Non-violent grass roots reform and Democracy: Vote Independent, Green Or Lesser Of Two Evil Duopoly?

Both political parties, with the help of commercial media, controlled almost entirely by six corporations, routinely decide which presidential candidates are going to be viable, by simply refusing to cover candidates they don't support. This method almost always works at the local level as well, especially instate wide elections for large or medium states. Occasionally when the grassroots are well organized they can make a handful of exception for local elections, with a few mayor candidates or house seats and other relatively minor elected officials.

This isn't new. In almost all cases they decide who the front runner is well ahead of time; you can review the nominations going back decades, sometimes even predicting which nominee will win the general election even before the primaries begin, like in 1987, when the media overwhelmingly predicted that Michael Dukakis would win both the primaries and the general election. In this case they were only half right. However, in every election since then and most if not all before then, the media declared who the inevitable nominees would be, or narrowed it down to two or three possibilities, then provided obsession coverage for the candidates they selected for us to choose from.

In 1991 they began providing obsession coverage presenting Bill Clinton as the most likely nominee; then in 1992 when he started losing primaries, to several different candidates, his dream team led by James Carville and George Stephanopoulos came up with their rapid response team with spectacular enabling him to portray himself as the "comeback kid," especially since, although he lost several early primaries, they went for several other candidates, not just one, so when he started sweeping the south he was able to get the nomination. That was the closest thing to something that appeared to be a legitimate elections since then, although even then they rigged it so only a small number of candidates could get name recognition enabling them to win.

But since then they've been getting increasingly more obvious about rigging the nominations for people they support, with them virtually declaring Bob Dole to be the nominee in 1996 because it was "his turn" as even the media often put it; and declaring the inevitable nominees for each party since then, although they made it look like a close call in 2008 between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama both of which clearly turned out to support Wall Street insiders, despite most of Obama's rhetoric during the campaign.

I there was any doubt they were rigging the primaries by the time the 2016 elections came along they should have disappeared even before the Wikileaks release of DNC and Podesta E-mails. The establishment declared it was virtually guaranteed that Hillary Clinton would get the nomination and provided obsession coverage to ensure it happened, with almost the entire party agreeing not to run and rushing to endorse her even though she had incredibly high negative ratings in the polls and when people were outraged and rallied around Bernie Sanders they began brazenly rigging the primaries in a more obvious manner than ever before as I pointed out in Can Hillary Clinton win without cheating?

Then even after it became incredibly obvious that they effectively threw the race to Trump by rigging the primaries for someone the public hated so much they did it again, once again rigging primaries for Biden in another even more obvious scam as I pointed out again in Epidemic 2020 Election Fraud Again. Both these articles report on enormous amounts of obvious cheating to rig the primaries for Wall Street puppets. Now they're trying to shame us into supporting Biden!

The truth is that Biden and Trump aren't that different, despite all the rhetoric to make them seem to oppose each other!

Joe Biden is as corrupt as Trump and supports many of the same positions with almost as many scandals as I pointed out in Joe Biden Really Was Taken Off The Trash Heap which includes a lot of the stories that have been reported in a low profile over the years, or decades about, him, but have received minimal coverage. There's an incredibly long list of baggage which the traditional media has been ignoring during the primary, including the latest accusation by Tara Reade of sexual assault, and much more especially his long list of gaffes, which the media has been providing minimal coverage of, assuming they cover them at all.

One of his latest gaffes was about the Coronavirus reported in a video on Propping this up is freaking irresponsible. Give it to the runner up. 04/19/2020 where he says, "Um, you know, there's a uh, during World War... Two, uh, you know, where Roosevelt came up with a thing that uh, you know, was totally different than a, than the, the, it's called, he's called it a, you know, the World War Two, he had the World, the War Production Board," as Anderson Cooper and Sanjay Gupta, watch with stunned and embarrassed looks on their faces. Throughout the pandemic Biden has either been absent from the media or making many more gaffes like this like when he said "We Have To Take Care Of The Cure That Will Make The Problem Worse No Matter What." 03/24/2020 There's no way this guy is the most capable of beating Donald Trump or as he says, going to be able "beat him like a drum!" It won't be Biden beating Trump like a drum, it'll be Trump beating Biden like a drum.

If they follow through on their efforts to rig the primary again there's little or no doubt that he'll lose to Trump anyway. His only chance of beating Trump is if Trump self-destructs before he does; but, Trump is a far better speaker and more effective demagogue, even if he is nuts and corrupt as hell, so this is unlikely. If the media did a fair job covering diverse candidates, including honest ones, not just demagogues, and those collecting enormous amounts of money from Wall Street corporations there's no way either of these two clowns would get the nomination!

