Hillary's Blind Ambition - Now Let's Wake Up

By Jeff Simpson

Hillary Clinton was determined that she was going to be the 45th President of the United States.  She knew it, I would guess sometime around 2012 when Obama was re-elected. 

Everyone new that Hillary would be the next President, from Nate Silver to Moody's to Martha Laning.

Hillary's sycophants were out there trying to see who could be the most pro-Hillary because they wanted a piece of the White House Action!

This kind of stuff was common place:

The plan was simple, do her bidding, and when she took over the White House you were either going to be offered a job for the next 8 years or politically blackballed for the next 8 years. 

The choice was clear. 

So when they concocted a plan to become the next nominee, they knew they would beat Martin O'Malley, they decided to exert full control over the DNC.    Debbie Wasserman Schultz, chair at the time, was all in also.   I wonder what Cabinet level position she had her eyes on? 

Then a 70 year old, unkempt Jewish grandpa, decided to join the race and actually had a message that was not #imwithher and his message resonated.  People were sick to death of the politics as usual routine, while they could look around and see that they were 1 incident away from losing everything. 
America was sick of the infighting, the loss of wages and jobs and the constant worry about healthcare, while the people on Wall St. (who actually broke the world) were able to light their Cuban Cigars with $100 bills if they wanted. 

America is not working for too many of us. 

Hillary and her team could not see the forest for the trees, as they were too busy picking out curtains, and decided that since they were going to win anyway, they might as well take over the DNC before a vote was even cast!

In WI, we knew before most people, because of some great reporting by Rebecca Kemble and Barbara WIth.

Unfortunately, the rest of the country just woke up with the release of Donna Brazile's new book. Brazile took over the reins of the DNC when Wasserman-Schultz resigned. 

Her new tell all book, tells us of the massive incompetence and corruption behind the scenes of the DNC and all led by Hillary and her team!

Yet the states kept less than half of 1 percent of the $82 million they had amassed from the extravagant fund-raisers Hillary’s campaign was holding, just as Gary had described to me when he and I talked in August. When the Politico story described this arrangement as “essentially … money laundering” for the Clinton campaign, Hillary’s people were outraged at being accused of doing something shady. Bernie’s people were angry for their own reasons, saying this was part of a calculated strategy to throw the nomination to Hillary.
The agreement—signed by Amy Dacey, the former CEO of the DNC, and Robby Mook with a copy to Marc Elias—specified that in exchange for raising money and investing in the DNC, Hillary would control the party’s finances, strategy, and all the money raised. Her campaign had the right of refusal of who would be the party communications director, and it would make final decisions on all the other staff. The DNC also was required to consult with the campaign about all other staffing, budgeting, data, analytics, and mailings.
I had been wondering why it was that I couldn’t write a press release without passing it by Brooklyn. Well, here was the answer.

Hillary had a plan, she was going to be the 45th President of the United States, teh same way the Hare knew he could beat the tortoise in a race. 

No Problem. 

Well there was one problem, The American People had a different plan.  They did not feel that anyone "deserves" to be President and could not have cared less that it was her turn. 

They wanted jobs, college education without massive debt, the ability to take a vacation and not go bankrupt if their car broke down or they broke an arm. 

The Donald realized that and spoke to those people.  Being a "reality star" he knew how to play to the camera as an actor,  He acted like he cared and had plans on bringing jobs and healthcare to the people. 

Behind the curtain, all he really cared about was winning.  There was no there - there.   There still is not.

Now we are one of the lucky ones(kind of) as Hillary Clinton will finally make her way to WI(she ignored us during the election- and lost WI), next week to do a book signing.   

I will not be there, as I do not have an extra $500 to have her sign a book, or an actual desire to read her book. 

However, if you do go.....I recommend that someone asks Hillary come very important questions.

* What happened to the Hillary Victory Fund money that was supposed to finance down ballot races?

*  Did you feel the least bit uneasy, running the DNC before the primaries even started?  Did you not see a conflict of interest?

* Why would you take Harvey Weinsteins advice in a way to smear your opponent?

*  Did you not think you could beat Bernie Sanders in a regular primary or did you just assume the nomination was yours and work towards the final goal of being President?

*  As despicable a human being as Donald Trump is, why would you attend his wedding and why would you encourage him to run for President?


Now what should be the next steps to move on and win in 2018? 

*  Make sure that Progressives have a seat at the table at all times. 

