Thoughts On Where We Are, and Where We're Going

[Eric the Green]

(09-08-2018, 08:29 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(09-06-2018, 11:57 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I would like to see a non establishment candidate, or more than one, take over one or both parties.  That trend is real.  One element of the upcoming conflict is the division of wealth, and both rural and urban populations could benefit by non traditional anti establishment candidates.  This wave is growing, but so far the establishment is hanging on to power.

But the wave against the establishment is growing.  I am not seeing it breaking yet.  I am not seeing new values
triumphing soon.  I could be wrong.

Any non-establishment candidate who runs has to offer something real or (s)he's just another Trump.  Bring me ideas first, then pick a champion to bring them about.  I only have four critical issues: addressing climate immediately, establishing international relations on a win-win basis (definitely avoid war), move quickly to reduce inequality, and show basic competence.  A lot of other issues make achieving those hard to impossible, but they are symptoms rather than core issues -- race and gender being the two most potent.  Unless a candidate with FDR-like charisma, guts, energy and savvy emerges out of the political soup, we're still a few election cycles away from getting there.

Obama may be contributing more to a regeneracy now than he did as president, although now only as giving speeches to support the Democrats in midterms. He made the point in his excellent speech Sept. 7 at an Illinois campus that I have made before. There is no use separating the progressive agenda into those of white workers vs. diverse social groups; it is the same group with the same problem; domination of our society by an economic elite that uses fear and prejudice to prop up free market nostrums. 

https://youtu.be/66TSD2YiNhg?t=44m39s

Watch it and see the regeneracy happening. He describes it.

Waiting for the right candidate, is not a regeneracy. Expecting perfection, and not uniting for change, is not a regeneracy. One election victory, followed by a winning candidate who is not supported, and abandoned by cynical people staying home in elections, is not a regeneracy. Waiting for others to act, will not bring the wave. A young generation that stays home during midterms is not a regeneracy. Millennials can discover their collective power and save democracy; it's their destiny as a civic generation. And prophets and prophet cuspers like Obama to back them up and help lead them is their destiny. It's up to all of us to bring it, and it's happening.