The best chance the Democratic nominee is going to beat Trump is if Biden collapses before it's too late to replace him with Bernie Sanders, who can easily beat Trump. If they try to replace him with anyone but Bernie Sanders, including Cuomo, there will be so much outrage that that candidate won't be able to beat Trump either. This is increasingly unlikely with Bernie Sanders suspending his campaign, endorsing Biden, even though he opposes everything Bernie stands for, and even recommending people donate to the DNC; however, Biden is so incredibly bad that I won't completely rule it out, although it would require something extreme to bring it about, and will consider it a little more below; however, in the mean time we have to stop falling for the same scam over and over again, which is why they keep giving us worse options!

This is especially true since we have better options, even if corporate media refuses to provide fair coverage for honest candidates; and there are still more efforts to rig the election against lesser known candidates as well. However there's plenty of devoted grassroots support for other candidates, the most likely appears to be the Green Party candidate who will almost certainly be Howie Hawkins.

The Green Party primaries aren't over, and if anyone has a chance to beat Howie it's Dario Hunter, who's also far better than either Biden or Trump. And in all fairness, I did encounter one concern about Howie Hunter, which was that as an insider in the Green Party he was trying to rig the primaries; there might be some legitimate complaints which should be addressed; however, after taking a close look, I realized that Howie Hunter provided extensive explanations on his positions on many subjects and the people complaining that he was allegedly trying to rig the nomination weren't doing nearly as well. For years, if not two decades, I've been arguing that political candidates should be required to fill out an application just like working class people do even at McDonald's. Howie Hunter has done this while those claiming he was rigging the primaries haven't.

The best application that I've known of that has provided a fairly good questionnaire for political candidates, including presidential candidates has been Project Vote Smart, and even though I also have some concerns about them as I explained in Saving Project Vote Smart and improving it or replacing it, it's still far better than anything the media provides. The traditional candidates running for both political parties, now routinely refuse to fill out these questionnaires. Neither Donald Trump or Joe Biden have filled out this questionnaire; even Bernie Sanders hasn't filled it out, which I find disappointing, even though he's done far better to provide consistent positions on many issues elsewhere, while Biden and Trump routinely give conflicting answers and routinely break campaign promises.

Only one other candidate for the Green Party nomination has done this, while those allegedly claiming the primaries are being rigged haven't; there may be some legitimate problems with the Green Party which need to be addressed, but they seem to be minor compared to the corrupt establishment. Clearly Howie Hawkins and the Green Party are far better than the traditional parties that are catering overwhelmingly to Wall Street with little regard for the will of the people.

One of the most obvious examples showing this is that he provided clear indications of the policies he supports in the following questionnaire excerpts, which are far closer to the positions taken by Bernie Sanders and supported by the vast majority of the public than the contradictory answers or broken promises provided by Trump and Biden:

Howie Hawkins' Issue Positions

Abortion: Pro-choice

I support full and improved Medicare for All that covers all medically necessary services, including abortion and all reproductive health services. As immediate steps, I favor (1) repealing the "gag rule" issued by the Trump-Pence administration that makes it illegal for health care providers that participate in Title X to talk with their patients about how and where they can access abortion safely and legally, (2) legislation to protect Title X reproductive health services to people with low incomes, and (3) legislation requiring Department of Justice preclearance for abortion-related laws in states which enacted laws that violated Roe v. Wade.

Budget

I support higher income and wealth taxes on the very rich and tax cuts for the working class. I support doubling Social Security benefits by lifting the cap on the payroll tax for high incomes and other progressive tax reforms. I support full and improved Medicare for All.

Campaign Finance

I favor full public campaign funding: equal public campaign finance grants to all ballot-qualified candidates, mandatory publicly-sponsored debates for all candidates receiving grants, and free and equal broadcast time for all candidates receiving grants. I favor the We The People Amendment to the US Constitution to establish that only natural human beings, not artificial corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights and that money is property, not protected speech. This amendment would enable we the people, through our elected representatives, to fully regulate and publicly finance public elections. (He also supports Ranked Choice Voting)

Defense

I support a 75% cut in military spending with the savings devoted to spending to secure a safe climate and people's economic rights to a decent job, an income above poverty, affordable housing, comprehensive health care, a good public education from pre-K/childcare through college, and secure retirement. I want to bring our troops home from foreign military bases and adopt a non-offensive defense. I favor an end to the nuclear weapons modernization program, adopting a No-First-Use policy, and unilateral nuclear disarmament to a minimum credible deterrent, followed up by serious negotiations for complete, global, and mutual nuclear disarmament.

