Can Hillary Clinton win without cheating?

The only thing more pathetic than cheating at solitaire and losing anyway is cheating at a presidential election and losing anyway.

The political establishment just might be doing this if Bernie gets elected, or cheating to prevent him from winning so much that it is obvious that the entire political system has turned into a sham!

One of these options seems to be happening as we speak.

Some of the most obvious evidence of rigging the election hasn't been secret and isn't some conspiracy theory; it has been in the open for years for anyone with the critical thinking skills to recognize how the media is presenting Hillary Clinton as the inevitable nominee, discouraging people from entering the race and refusing to provide fair coverage for those that do run. The only reason they eventually provided Bernie Sanders some coverage, although not nearly as much as Hillary, is because of the enormous amount of grassroots pressure and alternative media outlets threatening to make mainstream media irrelevant if the refuse to do their job.

If not for this they would rig most if not all elections by simply refusing to cover grassroots candidates at all, while providing enormous amounts of coverage for candidates that support the agenda of the richest people in this country making it seem as if they're the only options.

But there is growing amounts of evidence that someones going further than that to suppress votes in primaries or illegal electioneering at poll places which the Sanders campaign hasn't been participating in. Some of it is so obvious that it is virtually undeniable but the media is only paying a token amount of attention to it. In other cases the evidence directly implicating Hillary Clinton is weak or non-existent but the evidence indicating problems is real and there is circumstantial evidence to indicate that even if the Clinton campaign isn't directly involved the multinational corporations that benefit from this might be either directly or indirectly involved.

Even with the enormous amount of support from the political establishment and much better coverage from mainstream media there have been reports of voting irregularities in at least seven different states, including at least one that hasn't voted yet. (Update this has risen to at least thirteen different states as indicated in further details below.) This started with the Iowa caucuses, which came first as indicated in the following excerpt:

Bernie Sanders: Hillary Clinton Trying To Steal Polk County -- New Allegations 03/12/2016

Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton supporters met up in Iowa Saturday night for county Democratic conventions. In Polk County, however, there are claims emerging that counts were less than accurate, and accusations that deliberate ploys were used to negatively effect Sanders’ campaign. This follows previous claims of similar mismanagement in the same county during the state’s caucus.

States use various methods to choose the candidates to whom they will apportion their delegates, and in Iowa, the process is multi-step, beginning with a caucus in February to determine which candidates will be considered viable, and followed by party conventions in March, where delegates are apportioned to each candidate based on level of support.

In February, Sanders supporters expressed concerns when they felt that voter counts had been mishandled. Specifically, voters divided into groups to support either Hillary or Bernie, but after being counted, the voters shuffled, rearranging into slightly different groups for a re-count. Claims began to emerge that workers added newcomers to Clinton’s voter count, but didn’t do a complete re-count, thus failing to properly account for any voters who left her group. Complete article

Additional reports of possible fraud in Iowa were reported in, We Now Have A SECOND Example Of Hillary’s Iowa VOTER FRAUD! (VIDEO) 02/02/2016 and there were also reports of fraud in Nevada, which was the second state she won by relatively tight margins before primaries in the South which she was heavily favored, How Hillary Stole Nevada: Voter Fraud Caught on Camera 02/21/2016 This was followed by undeniable violations by Bill Clinton which was caught on camera in at least two possibly three polling places. According to the following article he was in the Newton Free library and even met with mayor Marty Walsh at West Roxbury:

Bill Clinton may have broken Massachusetts law by telling people at polling locations to vote for Hillary 03/02/2016

On Super Tuesday, Bill physically entered at least two polling locations to woo voters, which may have been illegal For Massachusetts, the Super Tuesday primary was very close. Hillary Clinton beat Bernie Sanders by just 1 percent. (For comparison, in 2008, Hillary beat Obama in the state by 17 percent).

A more interesting and less reported story about the heated primary, however, was that Bill Clinton may have broken Massachusetts voting law by telling people at polling locations to vote for Hillary.

In an article titled “Bill Clinton Gets a Little Too Close to Voters in Boston,” The New York Times notes that Bill, who “was ranging over the state trying to pump up voters to cast their ballots for his wife,” physically went into at least two polling locations. Complete article

He was also caught on camera in New Bedford near the polling places, whether it was within the allowable limits of not, in this case a protester managed to get behind him with a sign saying "Bankers for Hillary" and a picture of it circulated after the primaries were over. Update, He's now being sued according to, Clinton sued for election fraud 03/31/2016

The following article indicates that like Iowa irregularities may have been enough to take first place in a tight race:

New Details Reveal Possible Voter Suppression in Illinois Primary 03/25/2016

Thousands of Illinois primary voters turned away from polling places due to lack of ballots have been denied their vote after a recent court ruling.

In six counties across Illinois — Adams, Champaign, Effingham, Madison, Sangamon, and St. Clair — polling places ran out of ballots amid higher-than-expected voter turnout, meaning thousands of voters were sent home after waiting in line. On March 17, Adams County state attorney Jon Barnard went before Adams County circuit judge Chet Vahle to ask for an injunction that would grant those voters the ability to vote late due to ballot issues.

The next day, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, an ardent Hillary Clinton supporter who has introduced her at campaign rallies, filed an appeal in Illinois 4th District Appellate Court to prevent late voting. On March 23, the appellate court issued a stay on Judge Vahle’s injunction, meaning those voters won’t get a chance to cast ballots in this primary. Hillary Clinton won Illinois by roughly 35,000 votes, or a slim 1.8 percent margin, effectively splitting delegates with Sanders.

Bernie Sanders won in four of the six Illinois counties that had ballot shortages. Complete article

Arizona was clearly so big of a disaster that even the mainstream media reported fairly widely on it but they didn't cover all the details including some covered in the following article:

Arizona: Hillary Clinton’s Election Fraud Masterpiece 03/23/2016

She stole Iowa, Nevada and Massachusetts – but Arizona is Hillary Clinton’s election fraud masterpiece.

Desperate to prevent another “Michigan upset”, Hillary found an ingenious way to guarantee victory in Arizona.

The key to Clinton’s strategy in Arizona was early voting. In Arizona, around 70% of voters cast their ballot by mail. Why is this important? Because

of the 297,714 voters who have already cast their ballots—174,706 were female, 59 percent of the total early Democratic vote. The breakdown of early Democratic voters by gender and age is shown below. The early vote by women is dominated by older age groups. Voters under 30 account for only 7 percent of Democratic early voters compared to 41 percent for the over 65 crowd. The large number of women, particularly older women, who have already cast Democratic ballots, is a good sign for Hillary Clinton. In other words, the elderly (see: Clinton supporters) make up the vast majority of early voters in Arizona.

Hillary's plan to steal Arizona was remarkably simple: Suppress voting on election day, and rely on her large lead with early voters to secure a win. Complete article

Additional irregularities were reported in 5 Outrageous Examples of Voter Suppression in the Arizona Primary 03/23/2016 and in, This crisis is bigger than Arizona: Behold the travesty that is Wisconsin’s new voter ID law 03/26/2016. Some of these are a result of voter suppression laws by Republicans but they're also financed by the same corporations that support the Democratic establishment, and clearly even when it is Republicans implementing voter suppression laws it is often corporate Democrats that benefit from them.

And Sanders Supporters In Washington Allege Voter Suppression: Wrong Caucus Forms Sent? 03/24/2016 What will be next? This one is difficult to tie directly to any one person but it is part of a much larger pattern to undermine the democratic process and it is much more common when a candidate supported by multinational corporations is faced with a strong challenge from one supporting the grassroots and getting enormous amounts of support in return!



Edit 05/20/2016: The following article came out since this was first posted indicating Clinton wins more where voting machines are easier to hack:

Clinton Does Best Where Voting Machines Flunk Hacking Tests: Hillary Clinton vs. Bernie Sanders Election Fraud Allegations 05/16/2016

At the end of the climactic scene (8 minutes) in HBO’s Emmy nominated Hacking Democracy (2006), a Leon County, Florida Election official breaks down in tears. “There are people out there who are giving their lives just to try to make our elections secure,” she says. “And these vendors are lying and saying everything is alright.” Hundreds of jurisdictions throughout the United States are using voting machines or vote tabulators that have flunked security tests. Those jurisdictions by and large are where former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is substantially outperforming the first full wave of exit polling in her contest against Senator Bernie Sanders.

