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America, which is it gonna be?
Democratic Socialist or Democratic Fascist
By John Grant
Any religion that professes to be concerned about the souls of men and is not concerned about … the economic conditions that strangle them and the social conditions that cripple them is a spiritually moribund religion awaiting burial.
– Martin Luther King
While the left continues its favorite habit of eating itself over identity politics rivalries, Cold War journalists like Chris Matthews are losing their marbles over Bernie Sanders as a socialist. First, Matthews was going off about being shot in Central Park following a Castro take-over of America, then he lost it and compared Sander’s win in Iowa and New Hampshire to Hitler taking over in Germany. Matthews’ owners at MSNBC yanked his leash and made him apologize live for the Hitler analogy.
Then, in the South Carolina debate when Sanders had the temerity to say something good about the literacy and health programs in Castro’s Cuba (things reported on 60 Minutes), the moderates all jumped him and began beating him as if they were an LAPD cop-pack working over Rodney King. When Bernie tried to mention Saudi Arabia and other American gangster/thug allies, the beating just got more intense and more self-righteous. At this point, I think I began to holler at my TV to help Bernie out.
Cold War reaction is surfacing with a vengeance over Sander’s success, which has been explained very reasonably by Robert Reich, former secretary of the Treasury. “Today’s main divide isn’t left versus right. It’s establishment versus anti-establishment.” What does this mean for the election? “[T]he socialist label doesn’t come with the stigma it once did.”
Matthews’ reaction is mired in the past. Instead of the frantic hyperbole, there are a host of more apt comparisons in American reform history that contained elements of socialism, such as FDR’s New Deal or even the Eisenhower 1950s when strains of American socialism (of course, it wasn’t called that) seemed appropriate to educate its returning veterans, to provide them housing and to do things like create a cross-country interstate highway system — all supported by healthy public-oriented taxes.
None of the moderate Democrats — let alone Trump Republicans — seem able to even conceive of a nation with a “mixed economy” that balances all sorts of -isms for the good of the entire population, not just millionaires and billionaires. When it’s mentioned that Bernie Sanders is a democratic socialist, these moderates go ballistic and compare him to popular historic demons; what’s wrong with very mainstream American politicians like FDR for comparison? If you’re looking for edge, there’s also more radical, home-grown versions like Eugene Debs; there’s even the great American poets of bottom-up sympathy for the poor and working people like Walt Whitman or Woody Guthrie.
No, they bring up Stalin or Trump’s beloved Kim Jong-un or their favorite, Fidel Castro…
For the rest of this article by JOHN GRANT in ThisCantBeHappening!, the uncompromised, collectively run, six-time Project Censored Award-winning online alternative news site, please go to: https://thiscantbehappening.
and:
State Supreme Court courts cops:
PA High Court’s King-Sized Assault on Abu-Jamal
By Linn Washington, Jr.
Recently the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania again underscored its willingness to impede justice in the contentious case of imprisoned journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal through issuance of an unusual decision that utilized a rarely employed power of that court.
Pennsylvania’s highest court used its King’s Bench authority to order an investigation into conflict of interest charges against the District Attorney’s Office in Philadelphia leveled by avowed enemies of Abu-Jamal.
Those opponents, in their request to the Pa Supreme Court, included a claim that Philadelphia’s DA Office was not aggressive enough in its opposition to appeals filed by this inmate convicted in 1982 for murder of a Philadelphia policeman. Many internationally view Abu-Jamal as a political prisoner.
One consequence of that uncommon investigation ordered by the Supreme Court is to further delay deliberations on an appeal pending for Abu-Jamal that ironically centers on instances of misconduct against Abu-Jamal by a member of the Pa Supreme Court.
King’s Bench is an extraordinary authority exercised by the highest courts in just seven states. It permits those courts to override the ordinary legal process. Pennsylvania Supreme Court rulings limit King’s Bench to issues of “public importance” that require timely intervention. As a general legal rule, King’s Bench is not appropriate for an individual or group simply displeased with a governmental action.
Last fall the Pennsylvania Supreme Court rejected King’s Bench relief for two inmates who argued the death penalty violated the cruel punishment prohibition in Pennsylvania’s state Constitution. One of those inmates has languished in death row isolation for 25-years. A Pennsylvania Supreme Court commission appointed in 1999 documented flaws and racial bias in Pa’s death penalty, findings similar to those of a 2018 Pa legislative task force.
While Pennsylvania’s highest court did not deem death penalty injustices of public importance it did grant a King’s Bench request based on displeasure against Philadelphia’s DA Office from an individual and a group long engaged in a revenge campaign against Abu-Jamal…
For the rest of this article by LINN WASHINGTON, JR. in ThisCantBeHappening!, the uncompromised, collectively run, six-time Project Censored Award-Winning online alternative news site, please go to: https://thiscantbehappening.
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