{"id":159231,"date":"2020-05-04T12:00:33","date_gmt":"2020-05-04T11:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=159231"},"modified":"2020-04-26T10:09:26","modified_gmt":"2020-04-26T09:09:26","slug":"trump-and-biden-trade-hit-pieces-distinctions-without-a-difference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2020\/05\/trump-and-biden-trade-hit-pieces-distinctions-without-a-difference\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump and Biden Trade Hit Pieces – Distinctions without a Difference"},"content":{"rendered":"

25 Apr 2020 – <\/em>This season\u2019s sequel to the Game of Thrones <\/em>features reality TV star and current occupant of the Oval Office versus the former Senator from MBNA<\/a> and two-term VP. It\u2019s time to binge watch dueling hit pieces from the US electoral duopoly going at it.<\/p>\n

The narrower the distinctions between Democrats and Republicans, the more vociferous they get in inflating those distinctions, as if a distinction were really a difference. As liberation president of Tanzania Julius Nyerere famously observed, \u201cThe United States is a one-party state but, with typical American extravagance, they have two of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

War with China \u2013 thinking through the unthinkable<\/strong><\/p>\n

Behind the blame game between the Democrats and the Republicans is a bedrock consensus, for example, on identifying China as not just a commercial rival but as a future enemy in a nuclear war. The US imperial ship of state is set on a collision course with China. Democrat Obama \u201cpivoted\u201d to Asia; Republican Trump seamlessly followed course. The RAND Corporation, a quasi-governmental think tank created to provide intelligence to the US Armed Forces, published a position paper<\/a> that spells it out: War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The corporate media echo the meme of China as the sinister enemy. The Democrat-leaning New York Times<\/em> reports<\/a>, \u201cChinese agents helped spread messages that sowed virus panic in US.\u201d \u201cAlarmed by fake text messages and social media posts,\u201d the newspaper of record warns, \u201cexperts see a convergence with Russian tactics.\u201d With no sense of shame, the Times <\/em>then accuses the \u201cpro-Trump news outlets\u201d of promoting \u201cconspiracy theories.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the Republican side, Fox commentator Tucker Carlson hyperbolically exclaims<\/a>, \u201cChina did this [coronavirus pandemic] to the world and we should not pretend otherwise.\u201d \u00a0Paranoically exhorting that \u201cin very real ways, the Chinese government controls us,\u201d Carlson demands, \u201cat some point our leaders should be held accountable\u201d for allowing China to \u201cundermine\u201d us.<\/p>\n

So ditto head Biden issues a campaign video entitled<\/a>, \u201cTrump did not hold China accountable,\u201d attacking Trump for correctly saying, \u201cChina has been working very hard to contain the coronavirus.\u201d This view, incidentally, is shared by the World Health Organization<\/a>, which praised China for its exemplary handling of the pandemic. The corresponding Trump hit piece retorts<\/a> with a video of Biden saying, \u201cI complimented him [Trump] with dealing with China.\u201d<\/p>\n

Proving that the rightwing media and Trump do not have a lock on xenophobia and racism, the Democratic Party ad shows Biden screaming, \u201cI would be on the phone with China and making it clear, we are going to need to be in your country! You have to be open!\u201d And \u201cTrump let in 40,000 travelers from China\u2026left this country unprepared and unprotected\u201d from the Asian menace.<\/p>\n

Non-essential services \u2013 rubber stamping the bipartisan consensus<\/strong><\/p>\n

The direction of US imperial policy is unquestioned as the partisan rivals compete to see, for example, who can be the bigger Sinophobe. Not mentioned is that China\u2019s rising economic power is in part a consequence of the US neoliberal consensus to export industrial production to low-wage Asia. Protecting the US working class is not what the politicians are squabbling about.<\/p>\n

Nor do they deeply differ on Trump\u2019s National Security Strategy<\/a>, which broke with the previous characterization of the world as a \u201ccommunity of nations\u201d to the present description of a great power \u201ccompetitive arena.\u201d In the drive to achieve global \u201cfull spectrum dominance,\u201d China and Russia are identified as military targets.<\/p>\n

Substantive unity between the Democrats and Republicans is obscured by the smoke and mirrors of partisan bickering. On some issues, the duopoly is so unanimous they do not even bother to make a show of debating.<\/p>\n

On March 8, the US House of Representatives pushed through a bipartisan resolution increasing illegal unilateral sanctions against Nicaragua, which passed on a unanimous voice<\/a> vote in eight minutes, with no debate and no one speaking in opposition.<\/p>\n

