Democrats

So far, Hillary Clinton has been able to count on the support of African-American voters. But that support is founded on inaccurate perceptions of Bill Clinton's record. If Sanders supporters are able to get the facts out, her support there will crumble and the Dems will nominate Sanders; if not, she may take the nomination and remove any reason for progressives to stay in the party, hastening its well-overdue collapse. Going to be interesting either way. Get your marshmallows ready to roast over the flaming wreckage of the American political system as we know it...

Why Hillary Clinton Doesn’t Deserve the Black Vote (The Nation)

What have the Clintons done to earn such devotion? Did they take extreme political risks to defend the rights of African Americans? Did they courageously stand up to right-wing demagoguery about black communities? Did they help usher in a new era of hope and prosperity for neighborhoods devastated by deindustrialization, globalization, and the disappearance of work?

No. Quite the opposite.

Image: Wikipedia

For a while yesterday, I was feeling happy with the Democrats. The news was that they had worded a plank of their platform so as to remove a pointless reference to "God" in the phrase "make the most of their God-given potential". It wasn't much, but it looked like a nod to secularism and religious liberty, to the idea that a significant number of Americans are not believers in the idea that some big daddy in the sky is responsible for assigning us our potential. Some of us believe in a big mommy, some in a committee, and some that our potential is based on a combination of heredity and environment. I was pleased that the Dems had made a small move to acknowledge that we have a secular government that leaves these beliefs up to each individual.

No question that Bill Clinton gave a good speech last night -- reading the transcript even I had to nod along in agreement in places. But his remarks about changing voting procedures to reduce turnout were pretty ironic:

If you want — if you want America — if you want every
American to vote and you think it is wrong to change voting
procedures…just — just to reduce the turnout of younger, poorer, minority, and disabled voters, you should support Barack Obama.

Has everyone already forgotten about his wife's disenfranchisement tricks in Nevada during the 2008 primary campaign? And how Bill defended those dirty tactics?