CounterPunch has interviewed hackers, academics, exit pollsters, and elections officials and workers in multiple states for this series taking election fraud allegations seriously. The tearful breakdown in Hacking Democracy is not surprising. There is a well-beyond remarkable gap between what security experts and academics say about the vulnerability of voting machines and the confidence elections experts and academics, media outlets, and elections officials place in those same machines.

In Leon County, Bev Harris’ Black Box Voting team had just demonstrated a simple hack of an AccuVote tabulator for bubble-marked paper ballots. Ion Sancho, Leon County’s Supervisor of Elections, also fights back tears in the Hacking Democracy clip: “I would have certified this election as a true and accurate result of a vote.” Sancho adds, “The vendors are driving the process of voting technology in the United States.” Complete article

Update: additional reports have turned up about "Technical Problems Prevented Some Voters From Changing Their Party Affiliation Before the Deadline" in several states including New York according to, New York Election Fraud: Is Arizona Happening Again? 03/25/2016 Other reports indicate there might also be problems in Pennsylvania and California, although I don't have articles on those at this time.

Additional problems took place in Florida according to, Polk County Fla. poll workers mistakenly tell voters election ‘not for Democrats’ 03/15/2016 This means that there are reports of voting irregularities in at least nine states in Democratic party primaries or caucuses.

West Virginia may also be added to this list according to Two West Virginia County Clerks Are Refusing People’s Online Voter Registrations. (04/05/2016) And this article, Clinton profits in Wyoming from Zombie absentee ballots 04/10/2016 describes how there were enormous votes in person in Laramie County but absentee votes gave it to Clinton. When this was reported live as the first results on Saturday even Clinton supporters admitted surprise. Even if this doesn't turn out to be evidence of rigged elections, when Bernie Sanders wins by 12% and splits the delegates evenly then four "super-delegates" all go for Clinton that is undeniable rigging of the election by establishment figures. This is a pattern repeating itself over and over almost always in favor of Clinton. The rare occasions where the rules or a handful of delegates go for Sanders doesn't come close to evening it up.

Additional problems around the country took place in the Republican Party as well according to, “Beyond upset” Voting irregularities reported across the nation on Super Tuesday 03/02/2016 This story reports about problems in Alabama, Colorado, Georgia and Texas.

Update 04/20/2016: New York had many irregularities in their primaries including the purging of well over 100,000 voters from registration rolls in Brooklyn according to Bungled NYC primary voting sparks Board of Elections probe: 'It's time we clean up this mess' 04/19/2016 and After More Than 100,000 Voters Dropped In Brooklyn, City Officials Call For Action, 04/19/2016 This was in addition to strict registration rules that prevent people from changing parities less than six months before the primaries. New voters were allowed to register later but people registered as independents or in a traditional party couldn't switch. Bernie Sanders made a point about three million people who couldn't vote in New York because they were registered as independents according to Sanders expresses 'concern' over NY voting laws after primary defeat 04/1/2016 Even two of Donald Trump's own children couldn't switch to vote for him because they didn't know about this until it was too late, even though independents that would have voted for Sanders weren't reported as widely as the Trump children there would have been much more of them, making an enormous difference if not for rules restricting voter registration. These rules are made by a small percentage of insiders with little or no input from the vast majority of the public. The media and political establishment rig the system so that only the two major parties can get the coverage they need to compete and they usually only provide coverage for those catering to the interests of the political class. These rules are clearly designed to minimize the chance of independents from having an impact, and they indicate that it isn't just Republicans involved in voter suppression tactics. This isn't the only incident with the Democratic Party involved in voter suppression by far, but it is one of the most blatant.

Update 04/26/2016: Additional voter suppression took place in Rhode Island which Closed 66% of Polling Places, allegedly to save money 04/20/2016

Additional evidence of voter fraud turned up in Illinois that may have prevented Bernie Sanders from winning and given rights to contest it according to several stories including, Election Board Scandal: 21 Bernie Votes Were Erased And 49 Hillary Votes Added To Audit Tally, Group Declares [Video] 04/22/2016

Election Fraud Proven at Audit by Chicago BOE - flipped precinct by 18pts from Bernie to Hillary 04/21/2016

The following are additional stories that came up since this post which add to voter suppression problems and raise doubts about legitimacy of the vote:

New York Primary Lawsuit Update: In Potential Win For Bernie Sanders Supporters, Judge Declares Voters Wrongly Purged From Democratic Party Rolls May Still Be Able To Vote 04/19/2016

U.S. elections head used political ties, then curbed voting in Alabama, Kansas and Georgia 03/31/2016

Bernie Sanders Wins Missouri After All 04/10/2016 includes total pledge count

Clinton profits in Wyoming from Zombie absentee ballots 04/10/2016

‘Morning Joe’ wonders why Dems bother voting after Sanders streak fails to dent Clinton lead 04/09/2016 “We’ve been talking about rigged systems,” he began. “Bernie Sanders wins 56 to 44 percent in Wyoming… why does the Democratic Party even have voting booths? This system is so rigged.

Sanders’ Legal Team Considering Federal Lawsuit Challenging Maricopa County’s Election Practices 04/10/2016

There may also be some additional problems indicated by CNN exit polls, which they reported at poll closing on the night of the New York primaries at 9:00. They indicated a much closer race with Clinton winning by only 52% to 48%. I was unable to find an article to back this up but other people reported this as it was happening on both the Democratic Underground and Reddit.

Also a report about a key delegate in Colorado was briefly reported in, Colorado Democrats admit mistake that cost Bernie Sanders key delegate. 04/12/2016 Most of these voter suppression problems are not being reported widely in the mainstream media and they certainly aren't compiling a comprehensive list of all the problems making it easy for the public to realize just how extensive they are. In most cases if they report it at all it is only at the local level in what ever state they occur without mentioning all the other states with additional problems. Then they rarely ever provide much if any follow up unless there is an enormous amount of grassroots pressure, and even then they often don't repeat it much.

Edit 04/27/2016: Pennsylvania Connecticut and California have been added to the list of states with problems suppressing votes according to the following three articles:

Voters Report Suspicious Irregularities in Three Different Primary States Pennsylvania Connecticut and Rhode Island 04/26/2016

Why Half a Million California Independents Could Be Shut Out of the Democratic Primary 04/21/2016

Arizona poll worker testifies incorrect ballots given to Democratic voters 04/25/2016

Could Bernie Sanders Pick Up More Delegates in New York? 04/2/2016 Two lawsuits are brewing in New York state, seeking to stop the New York primary election results from being certified.

Hillary Clinton and Electoral Fraud Why it is 99.9% certain electoral fraud was committed for Hillary Clinton 04/28/2016

Philly’s Democratic Party Breaks Law for Hillary 04/28/2016

Edit 05/14/2016: additional stories: Hillary Clinton urges New York state Democrats to aid in decisive primary victory 04/04/2016

Lee Camp: The Elections Board was paid MILLIONS before the NY Primary??, Hillary's new money laundering, and much more 05/10/2016

Evidence Shows “Democratic” California Purged Thousands of Eligible Voters 05/11/2016

Minutes Reveal BOE Chief, Commissioners Knew About Mass Purging Of Voters 05/05/2016

Man proves software stole votes in all ‘Hillary won’ counties 05/05/2016

Klamath Falls Oregon ballot drop box vandalized, ballots found in dumpster 05/16/2016

Bill Clinton Illegally INSIDE IL Polling Place - Sanders Supporters Demand Hillary Forfeit Delegates 03/15/2016

Edit 05/20/2016: BREAKING: Rampant Election Fraud Reported In 31 Kentucky Counties 05/17/2016

Fraud and Vandalized Ballot Boxes Couldn't Stop Sanders From Crushing Clinton in Oregon and Tying in Kentucky 05/17/2016

Lawsuit Filed today Voter Suppression in California 05/20/2016

Multinational corporations have been making enormous profits and traditional candidates including Barack Obama, who Clinton says takes their money without being impacted, don't hold them accountable despite Obama' or Clinton's claims according to many stories including, Federal Corruption Prosecutions Plummet Under Barack Obama. 03/25/2016 Of course many people might wonder if Clinton isn't influenced by Wall Street money why won't she release her transcripts. Perhaps because if she does the public will know more about what she's really promising them including the following which was obtained partially through a leak of one of her speeches:

Video of Hillary Clinton speaking to bankers and blaming homeowners for the financial crisis isn’t exactly her telling Wall Street to “cut it out.” 03/0/2016

Video of Hillary Clinton speaking to bankers and blaming homeowners for the financial crisis isn’t exactly her telling Wall Street to “cut it out.”

