moreover, they have very little or anything to do with the education of most young people.”

Meanwhile, salaries for top administrators increased by 39 percent from 2000 to 2010, while full-time professors saw their salaries grow by just 19 percent. And between 1978 and 2014, administrative positions rose by 369 percent, while full-time tenure and tenure-track appointments increased by just 23 percent. In a recent survey done by the Chronicle of Higher Education, it was found that 32 private university presidents earned $1 million or more in 2013, while many professors had unlivable wages. It’s not just our fast-food workers who struggle.




Clearly, administrator priorities are not in providing the best education for America’s young adults, but in climbing the national ranks, creating country club atmospheres, and attracting the wealthiest students, while increasing the cost of tuition in the process.

The corporatization of higher education, which has affected the Millennial generation the most, is a mere symptom of our political economy. Since the era of neoliberalism emerged sometime in the seventies, and exploded with the elections of Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom and Ronald Reagan in the United States, our political economy has had a complete makeover. The neoliberal ideology of economic liberalization — e.g. privatization, deregulation, free trade, commercial imperialism — promoted by both Republicans (Reagan, Bush Sr. & Jr.) and Democrats (Clinton, Obama), transformed the United States into what it is today. And with it came the financialization of our economy, a metamorphosis that eventually led to the crash of ’07-’08 and the vast economic inequalities that we currently have.

So then, is it any wonder that Millennials — especially those who are currently in college or recently graduated, who happened to grow up during the biggest economic downturn in nearly a century and witnessed how the greed of a few could hurt an entire society — are the biggest supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt)? Millennials have inherited an inherently unfair economy and corrupt political system that is a result of nearly four decades of a neoliberal consensus. Or to put it a bit more crudely: Neoliberalism has screwed the Millennial generation. And Sanders is the antithesis of a neoliberal.

The latest poll from the Harvard University Institute of Politics found that Sanders, who trails Clinton overall by about 25 points, actually leads her 41 percent to 35 percent among Democrats aged 18 to 29. It also found that the term “Democratic Socialist” has, if anything, a positive connotation among this age group — 66 percent said the label makes “no difference,” 24 percent said it would make them “more likely” to support Sanders, and only 9 percent said “less likely.” This seems to back up past polls that have shown Millennials reacting slightly more positively to the word “socialism” than “capitalism.”



Millennials see a society governed by plutocratic pawns who are legally bought by billionaires and corporations. They see a dysfunctional government that can barely keep itself funded, let alone tackle monumental issues of our time, such as climate change — especially when private industry does everything it possibly can to block necessary legislation. Most who are not fortunate enough to come from a financially well-off family see a future of taking on incredible amounts of debt, just to get an education that will hopefully (but not certainly) provide a job that pays enough to make monthly payments on that debt.

No wonder Democratic Socialism is catching on! The neoliberal experiment has had disastrous effects for the majority of people who are not in the top one percent (or 0.1 percent, for that matter), and the biggest problems we face — climate change, income and wealth inequality, economic instability, geopolitical turmoil, Millennial debt — can all be attributed in varying degrees to the philosophy and practice of neoliberalism. Millennials are inheriting all of these nightmarish problems, but surely they do not have to inherit the unsound philosophy that has created or exasperated them. Sanders and his political philosophy provide an alternative that gives Millennials hope in a future that currently looks bleak. And at a time when a fascist is dominating the other party’s primary, hope is in short supply.





Sanders: Silicon Valley crucial to defeating ISIS


http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/263496-sanders-vigorous-silicon-valley-aid-needed-on-isis





Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) says Silicon Valley’s help is crucial to defeating the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

“I think domestically we have got to do everything that we can technologically to make sure that we do not allow sleeper cells to develop, or we allow communication that takes place within ISIS groups,” the Democratic 2016 contender said Wednesday on MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports.”

 
“Here in this country, [that means] working with the high-tech companies to do everything that we can to shut off the communication capabilities of ISIS and sleeper groups,” Sanders added.
“These guys understand the issue and have more influence and more understanding of what is going on that any other sector in the world. They have got to play a vigorous role.”

Sanders also cautioned against restricting the Internet too tightly in the fight against terrorism.

“We cannot as a nation go around saying we are a free society and yet undermine the Constitution of the United States of America,” he said.

“No one is arguing that should not be vigorous, but some of us believe that we do have a constitution and that freedom in this country is extremely important.”

Sanders also said that only broad international cooperation could eliminate ISIS once and for all.
“The major focus bringing countries together — Muslim countries, Western countries, Russia — must be to destroy ISIS,” he said. "That must be the focus of our efforts."

“If we are serious about destroying ISIS and winning this thing in a way that does not get us in perpetual warfare, there must also be a coalition involving the Islamic nations,” Sanders added.

“King Abdullah of Jordan is absolutely right. This is a struggle for the soul of Islam, and the Muslim nations themselves have got to be on the ground in a coordinate way destroying ISIS.”

National security is a hot topic on the 2016 campaign trail following the terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif.

GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump said late Tuesday that he supports “closing the Internet” to potential extremists.

“I would certainly be open to closing areas where we are at war with somebody,” he said during the fifth GOP presidential debate in Las Vegas. "I sure as hell don’t want to let people who want to kill us and kill our nation use our Internet.”

Former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina at the debate called the federal government “woefully behind” on using technology for counterterrorism.


  20 déc.
Fresh off last night’s joins me to discuss the debate & this week’s campaign data breach.
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IBEW Local 1837 endorses :
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WATCH: Cornel West gives rousing introduction for Bernie Sanders at historically black college

Cornel West Introduces Bernie Sanders in South Carolina ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8cex4VTrwg
 Bernie 2016
Renowned activist and intellectual Cornel West endorses Senator Bernie Sanders for president and ...

Post Debate in NH | Cornel West, Bernie Sanders - YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at_V0tuM2gw
Bernie 2016
... Hampshire, Cornel West gives a fiery introduction to Bernie Sanders. ... 






  1. Democratic Socialism and Foreign Policy | Bernie Sanders

  2. 2

    If Men Gave Birth to Babies... | Bernie Sanders

  3. 3

    CBS News Democratic Debate | Bernie Sanders

  4. 4

    Terrorism Will Not Strike Fear in American Hearts | Bernie Sanders

  5. 5

    Voter Suppression, National Federation of Democratic Women | Bernie Sanders

  6. 6

    We Cannot Fight Evil Alone | Bernie Sanders








 


REBUTTAL: New York Times, Gotham & L.A. Critics awards, ‘Spotlight’ reviews by 160 Americans journalists. (FYI today’s journalists write for money, for their capitalist boss’ agenda, for ratings)
http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2015/12/rebuttal-new-york-times-gotham-la.html  

We're gonna have some fun, we're gonna make a political revolution, we're gonna transform America. Other than that, not much. Watch Cornel West give a fiery introduction:


0:28/14:04


WATCH Bernie Sanders speak TRUTH --

https://www.facebook.com/berniesanders 

Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are for Wall Street dinosaurs


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6 hil y a 6 heures
Coming down the road your way!
 
  6 hil y a 6 heures
14 foot tall Giant Bernie Sanders will march with hundreds of Bernie Supporters at the Rose Bowl Parade today!


 
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