Texas Longhorns with newborn calf in Bluebonnets

Texas Longhorns with newborn calf in Bluebonnets

Please note I have a new phone number...

512-517-2708

Alan Maki

Alan Maki
Doing research at the LBJ Library in Austin, Texas

It's time to claim our Peace Dividend

It's time to claim our Peace Dividend

We need to beat swords into plowshares.

We need to beat swords into plowshares.

A program for real change...

http://peaceandsocialjustice.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-progressive-program-for-real-change.html


What we need is a "21st Century Full Employment Act for Peace and Prosperity" which would make it a mandatory requirement that the president and Congress attain and maintain full employment.


"Voting is easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens"

- Ben Franklin

Let's talk...

Let's talk...

Sunday, August 2, 2015

Barack Obama was allowed to suck the aspirations for real change back into the Democratic Party where democracy was suffocated; will we allow and enable Bernie Sanders to do the same thing? Do we want Hillary Clinton?

Decision time is upon us; what will we do?



What needs to be done?



What can we do?



A decision is going to have to be made by Bernie Sanders and his supporters and those of us intending to vote for him in the Democratic Primary.



The decision is whether or not Bernie remaining in the Primary struggle is worth it if he has no chance of winning the Democratic Party nomination because the objective is not to win the Democratic Party's nomination but that Bernie Sanders is on the 2016 General Election ballot so he has a fighting chance of becoming president... this is the point of his campaign; or am I wrong?



A decision has to be made on whether or not we are going to develop and build a new political party that will run candidates for all these House and Senate seats, too, so we can sweep these Wall Street bribed politicians from office.



No matter what Bernie decides to do we have to take advantage of this tremendous momentum of support for him that is more about breaking free from this two-party trap in challenging Wall Street for political and economic power and get us on the road to real peace without all these dirty imperialist wars and on the road to meaningful reform measures and legislation when it comes to a Minimum Wage that is a real living wage with full employment, a national public health care system, a national child care system and real solutions to head off this impending climate change/global warming catastrophe.



These issues, together with Bernie Sanders' twelve point agenda that is basically the same agenda Ralph Nader ran on should be the basis for uniting a very large section of the American people.



Why should we allow ourselves to be sucked back in to the two-party trap at a time when there is such tremendous potential for breaking free?



Certainly among the more than 100,000 people who turned out to participate in the over 3,500 events to support Bernie Sanders last Wednesday evening there are more than enough people to bring together roundtable discussions about all of this as a base for launching a new political party whether that party is some kind of formation like taking the Vermont Progressive Party national or starting something from scratch or seizing the opportunity to turn the Justice Party into the kind of progressive party it was intended to be or working through the Green Party; these are just a few of our options but where we want to end up at is with some kind of national party similar to Canada's socialist oriented New Democratic Party which has yielded so many meaningful reforms for working class families and been a bulwark in the struggle to defend and expand democracy enabling ordinary people formerly locked out of the political process to participate to their full potential. We saw how this resulted in the Conservatives being driven from political power in Alberta. If such progressive grassroots and rank-and-file electoral activity can succeed in Alberta which is similar to our Texas it can succeed right here in the United States.



This is not wishful thinking based solely on hope for change because the very successful socialist Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party proved the viability of such politics right here in the United States, too. Only severe government repression and corrupt conniving and shenanigans by unscrupulous and dishonest politicians like Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale were able to thwart, stymie and destroy the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party but its base and foundation remain to be built on.



And it was former socialist Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party Governor Elmer Benson who chaired the efforts in building the national Progressive Party in the late 1940's; also smashed by severe government repression initiated by both Democrats and Republicans... first with the Democratic Party backed Dies Committee and then with Joseph McCarthy and then McCarthy and Hubert Humphrey and their Communist Control Act and House UnAmerican Activities Committee with Bobby Kennedy as its legal counsel working with the pathetic degenerate fascist, racist bigot Roy Cohn.



No matter what, we need to begin thinking right NOW about our options because more and more it is looking like Bernie Sanders has no possibility of succeeding in gaining the Democratic Party's nomination simply because big money Wall Street interests are controlling and manipulating the Democratic Party in an undemocratic way and no one can explain how this Wall Street control and manipulation of the Democratic Party can be ended.



Certainly even Bernie Sanders understands he has no chance whatever in gaining the nomination of the Democratic Party National Convention.



This isn't just about Bernie Sanders this entire electoral struggle is about defending, protecting and advancing the rights and livelihoods of working class families on and off the job.



Even for the diehard Bernie supporters who think he will succeed through some kind of miracle in obtaining the nomination of the Democratic Party they have a responsibility to help us assure there is a back-up plan in place that includes a way to challenge each and every bribed and corrupt Wall Street beholden politician occupying a seat in the House and Senate.



We need a clean sweep.



Maybe we could just call ourselves something as simple as "The New Broom Coalition" with the intent to hold roundtable discussions to address this very important issue of the need for a full-fledged national political party which would be the voice for liberals, progressives and leftists.



So; if we are fed up with war, poverty, unemployment, lack of decent health care and scared of what is in store for our children and grandchildren when it comes to global warming and climate change we can't allow this opportunity to be squandered by allowing our concerns to be suffocated, again, by the Democratic Party.



We can't allow on individual to make a decision about what needs to be done.



Bernie's campaign is supposed to be about full citizen participation in the political process. This includes making the decision on whether or not we need a new political party through which we, as working people, are empowered to look after our own interests when it comes to everything from war and peace to what kind of health care reform we need and wages and working conditions.



This is what democracy is all about.