Out of all 50 states, New Yorkers were some of the hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis. The U.S. Department of Justice’s $13 billion mortgage fraud settlement with JP Morgan set aside an entire $1 billion just for New York homeowners. The bank was sued for selling mortgage-backed securities to investors, knowing full well the investments were bogus.

In 2014, Bank of America paid out a $16 billion settlement for committing the same crime in the years leading up to the financial meltdown. Bear Stearns helped package mortgage-backed securities for JP Morgan; Bank of America’s partner-in-crime in peddling bogus securities was Merrill Lynch. Out of the $16.65 billion, $300 million was set aside for New York homeowners.

In 2007, Hillary Clinton, in her second term as Senator of NY, gave a speech at the NASDAQ headquarters—before the financial crisis reached its boiling point — about Wall Street’s housing loan practices, largely excusing financial criminals for their behavior.

“Now these economic problems are certainly not all Wall Street’s fault – not by a long shot,” Clinton said.

No, not “all,” just 90 percent.

Clinton’s address amounted to essentially asking the lenders in attendance to take voluntary action or else she would “consider legislation” to stop banks from kicking families out of their homes. But in the speech, Clinton placed equal blame for the subprime mortgage crisis on homeowners.

A YouTube user found video of the statement and put it side-by-side with her claim during the first Democratic debate in which she said she went to Wall Street before the crisis and told them to “cut it out.”

During the course of Clinton’s political career, JP Morgan contributed nearly $700,000 to her campaign finds, making them her 4th-largest donor. After Clinton left the State Department, she was paid $225,000 by Bank of America for a single speech. Bear Stearns contributed approximately $50,000 to Clinton’s campaign between 1999 and 2004, and Merrill Lynch gave over $33,000 in that same time frame. “Cut it out,” indeed.

So, if you’re looking to elect someone who’s going to be tough on Wall Street and the big banks and isn’t going to throw the little guy under the bus, you might want to look at their financing and legislative record before pulling that lever. Complete article

In addition to providing enormous amounts of coverage for Hillary Clinton starting years before anyone was paying attention and voting irregularities in at least seven states the establishment has front-loaded the election with states that are favorable to Clinton enabling her to get a massive lead, even though these states are mostly controlled by Republicans. And, perhaps one of the most obvious attempts to rig the election they arranged for a large percent of delegates to be controlled by what they call "Super-Delegates" which means they're not accountable directly to the people. Some of these are elected officials who might be as concerned with constituents almost as much as they are their campaign contributors but many of them are lobbyists or fund raisers with no accountability except to campaign contributors.

These "Super-Delegates" are supporting Clinton seventeen to one at this time; and without their contribution Bernie Sanders is only down by 230 delegates down from over 300 before the weekend sweep. With most of the states favoring Clinton already voting most of the remaining states either are too close to call or they may favor Bernie Sanders, by large margins, in some cases.

If he wins the pledged delegates anyone who is paying attention will know that either they should give him the nomination or admit they're blatantly rigging the election and the claim that the United States is a democracy is a farce.

If they don't there is sure to be enormous protests and well informed people bolting from the party.

If we want to have a Democracy in this country we have to stop accepting the lesser of two evils argument every single time; especially when they're accompanied by enormous amounts of other scams. And when the enormous amounts of environmental and economic destruction contirnues to grow and will lead to much bigger problems without real reform that neither Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump or any other Republican will even come close to trying to implement.

There is a growing movement to ask Bernie Sanders to Endorse Jill Stein - (Facebook) if the election is rigged for Hillary Clinton. Many may hesitate to do this if they think Bernie Sanders still has a chance but by increasing this movement they might make it that much harder for the establishment to rig it for Clinton since they might realize that we will not fall for their scams and Hillary Clinton will lose enormous amounts of support. This is especially true with a third or fourth party movement on the right, which is inevitable. Bernie Sanders, Endorse Jill Stein - Facebook

Both Clinton and Trump or all the other Republicans have record negative approval ratings. This could create the best chance to break up the duopoly controlled by corporations in a long time.

To help prevent Hillary Clinton from stealing the election or let them know we'll be bolting check the Current List of Democratic Superdelegates and their Twitter Handles. Tweet to them For Bernie! It's not too late to prevent them from rigging the election or overturning the Duopoly!



The following are a few related articles including a collection of grassroots reports about the outrage over Super-Delegates being used to rig the election. These are being reported much more widely on alternative media than the traditional media which is blatantly biased:

Bernie Sanders Is Currently Winning the Democratic Primary Race, and I’ll Prove It to You 03/23/2016

The Definitive, Encyclopedic Case For Why Hillary Clinton is the Wrong Choice 02/25/2016

Did Hillary Clinton ‘Plant’ Religion Question And What Happened To Separation Of Church And State? 03/07/2016

Progressive Group is Backing Bernie Sanders-Style Candidates 03/05/2016

Has Clinton Actually Won Anything? The Theft of Election 2016 03/20/2016

Top House Dem slams party’s superdelegate system 03/04/2016

The Reason Why Dozens of Lobbyists Will Be Democratic Presidential Delegates 02/29/2016

How the DNC Helps Clinton Buy Off Superdelegates 02/18/2016

KING: Superdelegates a corrupt tool designed to elect party establishment candidates like Hillary Clinton 03/07/2016

Sanders supporters revolt against superdelegates 02/14/2016

The Reason Why Dozens of Lobbyists Will Be Democratic Presidential Delegates 02/28/2016

Bernie Sanders or Jill Stein but Never Hillary Clinton!

First of all, for those of you who haven't heard me say this, Bernie Sanders isn't running against Jill Stein unless he wins the nomination, which is still a fair possibility at this time, despite what the media tells us; and if that happens it will be the best choice we've had in a long time.

So we shouldn't let the political establishment or media use divide and rule tactics to elect another representative of the rich pretending to defend the rest of us.

This trick has already worked way to many times; and if a growing number of people recognize it we can finally stop falling for it. There may be some signs that this might be happening as we speak; and even if it doesn't help elect a real grass roots candidate it could further expose the corruption of the establishment and provide lots of votes for real grassroots candidates showing them that we won't fall for it much longer and they have to at least try harder to pretend to address legitimate concerns.

We should be able to expect more than a better job pretending to do a good job!

Recently I posted Bernie Sanders, Jill Stein or Revolt in the Streets? based on the water crisis in Flint Michigan and explained that there are many more disasters that aren't being widely reported, which can be found through independent research from local or alternative media outlets. The traditional media sells enormous air time to oil companies which are profiting from the destruction of our environment; but they bury these stories where hardly anyone notices unless they do their own research. Shortly after posting this, I updated it since, the number of reports about lead in water around the country at schools, especially where poorer people live grew; however, once again, they were only reported sporadically.

Our current political establishment isn't willing to report on this but, believe it or not they're already setting the stage for environmental genocide in progress.

Don't believe me; check the facts the more you look at economic and environmental destruction the more evidence you'll see for yourself, assuming you haven't already done so.

