Opinion
Requiem For a Failed Presidential Campaign and a Party
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III
“…People know that something’s wrong; Everybody oughta’ know winter…The truth is there ain’t nobody fighting; Because, well nobody knows what to save, Brother, save your soul; Lord knows it’s winter in America. The Constitution, a noble piece of paper; With free society; Well, they struggled but they died in vain; And now democracy is ragtime on the corners; On the cord, hoping it’d rain…” Winter in America – Gil Scott-Heron
The 2024 American presidential election is over. The people have spoken. The world is shocked! Trump won! Americans fell for it again, or did they…fall for it?
Many in the African American community are angry, shocked and looking for the culprits. Who did this to VP Harris? Somebody must be held accountable! The audacity of those misogynistic Latino men, White women and those angry Black men who hate Black women. All of them must he held accountable. What damage does this do to the psyche of Black Women? VP Harris was ENTITLED to the Oval Office and has been denied.
According to Senator Lindsey Graham in 2015, Trump is a “a race-baiting xenophobic religious bigot.” Senator Rick Perry warned us that Trump, “doesn’t know the difference between truth and lies…” while Senator Ted Cruz said, “he lies, practically every word that comes out of his mouth…” With all of that, Hilary Clinton lost to him in 2016 and now VP Harris has lost to him as well. Trump has prevailed…AGAIN! Why? Don’t ask why Harris lost; ask yourself why did this “race-baiting xenophobic religious bigot,” win. AGAIN!
It’s too easy to chalk this up to or write this off as being a “masterclass in white privilege.” It’s too simplistic to attribute this cataclysmic failure to “hatred towards Black women.” Too many Democrats, their pundits, and some analysts are trying to write this historic blunder off as America will “never elect a Black woman as president”. Stop it! The bad lies are the lies you tell yourself. Even worse are the ones you tell yourself and believe.
That flawed “hatred towards Black women” trope is more convenient than making the necessary course corrections that the Democratic Party needs to make in order to help America live up to its promise. Instead, odds are that they will continue to “maintain course and speed”, running aground or striking the iceberg time and again. To truly be able to move forward, the Party and its African American constituency must first look inward and self-assess before placing blame.
On March 6, 1857, Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Taney opined in Plessy v Ferguson, “…negro’s had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations; and so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect…”
I believe that the racist, white supremist, eugenic based mindsets that led to the holdings in Plessey, even though that decision has since been overturned by the Brown decision and others, continues to influence mindsets in America today. Variations of this racist theme continue to be the reality in America. This is not new. This not a news flash. This is everyday life in America for Black people. So, to boil VP Harris’ loss down to “no one will vote for a Black woman” is too simplistic. It is an excuse, not analysis. It lets the Democratic party and her off the hook for their failures. Hilary Clinton (a woman) won the popular vote in 2016 with 64M votes. Harris (a Black woman) received 68M votes. Barack Obama (a Black man) was elected as president twice.
So, before we turn to the very simplistic knee jerk refrain that America will not elect a Black woman to be president ask yourself, did the Democrats set themselves up for this outcome? Was VP Harris the best candidate? Did the Party and her campaign make mistakes that resulted in this failure regardless of phenotype?
Start the analysis here, Democrats and their financial backers knew that President Biden’s faculties were declining before he embarrassed himself and the party during the debate. The phrase “non compos mentis” comes to mind.
It was a huge mistake to anoint VP Harris as the nominee. James Carville wrote in early July that Democrats needed to move away from Biden, “But it can’t be by anointing (VP Harris) or anyone else as the presumptive…nominee. We’ve got to do it out in the open — the exact opposite of what Donald Trump wants us to do.” Carville was correct.
Once on the stump, VP Harris ran a campaign based upon the politics of personality and identity, not a policy-based campaign. It took until mid-September before her webpage even had a policy tab and the policies that were listed were more campaign talking points than substantive solutions to the real problems facing the country.
VP Harris ran away from her base instead of embracing it. For example, polling showed that over 70% of Democrats supported a ceasefire in Gaza. Additionally, almost four in 10 likely voters, as well as more than half of all Democrats, believe that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. VP Harris and the DNC would not even allow a Palestinian spokesperson on stage at the convention. Thus, loosing Michigan.