By the end of March, after only a \u201csmidgeon of negotiating,\u201d Congress unanimously<\/a> passed the record astronomical $2 trillion CARES Act boondoggle<\/a>. While workers are experiencing the highest recorded unemployment, the bipartisan act will gift 43,000 rich citizens an average \u201cwindfall<\/a>\u201d of $1.7 million each, according to Forbes.<\/em><\/p>\n

Then while healthcare, transportation, sanitation, and other vital workers remain on the job, the Congress critters went on recess to shelter in place, demonstrating that theirs is not an essential service<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The decadence of the US two-party system<\/strong><\/p>\n

Being on the take at the expense of the US people is a bipartisan pastime and a mark of finesse for the inside-the-beltway crowd. Senators on both sides of the aisle benefited by insider trading<\/a>, dumping stocks after a confidential coronavirus briefing.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s corruption needs no elaboration, but he can legitimately criticize the Dems on the same count. A Trump hit piece<\/a> points out that father Biden took son Hunter on a taxpayer funded official US government visit to China, where the son profited with a \u201cbillion dollar deal\u201d with a subsidiary of the Bank of China.<\/p>\n

The highest-ranking Democrat, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appears in a video<\/a> showing how she\u2019s persevering through shelter-in-place, giggling in front of her $24k refrigerators stocked with expensive ice cream. \u00a0A Trump hit piece<\/a> juxtaposes that image with one of the millions of unemployed in this country saying, \u201cwe\u2019re starving.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joe Biden cluelessly compounds the error by tweeting<\/a>, Nancy Pelosi has \u201cgreat taste\u201d in ice cream. Meanwhile nearly 2,700 families preregistered at the Greater Cleveland Food Bank<\/a> drive-up. NPR reported 10,000 cars waited hours in line for emergency food<\/a> aid in San Antonio.<\/p>\n

A couple of years ago, former Democratic Party presidential candidates John Kerry and Hillary Clinton attended a wedding hosted by the richest mogul in India for his daughter, estimated to cost $100 million<\/a> by Bloomberg. While John and HRC inanely danced<\/a> Bollywood-style, 170 million Indians barely subsisted on less than $2 per day.<\/p>\n

Internet comedian Jimmy Dore<\/a> observes, \u201cThe Democratic Party is so corrupt, so unbelievably corrupt and out of touch, that a guy who sits [not his exact word] on a golden toilet gets to make fun of them for being out of touch elitists. And it lands.\u201d<\/p>\n

We will have to wait until November to see who the Electoral College anoints in its game of thrones. Even the premier progressive pundit Noam Chomsky<\/a> finds the only remotely redeeming quality in Biden is that he isn\u2019t Trump. Biden supported Bush\u2019s Iraq war and sided with the Republicans<\/a> to defeat the student bankruptcy and prescription medicine price control bills. He voted for cutting Social Security and for confirming Antonin Scalia. With Democrats like this, you don\u2019t need Republicans.<\/p>\n

The problem with voting for either the Republicans or Democrats \u2013 besides that they rule \u2013 is that you need a score card to figure out which is the lesser evil. That problem can be avoided by helping to build a left third-party movement. As socialist and one-time presidential candidate Eugene Debs commented: \u201cI\u2019d rather vote for something I want and not get it, than vote for something I don\u2019t want and get it\u201d<\/em>\u2026 like war with China.<\/p>\n

________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em>Roger Harris<\/em> is a member of the <\/em>TRANSCEND Network<\/a> and the immediate past president of the Task Force on the Americas<\/a>, a 33-year-old human rights organization in solidarity with the social justice movements of Latin America and the Caribbean. He is active with the Campaign to End US-Canadian Sanctions against Venezuela<\/a> and is on the state central committee of the <\/em>Peace and Freedom Party<\/em><\/a>, the only ballot-qualified socialist party in California. He recently visited Syria for an international conference on the impacts of economic sanctions by the US and its allies on over 30 countries in the world.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

25 Apr 2020 – This season\u2019s sequel to the Game of Thrones features reality TV star and current occupant of the Oval Office versus the former Senator from MBNA and two-term VP. The narrower the distinctions between Democrats and Republicans, the more vociferous they get in inflating those distinctions, as if a distinction were really a difference.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":127604,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[392,70],"class_list":["post-159231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members","tag-elections","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/127604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}