Blog Betty (Thomas Friedman is a Great Man was an online novel)

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

Cuba Gooding Jr. got all the breaks and didn't deserve one

I don't know. I just don't know.

We've already seen Bill Cosby for what he is. And that's good. I'm glad the women came forward. I am not glad that someone who was a national institution and beloved did what Cosby did. I am so disappointed on so many levels. This includes with all the people in the press who elevated Bill.

Grasp that Bill was a trailblazer but that, early on, the press had others they could back. They went with Cosby. They went with over Flip Wilson, for example.

So now we've got Cuba Gooding Jr. -- already accused of groping, now accused of rape.

Again, I'm glad the women are coming forward and I'm sorry for what they endured.

I don't blame them for anything.

I do blame Cosby and I do blame Cuba. I blame them for blowing every opportunity that they've been given.

Cuba won an Academy Award. That doesn't happen often to Black actors. He got press love -- press love, please note, that Louis Gossett Jr. didn't get. Louis won an Oscar too -- for AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN.

Louis played a real character -- one with self-respect.

Now Cuba was good in his role but his character was a buffoon.

Another key element that we need to start talking about in the Black community is that Cuba was much lighter skinned.

Look what happened to the two.

Cuba became a beloved media token. Louis didn't. The general media did not embrace him.

Studios didn't embrace him either.

He follows up his Oscar win with roles playing sidekicks to White actors -- some of the actors weren't even known at the time -- and still aren't famous. He wins an Oscar and he's playing supporting roles to nobodies.

A few years after he's won the Oscar, he's making movies with Dolph Lundgren and Chuck Norris. Because Hollywood didn't get behind Louis.

They gave Cuba every break in the world.

Cuba was the feel-good guy. Louis was a serious actor and he didn't play the buffoon.

We need to start holding people accountable. That includes calling out the press when they repeatedly present lighter skin as the 'better' skin.

Lighter skin allowed Cuba to have a career that his meager talents never warranted. Darker skin prevented Louis Gossett Jr. from getting the roles his talent called for.

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Wednesday, August 19, 2020. Night two of the infomercial being passed off as a convention goes no better than the first night.

The embarrassment that is the Democratic Party's national convention continued last night. Key takeaway? Vote Republican.

Some corporate whores are telling you a propaganda film narrated by Cindy McCain -- wife or c**t of the late War Hawk John McCain (that's what he called her, take it up with them -- and with the DNC for celebrating a sexist like John to begin with) -- told you how great a friend Joe was with the thankfully dead John McCain. He worked with John.

Yes, he did. Joe worked repeatedly with John to destroy the world. Murder allies, that's what they were, complicit in the murders of millions but let's put a happy face on it and call it 'bipartisanship.'

Question: Do Democrats want control of both houses of Congress? Do they want control of even one house of Congress?

The DNC's nonsense does not draw a line between the two parties. Yes, the DNC exists every four years to promote the presidential ticket. It also exists to expand the party. That's why you choose someone you think will be a rising star to deliver the keynote address. (We'll get back to Michelle Obama in a little while.) You also use the convention to promote your candidates for Congress and to put out the party line that argues why you should vote Democratic.

But they're not doing that. This obsession with Donald Trump has defeated them.

Donald Trump may win a second term. If he does, he does. The United States will go on. Life will continue. B-b-b-but his policies! Congress could fight back on any policy. They didn't the last four years. They were too busy with nutty conspiracy theories and Nancy Pelosi's empty gestures and attempts at bad political theater.

Grasp that in the midst of a pandemic, the party is offering nothing. There is no monthly stipend -- despite most Democrats in office -- and most of the American people -- feeling that there should be. Nancy and her lazy ass can't even protect unemployment benefits. They're promising America nothing.

To garner votes, they are promising nothing.

And, on top of that, they're spending a week promoting Republicans who argue for slashing school funding, who are anti-choice and don't even believe in abortion if the girl or woman is raped or the victim of incest. They are telling you these people are the 'good guys.

They aren't the good guys.

But watching this garbage, why in the world would you feel the need to vote Democrat?

Let's get to the supposed postal crisis. I don't believe it. It feels like more theater drummed up by a desperate party that will not meet the needs of the people.

But what I do know is mail-in ballots are not 'the answer.' I'm all for mail-in voting. But the notion that this makes it easier?

I'm sorry, is it 2020 or 1950?

How stupid are we? How stupid are leaders of the Democratic Party? They're pretty damn stupid.

Mail-in ballots? If I vote absentee -- and I have -- I don't just fill out a ballot, put it in an envelope (my own or one that comes with the ballot) and drop it in the mail.

I have to put something on it.

A stamp.

In 2020, how many people do you know who have a damn stamp?

Oh, just buy one!!!!

