Grass Is Always Greener On The Other Side Even When It Is Brown. Socialism Returns And Kids Love It. Biden In Freefall?

Mason Rudikoff is our new nephew and was born a few days before Max.   His mom and dad, Craig and Asya live in the Denver area. Where's his hair?
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Some articles worth reading at your leisure:

How Many Divisions Does Chief Justice Roberts Have?Clarice FeldmanThe citizenship question offers a perfect opportunity for President Trump to stand up to a runaway court system. More

Welcome to the Democrat Freak ShowRich LogisAre the Democrat candidates trying to lose the 2020 election? More

America Awash in Lies and DisloyaltyJack WisdomIgnorance is on the march. Attempts at reasoning with the unreasonable are useless. More

A World Without AmericaSally Zelikovsky
A world without America is a world none of us would want to live in. More

The Democratic Party Is Making an Irreversible Left Turn

 Bradley Blakeman, The Hill

Harris vs. Biden Equals Two Flops

 Jay Ambrose, Newsday
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Socialism rears its head and the young are  eating  it up
Grass is always greener on the other side even when it is brown. (See 1 below.)
The social justice warriors are generally full of themselves because they claim to be  on the side of the righteous.  The basic problem is the new crop are also the same old  hypocrites whose actual accomplishments are minimal but the degree of fury they stir is monumental. They seek chaos more than calm , their ideas are bizarre but generally strike a receptive chord among the passionate.
Witness the Oregon Antifa crowd in their masks fighting for the rights of fascists while pummeling a defenseless photographer.  Where were the police to guard his freedom?  Oh, they were hiding behind their shields under orders from the city's radical mayor.
This is the new America the Democrats want to establish and this is why the more radical among their candidates have gained appeal.++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Biden in freefall (See 2 below.)+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Eli Hertz, a friend and fellow memo reader. (See 3 below.)++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Dick+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++1)

Socialism Is Back, and the Kids Are Loving It

How dangerous is the democratic socialist resurgence?

ROBBY SOAVE 

For decades, democratic socialism was an old man's ideology. Its adherents were aging hippies, old-time union organizers, and folks who fondly remembered the pre-'60s left. As recently as 2013, the average member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) was 68 years old. Even today, the ideology's best-known spokesperson, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I–Vt.), is 77.

But Sanders is suddenly an outlier. Today, most DSAers are young: The average member is 33. The ideology's second-best-known spokesperson, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–N.Y.), is just 29. And the DSA's ranks have grown larger as well as younger. Socialist gatherings buzz with youthful energy, and they are taking place all over the country.

This movement is flexing its political muscles, having helped elect a number of candidates to office—most famously Ocasio-Cortez, who has quickly become a prominent voice in Congress. The DSA has every intention of shifting the "Overton window" of American politics far to the left. And if we're not careful, it might succeed.

Despite his own advanced age—and even though he's not a member of the group himself— Sanders is by far the person most responsible for bringing this wave of young people into the DSA. His groundbreaking 2016 campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination helped spread socialist ideas to a generation born after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

"Bernie Sanders is who introduced me to socialism," says Alex Pellitteri, co-chair of New York City's chapter of the DSA's youth arm, the Young Democratic Socialists of America. "I was a Democrat, I was a liberal, but I had never really crossed that line to socialism."

Essentially, Sanders has done for democratic socialism what Ron Paul did for libertarianism in the late '00s: make it an exciting, cool, radical alternative to the mainstream parties' staid orthodoxies. Just as Paul challenged other Republicans' commitment to waging increasingly unpopular wars, Sanders slammed Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton for her Wall Street ties, her hawkish foreign policy, and her general lack of left-wing bona fides. Clinton won the nomination, but Sanders put up a much better fight than expected—a testament to the popular appeal of the ideas he was proposing.

Those ideas included a single-payer health insurance system, free tuition for all college students, a federal minimum wage of $15 an hour, and a more progressive tax system that confiscates wealth from the richest 1 percent and redistributes it to everyone else. Such proposals are particularly popular with younger Americans. According to a 2018 Harvard Institute of Politics poll, 55 percent or more of 18- to 29-year-old's support a $15-an-hour federal job guarantee, free college tuition, and Medicare for All. In a Harris Poll this year, 73 percent of millennial and Gen Z respondents thought the government should provide universal health care, and about half said they'd prefer to live in a socialist country. While Americans overall have a much more favorable view of capitalism than socialism, Americans between 18 and 24 do not: 61 percent have a positive reaction to the word socialism, compared to 58 percent for capitalism.