......

Energy & Environment

I was the first US candidate to campaign for a Green New Deal in 2010 as the Green candidate for New York governor. I call for an emergency mobilization to achieve by 2030 zero greenhouse gas emissions, 100% clean renewable energy, and massive restoration of forests, wetlands, mangroves, and other habitat to draw carbon out of the atmosphere and into the biosphere. I call for an immediate ban on fracking and new fossil fuel infrastructure. I call for a public energy system for energy production, distribution utilities, and electrified railroads for freight, high-speed inter-city travel, and metro mass transit.

......

Health Care

I favor replacing Affordable Care Act with a better system of universal health care: a full and improved Medicare for All system that provides all medically necessary services with no cost on the point of service and free choice for consumers of any doctor or hospital. It will be publicly-funded by progressive taxation. 98% of us will pay less in taxes to support Medicare for All than we now pay for private insurance with premiums, deductibles, co-pays, and out-of-pocket expenses plus the taxes we pay for public health insurance programs like Medicare, Medicaid, military Tricare, and the VA. ......

National Security

The US should emphasize diplomacy and humanitarian aid, not military force. The 16-year "war on terror" has terrified Middle East communities and created more terrorists seeking revenge. US "regime change" wars have encouraged the proliferation of arms and nuclear weapons by other countries fearing US attack. The US should set an example of military and nuclear arms reductions, democracy, and human rights at home and on that basis join the community of nations and use diplomacy to achieve mutual disarmament among the world's nations.

......

Administrative Priorities

1. A Green New Deal: zero greenhouse gas emissions and 100% clean energy by 2030; natural carbon sequestration through afforestation and other habitat restoration. 2. An Economic Bill of Rights: job guarantee, guaranteed minimum income above poverty, affordable housing for all through public housing and universal rent control, Medicare for All, tuition-free public education from pre-K through college, retirement security starting with a doubling of Social Security Benefits. 3. Nuclear Disarmament: stop the nuclear modernization program, pledge no first use, unilateral nuclear disarmament to a minimum credible deterrent, negotiations to realize the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Complete article

There's an enormous amount of public support for most if not all of his positions on these issues; yet both Biden and Trump oppose most if not all of them; while Bernie Sanders supported them as well. In the few cases where the public isn't more in line with Howie Hawkins it's almost certainly because of all the corporate propaganda distorting issues in favor of ideologies that help rig the economic system for wealthy people in power.

One of the most obvious examples is privatized insurance, where corporations compete against each other by spending an enormous amount of money they collect from premiums on advertising instead of paying out claims. The media makes a fortune selling these ads, so they have a major incentive to repeat corporate propaganda to demonize a Single Payer system like Medicare for all, which is exactly what they do. the current system also takes an enormous amount of money from the premiums we pay to pay out huge profits to share holders, salaries to CEOs and donating to campaigns or lobbying against the interests of their own customers, with money they gouge us for!

His positions on reforming campaign finance is also much better than both Biden and Trump, who want to keep the system that enables wealthy to rig elections through a corrupt campaign process where multimillionaires and billionaires control almost all the news and debates that people use to make their political decisions, even though I don't quite think it's the best solution. The entire Green Party and many other Progressive organizations both support Ranked Choice Voting which means we wouldn't have to worry about voting against the greater evil every time, which is why the corporate parties oppose it and refuse to discuss it at all when they have the choice, since it would make it far more difficult for them to rig elections. He supports providing funds to campaigns equally which is better than what we're doing now; however, what would be even better is if we financed an interview process controlled by the grassroots, not Wall Street corporations.

This means that we should have some influence on an application similar to the one provided by Project Vote Smart, preferably with more input from the grassroots, as I pointed out in Saving Project Vote Smart and improving it or replacing it; one clear example of how the grassroots could improve on their aplication is asking better questions, for example instead of asking if candidates support single payer, which is being widely discussed by the grassroots and since it's so popular even the media mentions it, often trying to smear it, they asked, "Do you support repealing the 2010 Affordable Care Act?" which was written by the insurance lobbyists that Barack Obama promised he wouldn't hire for his administration.

Candidates that might keep promises like this practically never get coverage from the corporate media.

He's also far better on defense and national security than either Biden or Trump despite propaganda presenting them as being better on these issues. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and there are many other wars that we fight based on lies; not to mention the fact that we routinely arm tyrants around the world that often become our enemies like Saddam Hussein, Manuel Noriega, the Mujaheddin, and many more. And of course, even though Biden has recently come up with some promises for the sake of the campaign that indicate he's going to do more to protect the environment his entire political career has involved catering to corporations including the oil companies, so there's little or no chance that he'll be much better than Trump ion the environment, at a time when we need urgent action.