Former President Obama had a stroke of genius and decided, once again, to attack, castigate and lecture Black men during a speech in October. Maybe he forgot that approximately eight-in-ten Black voters – both women (84%) and men (81%) – are Democrats or lean Democratic. Mr. President, note to self, don’t attack your base that close to an election. Embrace them, Trump embraced his.
The Obama/Biden campaign promised to deliver federal codification of Roe. Over 2 terms they failed to deliver. The Biden/Harris campaign promised the same thing and failed to deliver. With women’s reproductive rights as a lead issue of the Haris/Waltz campaign, why would voters trust that she would deliver now?
VP Harris chose to embrace the endorsement of former ultra-conservative, war hawk, Republican VP Dick Cheney, over working closer with Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VM). She traversed the campaign trail with former Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) who voted with Trump 93% of the time, instead of campaigning with Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). These are just two examples of how the Democrats have moved to the political right and realigned themselves with political adversaries that were once considered extremists, instead of securing their base.
The traditional Republicans did not win. MAGA won. Project 2025 won. The kleptocrats won. America will now be governed by the pathocracy, the inmates have taken control of the asylum. Voters did not fall for it. They clearly voted for it and America is about to get what these folks voted for. JD Vance is being groomed to carry the banner forward after Trump is done. Are you ready for that? It might very well be a long cold winter in America.
As we continue to do this autopsy and/or requiem for a failed presidential campaign and a party, African Americans who have been so loyal and ideologically wedded to the Democratic party may want to reconsider this alliance. Former President Bill Clinton and his DLC acolytes have taken the party so far to the right that if he were alive today, Ronald Reagan would be considered a conservative Democrat.
Historically, those are not our politics and that’s why our continued support of it, without it supporting us makes no sense. DuBois told us in 1956, “I shall not go to the polls. I have not registered. I believe that democracy has so far disappeared in the United States that no “two evils” exist. There is but one evil party with two names, and it will be elected despite all I can do or say.” As Fred Hampton said, this is why you continue to “… come up with answers that don’t answer, explanations that don’t explain, you’ll come up with conclusions that don’t conclude…”
So, if you really want to understand why VP Harris and the Democrats lost, don’t blame misogynist Latino males or “the White man”. Look inward and self-assess before placing blame on those around you. Because contrary to popular belief, Harris/Waltz (just like Clinton/Kaine) was a lousy campaign.
“And I see the robins, yeah, perched in barren tree tops
Watching last-ditch racists marching across the floor
And like the peace sign that vanished in our dreams
That never had a chance to growSomebody want to go tell them it’s winter
It’s cold, it’s like winter in America…” Winter In America – Gil Scott-Heron
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III
“We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.” Karl Rove – 2004
By most accounts, Karl Rove was correct about the American empire. Nineteen years ago, America had the strongest militarily in the world, but the economy was showing signs of weakness. Back in March of 2000, the stock market bubble burst, resulting in the NASDAQ or “dot com bubble” crash. Still at that time, most of the country believed Reagan as he referred to America as, “…the shining city upon a hill…” Due to its military might America was able to project its power and impose its will upon the world.
Rove’s arrogant assertion that “…when we act, we create our own reality…” is a major part of the problem that the American empire is facing today. What gets lost in this assessment is the historic reality that all empires run their course. An examination of the European, Greek, Roman and British empires tell the stories of tragic endings. A common and significant factor in their demise was arrogance. Instead of recognizing the changing of global dynamics, the geopolitical landscape and making the requisite adjustments, they believed they could manage the world by sheer force, power projection and will.
This arrogance has manifested itself on both the domestic and foreign fronts. As America commemorated the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington, Dr. King told the world, “One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity… It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked insufficient funds.” As African Americans find themselves living in the shadow of the extrajudicial murders of George Floyd, Sandra Bland, Breonna Taylor, et al, too many of us still live on that lonely island of poverty. We can only pray that Dr. King was correct when he said, “We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”
On April 4, 1967 (a year to the day before he was assassinated), Dr. King delivered his first major public statement against the Vietnam War, entitled “Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break the Silence.” He warned America, “…I watched this program (the poverty program) broken and eviscerated, as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube.” Today, Ukraine is America’s Vietnam. America will never invest the necessary funds or energies to rehabilitate its poor so long as it continues to poor over $140B into this reckless and irresponsible war called Ukraine.