One reason for this is that people like Sanders have studiously worked to get a softer definition of socialism into circulation. Throughout the 20th century, the word evoked either the working class directly seizing the means of production or the government nationalizing industries, setting prices, and reducing or abolishing the right to own private property. The latter was much more common in practice, and the countries that took that route—the Soviet Union, mainland China, the Eastern European states, etc.—had horrific human rights records. Socialist regimes found it necessary to negate a whole host of individual rights and to arrest or murder dissidents in order to realize their ends.

But the founders of the DSA rejected Soviet-style socialism. They had more in common with the socialist parties of Western Europe, which established generous welfare states and sometimes nationalized industries, but which operated within the boundaries of a democratic political system, not a one-party police state. In 1962, future DSA founder Michael Harrington quarreled with the authors of the Port Huron Statement, a leftist student manifesto, because he felt they hadn't denounced the Soviet Union in strong enough terms. About a decade later, Harrington's former faction of the Socialist Party split off to form the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee, which later merged with another organization to become the DSA.

When today's most prominent democratic socialists are asked to explain their ideology, they tend to skimp on the substantial structural questions and lean on paeans to dignity, generosity, and equality. Sanders has defined democratic socialism as "the understanding that all of our people live in security and dignity" and "a government and an economy and a society which works for all." Ocasio-Cortez defines it as "democratic participation in our economic dignity."

It shouldn't be surprising that democratic socialism, reduced to a set of pleasant-sounding buzzwords and some proposals to give more people free stuff, is having a moment.

And what a moment it is. "When Harrington died in 1989," The Nation observes, "his organization hadn't grown much beyond the 6,000 aging members it had had at its founding." After a quarter-century, the members were even more aged and little else had changed. The DSA's official magazine, Democratic Left, had 6,700 subscribers in 2016.

A year later, in the wake of Sanders' first presidential campaign, the magazine had more than 28,000 paid subscribers. By 2018, it had 46,000. The organization now claims about 50,000 members. Many of them are concentrated in New York City, but DSA chapters can be found in 180 towns across the country.

The success of democratic socialism is much broader than just one organization. The socialist magazine Jacobin, founded in 2010 by Bhaskar Sunkara, increased its circulation from 10,000 in 2015 to 40,000 in 2018. The socialist podcast Chapo Trap House, which debuted in March 2016, is now the second most popular account on the crowdfunding platform Patreon, and its hosts rake in an average of $123,500 in donations per month.

Democratic socialists have won electoral victories too. The DSA is not a political party and does not run its own candidates, instead endorsing Democrats and independents who it feels are sufficiently committed to socialism. (Sex and the City actress Cynthia Nixon, for instance, received the DSA's endorsement in her unsuccessful 2018 primary run against New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.) In the 2016 and 2017 elections, DSA-backed candidates won a smattering of races around the country, including a seat in the Virginia House of Delegates. And in 2018, Ocasio-Cortez, a 20-something organizer and complete political unknown, won a stunning Democratic primary victory over incumbent Rep. Joe Crowley. She became an overnight sensation, and in the general election she was one of two DSA members to capture House seats. Rashida Tlaib (D–Mich.) was the other.

Ocasio-Cortez's savvy use of social media has generated tons of press coverage. She now has more Twitter followers than House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D–Calif.). Conservative websites and cable channels love to pillory her, but that has only helped her become one of the most visible members of Congress.

Sanders is the only major 2020 presidential candidate to self-identify as a democratic socialist. But most of the Democrats have signed on to DSA-friendly policies. Sens. Kamala Harris (D–Calif.), Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.), and Kirsten Gillibrand (D–N.Y.) have joined Sanders in backing Medicare for All. The Green New Deal, Ocasio-Cortez's pie-in-the-sky plan to tackle climate change while creating public works projects, has been endorsed by a host of candidates: Sanders, Warren, Harris, Gillibrand, Sens. Cory Booker (D–N.J.) and Amy Klobuchar (D–Minn.), and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro.

If the centrist standard-bearer, Vice President Joe Biden, wins the Democratic nomination, it will be a setback for the movement. But democratic socialists are not pinning all their hopes on the presidency, even as they work to install Sanders in the White House. They are patiently growing their ranks, expanding their influence, and increasing their cultural cachet.

So far, the strategy is working. If you assumed that socialism's appalling 20th century failures would relegate it permanently to the ash heap of history, you were wrong.

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2)  Biden in Freefall?