At the grocery store? Most customer service booths/desks are going to tell you that you need to buy a book. I think that's a little under ten dollars right now.

So it's the Monday before the election and you're feeling like maybe you should vote, so you fill out your ballot and you put it in the envelope and then . . . A stamp. You need a stamp. Are you driving to a grocery store? If so, when you're told you need to spend $10 dollars -- talk about a poll tax! -- are you going to do it.?

These are issues that should have been addressed and talked about.

Unemployment is huge. I mean, I guess the Democrats don't want that vote. That would explain why unemployment benefits were cut weeks ago and Nancy Pelosi still can't come up with a package to restore them. If I'm unemployed, I'm not wasting ten dollars for a book of stamps.

'You can go to the post office!' Post offices aren't always nearby. And, if it's after hours, is it going to take change and are you going to have change? Or is voting now going to be just for those with a credit card? Also, you want someone to drive cross town? Better choice would be a FED EX pick up location which would probably sell stamps. And that's something the convention could have educated on since, clearly, the elected Democrats are not bothering to.

Elected Dems have quickly become the biggest idiots in the world. Most haven't mailed anything themselves in years. (Having an assistant drop something in the plastic box where someone picks up office mail is not using the post office yourself.) They are so out of touch, they are beyond George H.W. Bush's apparent shock over the fact that groceries are scanned at check out. They are out of touch.

And on the post office, they're out of touch at at time when many voters don't use the post office to mail letters or bills. Grasp that this is the first presidential election in which people born in this century, the 21st century, will be voting. Grasp that people born in the 90s aren't postal senders either. E-mail, text, social media, that's largely taken the place of pen pals and letters.

Good luck with mail-in ballots when you've not bothered to factor in how many people do not use the mail that way (for sending) and how many have not ever used the mail that way.

Out of touch and stupid, today's Democratic Party.

And that's what the convention conveys.

It's an infomercial that forgot about the need to be live. No one wants canned speeches.

And why do we need Bill Clinton? The 90s were forever ago. His abuse with regards to Monica Lewinsky is not something we need to be reminded of. He was a married man, fifty-years-old and occupying the most powerful job in the US -- some would say in the country. He began an affair with a 22-year-old. And he was a selfish pig, let's be honest. Calling it an affair is being kind. He got off and wasn't too concerned whether she did or not. He abused the office, he abused the position. She was working for the government which made him her boss. It was wrong in every way possible including his attempts to get her to lie.

But there he was blustering his way through like we don't all know that he was visiting Jeffrey Epstein's pedophile island and like we don't all know that he lied about it. Like we don't all know that Juanita Broaddrick's charges of rape are highly credible. There he was acting like he was on the stage at MTV and they were all giggling over his answer to boxers or briefs.

Bill is as outdated as that question. He didn't belong on stage and shouldn't be again.

He has a lot to answer for.

John Kerry spoke. Why? To make Bill look better? John doesn't belong on stage. Hillary Clinton will speak this week and she doesn't belong on the stage either. John lost in 2004, Hillary lost in 2016. Why are they on the stage?

In 1988, Michael Dukakis lost to George H.W. Bush. Anyone remember the 1992 convention?

For those who don't, Michael Ross, LOS ANGELES TIMES, July 15, 1992:

Like Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, he was hailed as a man of vision and skill, someone who could unify the Democratic Party’s fractious ranks and lead it to victory in November.

That was four years ago, however. Mention the name of Michael S. Dukakis at the party’s current convention and eyeballs roll, shoulders shrug or fingers cross in the fervent hope that it won’t happen like that again.

[. . .]

While Clinton basks in the limelight this week, the fallen stars who preceded him to the banner-draped podium in election years past also are on hand: Dukakis, former President Jimmy Carter, former Vice President Walter F. Mondale and former South Dakota Sen. George S. McGovern.

But, with the exception of Carter--who as an ex-President has special status--all of these former champions of the party’s quadrennial quest for the White House are buried in the background of the gala festivities unfolding in and around New York’s Madison Square Garden. Grim reminders of earlier defeats, they have been consigned to the political shadows as the ghosts of conventions past.

“The Democratic Party tends to put you on the shelf after you’ve lost,” acknowledged McGovern. “It can’t afford to look back. It must always look toward the next election, not the last.”

Not this year. This year they promote the saggy mashed potatoes -- wait, the dried mashed potatoes, that's how old and moldy these speakers are -- while doing their best to undercut politicians who are actually popular with the people. Perfect example? US House Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Name a politician who's gotten more heat and more support in the last four years. You can't. And so the party responds by letting her speak for . . . sixty . . . seconds.

She should have been the keynote speaker.

