Political Parties or What's In a Name?

Political Parties or What’s in a Name?

There is no escaping the specter of Senator Bernard Sanders . The independent senator from very small, and very racially homogenous Vermont has recently been trotted out with DNC chair Tom Perez in something ironically referred to as a “unity tour.” Mr. Sanders seems to not have been informed of the title or even purpose of the these events. He was quite clear when asked if he was a Democrat that he was not. The official GOP twitter handle shared a video of Tom Perez being booed and Bernard did nothing to stop the derision from the crowd. Unity indeed.
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In my recent social media forays (almost all of which are a total waste of time), I find myself engaged primarily with those who identify on the left, are highly critical of the Democratic party, and see no problem with Mr. Sanders attempting to lead a party of which he is not a member. To be clear, I take no issue with reasonable critiques of the Democratic party. It is always subject to scrutiny and there is always room for insight into party affairs. Being a sports fan, I am quick to offer that attempting to lead a party (and Mr. Sanders has accepted the title of outreach chair) one is not in would be akin to attempting to be a team captain for the New England Patriots while being a back-up punter for the Cleveland Browns.
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This dissension begs revisiting the purpose of having political parties in the first place. It’s quite simple, parties are the tool by which democratic power is organized within a democracy. Given Duverger’s Law (google it) the US will always have two dominant political parties. The names of the parties have changed throughout our history, as have their affiliations, aims and goals. Looking at the Democratic party, one can see a shift from the segregation supporting party in the early 20^th century to the more liberal party today. Building a party is monumentally difficult. It involves cultivating relationships, reaching common ground with diverse swaths of people, crafting a message that resonates with constituents and ultimately convincing those constituents to vote for you. These actions all take place for the greater goal of using the party apparatus to put forth the party agenda in elected offices. The party is a tool, an engine of politics. Albeit an extremely unwieldy and unpredictable engine.
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I have been accused of many things, but one thing I will gladly agree with is that I am hyper partisan and have been ever since the malfeasance of the 2000 election theft. I am a Democrat because I recognize that the Democratic party is the most effective way to enact a liberal agenda in electoral politics. That is not to say every Democratic candidate is a good one. Obviously, races have primaries for good reason. Sometimes even after a primary the nominee isn’t ideal, it’s a democracy, that will happen. It then becomes imperative to judge the nominee against the general election opponent. People will say, “I shouldn’t have to vote against  someone.” This is a fallacy in our electoral system. It is incumbent on the voting citizen to choose the candidate that will do the most good and avoid the most harm to the country. Choosing not to vote in every election possible is to be derelict in one’s duty as an American.
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So, what’s all this to do with Bernard? To his credit, he has been able to amass political capital in tiny white Vermont without being affiliated with a party. Though he caucuses with Democrats, he has unquestionably been antagonistic to the Democrats throughout his entire career in public life. Most egregiously praising the Sandinista government in the 80s and musing that President Obama needed to be primaried in the 2012 election; and there are several other instances and quotes that mirror these sentiments. Mr. Sanders’ negative opinion of the Democratic both historically and in the present are perfectly allowable, but highly questionable for someone who months ago was running under the Democratic banner as a candidate for president. Furthermore, Bernard was blown out in dramatic fashion in the primary. A 13% loss that despite the coverage it received, was never close. Fans of Mr. Sanders can all tell you how close the MI primary was, but none know about the double digit wins Ms. Clinton racked up in South Carolina or Mississippi or Alabama. (This hints at the coalition building among black Democrats that Mr. Sanders was thoroughly disinterested in).
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Following the drubbing he received in the primary and Ms. Clinton’s subsequent Electoral College loss, Mr. Sanders resurfaced somehow as the great white septuagenarian savior of the Democratic Party. Let us pause for a moment and consider the monumental hubris of Bernard Sanders. Here we have a politician who misappropriated a party title, infrastructure, funding and legitimacy only to cast off any sense of responsibility they conferred once it became politically expedient to do so; to then be so arrogantly presumptuous to assert that the party that he will not join, and rejected him, must be remade in his own image to save itself. Re-read that massive run on sentence again. And again. It takes a few passes to absorb the enormity of Bernard’s conceited egotism.
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The bottom line is that political parties matter. Despite our flaws on the Democratic side, ours is still the best way to enact liberal, democratic values and ideals. It isn’t going to be perfect or fast enough but our country isn’t designed to be either of those things. Don’t let those flaws distract you from the bigger picture.  Don’t let a non-existent perfect be the enemy of the reality of the good. The party that we build needs leaders, but one thing they should all have in common, is that they are members. Don’t trot Bernard out in front of me or the millions of Democrats who voted against him. Give me Maxine Waters, Adam Schiff, Chuck Schumer, Kristen Gillibrand, John Lewis, Ted Lieu, Nancy Pelosi, and yes, even Keith Ellison. Don’t try to sell me on a politician whose entire career was made on sanctimonious sniping from the sidelines (and OMG dumped radioactive waste on a poor Latino community).
#UniteBlue      #DemForce  #butemailstho  #bothpartiestho
PS: Caucuses should be eliminated and all primaries should be closed. Pick a side and get involved.