It's hard to imagine how we got into such an extreme situation but the most likely explanation seems to be that when a few of these environmental disasters first appeared like Love Canal or the ones exposed by Erin Brockovich they fixed a small percentage of them, at least partially and learned to do their dirty work in the poorest areas with least political clout that the media rarely reports on and it escalated from there until the media consolidated selling air time to the polluters and the pollution is now creeping back into areas where the shrinking middle class live.



Most of the coverage of the Arizona, Utah, and Idaho caucuses or primaries was preempted by another terrorist attack in Brussels. This has lead to more panic calls for retaliation. These tactics routinely do the opposite of what they intend, primarily since the media is unwilling to do a good job reporting on foreign affairs any more than they report on environmental destruction. The United States has constantly been financing armed people that eventually turn against us. This has become so common that unless people pay attention to alternative media outlets they might not be able to keep track of it. We financed the Mujaheddin before they became Al-Qaeda and the Taliban; we funded Syrian rebels before they became ISIS and many other examples.

This means the vast majority of people with "experience" in foreign policy have experience doing incredibly corrupt things that routinely back fire.

Once again they're calling for "solidarity" with the people of Brussels but if that solidarity doesn't involve searching for the root causes of terrorism and preventing them it won't do much if anything to prevent future attacks, and could even prop up the establishment that is inciting retaliation. Some of the people showing "solidarity" might go home to realize that they don't have clean water or they might have some other social or economic problem the establishment isn't addressing. Most of these people are unlikely to become terrorists; but if even a small percentage of them conclude that "solidarity" doesn't benefit everyone they might consider the "terrorists" the lesser evil when the government doesn't protect them from multinational corporations.

I went into this more in Bernie Sanders wins foreign policy debate hands down despite propaganda but the short version is simply that people around the world don't like it when we attack them and refer to it as "Collateral Damage" anymore than we do!

No doubt that the religious differences the media points out is part of the problem but the attacks against their own people and the support for tyrants around the world by the United States is also a big part of the problem! Also while we're destroying the environment in the poorer areas of our own country, the multinational corporations are doing much worse around the world which will only increase the breeding ground for terrorism.

The same goes for preventing crime. Bernie Sanders has indicated that he believes we have to recognize the root causes of violent crime and prevent them, and as I elaborated on in Bernie Sanders Wins Least Violent States the states that do the best job doing this vote for him overwhelmingly; while the states that support the least effective authoritarian tactics have the highest murder rates and vote for Hillary Clinton, although their voter turnout is much lower.

Whether it is at home or abroad, maintaining a rational functioning social and economic system is necessary to prevent crime or terrorism and carry out basic functions for society, like providing education, clean water, safe energy without destroying the environment and more.

Maximizing profits for campaign contributors without addressing the concerns of the majority isn't doing this; and the media only gives reasonable coverage to the candidates that support corporations, not the people.

Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein are relying much more on the grassroots and alternative media outlets for their support and it shows when people take a good look at their track record compared to establishment candidates like Hillary Clinton or anyone the Republicans run.



A few weeks ago Hillary Clinton took a question from a little girl who was crying and worrying that her family might be deported and she took her in her lap and told her she would do the worrying for her and that everything would be OK; however her history when it comes to deportation involved saying that even children had to go back including refugees from Honduras that were fleeing after a coup which she supported according to declassified E-mails. She helped create this crisis and is trying to present herself as the more rational candidate compared to the Republicans; but as I explained in, Why would anyone consider Hillary Clinton if they knew this? this is just one example where she says one thing for political campaigns but does the opposite when in office; and there are a long lest of additional stories exposing past lies or flip-flops.

It's a good thing I still have lots of hair because every time I see propaganda making her look like the more rational candidate repeated over and over again in the media while the stories exposing her lies are quickly forgotten or relegated to alternative media outlets that actually try to report the news, I feel like pulling my hair out!

Donald Trump may appeal to emotions but he's supporting the same policies that many of the other corrupt Republicans that got his supporters into financial trouble in the first place. The Republican Party has been appealing to emotions and hatred for so long they're indoctrinated their constituents to support irrational policies and search for scapegoats when everything fails, instead of teaching them to think rationally and choose better policies or leaders.





Most of the states that are most likely to support Clinton have already voted, thanks to the front-loading of the primaries by the political establishment; which means that most of the remaining states are much more likely to support Sanders, possibly by large margins like in Utah and Idaho. This clearly means that he is much more likely to win the nomination than the media is trying to indicate.

However there is still a chance that he may not and if he is going to avoid that he will have to convince many of the "super-delegates" which are chosen by Party insiders, to switch sides. These "super-delegates" have the right to veto the will of the people under the current rules, which is highly undemocratic. If Bernie Sanders is going to convince these party insiders to switch sides he has to be prepared to exposed how corrupt these rules are, and hopefully overturn them before the next election.

He may have a better chance of doing this if they think that the grassroots are going to bolt from the Party, as they should, if the Democratic Party is Democratic in name only while representing multi-national corporations. Some Bernie Sanders might hesitate to ask him to endorse Jill Stein while he still has a chance to win the nomination but there is a movement to do just that on Facebook and if the establishment realizes that their grassroots will bolt if they take them for granted it might just help convince them to support Sanders, who has a better chance of winning in November and implementing real reform.

If they rig the primaries anyway then this could be the start of major reform if enough people join in support of alternatives like Jill Stein. Both Donald Trump and Hillery Clinton have enormous negative approval ratings in all polls. It is hard to imagine why the media would provide so much coverage fro candidates that the public don't like while ignoring those that they like much more.

Clearly greed and ideological fanaticism have a lot to do with it; but as long as they think they can get away with it every damn time they won't have incentives to address legitimate concerns and accepting incredibly bad candidates won't change that!

Both Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein are far better than establishment candidates but neither of them are as important as major grassroots reform. They can both do far more to help grassroots reform than establishment candidates, assuming they don't become like them once they get elected. One way for them to show they're not doing this would be to support reform while running by opening the debates for all grassroots candidates and supporting Instant-Run-Off elections that could break up the corporate duopoly controlling both parties. Even if Bernie Sanders wins the nomination he should support open debates inviting the most popular candidates like the Green Party or Libertarian Party and more. This was allowed more often before the Commission on Presidential Debates took over the process and started rigging it to preserve the duopoly. If they threaten to ban candidates that debate with third or fourth party candidates Bernie Sanders could do it anyway and demonstrate how the Commission on Presidential Debates has been censoring the debates for decades. If the only debates are with grassroots candidates and the media and Commission on Presidential Debates refuse to cover it they will indicate that they're heavily censored, which people reading alternative media outlets already know.

Both candidates should also update their Project Vote Smart questionnaires; both Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein filled out them in the past, and they're available, which is better than establishment candidates do; but it would still be better if they updated them.



Ironically, if there is a candidate as good or better than Bernie Sanders on the Palestine or Israel issue, it is Jill Stein, and they're the only two Jewish candidates running. The Palestinians weren't the ones responsible for the Holocaust and they've had their land for centuries after the Romans drove out the Jewish people almost two thousand years ago; but in order to justify taking their land they had to make them seem like the villains with their propaganda. Unfortunately the traditional media isn't willing to cover the majority of this reasonably.

Mind of the Market: Is Michael Shermer a Skeptic? Scam artist? or Idiot?

Michael Shermer is most widely known as a "Skeptic" who raises doubts about paranormal or conspiracy theories. He claims to use scientific methods to debunk unscientific claims and when the media gives him air time they echo these claims without scrutiny. In many cases he is right, however this may often be because he is refuting some of the least credible believers in paranormal or conspiracy theories.

However he also claims to have a background in economics which is what his book "The Mind of the Market" is about.

