3mo ago

‘Useful Idiot for Russia’: DNC Decides to Go Off on Jill Stein

www.thebulwark.com ‘Useful Idiot for Russia’: DNC Decides to Go Off on Jill Stein

The committee has largely kept quiet about the Green party nominee. But that’s now changing.

“Jill Stein is a useful idiot for Russia. After parroting Kremlin talking points and being propped up by bad actors in 2016 she’s at it again,” DNC spokesman Matt Corridoni said in a statement to The Bulwark. “Jill Stein won’t become president, but her spoiler candidacy—that both the GOP and Putin have previously shown interest in—can help decide who wins. A vote for Stein is a vote for Trump.”

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The problem is that "support genocide" is being used overly broadly.
The stated policy of the Biden/Harris administration is that Israel has a right to defend itself.
Surprise! They do. Every sovereign nation has that right.
As a result of that stated policy, Biden and Harris both support providing weapons and funding for the continual defense of Israel.
https://www.npr.org/2024/08/23/g-s1-19232/kamala-harris-israel-gaza-dnc
So follow me here:
Israel has a right to defend itself.
The US will support that defense.
Where it breaks down is Bibi and Likud taking that defensive support and directing it into the Genocide.
That's on THEM. The United States is making a good faith effort to provide support for the defense of Israel. Israel is intentionally misapplying that support.
Trump's stated policy is that Israel needs to kill everyone quicker.
https://apnews.com/article/trump-biden-israel-pr-hugh-hewitt-21faee332d95fec99652c112fbdcd35d
“They’re losing the PR war. They’re losing it big. But they’ve got to finish what they started, and they’ve got to finish it fast, and we have to get on with life.”
Only one of these two policies is pro-genocide, Trumps.
Biden/Harris is pro-defense which is illegitimately being used for genocide, not at all the same as being pro-genocide.
- That’s on THEM. The United States is making a good faith effort to provide support for the defense of Israel. Israel is intentionally misapplying that support.
  This is not a good argument. They're not infants, they have agency and the ability to perceive the impacts of their actions.
  Biden/Harris is pro-defense which is illegitimately being used for genocide, not at all the same as being pro-genocide.
  Eh, it certainly means they're not proactively anti-genocide.
  But more importantly it's not going to move someone uncomfortable with the Democratic material support for the genocide a single iota closer to accepting that there is still a better candidate both for Palestine and for all the aspects where they're actually good, not just not as a bad.
  
  They do have the ability to percieve the results of their actions, and they know if they cut Israel loose, they lose the election.
  
  Israeli vs. Palestinian support isn't nearly so overwhelming that there is simply one side that guarantees loss. This is an excuse by you for them, not a truth of politics.
  
  It actually is when the AIPAC machine is against you:
  https://www.commondreams.org/news/progressives-lose-oregon-primaries
  https://apnews.com/article/cori-bush-aipac-house-race-missouri-568c1a84974b8ba176a8d27a8375de42
  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jun/26/the-aipac-funded-candidate-defeated-jamaal-bowman-but-at-what-cost
  https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/2024-08-07/ty-article/another-victory-for-aipac-wesley-bell-and-8-5-million-defeat-squad-member-cori-bush/00000191-2adb-d2a9-a5dd-3edb30180001
  
  There's a world of policy positions between "give as many weapons as desired without condition" and "abandon Israel". AIPAC hasn't gone after Democrats that just express reservations and demand accountability and their effectiveness requires they actually have an argument that with a lot of ad money can sway meaningful numbers of voters.
  AIPAC's resources are not endless. They can drop big money in small races to influence them, but don't have the resources to veto a president. Those weren't crucial votes on Israel policy, they were members they thought were vulnerable. They couldn't oust Ilhan Omar and they're not even planning a challenge to Bernie Sanders despite his greater prominence and power. Learned helplessness however could give them everything they want without needing to have the actual power to force it.
  Finally, if you're trying to discourage antiwar opposition, saying she is effectively required to act in accordance with AIPAC's wishes is not going to sway anyone who's angry about Israel's genocide. If that were actually true then AIPAC supports genocide so, whether under duress or not, Democratic presidents will also be required to support genocide.
- So is your argument that the Biden/Harris administration is blind, or stupid?
  If I give my kid an AR-15 and they shoot up a school, I may or may not be culpable.
  But if I hand them another AR after the first shooting, they kill again, and then I give them another, and another, and keep handing them weapons for months, and theres a pile of 15,000 dead children, then I am definitely culpable.
  It doesn't matter how many times I tell the kid "this AR is for defense only".
  
  Oh, not at all, they know very well what they're doing.
  The unwavering support of Israel is due to two factors:
  The undue and oversized influence the Pro-Israel lobby has on American politics:
  https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus?ind=Q05
  The Evangelical opinion that we need to support Israel so Jeebus can come back:
  https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/truth-many-evangelical-christians-support-israel-rcna121481
  As with all good politics, it has nothing to do with "right" or "wrong", it's all about "money" and "power". That's it.
  
  Oh, not at all, they know very well what they’re doing.
  Then they know it's a genocide, they know what the weapons are used for, and they're sending the weapons anyway.
  That's. Supporting. Genocide.
  