But instead, we get Republicans. Apparently, the Democratic Party can't celebrate it's own but it can celebrate any nut job from 'across the aisle.' War Criminal Colin Powell will speak later this week, we'll note it then and we'll note how his War Crimes didn't start with the speech to the UN -- that speech filled with lies about Iraq. [ADDED: I got lucky, Colin spoke last night, I got lucky and missed it. Patrick Martin covers it at WSWS.]

So stars like AOC are sidelined or ignored -- the Squad deserved 15 minutes on stage together, at the very least -- and tired fixtures from the last century are brought on.

It's not your party, 21st century Americans. It's a party of the past.

There has never been a worse convention.

Let's go to Michelle Obama finally.

We called her out yesterday morning. We were right to.

Corporate whores and partisan hacks lined up to tell you she was amazing. She wasn't. She wasn't even adequate.

How are you going to speak to the electorate when you don't even understand them?

You lie and whore and that's supposed to be repeated often enough to confuse the American people and make them vote for you?

The American people ditched Michelle. Check the ratings. They didn't get many viewers to begin with (especially compared to 2016) but notice the drop off the minute Michelle starts speaking. It's there in the ratings Americans who bothered to watch decided to stop watching when she started speaking.

That's not a surprise.

She's not an elected politicians. She's accomplished nothing with her life.

She's a professional spouse. That's all she is. A First Lady is popular when she's not political. That's reality. Michelle got political. It's not a role anyone wants to see her in. The ratings proved that.

AOC should have been the keynote speaker, not some tired fixture from a few years back who has make-work projects to busy herself with. She doesn't speak to the American people. The press loves her -- they're paid to love her. There's no reason for the rest of us too and it's way past time that a hard hitting biography was published on her and it addressed how she harmed healthcare in Chicago.

Let's move! -- away from that topic? Michelle would like us to.

Best Tweet this morning? Yashar Ali:

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Upgraded To Full DNC Speaking Slot After Announcing Support For Iraq War

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Upgraded To Full DNC Speaking Slot After Announcing Support For Iraq War

All the latest politics coverage from The Onion, America's finest news source.

Apparently, that's what it will take for her to get a real slot of time at the convention.

The following sites updated:

Tuesday, August 18, 2020

Crack? Looks like Michelle's face imploded!

What the heck is wrong with Michelle Obama's face?

Did she get run over? Bad botox? Is some man (or woman) she's involved with beating her?

That face is rough.

Black don't crack, remember that?

Michelle's not bi-racial. Like me, she's Black.

And her face shouldn't be looking like that. They've painted her up -- including a 'warming' that neutralizes her actual skin color -- guess she'll be slathering on the Porcelana soon -- just another Black celebrity who doesn't want to be Black?

How did White America watch this and not comment on Michelle's face? Oh, that's right, most of them just registered that her face -- with the make up -- was a lighter skin tone, a Whiter skin tone, and that made her 'better' looking.

Michelle never had much going for her before but she did have her Blackness. How sad that she's walking away from that.

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Tuesday, August 18, 2020. Fake Ass Michelle Obama presided over the fakery sold as a convention.

The job shouldn't have been that hard. Air a boring convention that reassured those who were starting to weaken on Joe. No fancy guest stars, no innovative camera work. Just bore America into believing that Joe could be trusted.

But they failed. Epic failure, in fact.

Before we go further, can anyone explain why Michelle Obama was speaking -- in prime time, no less. What elected office did she hold? That's right, none. What other former First Lady gets to speak? In 2004, it was a fight to get Hillary Clinton on in prime time. And she was a sitting US senator. The DNC had a real woman problem but because of the pushback and because Hillary was a senator and was a fundraising star, the Democratic National Committee finally caved. Michelle's husband isn't running so why is she speaking at all?

Not only did she speak, she spoke for 18 minutes and forty seconds.

18 minutes.

Someone running for office could have used that time -- as was the case in 2004 when her husband was the keynote speaker and was running to become a US senator.

He gave the keynote speech which, by the way, Michelle did last night. Last night? We'll come back to that. But grasp that a spot that's always used to promote someone running for office was given to someone who held no elected office. And who had nothing to say.

She had nothing to say.

She had nothing to say yet she spoke longer than her husband did in 2004 -- and he had to take periodic breaks for applause and cheers.

Michelle had no audience to cheer her on -- just whores who were paid off. Stephen Colbert -- looking more like a child molester than ever now that he and others go without make up -- was happy to show what a whore he was:

Stephen Colbert on Michelle Obama's DNC speech: “I’ll be honest with you. My job is to have a joke for every time somebody says anything in public. After watching Michelle Obama’s speech, I have never been more happy to fail at my job.”

Where the wealth's displayed

Thieves and sycophants parade

And where it's made,

The slaves will be taken

Some are treated well

In these games of buy and sell

And some like poor beast

Are burdened down to breaking

-- "Dog Eat Dog," written by Joni Mitchell, first appears on her album DOG EAT DOG.

Sycophant -- that's Colbert.

No jokes?

How about . . .

Was it past her bedtime?

Were they afraid she'd show up at the podium in granny panties, the way she did in 2008?

There was a lot to mock. Some wrongly think a cat fight is brewing between Michelle and Senator Kamala Harris. Why do they think that? Because Michelle spoke -- and spoke and spoke and spoke and spoke still more -- for nearly 20 minutes and she never once mentioned Kamala.

It's not a cat fight, it's not jealousy.

It's that Kamala was announced as Joe's running mate after -- after -- Michelle recorded the speech that aired last night. No, she wasn't live. What's worse? Her keynote speech -- one of the most important speeches of the convention, of any convention -- was canned. It was filmed ahead of time. And not, grasp this, earlier that day.

Seven days ago, August 11th, Joe announced his pick.

Michelle's speech was filmed before that. AP:

In keeping with the virtual nature of the convention because of the coronavirus, Mrs. Obama’s remarks were recorded before Biden’s announcement last Tuesday that he had chosen California Sen. Kamala Harris as his running mate.

This isn't a convention, it's an infomercial and it's a really bad one. But sycophants will tell you differently.

The garbage and hate Michelle served up included, "Right now, kids in this country are seeing what happens when we stop requiring empathy of one another. They watch in horror as children are torn from their families and thrown into cages [. . .]" As Micheala Watkins character used to say on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, "Bitch, please."

POLITIFACT, September 2019:

But Biden mentioned "cages," specifically, and reporting from the time he was vice president described an enclosure for migrant children with that word.

Controversial use of ‘cages’ description

The term "cages" has continuously been used by Democrats in attacks against Trump and the detention of immigrants arriving at the border. The Trump administration says that the facilities it uses are not cages.

The description has been used to refer to chain-link enclosures holding immigrants at border processing facilities during both the Obama and Trump administrations.

Notably, critics of Trump’s "zero-tolerance" policy that resulted in family separations circulated a photo that purportedly showed children face down on the floor behind a chain-link enclosure during Trump’s tenure. However, the photo was from 2014 when Obama was president.

Our fact-check showed the Associated Press photo was taken in 2014 at a Customs and Border Protection facility in Nogales, Ariz. The photo was used in an Arizona Republic article centered on an influx of children arriving at the border unaccompanied by a parent or guardian.

The Arizona Republic article, in part, said:

"They are undocumented. They entered the country illegally. And when they were apprehended by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, they were shipped to Nogales from overwhelmed processing facilities in Texas.

"But they are still children in cages, not gangsters, not delinquents. Just children, 900 of them, in a makeshift border-town processing center that is larger than a football field."

The article adds that the children are "housed behind 18-foot-high chain-link fences topped with razor wire."

Jane C. Timm (NBC NEWS), "The Obama administration did detain people in cage-like structures, earning criticism from activists. Last year, Democratic activists circulated photos of children inside chain link fenced spaces in an attack on President Donald Trump, only for onlookers to later realize the photos were from 2014."

With her blow out and extremely false eye lashes, you had to wonder if she recorded early so she could work a hotel lobby?

You're a real whore when you get on national television to repeat a lie that's already been endlessly fact checked and determined to be a lie.

And you're a bigger whore for acting outraged about cages while staying silent while your husband put people into them. Michelle had nothing to say of value because she's just a liar. That's all she's ever been and that's all she ever will be. In 2008, the times were still incredibly sexist and she benefited from that. She gave a disgusting and anti-woman speech and the press lapped it up (we called it out in this community). Now it's the #MeToo era and she wants to style herself as a feminist -- forget that she and Barack asked Harvey Weinstein to create an internship for their daughter -- so we're all supposed to pretend that she's some sort of feminist. She's nothing. She had a lifetime to make some accomplishments. She did nothing.

And last night, she spewed lies and preached hate.

What an accomplishment.

The most amazing thing about 2016 was how hard the Democrats had to work to almost beat Donald Trump in the election. It's a sign of how pathetic and corrupt they were that they had to work so hard. They're even more pathetic and corrupt today.

They've got nothing to help the American people -- in the midst of a pandemic, no less -- so they offer attacks on Donald Trump's character. That didn't work in 2016 so this time around they're going to just lie.

Donald Trump, grasp this, is not disgusting or offensive enough to the Democratic officials, they have to lie to make him worse.

That's because the Democrats in office agree with the Republicans. That's why we never end wars anymore. It's why the American people are suffering.

And Michelle thought she could lie her way through a key note speech? Shame on her.

And shame on the DNC for putting Kristin Urquiza on stage. She lost her father to the coronavirus. And she was on stage to rip Donald Trump apart for it.

Really?

Because they also featured, among other, Andrew Cuomo. I love Andrew. I thought he showed leadership when none was being offered -- national leadership. RISING has repeatedly noted the problems behind his speeches and how his actions impacted, deaths he's responsible for. I love Andrew, but we've reposted that coverage here.

When you use someone to attack Donald Trump over coronavirus, you don't then put Andrew on stage.

When you do that, it makes it clear that it's not about the coronvirus, it's about destroy and trash Trump. You've taken a national tragedy and you've turned it into a partisan issue. It's ugly and it's not helpful.

Jamil Smith Tweeted:

The

@DNC

keeps trying to be down with plutocracy rather than turning out its base. Bloomberg, Kasich, and Whitman are speaking at the convention this week. But not Latino Democrats like

@JulianCastro

, whom I spoke with about his party’s issues last year.

Julio Ricardo Varela Tweeted:

Am still taken aback at how the only Latino presidential candidate in 2020,

@JulianCastro
, is not speaking during any prime time slot at
@DNC
convention this week. It's not like he was a keynote speaker in 2012. Dems are sending a really bad message here. Do they want to win?

No time for Julian, no time for Muslims or Latinos. The big-tent they're proposing is really just letting some really disgusting Republicans take the stage.

Wally Wests Tweeted:

ohio voters @ the dnc Am I A Joke To You?

What's he talking about? This DNC Tweet:

FACT: As governor, John Kasich cut $1.8 billion from Ohio public schools' funding.

10:51 AM · Jul 21, 2015

Republican John Kasich was put on stage. To speak at length. AOC will only get sixty seconds. She's a Democrat. She's a Latina. But Republican Kasich, whom the DNC warned about many times, was given the mike and treated like a hero.

That's whoring. There's no other word for it. You embrace someone as disgusting as John because you both don't like Donald Trump -- excuse me, because you both hate Trump. You're ruled by hate and it's why you look so desperate and pathetic.

And yet, as soon as he's out of office, Michelle will be sharing candy with him and hugging him. Just like she did with Bully Boy Bush because whores get paid off. And she certainly did. A really bad book that went through multiple ghost-writers. Podcasts no one wants to listen to and NETFLIX 'programming' that's a joke. She got paid off big time.

That the DNC has produced garbage TV is no real surprise. They're a party at war with their base. They're unable to make even the mildest of concessions. They want your vote, they just don't want to earn your vote. So they're going to tell you Donald Trump is worse than they are -- and, to really convince you, they will lie about him like Michelle did. How corrupt do you have to be to invent lies to make Donald look worse than he already is?

They have no Muslims this year. In 2016, they used a family to make Donald look bad. As though they hadn't been engaged in the witch hunts against Muslims, as though Barack's Drone War hadn't terrorized Muslims. But they don't really care about Muslims so they ditch them this year. They use everyone they can. They'll use anyone, tell any lie. What they won't do is come up with actual programs and plans that would help the American people.

While you're pretending Joe Biden didn't assault Tara Reade, you can also pretend that the party's working overtime to help the American people.

In 2008, Barack went around the country promising to end the Iraq War with shouts like, "We want to end the war and we want to end it now!" He had eight years in office and US troops are still in Iraq. He's a liar and his wife's a liar. But Colbert found nothing 'funny' about a ridiculous woman wearing cow-eye lashes and a fake weave on national TV in that ugly dress as she spouted lie after lie and appealed to you not to remember the promises made before -- promises never kept.

The Iraq War continues. That alone should silence Michelle Obama. That alone should shame her into silence. Instead, she shows up with a round of new lies.

The biggest lie -- that a pre-recorded informercial is a live convention.

I forgot to include this yesterday, Kat's "Kat's Korner: Haim and how it took a lifetime to get here" went up Sunday night.

The following sites updated:

Monday, August 17, 2020

Democratic Socialists need to grasp that Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is a joke

Adolph Reed Jr. has the misfortune of being one of the country's leading intellectuals -- in a country that doesn't value intellectuals. When you add in that he's Black, he's further devalued. But the last damn thing I expected was for the DSA to turn on him. I'm not surprised that Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is against him -- she's a joke, she's always a joke. She'd love to be an intellectual but you can pile degrees after your name and still not be an intellectual. You have to be able to actually think to be an intellectual. Reed can thing, Angela Davis can think, a lot of people. But a lot of people, like Keeanga, can't.

Niles Niemuth (WSWS) reports:

The New York Times published a lengthy news article last week highlighting an instructive incident that took place earlier this year within the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). A speech by professor emeritus of political science Adolph Reed, Jr. was cancelled due to objections by the AFROSOCialist and Socialists of Color Caucus over his “reactionary and class reductionist form of politics.”