In this book he doesn't express skepticism about the charitable organization described in the following excerpt:

Consider how nonprofits concerned with the plight of starving third-world children might employ the “adopt a child” strategy in order to tap into potential first-world donors’ natural empathies. The effect of the strategy was endearingly portrayed in the 2002 film About Schmidt, in which Jack Nicholson’s title character adopts a Tanzanian child named Ndugu, with whom he carries on a one-way correspondence that becomes the narrative outline of the story of Schmidt’s search for meaning in his later years. After writing countless self-centric letters about matters trivially irrelevant, Schmidt discovers in the film’s final scene that his foster charge cannot read or write. But the letter from the nun who looks after the boy brings redemption, as it is accompanied by a stick-figure drawing made for Schmidt by Ndugu that depicts an adult and child holding hands beneath a deep blue sky and radiant yellow sun. the scene is so moving in its emotional simplicity that it evokes empathetic tears. By touching one small child worlds away – a child with a name and face and a visual acknowledgement for a small but significant act of kindness – Schmidt’s life became meaningful. Call it the Ndugu Effect.

We care more about one named child with a face than we do about tens of thousands of nameless and faceless children. In the modern world, it is an irrational moral calculation – rational economic man should care more for the many than the one. But an apparently irrational calculation becomes a rational moral choice in the ancient world of our evolved brains, where we care more for the one than the many, .....

I went online through World Vision’s program to sponsor an eleven-year-old girl named Suada Isaku from Tirana, Albania, who lives in the rural farming district of Elbasan with her parents and sister struggling to survive on bread, vegetables, beans, and dairy products. My modest monthly donation, World Vision tells me, “will help provide Suada and her community with clean water and improved healthcare facilities. Your support will help create educational partnerships between parents and teachers to enhance students education. Economic forums will help the community develop plans for growth.” An accompanying photograph with additional details about my sponsored child – she enjoys reading, helps at home with housework, likes to play ball games, and is in good health – reinforces my sense of attachment to her. A subsequent search on Google Earth promptly carried me through cyberspace to Suada’s village, pulling on the heartstrings of my brain’s dopamine reward networks, igniting my Middle Land propensity to connect to those near me, transforming a total stranger into honorary family through the power of markets, minds and morals. (Michael Shermer "Mind of the Market" p.136-8)

He presents this as a success for "the power of markets, minds and morals."

This is an obvious scam, and I don't even need to do any research to prove it. All I have to do is consider the expenses to run these charities.

Anyone with background in economics, including Michael Shermer, shouldn't need me to explain it to them; the target audience for these scams are uneducated people or people who act on emotions without thinking things through. I explained the simple basics of this recently in Wounded Warrior Project finances War Propaganda with donations; and the same principles that raised doubts about The Wounded Warrior Project as a charity also raise doubts about this scam, and in the case of the Wounded Warrior Project it was eventually proven in a major expose.

As I said I didn't need an expose to figure out that there had to be Bureaucratic problems with this charity and many others that advertise on TV, since even without the advertising there has to be a lot of overhead. This is especially true since, about twenty or thirty years ago I once applied for a part time job thinking it wouldn't pay much but I might be interested in getting involved in a charity organization. They had all the applicants show up at temporary office to hear brief seminar. I mentioned something about being interested contributing to a good cause, out of naive and sentimental reasons. He said that most of his people are more interested in making money. It was clearly commission. After that I was never called back, but it was enough to figure that there was something seriously wrong with this especially after I thought about it later.

But not surprisingly a quick Google search turned up this article, Is this the most wicked scam yet? 04/04/2008, which ironically was exposing this scam just as Michael Shermer's book was going to press, although there probably aren't many people that noticed it. The same search also turned up this, The scandal behind World Vision 02/07/2013, which might not seem quit as reliable but there are plenty of back up sources raising doubts about these and confirming that even though it doesn't come from someone with credentials and more than me he's right. There's additional confirmation at Wikipedia: World Vision controversies.

Ironically World Vision is a Christian charity which could have gave him a legitimate reason to add to his criticism of religion; however whether his support for his selective ideology had anything to do with it, instead he provided them with a positive review without any skepticism, seemingly adding credibility to this scam.

If Michael Shermer actually believes the review he put in his book about this charity he has to be an idiot.

If he doesn't believe it he's a scam artists.

Either way when it was obviously justified he wasn't a skeptic.

He begins his case for his claim that "Markets are moral," by citing a psychological experiment that has no rational chance to be used in reality, especially since it involves a subsidy which his fiscal ideology routinely speaks against But ignoring inconvenient facts seems to be routine for him.

Behavioral economists employ an experimental procedure called the Ultimatum Game. It goes something like this. You are given $100 to split between yourself and your game partner. Whatever division of the money you propose, if your partner accepts it, you are both richer by that amount. How much should you offer? Why not suggest a $90–$10 split? If your game partner is a rational, self-interested money maximizer, he isn’t going to turn down a free 10 bucks, is he? He is. Research shows that proposals that deviate much beyond a $70–$30 split are usually rejected. .....

Markets are moral, and modern economies are founded on our virtuous nature. If that were not the case, market capitalism would have imploded long ago. For additional excerpts of this segment see Michael Shermer "Mind of the Market" p.10-2

His claim that "market capitalism would have imploded long ago," ignores and enormous amount of research from people like Richard Wolf author of "Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism," Naomi Klein author of "The Shock Doctrine," Maude Barlow, author of "Blue Gold" and many other alternative media outlets or researchers which traditional media refuses to cover. Anyone familiar with these investigation or other ones wouldn't have been surprised at all by the Flint water crisis. These alternative researcher routinely report on one crisis after another however the majority of the impact is on the poor. Unfortunately the media refuses to report properly on this so he can simply ignore facts that don't support his ideology.

In all fairness he could have made this claim out of ignorance since the media does such a bad job reporting the news, or so it seems. But he's been doing seminars and speaking tours for a long time, so it is hard to image that he wouldn't have herd from some of the alternative media outlets pointing things out to him. Furthermore as a so-called "scientific skeptic" he could have done his own research and confirmed or refuted some of these claims, assuming he wanted to but he doesn't seem inclined to do so about this or any other subject he reports on.

Also why would accepting an unfair split of 30/70 be considered moral? what does this have to do with merit, which his Capitalist ideology claims to champion?

Nothing, that I can tell it just seems to something he cited so that he could make his incredibly weak claim that "Market's are moral," but one people think about how little value this particular experiment has to his economic system it is meaningless. This is especially true when you consider the people making the most profit off of pollution don't live in the polluted areas. those that do don't get any compensation and can't afford health care to minimize damage in the so-called market economy. Also the market economy reports advertisers union busters and propagandists well even though they deceive the public and make their quality of life worse.

This sense of morality has no credibility and like most of his other work ignores inconvenient facts, which means he is highly unscientific as well.

I try to minimize use of ridicule and advise others not to choose beliefs because of ridicule; however it is often hard to resist. Michael Shermer often relies heavily on ridicule to dismiss those he portrays as fringe believers but his own claims are often just as flawed when people look at the details. He often deserves ridicule as much as his opponents, assuming you consider any degree of ridicule justified when the argument is really bad.

He describes another of his experiments which he fails to apply to an economic system, although, in this case he probably could have, although it might not support his claims, when he writes, "In a related experiment on cooperation, nine subjects were given $5. If five or more of the nine cooperated by donating their $5 to a general pot, all nine would receive $10" (Michael Shermer "Mind of the Market" p.180-3) This experiment is designed to see if people would cooperate assuming there was an incentive for them to do so and this incentive involved helping the community in order to help themselves. But they provided an incentive to essentially welsh, as you can see reading the whole excerpt from Google Books. He follows this up with a variation when he writes, "Then the experimenters added a step, members of some groups were given the opportunity to discuss their strategy options before playing," (Michael Shermer "Mind of the Market" p.180-3) and cooperation improves; however this experiment can't easily be translated into practical economic uses. These long lists of experiments he cites repeatedly can be used to understand how people react in certain circumstances; and it could conceivably be used to study how to manipulate people in this circumstances.

Or, if he was so inclined, he could try to find variations that could be used in practical economic situation which could work in the real world. However his economics system doesn't rely on cooperation to benefit society it relies on cut-throat competition.

