W.J. Astore
Hillary Clinton has selected her vice president and it’s Tim Kaine from Virginia. Kaine is known as steady, Catholic, in favor of “free” (corporate) trade agreements like the TPP, a man with foreign policy experience, and also a man with the right pedigree (Harvard-educated lawyer). Being from Virginia, naturally he’s considered to bring “balance” to the ticket.
But what about all those progressive passions that Bernie Sanders mobilized? What about tapping that movement? What about a candidate like Elizabeth Warren? By choosing Kaine, Hillary is saying, Forget all that, Democrats. I’m in charge here, and they’ll be no tomfoolery about progressive issues like health care or education or bank reform. They’ll be no reform of a “rigged system” because we are the rigged system and we like it that way, thank you very much.
Hillary is banking that progressives have nowhere else to go, so to speak. They’re not going to vote for Trump. Sure, a few might go Green or Libertarian. But most will stay with her, Hillary believes, as the best and only chance to keep Trump at bay. And perhaps she’s right.
An interesting statement from a puff piece at the New York Times: “He’s a company man,” said Dan Allen, who was an adviser to George Allen (no relation), the Republican Mr. Kaine beat in 2012 to win his Senate seat. “He was in Mark Warner’s footsteps as lieutenant governor, then he was in the footsteps of Obama. From a Clinton standpoint, this is a guy who’s shown a pattern of, he’s more than willing to be a follower in the footsteps of whomever is the leader.”
That makes perfect sense. Hillary wouldn’t want a VP who would eclipse her. Elizabeth Warren would have. Plus Warren is tough-minded, a fighter, an independent thinker. Hillary’s number one priority has always been herself and keeping those beneath her loyal and subservient. Seems like Kaine fits the bill.
In the aftermath of the Tim Kaine choice, if anyone out there still believes in a “progressive” Hillary, I have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn, some great vacation land in the swamps of Florida …
Bracing Views 
As expected, the Democratic party nominee for President of the United States has begun running rapidly to the right, seeking to appease the corporate sponsors of America’s never-ending political puppet show: namely, the Ruling Corporate Oligarchy. Usually, the Democratic candidate waits until after his or her nomination to do this, but in the present case, You-Know-Her has gotten off to something of a head start. As soon as Senator Bernie Sanders capitulated and fell into line, the race (further) to the right began. As Sheldon Wolin wrote in Democracy, Inc.: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism:
“While the Republican Party is ever vigilant about the care and feeding of its zealots, the Democratic Party is equally concerned to discourage its democrats.
The timidity of a Democratic Party mesmerized by centrist precepts points to the crucial fact that, for the poor, minorities, the working class, anticorporatists, pro-environmentalists, and anti-imperialists, there is no opposition party working actively on their behalf. And this despite the fact that these elements are recognized as the loyal base of the party. By ignoring dissent and by assuming that the dissenters have no alternative, the party serves as an important, if ironical, stabilizing function and in effect marginalizes any possible threat to the corporate allies of the Republicans.”
So, how does You-Know-Her’s selection of Viginia Senator Tim Kaine as vice-presidential running mate fit into this predictable pattern? Personally, I have little knowledge of, or any interest in, this person. Still, someone has done a little research which perhaps might illuminate the situation. See:
In Signal to Military, Hillary Clinton Picks Senator Tim Kaine as Running Mate”, By Tom Hall, July 23, 2016 “Information Clearing House” – “WSWS” –
[begin quote]
…
Presumptive Democratic Party nominee Hillary Clinton selected Virginia Senator Tim Kaine as her vice presidential running mate on Friday. The announcement, made in advance of next week’s Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, was originally due to be made at a rally in Tampa, Florida but was instead delivered hours later over Twitter.
In selecting Kaine, Clinton is making clear that she plans on running a right-wing, pro-war campaign targeted at winning over the military and sections of the Republican Party dissatisfied with Trump, and particularly with the Republican candidate’s attitude toward Russia. Clinton also wanted to repudiate any association with the issues of social inequality that motivated the widespread support for her main rival in the primaries, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders.
Kaine is among the most hawkish figures among Senate Democrats. As governor of Virginia from 2006 to 2010, Kaine oversaw billions of dollars in cuts to the state budget. The state of Virginia is a major center for the military and defense industry, and is home to the Pentagon and the headquarters of the CIA.
Between 2009 and 2011, Kaine served as the head of the Democratic National Committee, the leadership body of the Democratic Party. He is close to Wall Street, having recently backed measures to deregulate banks.
As a Senator since 2013, Kaine has regularly called for increased US involvement in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan. He has consistently supported the Obama administration’s reckless brinkmanship against Russia and China, two nuclear-armed powers. He has repeatedly pushed for a Congressional resolution officially declaring war against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in order to clear the way for stepped-up US intervention.
Like Clinton, Kaine has also supported the creation of a no-fly zone in Syria, an action that would quickly provoke a confrontation with Russia.
Earlier this month, in the lead-up to the NATO summit in Warsaw, Poland, Kaine co-authored an open letter to President Barack Obama urging him to “carry a message to world leaders…[that] success in Ukraine and resistance to Russian aggression, including through the rotational deployment of NATO troops to Eastern Europe, are in the best interest of all member countries.”