* Anyone who was in the Hillary inner circle needs to sit out this next election.   Their collective hive minds or brilliance, took a lifelong career politician and lost to a bumbling fool reality tv "star".  There is absolutely nothing that can be learned from them.   They can knock doors for the eventual candidates. 

*  STOP defending Hillary on this.   Yes, Bernie had a huge mountain to climb to wrestle the nomination from someone whose every move for 12 years was designed on her winning said nomination.   She probably would have won without any help at all. 

The word rigged is not exactly right either BUT no thinking person can deny that the scales were not strongly weighted against Bernie. 

In a country where half the people do not bother voting,  why would the DNC be arrogant enough to make sure and demean and devalue a huge chunk of primary voters who do show up to vote?

To pretend that there was no problem with the primary makes you look as insane as the Trump/Walker sycophants and is an affront against democracy. 

Your candidate won the primary, as flawed as she and it was, we can not go back and revote so just accept that it was not a level playing field, and vow to work on making it better next time.  Then please shut up!   

It is going to take a united effort to win in 2018 and 2020, that has to start with you! 

*  If you have paid your dues to be a good upstanding Democrat.  Bully for you!  To pretend that makes you more progressive, more liberal, a better American than others who feel the same or have similar beliefs than you, is the same as the righties trying to own the flag because of their beliefs. 

You choose to join the party, instead of pointing out how important you are to people who have not joined, try convincing them to join instead.  Explain why they should join instead of trying to shame them out of participating! 

Lets realize our mistakes, set aside our differences and win in 2018!      We must have a wave next November.   

The Four Keys to Taking Back our Democracy

By Matthew Van Grinsven

I would like to thank Bernie Sanders for initiating this political revolution.  I agree with most of his ideas, but his strategy is ultimately flawed.  He is attempting to reform the Democratic Party instead of getting our democracy back.

I don’t have enough time to engage why we are not a democracy now but I can quickly share a couple illustrations that display this; the approval rating of congress according to Gallup and the mainstream parties’ presidential nominee’s net favorability ratings.  When a democracy is supposed to be government by and for the people why would we so greatly disapprove of our representatives?

So, where do we go from here?  The four keys to taking back our democracy are:

1. Reverse the Citizens United decision by constitutional amendment. Corporations are not people and money does not equal speech. Money cannot drive our policy nor sway our politicians any longer. 
 
2. We must always vote and vote our conscience.  We cannot ever sit out an election and we must never vote based on fear.

3. Break up big media. Six corporations own 90% of the United States’ media.  They wield an enormous amount of influence in our media saturated world.  We likely are in the midst of a media oligopoly.  And on the horizon we have legislation further deregulating print and television media.  We must reduce the percentage of markets that large corporate media conglomerates may own local outlets in.  The FCC’s regulation of media ownership is for the public good and to make sure we don’t end up with a single new station and a single paper.  In this scope six is not much better than a monopoly

The leaks of the past week have proven how much collusion exists.  From a major online source, Politico, allowing the Democratic National Committee toedit stories to e-mails being exchanged by the DNC and NBC. (At this point I suggest they merge and just call themselves MSDNC.)

4. Install ranked choice/instant runoff system at the polls. The winner-take-all, two-party system needs to be decimated.  There is a common belief that we must change the Democrat party from within electing more progressives at local levels and slowly moving up the ranks.  This is an idea set forth BY the Democrat establishment.  Attempting to change one of the two mainstream parties is work that will take a generation.  And the establishment counts on people not staying focused long enough or caring for that long.  And they are right.  The establishment is more likely to change you, than you change the establishment. I’ve seen it happen time and time again.
Listen – EVEN IF we had two party system with everybody thinking at least one of the two parties was great, we would still be in this mess.  The inherent problem with a two party system is that we are stuck having ONLY two choices.  Most of us think one of the two mainstream parties is at least a bit better than the other so we feel a duty to whomever our party nominates.  When the party games the primary we don’t have a meaningful choice. No other viable choices exist.  And with a system dominated by only two entities – corporations only have two targets to influence and dominate.  Now if we were in a system where we thought the party we liked had been corrupted, we could all say, “Hey Debbie Wasserman Shultz GET BENT!” and go to a different party.  However, because we have a winner-take-all, two party system, when we don’t like what “our” party is doing we have the choice to not vote or vote for another party’s candidate, say Green, Libertarian, America Delta, Constitutional, Prohibition, Nutrition, or America’s Party – and yes, those are all parties with candidates for president of the United States – and if we do that we are told that you’re supporting the mainstream party we don’t like a.k.a. the eviler of two evils.  UGH!  Having the two party winner take all system changes the power dynamic of the party to member relationship to a system where the power resides with the party, instead of it coming from the people.

