21st Century Progressivism

Tag: Donald Trump

  • A Progressive View of the 2024 Election

    Reading Time: 3 minutes

    This article is a progressive view of the 2024 election. This is just the way I see it. It’s the result of watching the electoral process very closely since 2015, but I could be wrong on any point. It’s value to me is that it refutes many of the strategic mistakes I see in the political conversation. I think the following factors are important for decision-making in 2024. What do you think?

    • The political establishment is able to stop the progressive agenda in its tracks. Progressives should have learned this in the 2016 election.
    • Donald Trump is part of the establishment. That explains why the Biden Administration has continued many of Trump’s foreign policies. However, President Biden has cooperated with progressives in domestic policy. Biden achieved many important policy changes as a result. We seem to be looking at two different factions within the government.
    • Kamala Harris is a legitimate alternative to Donald Trump. However, Harris supporters of all political persuasions lament that she does not have the particular policies they want her to have. I believe this is evidence of a blindness to the reality that progressives were forced to learn in 2016, and which was repeated in 2020.
    • Biden and Kamala Harris as his VP have taken the progressives seriously. We don’t know if this will continue with a Harris presidency. Nevertheless, anyone who tells you that you have a choice in this particular election is leading you astray.
    • Kamala Harris is a good soldier, or she would not be the Democratic candidate for president. However, she may now have, or she may develop in the course of her presidency, a more nuanced agenda. We won’t know until we elect her.
    • Kamala represents a new generation of leadership. The entire political establishment is past its prime. Republicans admit this fact. The Democratic establishment still thinks it dodged a bullet in defeating Bernie Sanders.
    • The Green Party in the United States acts as an electoral pied piper for progressives. So does Donald Trump. Trump plays the part of the dancing fascist, partly as a way to distract the electorate.
    • It is well-known that Donald Trump has had ties with the Mob. This brings up some interesting questions. Mafias need states to make money. They earn money by providing services for these states. One of these services is helping certain candidates win elections. Therefore, it is very interesting that Trump is proposing to dismantle the US government bureaucracy. Trump’s Mob ties suggest the US ‘state’ is not going away. Apparently, Trump is serving its most extreme faction.
    • This extreme faction had no plan until the progressives developed their agenda in 2015. That’s how the right operates. Conservatives don’t propose new ideas. They only react to progressive proposals.
    • Trump is both a fraud and a real threat. He is an actor in someone else’s play. That has always been his role in the US government.
    • Mara-a-Lago has flood insurance through the federal government’s National Flood Insurance Program. Trump once took a $17 million insurance payment for damage that no one remembers happening.
    • Trump put on quite an act when he teased us with the release of the JFK assassination files. Trump probably knows exactly who killed JFK and he doesn’t need the files to give him this information.
    • Donald Trump had a meeting with Bill Clinton immediately before he announced his candidacy in 2015. Perhaps the events are not connected. Bill should explain this.
    • Hillary Clinton received a large sum of money in 2016, after she was defeated. The Clintons used it to purchase the estate next to theirs in New York. Their daughter Chelsea and her family have the use of that estate when she visits her parents.
    • I believe the loss of the 2016 election surprised Hillary. It was a crushing blow. Trump was probably surprised as well. He thought he was only there to defeat Sanders. I’ll bet Bill was not surprised.
    • This does not mean that the 2024 election is not meaningful. If we fail to defeat Trump in this election, he will do exactly as he says he is going to do and no one will stop him. Trump will continue to behave as a fascist if he is elected, although he won’t have free rein.

  • Why No one Denies Anything to Netanyahu

    Reading Time: 4 minutes
    Why No One Denies Anything to Netanyahu
    Dolphin-class Submarine

    In a Neutrality Studies interview, Professor Dr. Dr. H.C. Wolfgang Streeck explains why no one denies anything to Netanyahu. They fear he might use nuclear weapons on his neighbors. This interview was based on an article Dr. Streeck wrote on this subject in December of 2023.

    If Streeck is correct, this explains President Biden’s unwavering support of Israel’s brutality during an election year. It also suggests why Biden’s support of Israel is not unique among American leaders, including Donald Trump. Nor is it unique to the United States. Aside from South Africa no government has done anything to stop Netanyahu.

