18 November 2017

Brazile's Challenge to the Clinton Narrative

Bernie Sanders is either corrupt, stupid or some kind of megalomaniac. Of course these categories are not mutually exclusive and he may be all of these things. The 2016 election was a farce on so many fronts and while the Trump people are dirty and corrupt and clearly sought (and seek) to profit on every relationship and diplomatic exchange, the Clintons and the people heading the DNC have demonstrated they are cut from the same cloth.


Conspiracists with some warrant believe Sanders is a phony whose real task is to deceive the left and channel dissidents back into the Democratic Party. He belied his own convictions and declared himself a counterfeit when he endorsed Hillary Clinton. Now in the wake of the recent Brazile revelations he wants to remake the party. Some might say this is his attempt at a coup d'état. He's going to capitalise on the chaos.
Others would say he is profoundly naive, even clueless and clearly unimaginative and unwilling to break with the absurd binary political system that dominates American politics. One would think at his age, what does he have to lose? Or, perhaps he is just clueless and has failed to grasp the magnitude of corruption and still thinks he can somehow 'fix' the system.
Brazile's revelations are earth-shattering and reveal that not only is American democracy a joke, the scale of double-dealing and misconduct points to a greater reality... this corruption has been the case and has been the norm for a long time. It's institutionalised. Some have tried to say this for generations and there have been many scandals, but people soon forget.
What's also striking is the tone of fear. In bringing up Seth Rich is Brazile threatening the Clinton machine? Was mentioning Rich a form of life insurance? She's potentially playing a dangerous game. She doesn't come out and say that she believes he was murdered by someone other than a street thug... but she certainly implies it. Is she sending a warning? Is she just venting her angst? Clearly Rich's murder sent shockwaves through the Clinton campaign and the DNC power structure. Some might try to spin it and say he was killed by the Russians and yet clearly they would have no reason to kill him if he was the leaker. In fact they would want him alive, desperately so because if it turns out Rich was a Wikileaks source (Assange's cryptic actions and statements all but suggest this) then the whole Clinton narrative regarding the Russian plot is decimated.
While the mainstream has dismissed the Rich story and is quickly trying to sweep Brazile under the rug, it's probably not going to go away. If it does or falls into the realm of 'conspiracy quackery' it's because the public by and large fails to understand what politics is, what is at stake and what sort of people attain and maintain power. They're not nice people but incredibly the public by and large still seems to fall for the propaganda.
Are all the politicians and their cronies just a bunch of thugs and murderers? No, by no means. But they're part of system that relies on such people, and those sorts are in their midst even if often on the fringes of the political machine. People forget that during Watergate there was a period in which both Felt (Deep Throat), as well as Woodward and Bernstein were in genuine fear for their lives.
Phonies such as the pseudo-repentant Charles Colson would deny that they (the leakers and journalists) were ever in physical danger but... those that knew Colson wouldn't have been the least bit surprised if he and other powerful figures connected to Nixon would have relied on violence to solve their problems. There's evidence to suggest that these things were seriously contemplated and not just with Woodward and Bernstein.
Somehow it's all sanitized. Politicians (especially presidents) regularly use violence to go after their enemies. They launch missile strikes, flex their muscles and kill innocents to send messages. And yet if it's done via a media campaign and dressed up in diplomatic and political language... it's suddenly legitimate, right and proper.
Consider the Bushes. GHW Bush killed thousands of Panamanian civilians and all but wrecked a country to go after Noriega... a man who just a few years before was a very close ally of the United States. This is like mafia violence on a massive scale! But it's dressed up in terms of geopolitics, lies about the war on drugs and other concerns.
His son flexed his muscles on the eve of the Iraq invasion in March of 2003 by launching a very expensive hit, an attempt to take out Saddam Hussein from the sky. The official report says one civilian died in that attack, a number which could be disputed. Subsequently the US launched dozens of High Value Target (HVT) assassination strikes which killed scores of civilians and in most cases failed to hit their actual targets.
If you're a mafia hit man or gangster that sprays a house in a drive-by shooting you're a monster, a wanton killer. But if you are the president, you are simply fulfilling your role as commander-in-chief and people will applaud your deeds and honour the hit men you sent to carry them out.
These people are brutal killers and yet the public doesn't perceive them that way. What is the difference between a mob boss giving a little nod or whispering in the ear and a president signing an order in the Oval Office or giving the nod in the Situation Room? It's just this, one form of power is viewed as legitimate and one isn't. While Providence ordains the powers that be, in no way does that make these corrupt people sitting atop a corrupt system ethical or legitimate in terms of their idealism or morality. Providential decree is not the same as Divine sanction.
This is power. It's corrupt and corrupting. Returning to Brazile, we can be thankful. We got a quick peek behind the curtain. It probably won't last long and most will forget but for those awake there's a lot to be learned here and more will probably come out. The media will spin it. Count on it. Sadly the fact that Hannity and other FOX news cretins have picked up this story and work it for their own purposes does not change or affect the overall truth, nor should we let their lunacies and machinations cloud the picture.

If we want to see through the fog we have to keep focused and it's hard to do. It's like trying to hear a hummed melody in the midst of a raging battlefield. It can be done but it's not easy.

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