On the campaign trail then former VP Biden promised to provide $70B specifically for HBCUs and Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs) like Hampton University and Howard, “…I’ll invest $70 billion in HBCUs and MSIs…”. According to the New York Times, “…the House bill proposed just $2 billion, to be awarded through a competitive grant program that pits roughly 100 H.B.C.U.s against hundreds of larger institutions that have far more resources.” The Biden administrations failure to deliver on its promises to enact racial-justice legislation and a voting-rights law have not helped his position in the African American community either.
On the international front, America is blinded by its arrogance and cannot properly assess the realities before it. America still believes it is the unitary hegemon and many of its recent actions are exacerbating its demise. In 1991, President George H. W. Bush announced a “new world order” that he believed would replace the bipolar politics of the Cold War era with a US driven unipolar order. While still Governor of Texas but running for president, George W. Bush outlined the foreign policy principles that would guide his presidency, promising a “distinctly American internationalism”, again, not so subtle code language for a unipolar American order. Recently, Secretary of State Blinken and other Biden administration officials continue to discuss a “rules-based order.” They seem to be the only ones who know what the rules are.
America continues to assert itself as a unitary power in what is emerging as a multipolar world. In The Sun Also Rises, Hemingway’s Bill Gorton asks Mike Campbell, “How did you go bankrupt?” Mike replies, “Two ways…Gradually and then suddenly.” The unipolar hegemonic dominance of the US is bankrupt and coming to an end.
In October of 2020 I published a piece entitled “The Non-Aligned Nations Realign” wherein I wrote, “As the US has emerged from the post-Cold War era as the unitary global hegemon, it became increasingly more difficult for countries to maintain their sovereignty and battle the inequities of the “new world” economic order imposed upon them by the United States. The US’ “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions and regime change has been applied as a weapon of economic warfare against US “enemies” such as China, Cuba, Iran and Venezuela. Except for China, these tactics have crippled economies and wreaked havoc on societies.”
With the technology at our disposal, we can see the demise of the American Empire happening in real time. According to Alexander Mercouris, host of The Duran, “the great period of danger in any international system is when the overarching empire declines, when it starts to lose control. Whether they (the leaders of the empire) understand that their empire is in decline and try to manage that decline in a way that preserves the international system or whether alternatively they try to go for broke and they try to preserve their position by managing conflicts that they believe that they can win.”
Even though the empire is in decline, it is far from over. It is important to understand that America is a nuclear power and still maintains military dominance over most of the world. According to The Soldiers Project, America has roughly 750 US foreign military bases spread across 80 nations. Russia (a nuclear power) has about 3 dozen bases, and China (a nuclear threat) has just five. This implies that the U.S has three times as many bases as all other countries combined. One of the major challenges facing the US is nuclear deterrence and the concept of mutually assured destruction. A nuclear attack by one superpower would be met with an overwhelming nuclear counterattack such that both the attacker and the defender would be annihilated.
With that reality being understood the issue shifts to one of economics. Until recently, the US has been able to assert its will via its economic leverage and a sanctions regime combined with the threat of military action. That’s not working any more. The non-aligned nations have realigned.
In response to the US sanctions regime, China and Russia were forced to reassess their interests and differences. They came to understand that US hegemony and imperialism was a common threat. The US proxy war in Ukraine has proven to be a major threat to Russia and the US involvement in Taiwan threatens to start a war with China. Russia and China now enjoy the best relations they have had since the late 1950s. There is a “new world order” on the horizon but its not the same order Bush 41’ spoke about.
Other examples of global realignment include, on March 10, 2023 Saudi Arabia and Iran announced the normalization of ties brokered by China. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa invited 67 country leaders and 20 representatives of international organizations to the BRICS summit. Even though it’s not on the immediate agenda, BRICS is moving towards a new currency that will be based on a basket of the currencies of the initial five-nation bloc. In response to US sanctions, the non-aligned nations are realigning, making it increasingly more difficult for the US to project its power as nations seek to assert more control over their country’s resources and governance.
It is important to realize that in spite of US sanctions, well-stocked Iranian supermarkets have opened in Venezuela and Iran is exporting oil to Venezuela. China and Iran have entered a 25-year strategic partnership in trade, politics, culture, and security. In spite of US pressure, a British Court of Appeal set aside a decision by the High Court giving President Maduro of Venezuela access to $2 billion of gold stored at the Bank of England.