If an open minded person wanted to find a practical use of cooperation there are several examples that can easily be explored including a revision of copyright laws involving intellectual property. Right now, thanks to computer technology and the internet it is rapidly getting tougher and more expensive to prevent the spread of information, including information that well informed people need to make educated decisions about the democratic process, than it costs to allow information to spread freely.

Michael Shermer or anyone else could easily reduce this problem if they at least considered different ways of financing what we call "intellectual property." We could consider a cooperation experiment where everyone paid a relatively small amount, perhaps one or two hundred dollars a year into a fund; and in return they would get access to all the intellectual property they wanted on the internet or they could buy all the book they wanted at reduced price since if all this educational material were available without copyright prices would plummet.

A lot of additional details would have to be worked out but it would be a far more practical use of his psychological experiments that could lead to policy decisions that could benefit everyone by strengthening democracy by making much more information available, and bring down the cost of education as well. All the money currently being spent preventing the spread of information can be distributed to those that create content instead.

A similar argument could be made for privatized insurance compared to fully disclosed single-payer insurance, however instead of adding benefit by cooperation it could dramatically cut bureaucratic expenses. What supporters of our current never remind us is that insurance is pooled risk. Everyone pitches in a little them when one person faces catastrophe they take from the pool of money, but bureaucratic expenses have to be subtracted from that pool of money. Insurance should be kept to a minimum since it is by nature inefficient, especially if bureaucratic expenses cause it to skyrocket like a privatized system does. The more they spend on advertising lobbying or keep fro profits the less there is for payouts to those in need.

This would be incredibly simple to understand if anyone actually tried to understand, yet like many other facts that doesn't support Shermer's ideology he simply ignores it. Health insurance in Social Democracies is much more efficient than in ours, so the way the establishment and Michael Shermer address this issue is to simply refuse to report on it.

The same comparison can be made for a banking system as reported in, Why Public Banks Outperform Private Banks: Unfair Competition or a Better Mousetrap? 02/15/2015; however neither the political establishment or media is willing to report on this so the majority of the public is unaware that we could have a much better way.

Ignoring facts that don't support his ideology is highly unscientific. Also refusing to be skeptical about scams when it is part of his own ideology indicates that Micheal Shermer is a very selective skeptic, only about things he disagrees with, which is a common trait of those he attempts to debunk; however due to his pseudo-scientific methods the most rational of his critics might be much more scientific than he is.

Michael Shermer routinely defends big business and government regardless of how much evidence might be implicating them on any given subject, often with selective facts that support his beliefs, that would never stand up to scrutiny if scrutiny is actually applied. However his views are routinely presented in forums that don't apply scrutiny, either in the mainstream media that only provides opposition from ideologues that might be as flawed as Shermer or in the "Skeptic Community" where other so-called skeptics repeat the same views over and over again often citing each other without providing good scrutiny despite claims to be using scientific methods.

At several points in his book he has defended Alcoa, Walmart and Microsoft when they were accused of antitrust violations. He has argued that they have brought down prices or provided free software when they were allowed to dominate the market, which may be partially true, at least temporarily. However he fails to mention many so-called negative externalizes to these monopoly practices or their potential long term consequences. They often lower prices long enough to wipe out competition then raise prices once they have monopoly power. Michael Shermer conveniently only mentions brief periods of time when they're offering their best deals.

At at least one point he cites a study talking about how much Walmart has benefited society; what he doesn't mention is that several studies have had financial ties to Walmart and those that don't tend to be much more critical. Shermer is like several media outlets which often receive financing from Walmart that help them provide propaganda ignoring enormous problems. They ignore the enormous environmental damage done by Walmart or other corporations, economic inequality, oppressive labor practices, what happens when an enormous corporation dominates the market then shuts down abandoning the neediest and many other problems.

Given time I could provide plenty of sources for all these problems and many more but if Michael Shermer were remotely sincere he would seek them out himself.

Michael Shermer claims free market Capitalism is caused by evolution in nature and writes that "This is, in fact, why WorldCom and Enron type disasters still make headlines. If they didn't -- if such corporate catastrophes caused by egregious ethical lapses were so common that they were not even worth covering on the nightly news -- free market capitalism would go the way of the dinosaurs." What he fails to mention is that the media ignored these disasters and many more until they were so big they had to report on them. He also fails to mention that the media isn't reporting on many of the biggest disasters in a high profile manners, especially the environmental and economic disasters that impact poor people.

This information is available in alternative media outlets or for people checking local media reports in an enormous number of different places. He also fails to mention the reason these disasters that were so big he couldn't ignore them got so bad is that the media government and every major institution that was supposed to prevent these disasters failed miserably.

He also ignores the fact that when the government finally feel they needed to do something about it, amazingly, they bailed out the rich that caused it without helping the poor or middle class and left them with the burdens of debt. No one was held accountable and it is virtually guaranteed to happen again and cause another disaster.

Michael Shermer makes an effort to debunk some of the most ridiculous doomsday profits of "Climate Change Deniers" but at the same time he is in total denial about how the economic system that he supports is causing astronomical amounts of environmental destruction, including the Climate Change he pretends to want to reverse, and much more including epidemic levels of air land and water pollution that is already causing enormous amounts of disease and even killing thousands if not millions of people. Presumably, he seems to believe that if the comercial media refuses to report more than a fraction of the news he can pretend it isn't happening.

How does Michael Shermer think we should address many of these problems besides ignoring them until they become so extreme we can't continue ignoring them?

He explains one possible way to address problems when he writes, "In honor of the late economist Milton Friedman, author of the radical book Free to Choose, I propose that we begin by marketing this brand — the Principle of Freedom: all people are free to think, believe and act as they choose, as long as they do not infringe on the equal freedom of others." (Michael Shermer "Mind of the Market" p.232)

First of all he's not advocating for "Free Markets" at all throughout his book he defends the right of the largest corporations to dominate the market so they no longer have to compete and can destroy small businesses every time they rise up to challenge them. This isn't a free market it is either a monopoly system or an oligarchy system. They only call this a "free market where big business control everything instead of government using antitrust laws to make sure there is healthy competition.

Second of all does he really believe that marketing morality will make corporations behave themselves?

Is this supposed to be a joke?

As a skeptic shouldn't he be skeptical of advertising which is controlled by people with a financial incentive to lie, especially since they're fro profit organizations?

He doesn't seem to be a skeptic when it comes to advertising at all, which might explain why he fell for the World Vision scam even though it is incredibly obvious.

I've got news for Michael Shermer corporation have been Marketing morality for decades but it has absolutely no credibility.

Corporation market their environmental friendliness while the devastate the planet, they market their good treatment of employees while they're involved in outrageous sweatshop violations they market how they help communities while they're shutting down and abandoning the poorest people when they can't make any more profit.

Advertising has no peer review. Who ever pays for the ads gets to decide what's in them and they routinely lie over and over again; yet a growing portion of our media is being controlled, either directly or indirectly by advertising.

Marketing morality is so stupid it doesn't pass the laugh test.

Amazingly, he writes, "Capitalism may not need apologists and propagandists but it does need a scientific foundation grounded in psychology and evolution, which I have attempted to give it in this book." (Michael Shermer "Mind of the Market" p.247) He comes to the conclusion that "Capitalism" doesn't need "apologists and propagandists" by quoting Ludwig von Misis who ignores enormous volumes of inconvenient facts to support his claims as well.

Can his beliefs get any worse?

Yes

He writes, "You can even reverse the causal link-giving subjects a nose spray that includes a dose of oxytocin induces them to cooperate twice as much as they normally would. Trust is good for business and is among the most powerful factors affecting economic growth in a country." (Michael Shermer "Mind of the Market" p.256)

Does he expect us to believe that trust is good for business even when corporation get caught in one scam after another? Does he think it would be good to give people in Flint doses of oxytocin when Rick Snyder tells them their water is safe? Whenever customers become skeptical of deceptive marketing scams should corporations give them oxytocin so it will be easier to scam them?