The race-based caucus claimed that by inviting Reed to address a political education session on the COVID-19 crisis, the Philadelphia and NYC Lower Manhattan chapters had launched a “reactionary, class reductionist and at best, tone deaf” assault on members of the DSA who are racial or ethnic minorities. Reed is an African-American professor who has a decades-long history in critiquing racial identity politics from a left-wing perspective.

According to the Times, Reed had intended to speak to the branches about why the obsessive focus of “the left” on the disproportionate impact of the coronavirus pandemic on African-Americans undermined efforts to organize across racial lines and advance health and economic justice for all Americans. Reed backed Democratic Senator Bernie Sanders for president in 2016 and 2020 and was a founding member of the Labor Party initiative headed by union leader Tony Mazzocchi.

Reed had criticized the race reductionism of the Times’s 1619 Project in an interview with the World Socialist Web Site in December, no doubt raising the ire of the racialists in the DSA and broader pseudo-left who have staunchly defended the reactionary racialist falsification of American history.

The morning the event was to take place, the AFROSOCialist Caucus demanded that Reed’s talk be cancelled and instead that there be a debate of his “class reductionist analysis versus our intersectional socialist analysis.” The leaders of the DSA’s New York chapter quickly responded to the letter by cancelling the event.

The AFROSOCialist Caucus boasts of receiving generous funding for its first training session in 2017 from the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, which is associated with the Left Party in Germany and operates thanks to the infusion of tens of millions of dollars annually from the German state.

The furious reaction within the DSA leadership to the invitation to Reed reveals how deeply the organization is imbued with the reactionary and right-wing politics of racial division. The extreme hostility to any analysis based on the primacy of class expresses the interests of affluent sections of the petit bourgeoisie, who utilize racial and identity politics in the fight over positions of power and privilege within the apparatus of the state, the trade unions, academia and corporations.

Significantly, a leading voice in the campaign against Reed is professor of African-American studies at Princeton University Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, who is cited by the Times as a representative of those who see race as “America’s primal wound,” which takes priority over “ephemeral class solidarity.”

Keeanga is a joke.

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Monday, August 17, 2020. Does Iraq matter in the US, does a virtual political convention matter, an activist is assassinated in Iraq, and much more.

Is Tony Blair a War Criminal? PARLA poses the question as the Democratic War Party kicks off their convention online and as the US press tries to play what's-Iraq-never-heard-of-it?

The war continues, no matter how hard US outlets try to ignore it. What will they do August 20th? That's when Iraq's prime minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi is due to visit the White House.

In anticipation of that visit, or perhaps to get a few laughs or just to flaunt their stupidity, Aykan Erdemir and Philip Kowalski (NATIONAL INTEREST) offer "Joe Biden Will Be America's Most Pro-Kuridsh President."

First, "Would Be" is the wording they're looking for unless THE NATIONAL INTEREST no longer wants to be seen as objective journalism and instead wants to model themselves after Sibyl The Soothsayer in the film NETWORK. The election will take place in November.

The laughs never end, though. Joe Biden the most pro-Kurdish?

Joe Biden gave lip service to the Kurds as a US senator. As vice-president, when he was tasked with Iraq by Barack, he did nothing to assist the Kurds. He repeatedly ignored their interests and their concerns.

B-b-b-but he had to do what Barack told him!!!!!

Did he? Even after he was no longer vice president? From the September 26, 2017 snapshot:

Yesterday, a historic referendum was held in northern Iraq. Results above from RUDAW, the official results will be released later-- some day two to three days but Susannah George (AP) reports the results are expected this evening. .

RUDAW explained the referendum as follows:

More than five million people are eligible to vote when the people of Kurdistan head to the polls on Monday, September 25, to decide whether they want to leave or stay with Iraq.

With an estimated global population of between 30 and 40 million, the Kurds are one of the largest ethnic groups without a state. Under the post-WWI Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916, Kurdish lands were divided between Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria.

Kurds in all four parts of what is known as Greater Kurdistan have faced persecution, discrimination, and genocide, and have fought at times for greater rights, autonomy, and independence.

In Iraq, Kurds make up 17 to 20 percent of the total population. In the Kurdistan Region of northern Iraq, Kurds have had a semi-autonomous government since a no-fly zone was established over their lands in 1991 after the first Gulf War.

The new Iraqi constitution that came into effect in 2005, after the US-led invasion of 2003, recognized the Kurdistan Region as a federal region with its own legislature and armed forces, the Peshmerga. Both Erbil and Baghdad have accused the other of violating the constitution.

The September 25 referendum will take place in Kurdistan of Iraq only, not neighbouring countries.

It's worth noting that this vote was put together in about three months. It's also worth noting that provincial elections were supposed to have taken place throughout Iraq earlier this year, then pushed back to September, then pushed back to next year.