Remember when President Biden told the world that US sanctions against Russia would cripple its economy? “As a result of these unprecedented sanctions, the ruble almost is immediately reduced to rubble…”, as Biden infamously said. According to World Bank data, Russia was among the world’s five largest economies and the largest in Europe in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP) as of the end of 2022, despite Western sanctions. China topped the list as the world’s biggest economy ($31 trillion), followed by the US, India, and Japan. So much for US sanctions.
The US has agreed to withdraw its more than 1,000 troops from its drone base in Niger and France’s access to uranium by attempting to exert its power in Niger. The current leaders of that government did not take a meeting with America’s coup plotter extraordinaire, Acting Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland. They would also not allow her to meet with deposed President Mohamed Bazoum. They are ignoring the “rules-based order.” As Algeria, Mali and Burkina Faso continue to back the junta in Niger, the US’ ability to control the dynamics is in question. It becomes increasingly more difficult to project power when the world sees that you are weak and alternative alliances become available.
Americans see America in the romantic context of Reagan’s “Shining City on a Hill” while the “Third World” sees the US as the Leviathan, in which the taints, the sickness, colonialism/neo-colonialism and the inhumanity of Europe have grown to appalling dimensions. The “non-aligned” nations are in realignment. The US should be as Killens says, about “free people” not “free enterprise.”
It is said that a dying mule can manage to engage in some kicks. These kicks may be dangerous, but they don’t last long. Progressively, they become weaker and weaker until the mule finally gives up. We know the US empire won’t go quietly into the night. That’s when it is proving to be its most dangerous. As Antonio Gramsci wrote, “The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.”
Dr. Wilmer Leon is the author of Politics Another Perspective and a nationally and internationally broadcast radio talk show host. Go to www.wilmerleon.com or email: wjl3us@yahoo.com. www.twitter.com/drwleon and Dr. Leon’s Prescription at Facebook.com
© 2024 InfoWave Communications, LLC
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III
“Hamas and Putin…both want to completely annihilate a neighboring democracy…Hamas’ stated purpose for existing is the destruction of the state of Israel and the murder of Jewish people. Hamas does not represent the Palestinian people. Hamas uses Palestinian civilians as human shields, and innocent Palestinian families are suffering greatly because of them.” President Biden October 19, 2023
On October 19th President Biden gave an Oval Office address. He was desperately trying to convince the nation to support his $105B military and humanitarian aid package for Israel, Ukraine and border efforts. His focus was on the wars between Israel/Hamas and Ukraine/Russia.
Biden’s presentation was ahistorical, based upon supposition, personal bias and just wrong. One of Biden’s constant underlying themes as he champions support for these failing efforts is that by supporting Israel and Ukraine, we’re supporting “democracy”. One of the prevalent talking points about Israel is that it’s the “only democracy in the Middle East”. First off, there are many democracies in the Middle East, including Turkey and Algeria.
As for the settler colonial state known as Israel, it is not a democracy. It is defined in its declaration of independence as a “Jewish state”. Thus, all authorized political parties must acknowledge Israel as the state of the “Jewish People”, meaning you cannot be elected to the Knesset (Parliament) if you call for a secular state for all its citizens. It seizes Palestinian land and destroys Palestinian homes, villages and towns without judicial review. If you are Palestinian living in the “Occupied Territories” , there is no democracy. In fact, democracy, freedom of self-determination and freedom from extra-judicial detainment and murder are a major part of what Hamas is fighting for.
Ukraine is also not a democracy. The current conflict was not “unprovoked” as President Biden loves to claim. The US overthrew the democratically elected government of Viktor Yanukovych in the Maidan Coup in 2014. The actions fomented by the US put an end to democracy in Ukraine. As author and columnist Branko Marcetic writes, “…understanding it is critical to understanding the ongoing standoff over Ukraine…” Dr. Jeffrey Sachs writes, “There were in fact two main U.S. provocations (to the conflict in Ukraine). The first was the U.S. intention to expand NATO to Ukraine and Georgia…The second was the U.S. role in installing a Russophobic regime in Ukraine by the violent overthrow of Ukraine’s pro-Russian President, Viktor Yanukovych, in February 2014.”
If there is democracy and sovereignty in Ukraine, why did the US dispatch former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to Ukraine to end peace negotiations? The Ukrainian news outlet Ukrayinska Pravda reported in May of 2022, “Johnson brought two simple messages to Kyiv. The first is that Putin is a war criminal; he should be pressured, not negotiated with. And the second is that even if Ukraine is ready to sign some agreements on guarantees with Putin, they (the West) are not.” