Global
For a long time, as he campaigned for president, a wide spectrum of establishment media insisted that Bernie Sanders couldn’t win. Now they’re sounding the alarm that he might.
And, just in case you haven’t gotten the media message yet -- Sanders is “angry,” kind of like Donald Trump.
Elite media often blur distinctions between right-wing populism and progressive populism -- as though there’s not all that much difference between appealing to xenophobia and racism on the one hand and appealing for social justice and humanistic solidarity on the other.
Many journalists can’t resist lumping Trump and Sanders together as rabble-rousing outliers. But in the real world, the differences are vast.
Donald Trump is to Bernie Sanders as Archie Bunker is to Jon Stewart.
– President Obama, State of the Union, January 12, 2016 “Even worse, we are facing the most dangerous terrorist threat our nation has seen since September 11th, and this president appears either unwilling or unable to deal with it.”
Major corporate media outlets in the United States are reporting on a new viability for Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign, based on his rise in the polls nationally and in Iowa and New Hampshire -- and possibly, though this goes largely unmentioned, based on his big new advertising purchases from major corporate media outlets.
Every year that I am able I pay a visit to Big Sur, California, one
of my favorite places since I was very small. I love the scenic drive
up the rugged coast on the winding WPA-era highway One through the
land where the mountains meet the sea. You've seen it in car
commercials, and the famous chase scene from North by Northwest, and
the picture in your mind, no doubt, is of the azure Pacific waters
glistening in the sun as waves lap the rocky coast line below sloping
Emerald meadows. As a kid I took all of this for granted, but I
gradually came to realize that the ribbon of highway isn't the only
feature there that is foreign to the natural landscape. The fact is
that those brilliant swaths of Green shouldn't be there – and they
wouldn't be were it not for the small herds of cows that regularly
scour the fenced-in private ranches, allowing grasses to flourish
where once there were coastal prairies and thickets of woods. The
fact is that the Big Sur we have all seen in pictures and post cards
for as long as we can remember is, in reality, a severely altered
As the 2016 election approaches, we must remember that our electronic voting system as it currently stands is thoroughly rigged. The entire outcome can be flipped with a few late night keystrokes, as was done in Ohio 2004. This year least 80% of the nation’s votes will be cast on electronic machines whose outcome can be altered by a governor and secretary of state with just a few keystrokes, and without detection. There is a way—-we call it the “Ohio Plan”—-by which we can attain a fair and reliable vote count. The Ohio Plan is this: Voter registration must be universal and automatic for all citizens as they turn 18; Electronic poll books are banned, with all voter registration records maintained manually; All elections happen over a 4-day weekend—-Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday—-which together comprise a national holiday, preferably around Veterans Day in November.
How many people have been killed in the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen or Somalia? On November 18th, a UN press briefing on the war in Yemen declared authoritatively that it had so far killed 5,700 people, including 830 women and children.