This sounds like something out of "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley who tried to warn us against a future where academics controlled the public by keeping them drugged; and judging by this statement Michael Shermer thinks it is a good idea. This is way too much like using Rohypnol, as a famous date rape drug. Should it be much of a surprise after reading this comment that Michael Shermer was accused of rape during a conference about the same time as this book came out? This was presented as a smear against Michael Shermer for a while but some of the people looking into it weren't quite so sure. This accusation is described closer in The Wall of Silence Around Michael Shermer 09/29/2014 by Adam Lee. If they considered this outlandish claim perhaps they shouldn't be quite so quick to defend Michael Shermer, although first ahnd accounts should be credited more on this sicne I haven't looked at the details personally.

Noam Chomsky claims that "Hundreds of Billions of dollars are spent every year to control the public mind." If anything this is almost certainly an understatement even without citing sources. There is an enormous amount of money spent on advertising and behind that they pay psychologists and political pundits big money to figure out which methods work best to control the public.

How else do they convince so many people to vote against their own best interests for decades? After they successfully impair rational thinking processes for thousands if not millions of people is it so surprising that a shocking number of people think they can trust a demagogue like Donald Trump to stand up to the other scam artists?

Amazingly according to Is Michael Shermer supporting Donald Trump? and Michael Shermer: I’m Not Endorsing Donald Trump Michael Shermer sent out mixed messages about Trump's campaign. In one of them he claims to believe that Trump wouldn't use the military much but Trump is so irrational I don't see how anyone could come to that conclusion. Any rational skeptic would recognize Trump as the lunatic he truly is; it isn't like this one is even close!

Does Michael Shermer really believe half of what he writes?

If so perhaps he provides his own explanation for why he believes weird things.



Or perhaps he isn't so idiotic as to believe his own lies then if he wanted to be honest he might have said, "Smart people pretend to believe weird things because they are skilled at defending beliefs to help scam people that aren’t quite so smart."

How could any rational person avoid calling this man a scam artist?

If a rational and reasonably well informed person looked at the selective citation of facts in this book or in most if not all of his other work it would be foolish for them to conclude that he uses scientific methods yet an enormous amount of people from the academic world, including Steven Pinker, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris have cited him as what they consider a rational skeptic. This is further evidence of many examples within the academic world where they're allowing politics to influence research at an epidemic level as I explained in Is the academic world defending democracy? or corrupting it?

No doubt, many may seem skeptical that the academic world often behaves in unscientific ways based on politics; if so check the facts and come to your own conclusions based on them not on what any authority figure says without scrutiny.

As I said in the opening he is most well known for being a skeptic of Conspiracy Theories but as I explained in Are Michael Shermer and Philip Zimbardo trying to be secular cult leaders? he is very selective at that as well and does it in an irrational manner. When dismisses Jesse Ventura's 63 documents he writes "what the reader actually finds between the covers are documents obtained through standard Freedom of Information Act requests that can also be easily downloaded from the Internet," clearly implying they aren't conspiracies since they're publicly available to everyone. This may be true now but they were secret when they took place. This is a clear admission to past participation in conspiracies but they're only being disclosed in a low profile manner and Michael Shermer doesn't even seem concerned that this displays a pattern of behavior by the government which continues to get caught in their lies.

When it comes to paranormal or UFOs I also believe that reasonable skepticism is a good but as I explained in UFO Hypothesis with rational use of Occam's Razor mixed in with flawed claims are some legitimate concerns and any rational theory has to acknowledge them instead of pretending they don't exist.

Bernie Sanders Wins Least Violent States

Hillary Clinton may have swept the South, so far, but but Bernie Sanders won eight out of eleven states outside the South with much larger turnouts and almost all the Southern states have already voted. (Now 9 out of 12 additional edits updating full count will be listed below as we go.)

Bernie Sanders also wins more in states that vote Democratic or swing states for the General election; and these are the states with the larger turnout and more enthused voters necessary to win in November.

This virtually guarantees that he will significantly cut Clinton's lead and may still win despite what the media is trying to convince us.

The primaries were front loaded with states that Clinton was expected to win which creates the illusion of an insurmountable lead, intentional or not.

Bernie Sanders also does much better in the states with the lowest murder rates, including his home state which consistently has the second lowest murder rates and Clinton does much better in the states with the highest murder rates, include her prior home state of Arkansas which was in the top ten until recently before dropping to thirteenth. Bernie does much better in states that ban corporal punishment in schools; while Hillary Clinton does better in those that still allow it.

This is important for several reasons including that the people in states that support policies that result in lower crime rates may recognize that Bernie Sanders also does and support him. One of the most important long term contributing causes to escalating violence is corporal punishment and child abuse which often escalates to more violence including bullying, hazing, domestic violence and higher murder rates. This is also used to teach children from an early age that they should obey without question and believe what they're told by authority figures. These are authoritarian child rearing methods which don't help teach critical thinking that enables adults to sort through issues and recognize when politicians are constantly promising one thing during the campaign and doing another after getting elected.

I reviewed how early child abuse leads to escalating violence and can be used as an indoctrination process in many past articles including Does child abuse and bullying lead to more violence? and Dobson’s Indoctrination Machine; and last year I also did a series of articles, listed below that examined other contributing causes to violence and backed each separate subject up by finding additional peer reviewed studies that supported my own brief studies. Few of these were reported well in the traditional media or by traditional politicians; however the studies that I found to back them up were also available in alternative media outlets or in the academic world. In many cases, thanks to grassroots pressure local communities, do a much better job learning about how to reduce crime and pressure their politicians to help them.

They aren't promoting the get tough on crime and zero tolerance policies that consistently fail. Instead they try to recognize the root causes of crime and address them. These states are the ones supporting Bernie Sanders, while the ones that support authoritarian policies that don't reduce violence or may even increase them support Clinton.

Clinton demonstrated her support for these authoritarian policies when she famously said "We have to bring them to heel," which is the type of control policies used in police states and taught by authoritarian manner starting with corporal punishment. According to Corporal Punishment in Public Schools, by State (2008) Arkansas, where Hillary Clinton served as first lady used corporal punishment more than any other state except Mississippi, which was first and Alabama came in third. The fourth one drops off significantly, those are the only three that paddled more than four percent of their students.

The right wing often claim that one of the biggest problems with crime is black on black crime where they are killing each other. These claims are often exaggerated or mixed with outright lies; and there are also problems with white on white crime; but they're not completely false. What they fail to mention is that most murders are often within their own race regardless of which race. They also fail to mention that minorities are subject to corporal punishment in schools much more often than whites, teaching them to use violence as way to accomplish their goals. If they were willing to research this they would realize that their practices of "bringing them to heel" is one of the biggest contributing causes of violence and it is counter productive.

Those without political power are routinely held accountable to the full extent of the law and no excuse is considered. Those that control the law often set the stage so that children don't have the resources to develop properly but when inevitable problems arise they're not held accountable.

For all practical purposes this should be considered institutionalized entrapment on a massive scale!

Hillary Clinton's reference to "super-predators" was based on prediction that were widely circulated in the nineties that turned out to be false. These predictions came from academics that were in denial about how corporal punishment leads to escalating violence and the academics that were doing the more reliable work weren't give the opportunity to make their case in a high profile manner but they turned out to be right.

The same research that indicates that corporal punishment leads to escalating violence also indicates that it impairs children education and makes it more difficult to develop critical thinking skills. Many of these children learn from an early age that they're supposed to comply with authority without question which is why many of the states that still allow corporal punishment also have the highest recruiting rates in the military where they want people to obey orders without question.

Children raised in authoritarian manners are more likely to trust their leaders if they don't have the critical thinking skills to do their own fact checking. Some times this includes leaders who seem to be major supporters of real reform, or perhaps were once supporters of real reform and those that still trust them think they still are. Regrettably there are too many former reporters that slowly became part of the system and began doing more to protect their own agendas than their people, including some that many never thought would betray them.