Brief thoughts during Pesach 2017

Of course I’m eating matzo right now and one cannot eat matzo and not be reminded of the Jews’ time as slaves in Egypt. As every Jew knows, the seder is intended to remind us of all the aspects of the hundreds of years our people spent there. We are continually told that we were strangers in Egypt, so we must never forget what it was like to be a stranger. Tonight I’m thinking of a particular stranger that has been suffering horribly for years: Syrians.
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I don’t usually link to other articles, but the following piece by David Inserra from the very conservative Heritage Foundation is required reading before discussing this:
http://www.heritage.org/immigration/commentary/how-the-refugee-vetting-process-works
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It’s important to understand that from an American perspective, there isn’t a side that is good for our interests. Assad is a brutal dictator who is clearly content to watch his country fall apart while he clings to power. The opposition is bolstered by Islamic fundamentalists (except for maybe the Kurdish fighters). I support the right kind of foreign interventions, such as the Israeli airstrike that took out the North Korea designed nuclear reactor in 2007, and the Libyan intervention in 2010. I see no strategic advantage to US involvement in this civil war. What does have a clear US interest is aiding the innocent civilians who are brutalized by both sides of the conflict, and the US can do something about it.
What is undeniable is that pain, suffering, and misery have befallen the Syrian people. Donald Trump made it clear during his campaign that not only is he opposed to the refugee vetting process we’ve had in place for years, he wants to halt all immigration from certain countries. This is the failed “Muslim ban.” While I’m relieved it has failed (weren’t we supposed to be tired of all his winning by now?), it’s disheartening that such a thing was even in the platform of a candidate for president.
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Reading the vetting process of refugees described by Inserra, it is comprehensive, exhaustive, and effective. I’d wager that most Americans are not familiar with what the US has actually been doing, and most don’t know that we’ve only admitted approximately 1200 Syrian refugees. I would prefer if we were taking in more. The terrorists are the ones that are staying to fight the damn war. The terrorists have the vested interest in toppling the Assad government. The Assad government is killing civilians whether they’re suspected of being terrorists or not; at times with chemical weapons Those who are fleeing the war are those that have decided that their lives are more important than taking a side; which is exactly what I would be doing because Assad is a secular dictator and the opposition would institute a repressive theocracy. People fleeing these outcomes are exactly the people that we should want to come here. These are people who would be able to see the promise of America in a positive light, and that would reverberate throughout the Middle East.
Could there be people who seek asylum here that intend to do us harm? Of course. We have law enforcement for that and I trust them to protect us. However I want to live in a country that isn’t so dominated by fear that we cower from the stranger. We were all strangers somewhere once, and it is incumbent upon us (not just Jews, but Americans) to treat the stranger among us well. Our hearts must be stronger than our fear.
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Ours is supposed to be a nation of hope, not just to our citizens already here, but to the whole world. I’m not advocating for open borders a la Ellis Island. I’m calling for the vetting process that’s in place to remain, and perhaps be expedited in certain cases. Trump fired cruise missiles at an air base that was active again the next day and did nothing to prevent chemical attacks from being carried out against Syrian citizens again. This cannot be the extent of our Syria policy. In fact the actions taken by Trump made the chemical weapons situation worse. Intelligence used to know where the chemical weapons were stored, they have since been moved. We have ordnance designed to neutralize chemical weapons, but these were not engaged in the 59 cruise missiles that were launched. Trump even stated in an interview that the missiles were fired at Iraq and had to be corrected by the host that they were launched at Syria. In that same interview he spoke as much about his damn chocolate cake as he did the missiles.
#butemailstho