    None of this is Biden’s fault. It’s not even the fault of the United States. That might sound strange. Lately, everything seems like the fault of the United States. But the most likely culprits have escaped notice. The United States did not create the overarching threat of nuclear weapons in Israeli hands. France was the first country to supply Israel with the ability to make nuclear weapons. Germany has contributed to Israel’s expansion and nuclear arsenal since World War II. The Israelis now have a ‘tripod’, which means submarines, missiles, and fighter jets. Their huge fleet of fighter planes is capable of going to Tehran and back without refueling, and while carrying a nuclear payload. And their Dolphin-class submarines are capable of being fitted with nuclear warheads.

    The nuclear arsenal of Israel is not just playing a part in the strategic decisions of Israel, but in the behavior of its neighbors. It is estimated that Israel has about 400 nuclear warheads of different kinds. By some estmates, Israel has the most technologically sophisticated nuclear arsenal, just behind or on par with the US.

    And it gets worse. The Israelis haven’t admitted they have nuclear weapons. This means there are no inspections and no formal nuclear policies. That’s serious enough, but when you consider that Israel’s neighbors in the the Middle East don’t have nuclear weapons at all, you begin to understand why Netanyahu feels so free to butcher the Palestinians. Israel’s neighbors in the Middle East offer no deterrence to Israel’s nuclear arsenal.

    How did this happen? France’s contribution took place before the Unite States entered the world stage. Germany’s contributions have been taking place since World War II. After the war the Germans were being supervised by the United States. However, they did some things on their own initiative.

    Streeck blames Germany’s courting of Israel on an absence of an identity, its dependence on the United States, and its pariah status. For these reasons, the Germans thought it was important to have some kind of good relations with Israel. After 1949, there was a conversation about reparations between Germany and Israel’s David Ben-Gurion. They discussed what Germany could do as compensation for the Holocaust. Ben-Gurion was quite clear that he needed support for expansion in Palestine, and Germany gave him that support. More recently, Germany has supplied Israel with six Dolphin-class submarines capable of being fitted with nuclear warheads. That’s how Streeck explains it anyway.

    I would put it this way: Germany made an alliance with Jews who happen to live in the most strategic location in the Middle East. Out of guilt. Never mind that every conqueror in the modern age has had designs on that place, incuding Hitler. But back to the interview.

    The fact that the Israeli government can pursue the strategy they are now pursuing has something to do with their confidence that if American public policy weakens US support, they have their own tools. So, there is a sort of intelligence feedback loop. The Americans are aware that if they don’t support Israeli policy in relation to Palestine, the Israelis will do it themselves. Then Israel might do things that are out of the control of the United States.

    I was worried before watching this interview by suggestions for electoral stategy in the US. There are journalists who say we can’t vote for Joe Biden because of his part in the genocide of Gaza. Some say outright that Trump is a better choice. It’s hard to explain these comments from reasonable people. We know that President Donald Trump helped Netanyahu’s reelection chances. He did this by recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heighs. Israel illegally seized the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967, and since then every American administration has considered it ‘occupied’ territory. But not Trump. Trump also moved the US embassy to Jerusalem against the wishes of the Palestinians. And, since October 7, candidate Trump has assured Israel of his support.

    I agree that the US should support Israel when it is attacked by Hamas, but electing an eratic character like Trump is not the solution. Trump is no more concerned about the Palestinians than Netanyahu.

    Another thing to consider is whether this attack on Gaza is part of a strategy to elect Trump. If Netanyahu prefers Trump to Biden, which I think he does, humiliating Biden would be a good way to help Trump. And if Streeck is right, there’s nothing Biden can do about it.

    If you’re waiting for my suggestion of who you should vote for, you may have missed the point of this article. I predict that Netanyahu will continue to pound the Palestinians until the election. And if that’s what he wants to do, no one will stop him.

  • Rosicrucians and Fallen Angels in American Politics

    Reading Time: 4 minutes
    Rosicrucians, Fallen Angels, American Politics
    Fallen Angels

    Is magic a left-wing thing?

    Accusations of leftist magic leveled by right-wing members of Congress led me to research the question, is magic a left-wing thing? The closest connection I was aware of was the association of the drug culture of the 1960s with shamanism. It seems to me the right-wing is more magical-minded. It turns out the story of magical politics in 2016 begins by blaming the left for the whole phenomenon. Bothsidism is apparently the handmaid of American politics, even its weirdest manifestations. This is the story of Rosicrucians and Fallen Angels in American politics.

    The magical theory of politics

    Egil Asprem’s article about the magical theory of politics came up first in search results. The article indicates that the magic war is currently serving a right-wing agenda. The left is included in the discussion because it’s such a perfect target.

    Three camps of belligerents in the magic war

    Asprem distinguishes three camps of ‘belligerents’ in the magic war over Donald Trump: The Cult of Kek; the Magic Resistance; and the Magic Reaction. The Magic Resistance is where the left comes in. Asprem cites an article published on Medium by Michael M. Hughes, a left-leaning author and lecturer. Published on February 16, 2017, it was entitled A Spell to Bind Donald Trump and All Those Who Abet Him. Hughes suggested that a ritual be performed at midnight on every crescent moon until Trump is removed from office.

    The magic resistance and the media

    We can’t tell from Hughes’s own comments how serious he intended this effort to be. Asprem defines it as “a social media-coordinated protest movement leveraging the trappings of magic and witchcraft to mobilize resistance against the incumbent United States president and his administration.” It was the media coverage that made the magical resistance hard to ignore. The first event took place on February 24, 2017. The ‘movement’ was given coverage on social media and in magazines such as Elle, Dazed, Vanity Fair, and Vox. It’s not clear how many people actually participated in the initial event, and the numbers quickly diminished. But the movement earned equal billing with the right in the magical drama. This event supposedly inspired the Magical Reaction.

    QAnon, the Cult of Kek and Donald Trump

    In my opinion, the most disturbing discovery in Asprem’s article is a date that connects Donald Trump’s nomination as GOP presidential candidate, with 4chan’s /pol/ board. There was an unlikely coincidence involving the Cult of Kek, 4chan, 8chan, and QAnon. Since it predicted Trump’s victory in the presidential race, the question arises whether this association had help. This was the magical reaction.

    According to Asprem, there is “a particular form of playful superstition on 4chan”.

    Posts on 4chan are consecutively given an identifying number (currently nine digits, reflecting the fact that the total number of posts number in the billions). Due to the very high posting frequency (over one million a day, in 2018), it is impossible for a user to predict exactly what the last few digits will be when posting. This has given rise to a phenomenon where certain numbers, patterns, and repetitions of numbers–especially repeating digits, labeled “dubs,” “trips,” “quads,” and so on–are considered particularly auspicious. This phenomenon is related to a wider practice known as GET, by which posters on an image board would attempt to score certain integer sequences considered “special” (e.g. posts number 123456789, 1000000, or 555555555). Themes, memes, or users that frequently “GET,” or that just score many dubs and trebs, are considered special, allowing for hidden patterns and connections to emerge in the minds of users. During the primaries and the presidential campaign, a perception formed on /pol/ that Trump and Pepe memes were doing just this. For example, on 19 June 2016, a post on 4chan’s /p/ board with the text “Trump will win” achieved the remarkable GET 77777777. A web of significance was gradually spun, in the usual post-ironic way, in which Trump was divinely selected, the god selecting him was Kek, and the Pepe meme was one of the god’s many manifestations.

    The Fallen Angel Azazel and Republican Resistance to Trump’s nomination

    July 19, 2016 also connects the Rosicrucians to the current political turmoil.  That is the date when the fallen angel Azazel was supposed to rise from his earthly imprisonment.

    All things considered, this coincidence might have something to do with the scene that took place at the Republican National Convention after Trump’s nomination.

    Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions put Trump’s name up for the nomination shortly before 6 p.m. ET. The nomination was seconded by New York Rep. Chris Collins, the first member of Congress to endorse him.

    “Donald Trump is the singular leader that can get this country back on track,” Sessions said while nominating Trump.

    (It is likely Jeff Sessions is a 33rd Degree Freemason.)

    Particularly outraged was the Washington, D.C., delegation, which held its convention in March and attempted to award 10 votes to Marco Rubio and nine to John Kasich. But convention officials announced the rules merit Trump be award all 19 delegates from the nation’s capital.

    “This is an outrage, and this is a reason the Republican Party is turning off a lot of voters,” a Kasich delegate from D.C. said on MSNBC.

    After Trump had clinched the nomination, the Alaskan delegation contested how its vote total was recorded. They originally requested 12 votes go to Ted Cruz, 11 to Trump and 5 to Rubio, but the RNC recorded all 28 votes to Trump. However, the appeal was unsuccessful because, Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus said, all the votes went to Trump because Rubio and Cruz suspended their campaigns…

    The official nomination came on the second day of what has been a rocky start to the convention. An effort Monday to protest Trump’s candidacy on the convention floor fell short, but not before images of chaos unseen in recent conventions played out on live television.

    See also: Neocons Erased George Kennan