[end quote]
Those interested can read the rest of the quoted article, but I don’t see much point in going any further. The Wall Street hooker and war bimbo has selected a Wall Street pimp and wannabe warlock to ride behind her on her bomber broomstick. Just as I knew she would. This particular puppet show has gotten really old and tired. The Pentagram will breathe a lot easier, though. Cold War 2.0 coming right up, only a lot warmer this time around.
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Wolin sure has it right. The Democrats and Republicans are a political scam on the public. But then, it seems that no one ever loses an election by underestimating the public.
Funny how these talking point dittohead Democrats have devolved. I guess I was a fool, but I can remember a time when Democrats had differences and talked about them. I remember thinking that men like Wellstone and McGovern, or a young John Kennedy Jr. represented to me what being a Democrat was about. Now they just fall in line.
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Yes.
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Voting for Hillary is consent to tyranny. Voting for Jill Stein is protest against tyranny.
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A comment from my friend “Davout”
I’ve been reading the back and forth on DailyKos and have a more mixed view of Kaine than I had before. He is pro-TPP and has recently pushed for deregulation of some kind of banks (credit unions among them). On the other side, his ratings from choice, LGBTQ, and environmental orgs have tended to be high. On the biggest domestic issue facing us, in my view–restructuring the economy–he appears to be a corporadem.
He was trained by Jesuits and went to Latin America on a mission with them, which suggests that he has been steeped in the social justice tradition of the church. What I like about him is that he has been elected city councilor and mayor, as well as governor and senator, which means he probably has a nuanced understanding of what it means to implement policy at the local level. His supporters say that in confronting a pro-gun and anti-abortion state legislature, he was able effectively to defend gun control policies and women’s choice.
Clinton picked somebody for whom loyalty seems a prime asset. Typical move on her part. Still waiting for a sign that she is going to push the country to the left.
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How has moving to the right ever pushed the country to the left?
As for the Jesuits, they always believed in starting at the top, with the kings and other royalty, who would then simply order their subjects to convert. A ot less work — not to mention, dirt — that way. The Franciscans took the opposite tack, starting at the bottom with the poor and wretched of the earth. I read somewhere recently that Mr Kaine had done some missionary work in Honduras but hasn’t had much to say about You-Know-Her’s backing of a coup in that country overthrowing yet another “leftist” government in South America. Looks like the Franciscans have lost and the Jesuits have won — again.
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Mike: Perhaps my friend “Davout” believes Hillary when she claims to be a progressive. Supposedly, a wise Democrat must pivot toward the center in the main campaign, else risk being dismissed as a commie socialist hippie freak. But when she wins, she’ll pivot back to reveal the compassionate progressive within.
Of course, that’s nonsense. Hillary is a rightist. She’s basically a moderate Republican, and on some issues (blanket support of Israel, cozying up to the military, interventionist wars), she’s still a Goldwater Girl.
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One factor in Kaine’s favor: Pundits who know him say he’s affable. Likable. Hillary, of course, is secretive and unlikable. So Kaine brings balance to the ticket!
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Get ready for Bawl and Pillory, the Sequel. With Bubba Bill back in the white house, I wouldn’t want the Vice President’s job — normally not worth a bucket of warm piss anyway — or that of any cabinet secretary or U.S. ambassador. You-Know-Her has already threatened to put Bogus Bill in charge of the economy, just like he put her in charge of health care. Even so, I doubt that she’ll have what it takes to corral his appetite for power, influence, notoriety and, … well … you know. If she makes it through one term without the White House roof caving in or the world economy collapsing — again — then I will count us all lucky, indeed.
Also, without one of those “First Lady” persons, who will oversee the traditional Easter Egg hunt on the White House lawn?
And have you seen the latest thing about Wikileaks dumping some of her e-mails to the DNC? Her campaign has now taken to blaming Vladimir Putin for hacking her unsecure communications — who hasn’t? — thereby trying to help Donald Trump. And with those four-foot-tall headlines that The Huffington Post keeps running blaming President Putin for every crime imaginable, I’d say that the Clinton Gang shows an alarming lack of knowledge about, or even interest in, the real world which, for the most part, regards Russian President Putin as a competent, popularly elected (several times), and generally moderate statesman. Gratuitously insulting him as “Adolph Hitler” probably explains why You-Know-Her had such a dismal and unproductive record at the State Department. Even John Kerry has done better at the job, negotiating actual agreements with foreign governments, like Iran, for instance.
You-Know-Her’s putative “experience” in government seems to consist solely of trying to scare the shit out of Americans — nornally a pretty easy task — by conjuring a Russian and Chinese bogeymen intent on world conquest. It might get her elected since the American people have few other options, if you can call Donald Trump an option. I don’t. But our own history shows us how the people of the United States, in their hour of need, elected Franklin Delano Roosevelt to the presidency four times. I see no reason why the Russian people, in a similar situation not that long ago, won’t do the same with Vladimir Putin whom they overwhelmingly regard as having resurrected their nation from the utter catastrophe of Boris Yeltsin and his drunken policy of “let’s let the West rob us of everything.” Vladimir Putin stopped the looting and brought his country back from the edge of the abyss. Personally, I think that the Russian people will one day append “the Great” to Vladimir Putin’s name. And he will deserve it. Let the Clinton Gang from Goldman Sachs think that over before they leak their next batch of scurrilous innuendoes about him to the Huffington Post.
Tim who?
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