Before the last presidential election, America was great. Now, we are abandoning our leadership position in the world, and destroying or repudiating everything that makes us great. Our president and his cabinet have contempt for the Constitution and the courts, no respect for workers and their needs, no respect for the planet, no respect for our agencies, no respect for our allies, and no respect for people in general.
For the purpose of the upcoming primaries, we need to abandon the arguments that Trump stole the election in the electoral college owing to the email scandal and help from Russia, and accept that we, the opposition, put him there. It was an election that should have been a landslide, but we, by supporting Wall Street democrats instead of the democrats who speak for all of us, gave voters who were dissatisfied with the status quo nowhere to go but to Trump.
Wall Street Democrats are democrats who take money from the rich—the one percent—and who, as a result, support anything that Wall Street supports to the detriment of the People. Wall Street democrats hedge on everything: they want to tweak rather than fix healthcare, they want to increase taxes, but they won’t commit to taxing the one percent as the rich were taxed in the 1970s, they don’t want to raise the minimum wage to a livable wage because they say that might destabilize things, they don’t want free college tuition because that’s going too far (even though crippling college debt is often as much as the cost of a house), they support the environment but see good uses for fracking, they won’t commit to withdrawing from Middle East entanglements and using some portion of the military budget for other things because we have to continue to “lead” over there, and most importantly, they won’t support regulations to curb Wall street abuses, because Wall Street is a major funder of their campaigns.
Hillary Clinton lined her pockets with millions in speaking fees from Wall Street firms while she was talking about running for president and claiming that she would rein in Wall Street. Many democrats in the House and Senate are heavily supported by Wall street, and make the same claim.
This is what happened. Voters who were not committed democrats, but who wanted to vote democrat, did not vote democrat, because we only gave them Wall Street democrats instead of a choice for change. Those uncommitted voters ruled out republicans and Wall Street democrats because they are both funded by the rich to help the rich get richer and neither group wants to make changes to the status quo. The view among many is that neither party represents the People. Trump and Sanders were the two forces for change—change from the left and from the right. Once Bernie was out of the running and Hillary was in, we left them nowhere to go. They fell into the arms of Trump.
As a candidate, Trump oozed corruption, but promised something different. Honest hardworking educated intelligent voters voted for Trump knowing his flaws, but thinking he was who he said he was, that he would bring about some kind of change in a country desperately in need of change, and that he was the lesser of two evils. It’s hard for democrats to hear this, but to many Americans, especially the independents and dissatisfied republicans, both candidates, Hillary and Donald, were seriously flawed and corrupt, but Trump was the only choice left for change once Bernie was out. Bernie or Elizabeth would have cleaned up in that election, because they offered change without hypocrisy.
How can we stop this from happening again? The answer is we can’t let Wall Street democrats reach the general election, because the base won’t show up to vote, and the independents and disillusioned republicans will vote again for right-wing change. We want the general elections to pit liberal democrats with vision, who represent change, against main stream republicans, or against republicans who want change, because their message is change for the one percent, and our message is change for the 99 percent. Those are battles we can win, and take back America.
Stop the Wall Street democrats by showing up at the beginning of the primary process, and by working hard to select and support candidates who are not Wall Street democrats. Show up, step up and save America. Make America great again.
In the sea of blue candidates running for office, how do you identify the Wall Street democrats, especially when they all claim that they will rein in Wall Street?
First, see who is donating money to the particular candidate. If it’s a PAC, see if they will disclose the source. If they claim not to know, it’s probably Wall Street.
Second, does the candidate support the 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act? The original Glass-Steagall Act was a Great Depression Banking Act from the Roosevelt era, that kept our savings banks and our deposits safe from being used for speculation by commercial banks. It prevented major economic crashes from 1933 until Bill Clinton killed it during his presidency. Since then savings and commercial banks play with our savings, and we have major economic crashes every few years.
Elizabeth Warren and John McCain have been trying for years to pass a 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act to reinstate those protections, but without success because republicans and Wall Street democrats are beholding to Wall Street and to the one percent, and neither Wall Street nor the one percent want this bill to pass.
Candidate Hillary Clinton was on record as being against passage of the 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act. In contrast, candidates Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders supported its passage, but President Trump has quietly reneged on his promise.
If a democratic primary candidate does not enthusiastically support passage of the 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act, you don’t need to know anything else. That’s either a Wall Street democrat or a confused candidate. If you can’t educate the candidate to support Glass-Steagall, vote for the other candidate in the primary. Better yet, get involved early, and ensure that a candidate is running who supports the 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act, and who will not take money from Wall Street. If no candidate meets those criteria, run for office yourself. Take back America in 2018 and 2020. Make America great again.
And remember, don’t demonize or criticize Trump supporters. Unless they are making over $250,000 per year, their interests are our interests, and they should be voting democrat. Let’s bring them into the fold by giving them credible candidates, and let’s show them that our issues are their issues.
Click here to see Atlantic article on survey results concluding that Democrats are out of touch
Click here to see Senator Warren press release on bill
See 2003 Frontline article on “The Long Demise of Glass-Steagall”
6/5/17