Tag Archives: socialist

national news

Waiting for the candidate who can wipe out Trump

Critics of this blog — at least some of them — have made some incorrect presumptions about me. They seem to believe I am some sort of far-left socialist who wants to redistribute wealth. That’s the vibe I get from a few of ’em.

I am a patriotic American, a veteran who went to war for my country, someone who’s been married to one woman for 48 years, has reared two sons watched them become two of the finest men on Earth. I pay my taxes without complaining.  I attend church most Sundays. I revere the principles for which our flag flies and I get choked up at military parades.

Accordingly, I do not want to see some far-left socialist nominated by the Democratic Party to run against Donald J. Trump. I favor a more moderate approach to good government. Who is that candidate? Who should carry the torch forward into political battle against a president who has zero business holding the office to which he was elected? I do not yet know.

I merely want to endorse the candidate who embodies moderation but one who can take the fight directly to Trump and his minions.

I had the distinct pleasure this week of attending a Trump rally in downtown Dallas. I went as an observer. I told a couple from Rockwall I meant about my intent in being there. They got it, even as they wore their Trump gear while waiting to get into the arena.

I met a lot of nice people. I had half-expected to see my share of wild-eyed wackos. I didn’t see them. Instead, I saw thousands of committed Trump supporters whose enthusiasm for their candidate was as fervent as any I have seen since, oh, 1972, when I got involved politically for the first time. My guy at that time was progressive U.S. Sen. George McGovern, a Democrat from South Dakota who campaigned on a pledge to end our involvement in the Vietnam War.

I had just returned from Vietnam and I wanted Sen. McGovern to win in the worst way. Instead, he lost in the worst way, losing 49 states to President Nixon. We were committed, too. Our crowds were huge and enthusiastic, too. We lost big.

My point is this: Fringe candidates do not win national elections. Trump is no extremist. He is, as best I can tell, a complete anomaly. He has no ideological base. He doesn’t stand on principle. He brought zero public service credentials, let alone interest, into the office he won in what I consider to be the Mother of All Political Flukes.

He has disgraced his office. He has embarrassed me as an American patriot. I want him banished from the White House. I want the next president to represent the sensible center of American life.

Whoever that person is, I am waiting for him or her to present themselves to Americans and to make the case in the strongest terms possible that they can — and will — restore dignity to the nation’s highest and most exalted office.

national news

Let the socialist congresswoman learn her way

I am amused and slightly baffled at all the attention a rookie member of the next Congress getting.

Ocasio-Cortez is the talk of D.C. Democrats love her; Republicans ridicule her. She’s a Democrat, having knocked off a well-known member of her own party’s congressional leadership in the New York state primary, then cruising to election this past month.

Ocasio-Cortez is 29 years of age. She’s a socialist, at least that’s what she calls herself. GOP foes are equating that to her being the daughter of Satan.

Her entry onto the national stage hasn’t gone all that well. She has made a gaffe or two along the way. Democrats are giving her a pass; Republicans are, um, ridiculing her. Oh, I already said that last part.

Ocasio-Cortez is a freshman lawmaker. She hasn’t developed any kind of congressional record on which to pass judgment. I intend to wait to see how she matures on the job. Maybe she’ll learn the difference between the various branches of the federal government.

As for this fascination with her, Democrats need to cool their jets; Republicans, meanwhile, need to quit piling on. They have enough troubles within their own party to make them squirm.

national news, political news

Socialist could do HRC a huge favor

Bernie Sanders’s campaign for president next year is likely to produce a huge favor for the Democratic Party’s frontrunner, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Sanders is an unapologetic socialist. He’s an independent U.S. senator from Vermont. He’s going to attack Clinton from the left as the two of them seek their party’s presidential nomination.

The favor? It will be that Clinton will be seen as the mainstream candidate and — perhaps — more palatable to the vast middle-of-the-road sea of voters who dislike extremists on either end of the political spectrum.

Socialist to snap at Clinton’s heels

Republican candidates and members of the TEA party wing of the GOP try all the time to label Clinton as some kind of “closet socialist.” Well, she’ll be running for her party’s nomination against the real thing.

Sanders has no qualms about extolling the virtues of wealth redistribution, which is a socialist tenet. Clinton doesn’t say such things — out loud, at least. That doesn’t stop her fervent critics from hanging the socialist label on her.

So, look for Hillary Clinton to welcome Sanders’s attacks. She’ll parry them easily and possibly deprive her Republican foes a key weapon in their own arsenal against the probable Democratic presidential nominee.