  It isn't though.
  Look at our humanitarian support that often gets hijacked by corrupt governments.
  People are starving.
  We send support.
  Support gets hijacked.
  People keep starving.
  "WhY Do yOu sUpPoRt sTaRvAtIoN??!?!?!"
  We aren't going to stop sending support just because bad actors are misusing it.
  
  We aren’t going to stop sending support just because bad actors are misusing it.
  The bad actors in this case are the people we keep selling weapons to. No hijacking is taking place like in your example about food aid. We sell them weapons, they get immediately used for genocide.
  Pretending that Netanyahu totally meant to use the weapons for defense but accidentally goofed into using them for genocide is flimsy apologia indeed.
  
  Oh, there's no goof, they're intentionally mis-directing the aid. That's absolutely plain, but we won't stop providing it just because they're misusing it.
  
  That’s absolutely plain, but we won’t stop providing it just because they’re misusing it.
  Well, we should. Because it's making us complicit in an ongoing genocide.
  
  I agree we should, but we won't because of the larger political implications.
  Politicians are SCARED of AIPAC and they have a right to be:
  https://www.commondreams.org/news/progressives-lose-oregon-primaries
  https://apnews.com/article/cori-bush-aipac-house-race-missouri-568c1a84974b8ba176a8d27a8375de42
  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jun/26/the-aipac-funded-candidate-defeated-jamaal-bowman-but-at-what-cost
  https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/2024-08-07/ty-article/another-victory-for-aipac-wesley-bell-and-8-5-million-defeat-squad-member-cori-bush/00000191-2adb-d2a9-a5dd-3edb30180001
  
  Politicians are SCARED of AIPAC and they have a right to be:
  From where I'm sitting, it looks like centrists continue to support genocide because AIPAC funds challengers to progressive incumbents for them.
  
  Yup. Because if you go against AIPAC they will spend loads to remove you.
  There is no pro-Palestine PAC with the same cashflow, maybe there should be?
  Hey Crab! Let's get on that? Think we can get, I dunno, a billion from the Saudis and flood AIPAC out?
- Every sovereign nation has that right.
  Per the UN and international law and occupying country can NOT claim self defense
  Biden/Harris providing unlimited weapons and money is allowing Israel to finish the job before January 2025.
  Turning a blind eye and genocide denial because it's team blue committing it is weird and inhumane
  
  It's not going to be finished by January.
  Israel doesn't need our help to shoot little kids in the chest and head. Bullets are cheap.
  
  Israel doesn’t need our help to shoot little kids in the chest and head. Bullets are cheap.
  Then they can do it without our help. We don't need to be complicit.
  
  It will be a little more difficult if their supply of bullets was cut off, and their bunker buster bombs were cut off.
  
  Israel is the #8 arms dealer in the world. You can't cut off someone who is producing their own weapons.
  https://www.statista.com/chart/17316/share-of-global-arms-exports-by-country/
  
  They don't need our support which is why they're completely ignoring our demands.
  
  They don't produce the weapons they buy from us. Eventually they could stand up domestic production, but it would absolutely impact the current war. Israelis themselves have said that. You're just making up excuses the actual people involved don't make.
  
  They don’t need our support which is why they’re completely ignoring our demands.
  Then why not withdraw our support? They can "dEfEnD tHeMsElVeS" without our help.
  
  Because if we withdraw our support, they would get immediately attacked by Iran, and there would be chaos in US politics. Harris would lose the election, and Trump would be installed.
  
  Because if we withdraw our support, they would get immediately attacked by Iran, and there would be chaos in US politics
  We weren't selling them weapons for genocide before October 7. We can withhold weapons without withholding overall support. And Israel has nukes while Iran doesn't. Iran wasn't invading them before we started selling them weapons for genocide.
  I love how Israel can take care of themselves so there's no point in stopping weapons sales, but they can't take care of themselves so we have to keep selling them weapons.
  
  We have given Israel over $300 billion in weapons and support since their creation. It's not going to stop.
  https://www.cfr.org/article/us-aid-israel-four-charts
  
  We have given Israel over $300 billion in weapons and support since their creation. It’s not going to stop.
  The sunk cost fallacy is no reason to continue furnishing supplies for an ongoing genocide.
  
  I agree it's no reason to continue and they should have been cut off decades ago, but that doesn't mean it's going to stop.
  
  I'd imagine that having no allies in the Middle East isn't a strategically sound plan. If Israel is going to do their thing anyway and can arm themselves we gain nothing by rebuke. The only way we could enact real change would be to threaten or attack our only ally in the region which is self-defeating and doesn't solve the problem.
- This shit is so disjointed. Its not a genocide, its only a genocide because the countrys leaders want it to be, Biden is only arming a genocide because those leaders want to use the weapons for genocide. You're stuck, man, you cant get past any of the uncomfortable truths. You cant make an argument that its not a genocide. You cant make an argument that our government is not arming and funding that genocide. You cant make an argument that youre not supporting a candidate that is likely to continue to arm and fund that genocide.

418 comments