Howie does far better on reducing crime and reforming the police as well; while both Trump and Biden support the get tough on crime policies while ignoring the root causes and police corruption. On his we page he goes into detail about community control of the police and how to reduce police violence and crime. This provides a lot of links to research that backs up his policies which traditional candidates never provide. Even though Bernie Sanders is far better than either Biden or Trump, even he doesn't provide as much details about how he'll address these issues and the research to back it up. This includes a lot of reforms community organizations around the country, especially in minority communities or abandoned inner cities hit hardest by police corruption and violence are demanding but even more important; it provides policies that will cut crime and confrontations between citizens and police in the first pace.

Bernie Sanders has been the best at this of the candidates that the media cover; but, even he hasn't directly pointed out how addressing these social problems will reduce crime and the potential for confrontation with the police, and Howie provides statistics showing how reducing income inequality will help reduce crime in the following excerpt, which deserves far more attention than it gets:

CUT POVERTY AND INEQUALITY TO CUT CRIME AND THE NEED FOR POLICING

Policing is much more effective at apprehending criminals after crimes have been committed than preventing crimes in the first place. The most effective way to reduce police misconduct is to reduce crime and therefore the need for policing and the number of encounters where police might misuse force.

Crime rates and inequality are positively correlated within countries and between countries, according to a comprehensive 2002 World Bank study. The study found that this correlation is caused by the degree of income inequality, even after controlling for other crime determinants. Some 60 academic studies have found that income inequality predicts murder rates better than any other variable.

To really reduce police violence we must uproot the causes of crime in poverty and inequality and reduce the need for policing.

It is past time to enact an Economic Bill of Rights as President Franklin Roosevelt called upon Congress to enact in his last two State of the Union addresses in 1944 and 1945. The demand for an Economic Bill of Rights was picked up by the civil rights movement with the demands of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, the 1966 Freedom Budget, and the 1968 Poor People’s Campaign. It is time to renew those demands today.

An Economic Bill of Rights today should include these six economic human rights:

1. A Job Guarantee—A public job for anyone willing and able who cannot find a private job. The jobs should be on public works or in public services and provide a living wage with decent benefits.

2. An Income Guarantee—A guaranteed income above poverty built into the federal income tax system. If your income is below poverty, instead of paying taxes to the federal government, the government will send you a check to bring your monthly income above poverty.

3. A Decent Home—A radical expansion of quality public housing to provide an affordable option for all and to serve as competition to keep rents in the private market down to closer to the real costs of providing housing.

4. Comprehensive Health Care—An improved and expanded Medical for All system providing all medically necessary services with free choice of providers through a single public payer.

5. Lifelong Free Public Education—Free public education from pre-K and childcare through postsecondary college, technical school, and continuing adult education.

6. A Secure Retirement—Double Social Security benefits and fully fund job-related pension funds in financial trouble. Complete article

Howie Hawkins provided far better policies that will help reduce crime, violecne, and confrontations than either Joe Biden or Donald Trump; and, at times, even presents a better case than Bernie Sanders. Yet the media refuses to provide him with a fair amount of coverage. Nor do they cover even better research on many different subjects including how early child abuse, including corporal punishment, leads to escalating violence, as I pointed out in Evidence Is In; Corporal Punishment Should Be Banned! and numerous articles before this. The nineteen states that still allow corporal punishment in schools, and use it more at home, have, on average, for the last ten to twelve years, between 22% and just over 32% higher murder rates than the states banning it with the biggest difference coming in 2018, the last year complete data was available to calculate it, showing this difference is growing.

There's also additional research to show how abandoned inner cities lead to higher crime, and like Howie Hawkins indicated solving economic and educational problems will help reduce crimes and the need for policing or potential for conflict with them and citizens, including shootings , often fatal. We have the research available to solve many of our social problems like some other European countries are already doing; but this isn't being presented to the American people by a media establishment far more concerned with maximizing profit than educating the public.

In a functioning democracy, not only do we need fair coverage for all political candidates that want to run for office, so they can get name recognition enabling them to be viable, assuming they support popular positions; but we also need to provide the public with the best educational resources on any given subject. Our media establishment does neither of these; instead trying to maximize profits and provide obsession coverage for candidates that routinely rig the economy for the wealthy and ignore the best research that could solve many of our social problems.

What the media doesn't tell the vast majority of the public is that there are literally hundreds of people running for president every four years; however, in order to become viable they need name recognition; and there's no way they can get that unless the mainstream media covers them. On the rare occasion when they do mention any of these candidates it's usually one of the nuttier ones to make it seem like all the ones they hardly cover are quacks. However many of them are much better, some far more honest than those the media provides obsession coverage. In order to qualify for media coverage, judging by their actions, candidates need to collect an enormous amount of money from wealthy Wall Street insiders, or in rare occasions be so popular, like Bernie Sanders that they can't ignore them without being way too obvious.

I went into this more in Censored Candidates For President By Mass Media and More Censored Candidates From The Underground. I wasn't able to check out them all closely, but did find a few good ones and one exceptionally good one, Sanderson Beck, that went to a lot of trouble to present his positions on many issues, who probably should have been a leading candidate, assuming he could get fair media coverage, and is certainly far better than Donald Trump.

Sanderson Beck didn't hesitate to fill out his questionnaire or Issue Positions (Political Courage Test) from Project Vote Smart and provided additional information on his positions on his web page He also wrote dozens of books which are apparently available free online including Progressive Democracy 2011 and History of Peace. Sanderson Beck didn't hesitate to tell the truth and make a clear case yet he had absolutely no chance since the media simply refused to cover him.

I'm not guaranteeing that he would have been the best candidate for the job, since I haven't screened all of them, nor have I completely read his web page or books, but there';s no doubt that he's far better than the typical politician pushed by the corporate media and that he deserves for more coverage than he got so that the people could have come to their own conclusions. Our current system is designed to give overwhelming advantages to candidates supported by a small fraction of the wealthiest people in the country without giving a chance to the most honest candidates to even make their case.

This isn't limited to rigging the election for president; they have ways of giving overwhelming advantages to candidates supported by the richest people in the country in congress and any other local office including the Senate. One of the most brazen examples happened within the past couple days when the grassroots candidates running for the Senate attended a forum, which mainstream media refused to cover, and the two candidates supported by the establishment refused to attend. The candidates that do the best job addressing are routinely marginalized while corporate canddiates get obsession coverage presenting them as if they're the only viable options. As Lisa Savage for US Senate who is one of those candidates said 04/21/2020 "Last night's US Senate candidate forum was a rich and civil discussion of the critical issues we face, from the pandemic to climate crisis to building a fair economy for working people. Thanks to USM students and to Betsy Sweet, Bree Kidman, and Tiffany Bond for a great event - even if our opponents Susan Collins and Sara Gideon couldn't be bothered to show up and answer Mainers' questions!"

Lisa Savage also said 04/20/2020 "Isn't it kind of bad optics to be available for $2,800 a plate fundraisers out of state, but not a zoom meeting with Maine grad students preparing to enter public administration?" The candidates supported by corporations are far more concerned with collecting bribes, thinly disguised as campaign contributions, than listening to what their constituents have to say. Fortunately a recent ballot initiative may make it much tougher for them to rig the election against grassroots candidates in Maine.

They're now running in a Ranked Choice Voting elections, so there's no reason to worry about wasting your vote to stop the one you consider a greater evil, which means it's far more likely that Lisa Savage or one of the other independents will win, if we educate people at the grassroots level. It's still a tough race since the is obsessively trying to portray it as a two person race which both nominees chose=n by the establishment buying enormous amount of propaganda to deceive the public while suppressing the best election coverage;but with a growing alternative media and grassroots efforts there's a good chance that a progressive wins this; my favorite choice would be Lisa Savage but if Betsy Sweet wins the Democratic nomination, or if one of the other independents defeats the two corporate candidates that would be far better than the duopoly. Even if they don't do this, the stronger the showing they make with ranked choice voting the greater their chances will be the next time, since it will be virtually impossible for the media to ignore honest candidates without losing the last shred of credibility they seem to have.

The presidential election looks much tougher; although it's not hopeless, especially with an enormous number of people outraged at the atrocious candidate they rigged the primary for. Supporters of the Green Party always hold out hope that they'll finally win, but the strongest showing they make will do far more to let the establishment know they can't get away with rigging everything for long, and at a minimum it will warn them not to pick another candidate so pathetic.

I'm not completely ruling out a Howie Hawkins victory, however the best chance to get a progressive in office may be if Joe Biden self destructs before the primaries or convention enabling them to admit their mistake and allow Bernie Sanders to have the nomination. He would easily be able to beat Trump, while Biden is almost guaranteed to lose. This is far more likely to happen if they see us all lining up to support Howie Hawkins, or perhaps some people might write in Bernie. And there's no doubt that Biden is going to make more gaffes and be exposed for more corruption as well.