Not the Hillary Establishment Tip Jar…

Also, this is an open thread if you wish to post other news.

This tidbit caught my eye..

Bill Maher enters damage-control mode with next “Real Time” guests

Symone Sanders, a democratic strategist, CNN commentator and former advocate for Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign struck a similar note. “I am still planning on doing the show Friday,” she told HuffPost. “I thought Maher’s comment, Ben Sasse’s reaction and the crowd’s applause were all equally distasteful, inappropriate and offensive. I am glad Maher too recognized as such and issued an apology.”

This is all well and good (and makes for solid television). Yet, the question must be asked: in showcasing people who are, to some extent or another, accepting of Maher’s apology and willing to talk the matter out with him, is the host delivering a strong and necessary conversation on race and privilege or simply serving himself?

Certainly, the show will be on Maher’s terms and — perhaps pleasingly for the famously smarmy, self-assured host — all about him. While the live format could allow his guests to throw him curveballs, he will remain in the driver’s seat.

This lineup, and the fact that Maher looks willing to talk about this issue, could wind up creating an episode that’s a great step forward, a true apologia combined with a real confrontation of the icky, nasty places most white liberals would rather not believe exist within themselves. Then again, it could wind up as a self-aggrandizing exercise in cynical rebranding, damage control paired with further polishing of Maher’s already outsized self regard.

http://www.salon.com/2017/06/06/bill-maher-n-word-real-time-guests/

What’s a former Bernie Sanders campaign aide doing in the UK?

With so much at stake, the progressive cavalry has turned up to aid Labour’s efforts ahead of the vote. Claire Sandberg, an American activist and former digital organizing director for Bernie Sanders during his primary bid, is in the UK now, advising Labour-aligned groups working to defeat May and the Conservatives.
I spoke to Sandberg over email on Monday about what she’s doing, the state of the race and how its results might affect the US political scene. Here is a transcript of our conversation, lightly condensed and edited.

Krieg: First, the news. There have now been two terror attacks during your time in the UK — Manchester and then, of course, on Saturday night in London. So that’s three in a relatively short period of time. Will the attacks weigh on voters — and could they tilt the results on June 8?

Sandberg: There’s no way for the attacks to not be on the minds of many voters. The sense that these attacks are rare or difficult to plan, or that after police raids and arrests people will be safe for a while, is giving way to the expectation that more attacks like these may be inevitable, and could come at any time.
But how that increased worry about terrorism will play out politically may not be in the way outsiders would expect.

The tabloid press was already in overdrive even before this latest attack, trying to paint Corbyn as soft on terrorism because of his talks with Sinn Fein, the Irish nationalist party, in the 1970s and 1980s. But I think, increasingly, many voters are seeing that line of argument as a cheap political attack that doesn’t bear any relevance to today’s terror threat, and they feel that Theresa May, who was home secretary for six years before becoming Prime Minister, has a lot more to explain to voters.
In particular, she’s drawing a lot of criticism over her drastic cuts to the police forces — there are 20,000 fewer officers now than there were in 2010. Law enforcement leaders had previously voiced alarm over those steep cuts, but May accused them of “crying wolf.”

May’s response to London Bridge has been to call for censorship on the Internet and a new agency to counter extremist ideology, but her four-point proposal was immediately blasted by former top law enforcement officers, who decried her cuts and said that May had only been able to temporarily step up the police presence following Manchester by forcing cops to work 16-hour days and take mandatory overtime. Now, May and her deputies are scrambling to explain themselves, while Jeremy Corbyn is calling for the cuts to be reversed and for security services to be fully funded.

Read the rest here: http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/06/politics/uk-election-corbyn-labour-us-progressive-activist/

Why Elites Hate: The liberal contempt for the Middle Class is Baked into Identity Politics

Nine years after Barack Obama accused small-towners of clinging to guns or religion, nearly three years after Jonathan Gruber was shown to have attributed ObamaCare’s passage to the stupidity of the American voter, and eight months after Hillary Clinton pronounced half of Donald Trump’s voters “irredeemable,” Democrats are now getting some sophisticated advice: You don’t win votes by showing contempt for voters.

In the last week or so a flurry of articles have appeared arguing for toning down the looking-down. In the New Republic Michael Tomasky writes under the heading “Elitism Is Liberalism’s Biggest Problem.” Over at the New York Times , Joan C. Williams weighs in with “The Dumb Politics of Elite Condescension.” Slate goes with a Q&A on “advice on how to talk to the white working class without insulting them.” Stanley Greenberg at the American Prospect writes on “The Democrats’ ‘Working-Class Problem,’ ” and Kevin Drum at Mother Jones asks for “Less Liberal Contempt, Please.”

None of these pieces are directed at Trump Nation. To the contrary, they are pitched to progressives still having a hard time coming to grips with The Donald’s victory last November. Much of what these authors write is sensible. But it can also be hilarious, particularly when the effort to explain ordinary Americans to progressive elites reads like a Margaret Mead entry on the exotic habits of the Samoans.

Mr. Tomasky, for example, informs progressives that middle Americans—wait for it—“go to church.” They have friends (“and sometimes even spouses”) “who are Republicans.” “They don’t feel self-conscious saluting the flag.” Who knew?

Most of these writers allow that there is at least some fraction of Trump voters who are not deplorable. What they do not appreciate is how condescending they can be while advising their fellow Democrats to be less condescending. Exhibit A: Mr. Drum’s recommendation that Democrats can “broaden [their] appeal” because these are “persuadable, low information folks.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-elites-hate-1496702030

I recognize this is from the WSJ, but bear in mind, many WSJ’er voted for Clinton.

Yo, this is almost ugly:

Hillary Clinton seems to have launched yet another political campaign in 2017, one to convince Americans that they absolutely did the right thing by not electing her president in 2016.

Which is not to say the victorious alternative was ideal either.

But the ongoing public Clinton struggle with herself is alienating even supporters, and it’s crippling the required remodeling and rejuvenation of her aged Democrat Party that needs a very long rehab at some political spa.

Read more here:
http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/article154580204.html