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Wednesday, April 8, 2020

In Short, I'm Unhappy With the Democrat Result

So here we are.

Joe Biden is the worst possible Democratic candidate for public education; only Blomberg would have been worse.

It's possible that Biden so closely resembles an establishment Republican that traditional GOP members who are appalled by Trump will vote Biden. If there are any significant number.

The campaign will be awful and stupid and largely pointless, because Trump's supporters will stick by him, firmly insulated by Fox against any facts that don't fit their love of Beloved Leader. There can't be more than three or four undecided votes in the country, which means the campaign will be all about managing the actual vote. The GOP will focus on voter suppression (voter ID, closing polls in non-GOP areas, all the stuff they've been honing for years) not even just because they want power but because they believe some Americans should not count, and the Dems will try to somehow drive enthusiasm among the Common Folks that party hoi polloi barely can identify, let alone identify with. The GOP/Russians will remind all the Democratic voters about how the candidate they actually wanted was screwed over and don't they just want to stay home to teach the party a lesson. A whole bunch of low information voters will go ahead and believe whatever lies the Trump camp continues to pump out, with highly educated people somehow believing only what Fox tells them today (even if it's the opposite of what they said yesterday). The Democrats will struggle with creating a compelling campaign around a guy who has the same rapey mental blur corporate lovefest as the current occupant. It will be ugly, and it will suck, and by the time we're done, there will be a whole lot of people that I won't be able to look at the same way ever again-- kind of like the last four years, only worse.

And at the end, whatever the outcome, public education will once again have no friends in high places.

So, I'm not having a great day here. I'll hope and pray and work for the chance to hear about Senate Majority Leader Elizabeth Warren, and I'll wish that the amplification of Trumpian hatefulness won't completely ruin every day, and I will go and vote and hate every minute of it. And please God, oh, please, let nobody that I care about try to explain to me why a vote for that hollow shell of a virtueless gorm in the White House is a good and justifiable thing.  And then I'll get back to agitating over the privatizing profiteering disruption that passes for education policy in this country.

I did call this, just over a year ago. I said I wouldn't like the candidate, and I don't. I like him even less because all the DFERs and neo-liberal privatizers and corporate money-grubbing disruptors are right now sitting at home and writing each other emails about how relieved they are that the gravy train will, red or blue, keep running to the green. And I swear-- the first union leader who starts to tell me about the virtues of a seat at the table-- well, I will say some very cranky words.

It just, you know, sucks.

I'll practice saying, "Yes, that thing about him stinks. How is Trump any better? And please answer only in actual facts." I'll put on my big boy pants and get back to it, but this space has always been where I dump out my frustration, so congratulations if you made the mistake of clicking on this link.

Silver lining? I see none. Just a reminder that waiting for some political beast to come lead us to a more just nation is a fool's game. We've all got to do the work ourselves.

5 comments:

  1. Oh, everything here...everything….is exactly how I feel. Thank you for venting for me and others who feel the same. Right now I have no confidence that this election will go well and as for the results, no matter what they will be, we can only hope that Biden decides to use Bernie and his ideas to get something done.

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  2. Re: "...with highly educated people somehow believing only what Fox tells them today (even if it's the opposite of what they said yesterday)" Maybe more closely examining 'highly educated' could lead to a better analysis?

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  3. Have you tried to contact Biden to share your agenda? He seems to be willing to listen to people. It will take persistence and lots creative efforts. That is a good way to channel all the rage into something constructive.

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  4. The #1 donor group to Bernie was teachers. Bernie is hanging on to his delegates to leverage some of his agenda into the platform. Let's remind Bernie that teachers and public schools need consideration.

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  5. You're kidding, right? The guy who tells people who try to talk to him, "Why don't you go vote for Trump"? This is the guy you think listens to anyone?

    Oh, sure, he might learn to say some of the right things to "appease" the left, but he doesn't believe a word of it and not one of those things will make it into his policies. We saw it in 2016, it will be worse in 2020.

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