Read the snapshot. Two members of the US Congress bucked the Trump White House and issued statements supporting the Kurds. Where was Joe Biden?

And isn't that kind of the cry throughout his long, long public servant career: Where was Joe Biden?

For those who've forgotten the entire US national security establishment trashed and shamed the Kurds -- that's the US State Dept, THE WASHINGTON POST, THE NEW YORK TIMES, all the official and unofficial elements.

And for what?

A long, overdue non-binding referendum on Kurdish independence.

They rushed to trash the Kurds. They rushed to shame the Kurds. They rushed to hector the Kurds. Where was 'friend' Joe Biden?

The Kurds knew Joe checked out long ago. He lied to them repeatedly. Jalal Talabani looked like the biggest idiot in the world as he held on to the belief that Joe was going to come through on one of his promises -- at least one. He never did.

The Kurds have been betrayed repeatedly by the White House going back to the days of Richard Nixon -- as The Pike Report revealed. This was not by accident, this was by design. For those late to the party, February 16, 1976, The Village Voice published Aaron Latham's "Introduction to the Pike Papers." Latham explained:

In 1972, Dr. Henry Kissinger met with the Shah of Iran, who asked the U.S. to aid the Kurds in their rebellion against Iraq, an enemy of the Shah. Kissinger later presented the proposal to President Nixon who approved what would become a $16 million program. Then John B. Connally, the former Nixon Treasury Secretary, was dispatched to Iran to inform the Shah, one oil man to another.
The committee report charges that: "The President, Dr. Kissinger and the foreign head of state [the Shah] hoped our clients would not prevail. They preferred instead that the insurgents simply continue a level of hostilities sufficient to sap the resources of our ally's neighboring country [Iraq]. The policy was not imparted to our clients, who were encouraged to continue fighting. Even in the context of covert action, ours was a cynical enterprise."
During the Arab-Israeli war, when the Kurds might have been able to strike at a distracted Iraqi government, Kissinger, according to the report, "personally restrained the insurgents from an all-out offensive on the one occasion when such an attack might have been successful."
Then, when Iran resolved its border dispute with Iraq, the U.S. summarily dropped the Kurds. And Iraq, knowing aid would be cut off, launched a search-and-destroy campaign the day after the border agreement was signed.
A high U.S. official later explained to the Pike committee staff: "Covert action should not be confused with missionary work."

That last sentence? THE NATIONAL INTEREST doesn't comprehend it. It leaves their thick head confused.

There's also the fact that Joe Biden became Vice President in January of 2009. What are the KDP and PUK, by the way?

They're political parties in the KRG. The Talabani family controls the PUK and the Barzani family controls the KDP.

While Joe Biden was vice president, these two political parties were also another thing?

Any guesses?

Terrorist organization -- according to the US government. Joe Biden, friend of the Kurds, was just fine with that. It wasn't until February 2015 that these designations were finally removed. Grasp that. Joe's friend Jalal Talabani was the president of Iraq from 2005 through 2014 and, that whole time, the US government considered him the head of a terrorist organization.

What a friend they have in Joe.

Blue no matter who? Not for US presidential candidate Joseph Kishore (Socialist Equality Party) who writes:

Whatever reservations they may have over the right-wing character of the Democratic Party and its candidates, the argument goes, this is the only way to get rid of Trump. Everything else must be subordinated to this electoral outcome.

This is hardly the first election in which such “lesser evil” arguments were advanced. In 1988, it was a matter of voting for Dukakis, the right-wing governor from Massachusetts, to finally put an end to the Reagan years. After Dukakis lost to George H.W. Bush, the following election in 1992 became a matter of putting an end to the Bush years by electing Bill Clinton, whose right-wing policies cleared the path for Bush II in 2000. In 2008, the argument became the need to elect Obama, the “candidate of hope and change,” in order to end the disaster produced by Bush II, above all, the war in Iraq.

Obama continued the most right-wing policies of George W. Bush (with whom, by the way, he has established a close personal friendship), including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the overseeing of the Wall Street bailout following the 2008 financial collapse. It was the right-wing policies of Obama and the nomination of Hillary Clinton on the basis of a prowar program, glossed over with identity politics, that created the conditions for the election of Trump in 2016.

This act, in other words, has been played out before, and each time the result is a further shift to the right of the entire political establishment.

In this case, amidst all the hoopla over the “historic” character of the Biden-Harris ticket, attributed entirely to the race and gender of Harris, the nominees have been selected through the machinations of the Democratic Party against the candidacy of Bernie Sanders and even Elizabeth Warren.

That is, the Democratic Party’s campaign is founded on a repudiation of any suggestion that it will carry out a policy of social reform. The Democrats are not even making the pretense of providing a program to address the catastrophe unfolding in the United States.