This means that political endorsements from former reformers like Charles Rangel or John Lewis might hold a lot of sway when older people raised in authoritarian manners make their decisions especially if they didn't learn to fact check when they were young and may have started following what they considered reformers early on. It shouldn't be surprising, to many, that Charles Rangel might cut deals to endorse corrupt candidates, since he has a history of ethics violations; however John Lewis, who is often considered a civil rights icon seems like a surprising person to endorse Clinton who has a horrible record as I indicated in Regardless of Polls Bernie Sanders Supports Blacks much better than Hillary Clinton.

His endorsement is highly disappointing and many people including me don't want to believe that he would allow undue influence impact his judgement; but this raises major doubts especially after that comment about how he never saw Bernie Sanders during the civil rights movement but that Hillary Clinton was there. This doesn't stand up to a minimum amount of scrutiny although there is almost certainly some truth to parts of it. The civil rights movement was a large movement and most of Bernie Sanders work was in the North including some organization in Chicago. Also reports indicate that he didn't meet either of them until getting into congress when he met both. The implication that Bernie Sanders wasn't involved in the civil rights movement and Hillary Clinton was seems an awful like an "artful smear" and it was hard to believe it came from John Lewis, but it did, no matter how much most of us don't want to believe it.



Younger voters that weren't around during the first civil right movements didn't develop the emotional attachment to John Lewis and they may also have been raised in a much less authoritarian manner. This might explain why they might be better at sorting through Hillary Clinton's and Bernie Sanders background and coming to different conclusions. I'm not recommending that people trust me any more than they should trust John Lewis; instead they should check the facts including many that I listed below or it might be better if more people did their own research even if some of the sources I cited might be helpful.

I have no doubt that if people do they'll find that there's an enormous amount of evidence to indicate that Hillary Clinton is a corporate puppet whether it is Goldman Sachs, Wall Street behind the curtain or the Military Industrial Complex or many other corrupt special interests.



Of course the same critical thinking skills should be used when recognizing propaganda tactics including memes or graphics like this one. These are simple and catch peoples attention but slower reading and research should be more important in the long run since graphics can be used to promote bad causes just as easy as it does good ones. I don't mind reminding you of this since I have no doubt that there is an enormous amount of evidence to back up the claims in these graphics.

A close review of Clinton's record raises major doubts on one issue after another about her credibility or whether she intends to keep her promises. She has changed one position after another during the election. Most of her older positions support the corporate interests that are financing her campaign and she has demonstrated that she will change her position on issues like the one Elizabeth Warren called her out on with the banking bill that she opposed as first lady but then after accepting enormous amounts of money she voted for it as Senator. This is just one example of many. I have also listed some of my past articles below, along with the ones about the previous studies on root causes of violence below. Whether it is the root causes of violence, support for children minorities or working people these articles include long lists of sources indicating that she routinely does the opposite of what she claims.

People that develop better critical thinking skills do a much better job sorting through theses stories and they're more likely to support Bernie Sanders in large numbers. This includes young people who are much less likely to be raised in as authoritarian manner as older people since child rearing tactics have been changing significantly, so they often develop better critical thinking skills than the previous generations which were often subject to more corporeal punishment at children when they learning skills were developing.

In last nights debate Bernie Sanders did a slightly better job addressing the question about the crime bill and they both did a poor job addressing the question on gun control; however Bernie Sanders does much more to address economic inequality, education issues, abandoned inner cities, and many other issues that could be long term contributing causes for crime if they're not addressed properly. Unfortunately Hillary Clinton has history of supporting corporate ideologies which often contribute to higher crime indirectly.

The following will be updated as the primary season goes on to include other primaries.

According to Murder Rates Per 100,000 People by State the five states which have the lowest murder rates in 2013 were New Hampshire, 50th, Vermont, 49th, Minnesota, 48th and Maine, 47th, Hawaii, 46th, all of which voted for Bernie Sanders by large margins with high turnout. He also won Oregon, 44th, Idaho, 42nd, Utah, 41st, Rhode Island, 39th, Washington, 37th, Wyoming, 36th, Colorado, 35th, Wisconsin, 34th, Nebraska, 33th Kansas, 30th, West Virginia, 26th, Oklahoma, 21st, Indiana, 17th, Michigan 14th and Alaska, 12th.

Also most if not all the races he won were with high voter turnouts than the races Clinton won in the South. Oklahoma has an average murder rate at 4.5 so the states he won, as of the original writing all have below average murder rates; Michigan was the first one he won in the top half. Only six of the states Bernie Sanders won still allow corporal punishment in schools, and they almost certainly don't use it as much as the other southern states. Kansas doesn't allow corporal punishment that draws blood, they had a law maker that wanted to change that a few years ago and allow it but he failed and it raised an enormous amount of attention outraging many people. What they didn't mention so much was that most of the other Southern States do allow this and they have higher murder rates than Kansas, which has the second highest murder rates so far of states that went for Bernie Sanders.

Clinton won won Louisiana, 1st, Mississippi, 2nd, Missouri, 3rd, South Carolina, 4th, Maryland, 5th, Nevada, 6th, Delaware, 7th, Florida, 8th, Alabama, 9th, Georgia, 10th, Tennessee, 11th, Arkansas, 13th, Illinois, 15th, North Carolina, 16th, Pennsylvania, 19th, Arizona, 20th, Texas, 23rd, Virginia, 24, Ohio, 25, Kentucky, 28th, New York, 31st, Connecticut, 38th, Massachusetts, 43rd, and Iowa, 45th.

Sixteen of the states she won had above average murder rates (due to variations in population and murder rates 21 states are above average and 29 are below average.) including eight in the top ten, and these were the ones with the lowest turnouts. She won two states in the lowest ten but only by small margins; and only five including those two, were below average. Twelve out of eighteen states that Clinton won still allow corporal punishment, and they use it more than the states that voted for Bernie Sanders. Nevada was one of the few states in with the top ten murder rates that don't allow corporal punishment in schools. In another article, Can Hillary Clinton win without cheating? I compiled all the states where there were reports of voter suppression; and Hillary Clinton didn't win any of state with the lowest twenty five in murder rates where there weren't reports of voter suppression or other irregularities.

The correlation between states with high murder rates and those supporting Hillary Clinton is much stronger than I would have expected. If I hadn't done some of the studies listed below prior to this election it is unlikely that I would have recognized it. The Republican side doesn't seem to have as clear a correlation; however they don't have candidates that provide such a clear contrast. It is hard to imagine why the political establishment decided to present Hillary Clinton as the inevitable front runner years ahead of time and refuse to cover any possibilities in a reasonable manner; but thanks to Bernie Sanders stronger than expected candidacy it created a surprising opportunity to compare the electorate, although many may consider it controversial.

The following are past studies on contributing causes of crime. In most cases I did my own statistical review based on states and their characteristic and found additional studies that were peer reviewed coming to similar conclusions, and in some cases also reviewed studies that came to different conclusions.

Ignored evidence linking corporal punishment, poverty and crime grows

Does lack of education increase violent crime? Religion?

How much does Income Inequality Affects Crime Rates?

States with high murder rates have larger veteran populations

Teach a soldier to kill and he just might

The tragedy of gambling politics in United States

How does gambling and gun control impact violent crime?

Politics, not technology, caused botched executions

Troy, Cameron, Gary all innocent? And executed?

Democrats do a bad job on crime; Republicans and the Media are worse!!

Politicians increase crime; Grass roots efforts reduce crime; Politicians steal the credit

Life Insurance and media companies are encouraging lots of murders

Union Busting adds to corrupt bureaucracy and incites crime

The following are past articles on Bernie Sanders or Hillary Clinton and their records, also citing numerous sources:

Regardless of Polls Bernie Sanders Supports Blacks much better than Hillary Clinton

Bernie Sanders wins foreign policy debate hands down despite propaganda

Nominating Bernie Sanders would virtually put Minimum Wage on the Ballot and Drive Voter Turnout Up

Hillary Clinton Is Using Children As Props While Her Record Betrays Them

Why would anyone consider Hillary Clinton if they knew this?

Bernie Sanders, Jill Stein or Revolt in the Streets?