Joe Biden’s ratings have continued to go down in the face of his opponents surging. The Daily Caller reports:

Former Vice President Joe Biden’s poll numbers have plummeted to new lows following his widely panned performance in Thursday’s debate.

Biden was polling at 27% in the RealClearPolitics polling average as of Tuesday evening — Biden’s lowest average since launching his campaign in April, and well below his peak at 41% in May.

The most recent polls following Thursday’s debate show Biden dropping even further.

A CNN poll released Monday and a Quinnipiac poll released Tuesday both showed Biden at 22% — lower than he’s been in either poll since his campaign began 

If Biden continues to bleed support, the nomination could very well go a far more radical Democrat.

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3)

Mideast Peace Plan: A Dream  By Eli. E Hertz when one grasps the duration of the Arab-Israeli conflict and its roots, when one fully faces the depth of animosity towards Israel and the antisemitism that permeates the Arab world from the political, religious and intellectual elites down to the grass roots, the sheer magnitude of the challenge for peacemakers becomes painfully apparent. When one admits the implications of Palestinian society’s behavior – the repetitive pattern of zero-sum rejectionism on the diplomatic front and penchant for terrorism against civilians over the past 90 years and institution of this pattern as Palestinian ‘state policy’ since Oslo, the ‘readiness’ of Arabs for co-existence and the chances of a breakthrough assume their true proportions. The unwillingness to accept Israel as a legitimate non-Muslim political entity is epitomized by the Palestinian’s asymmetrical demands for the Right of Return of all Palestinian refugees to the Jewish state coupled with a demand that the West Bank and Gaza be cleansed of all Jewish neighborhoods.   The Problem is the Arab World, Not Just the Palestinians True peace cannot be based on a lie: There has never been ‘a cycle of violence’. Resorting to such neutral terminology requires the United States to acquiesce to and perpetuate a gross misrepresentation of reality: Putting Israel and its neighbors on the same footing totally ignores the asymmetry of the history of the conflict and something as fundamental as ‘cause and effect’. The truth is – one side has been the aggressor time-after-time. The Arabs have been the initiators of more than five major wars, political and economic boycotts and unbridled incitement. The Palestinians have launched wave-after-wave of terrorism against Israelis and other Jews and made hate the fuel that directs and runs their society. All this began before there was a State of Israel, before there was an ‘occupation’ and it continues unabated to this day.  In response to these onslaughts, Israel has not demanded reparations for the horrific causalities it has sustained in its fight for survival against repeated Arab aggression; it has only asked that it be allowed to live in peace with recognized and defendable borders and to develop according to its own Jewish ethos. This is hardly an excessive demand. Attempts to cajole the Arabs to seek compromise and failure to put a price on intransigence and intolerable behavior has only perpetuated the conflict; encouraged further bloodshed and hardened Arab demands. It’s time to call a spade a spade and demand some concrete ‘concessions’ from the Arabs, not just Israel.  American leaders need to have the courage to change course – to admit that without reciprocity and responsibility on the part of the entire Arab camp, there can be no genuine peace. It is time to demand that the Arab states own up to their complicity in the conflict and demonstrate in practice that they are dedicated to reconciliation and an end to the conflict. If the Arabs are serious about peace what is needed is deeds, not more words – beginning with an end to state-sponsored incitement and an end to using refugees as a weapon.   Minimizing the Conflict Does Not Work One of the historic flaws of past peace-making efforts is that they have been artificially limited in scope: Only a few decades ago attempts at ending the Arab Israeli conflict focused on bringing the Arab states to the negotiating table, assuming the Arab states Could then dictate realities to the Palestinians. Then came Oslo.  It took the opposite approach – assuming that the Palestinians hold the key to peace in the Middle East – that if an accommodation between Jews and Arabs in Israel and the Territories can be reached, everything else will fall into place. Both paths artificially reduce the conflict to ‘manageable size’, while true peace hinges on a comprehensive settlement both in terms of the parties and the issues.  Peace must encompass the entire Arab world, not just Palestinians vs. Israel. Comprehensive means one cannot leave rejectionists and extremists – be they Iran and Saudi Arabia or Hezbollah and Hamas – free to follow their own anti-Israel agendas and call it ‘peace.’ Moderate Arab states do not have to embrace Israel as a bosom buddy, but comprehensive peace does mean squarely facing a host of unsettled issues peacemakers prefer to turn a blind eye to as long as there is no open warfare. Among the substantive issues that can no longer be ignored:  ∙ Countries of the Middle East – the ‘outer rim’ and close neighbors continue to arm themselves with weapons designed to destroy Israel – including weapons of mass destruction.  ∙ The Arab world remains a global hub for antisemitism and a hotbed of vicious incitement and demonization of Israel. Even those with peace treaties with Israel continue to reject Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state or pursue polities that will ensure Israel remains a Jewish state.   ∙ Countries presumably at peace with Israel have increasingly crossed the line between a ‘cold peace’ and unacceptable behavior. Using Palestinians as a ‘proxy’ in lieu of their own direct involvement and legitimizing and encouraging Palestinian terrorism and zero-sum demands can hardly pass for ‘peace.’ Sweeping Tough Problems under the Carpet or ‘Saving them for Later’ Breeds Dangerous Illusions    A comprehensive peace must avoid the pitfall of Oslo. Oslo suffered from the ultimate of anomalies: A decade of negotiations and interim agreements ‘drained the peace process of content’ while at the same time ‘gaining momentum’. How does it work? Time-and-again the tough issues – the ‘land mines’ on the road to peace with the Palestinians such as the Right of Return have been removed. Unfortunately, instead of defusing this and other explosive issues and moving them to the side, every time an issue of substance has resurfaced, the parties have removed the ‘land mine’ to prevent an impasse that would bring down the peace process, reburying these time bombs down the road.  Thus, the peace process ‘went forward’ interim agreement after interim agreement until all the land mines, such as Jerusalem and the Right of Return, came to rest – ready and waiting to explode ‘on the threshold of peace.’  The folly was assuming that the so-called momentum created by the ‘process’ would ultimately allow the parties to jump over these barriers in the 90th minute of the game at Camp David when Arafat and Barak came to hammer out a final status agreement in July 2000. That did not happen, could not happen because objectively, in terms of substance, for ten years, the process of conflict resolution between Palestinians and Jews has been confined to small increments and a host of issues of marginal importance. This has been the core essence of Oslo: the peace ‘process’ most lasting legacy has been the creation of an illusion of ‘process’.  The illusion of ‘progress’ has not merely left Washington and Jerusalem disappointed.  It was responsible for raising expectations of a Return among Palestinians to a fever pitch.   This mistake should not be repeated. Yet, today other forms of ‘removing the land mines and burying them further down the road’ continue to surface: One is the road map which makes a Palestinian state a forgone conclusion independent of solving the refugee problem and final borders. Another is the notion of a trusteeship – one of the latest ‘creative solutions’ being floated in the marketplace of ideas. Both are road maps for further strife down the road, not reconciliation. The seven year Oslo experiment in limited Palestinian autonomy under the Palestinian Authority has produced but another Arab dictatorial polity rift with civil rights violations that is as much a danger to its people as its neighbors; an independent Palestinian state will create just the kind of rogue state that the United States is in the process of eliminating elsewhere. Peace-makers must deal with the nitty-gritty – including both substantive issues that concern Israelis and Palestinians and substantive issues that concern the Arab world as a whole that have also been left in abeyance or swept under the carpet. If these substantive issues cannot be solved, one must accept this reality – not call it peace.  ∙ A solution must recognize what the ‘nitty-gritty’ of peace means:  The barrier to peace is not borders or territory.  It is the refusal of the Arabs to accept the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish state and the right of Israel to resist solutions that are designed to compromise its ‘Jewish nature.’   ∙ A solution cannot minimize the scope of the problem. The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the core of a much larger conflict between Israel and the Arab world. One cannot settle for less than an integrated solution – one that spans the entire Arab world of which the Palestinians are only a part. The objective of peacemakers cannot be less than a genuine ‘just and lasting peace’, not cosmetic stop-gap measure that require Israel to make concessions while leaving explosive issues ready to flare up in the future.   ∙  The Arab world is the problem, and therefore it must be part of the solution.  Israel did not start this conflict nor does it perpetrate it, unless one accepts the premise that Jews have no right to be in their ancient homeland and should all go back to Poland and Baghdad. Incitement must end. Hatred can’t be left to fester while pretending to ‘cement a peace.’ Resolution of the Arab refugee problem must be a pillar of any genuine peace process. Resolution also hinges on the Arab states accepting a solution to the Arab refugee problem that does not undermine Israel’s right to live as a Jewish state. Acceptance of Israel’s Jewishness requires the Arab states play an active and positive role in solving the refugees problem they helped create – resettling them within the vast reaches of the Middle East. What has stymied such a solution to date is the unwillingness of Arabs as a whole, and Palestinians in particular, to recognize the legitimacy of Jewish claims and rights, alongside Arab claims and rights – a breakthrough without which there can be no talk of ending the conflict.

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