Bill Glauber (MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINAL) tries to create interest in the online DNC convention by noting the following will be performing: Billie Eilish, John Legend, Common, The Chicks, Leon Bridges, Jennifer Hudson, Billy Porter, Maggie Rogers, Prince Royce and Stephen Stills.

What an unimpressive line up. Removed Jennifer Hudson and Common and what's the point? Billie is not a live performer (so the virtual convention may actually benefit her). The Chicks? Their career is over. And should be, I say that as a friend of Adrian Pasdar. 'B-b-b-but their new album debuted at number three!' A few weeks later, where's that album? At number 54. No one's buying it, no one gives a damn. It's seen as the desperation move it is, Natalie's solo career flopped so she decided to try to reform the Dixie Chicks -- now called the Chicks, though they're too long in the tooth to be considered to be considered baby chicks.

The group did 'bravery' in 2003. A weak and ad libbed remark from Natalie on a British stage which was quickly followed by trashing themselves and begging for mercy. Only after it was clear that wasn't going to work did they find enough spine to stand up for themselves. And Natalie never talked Iraq again? The Iraqi people have never been a concern of hers, have they?

They suffer but she didn't give a damn, did she? All the years after, 'political' Natalie has had nothing to say in defense of the people of Iraq.

Save The Iraqi people posted the above video on Saturday and noted:

Iraq, BASRAH 15/Aug/2020 Tahseen Osama is a civil rights activist, Father of 4, was assassinated on 14/Aug/2020 with more than 20 Bullets from an Iranian Backed militias members‼️ By the orders of albasrah Governor Asa'ad Alaidani; the Aidani has many crimes files against him: Killing of the ex-governor (Mohammed Al-waieli), Killing The demonstrators in albasrah in 2018, records of him giving direct orders of Killing the demonstrators in 2019, and many other crimes of killing, kidnapping, corruption, theft of money & lands, and more.. 🔴THIS IS THE LAST POST OF THE VICTIM (TAHSEEN OSAMA) AS HE WAS ASKING FOR A TRIAL & JUDGMENT OF ASA'AD ALAIDANI: https://youtu.be/jccD-eZ46ns

Karwan Faidhi Dri (RUDAW) reported:

Tahseen Oussama was shot 20 times at his internet service company in the city's al-Junaina neighbourhood by "militia" gunmen, according to local media outlet Basra Today. The identity and affiliation of the perpetrators has not been confirmed.

Oussama had taken part in anti-establishment and anti-corruption protests in Basra that had spread from Baghdad across the country in October of last year. He was a vocal critic of both the government and of militias accused of killing protesters with impunity.

On July 6, the day of Iraqi security analyst Husham al-Hashimi's assassination – largely suspected to have been conducted by Shiite militants – Oussama took to Facebook to warn “we will all be slaughtered in the Islamic way one day,” sharing a photo of a gun and its silencer.

Iraqi activists have been warning of an increasingly threatening environment for those who speak out against the country's current political order. Data provided to Rudaw English from the Iraqi High Commission for Human Rights (IHCHR) last month put the number of protesters and aligned activists killed between October 1, 2019 and March 17, 2020 at 22.

Let's note some reactions to the assassinations. Kazthoomy Tweets:

Tahseen Oussama, an activist and a father of 3, was shot 20 times in his hometown of Basra today. His daughter warned him "don’t go out I’m scared they might kill you", he replied "we have to bring down those who steal and kill your dreams". His name won't be said.

Hossain Tweets:

+40 days after the assassination of @hushamalhashimi
, yet the government of @MAKadhimi
 is not willing to bring the ones who did it to justice. Today, we've lost another good and brave man, Tahseen Oussama, who was assassinated in Basra.
#تحسين_اسامة_شهيد
#اربعون_يوم_وقاتلك_حر

12:26 PM

H Tweets:

Tahseen Oussama posted on his Facebook: I was speaking to my daughter she was saying don’t go out I’m scared if they kill you, I told her we have to bring down those who steal and kill your dreams, she was saying (Alawi, Mastofi, Rathawi and I) will grow up and bring them down +

12:35 PM · Aug 14, 2020

Khaled Sulaiman Tweets:

An Iraqi activist called #Tahseen_Oussama, was #assassinated by Iraqi militias in #Basra. The victim wrote On July 6th 2020: One day we'll all be slaughtered in an Islamic method. And he wrote 4 days ago: Political parties & militias control Basra city and no one can deter them

9:22 AM · Aug 15, 2020

Journalist Steven Nabil Tweeted:

Iraqi activist Tahseen Oussama was shot 20 times today in Basra, a horrendous crime. Tahseen is a civil rights figure and an important thinker among the protest movement.