There is NO choice to leave in the mainstream party’s collective mind…..being all other choices have been rendered irrelevant.  And how about that fear based voting? Instead of voting FOR people and policies we support we are “forced” to always vote AGAINST a candidate or for the lesser of two evils.  Who is sick of doing that too much in their lives?  If you don’t like it, you want ranked choice /instant runoff voting.

This is the problem with Bernie Sanders’ most recent strategic system.  He’s told people to join the party.  He’s told people to vote for Hillary Clinton, even though the primary was rigged against him.  He’s told people to run for office…..and they have, as Democrats.  This has done nothing but REINFORCE the two party system.  It has BOLSTERED the leverage of the Democratic Party establishment.  Who says that this is the best way to change our political climate? Again, it has been initiated by the establishment. I say, let’s start fixing our political system immediately and get to the representative democracy we deserve.

Like the lands and grooves on a key, we will not take back our democracy in the United States until all four of these actions occur.  There is no magic bullet to singlehandedly serve our democracy on a platter to us.  In order to unlock democracy we must turn these four keys.

What is Outrageous?

 By Jeff Simpson

out·ra·geous

adjective \(ˌ)au̇t-ˈrā-jəs\

: very bad or wrong in a way that causes anger : too bad to be accepted or allowed

: very strange or unusual : surprising or shocking

By now everyone who is paying attention has heard of the ridiculous analogy that Debbie Wasserman Schultz has used to describe Scott Walker's policies toward women.   

Scott Walker is not one to comment but he had thoughts on what Ms. Wasserman Schultz had to say:

"Governor, what's your reaction to Chairwoman Wasserman Schultz's comments Wednesday in Milwaukee?" Wainscott asked.
"I think it's outrageous, and it's unfortunate," Walker said.
While many Wisconsin Republicans were quick to blast Wasserman Schultz, calling her language insensitive to victims of domestic violence, this was WISN 12 News' first chance to hear what the governor had to say about the comments aimed at him and his policies.
"To use that language, (is) just completely inappropriate. And I would hope that my opponent and others, as loudly as possible, would denounce that. It shouldn't matter where it comes from, regardless of party, people shouldn't be using that language," Walker said.
Walker said that if Mary Burke believes the comments from the Democratic Party leaders were, in his words, outrageous, she should take a strong stand against them.

Now we finally have a base line to what the Governor feels is "outrageous" and what he feels should be done when someone uses "language that is just completely inappropriate".   You should take a strong stand against them.   

What is incredibly interesting about that belief from Governor Walker is the fact that he has had NOTHING whatsoever to say or even acknowledged the following(that were all part of #walkerdocs and emailed to him and made public):

Emails from one of his top aides refer to county mental health facilities as “the loony bin” and that same top deputy claims “no one cares about crazy people.”  -- greeted with silence by Scott Walker.  

  
When a rape happened at a county facility, was part of an email chain that pointed out that his staff should STOP thinking like a lawyer and think about how this effects us politically!  ----greeted with silence by Scott Walker


 Scott Walker's chief of staff, the recently deceased Tom Nardelli, sent an incredibly disgusting racist email that started a little email chain of comments(no complaints) -  also greeted by silence from Scott Walker.

A woman who starved to death at the county mental facility family, was planning on suing the county and Scott Walker showed so much sympathy that this is all he had to say about the matter "keep it buried until after the election."   -   --- No explanation from Scott Walker here either.  


Yet another racist email by Nardelli now smearing Muslims. --- Silence from Scott Walker. 

14 year old boy dies horrible death in front of his parents and the one concern that Scott Walker and his staff have is that it not hurt him politically.    --- no explanation from Scott Walker.  


Now to recap from our short incomplete list.  To Scott Walker it is not "outrageous" nor is it "unfortunate" to send racist emails, make racist comments, cover up deaths and rape and make fun of the mentally ill.  It is however unfortunate  and outrageous to criticize his policies. 

Seems to me Mike Ellis got it right!  

"Walker is for Walker"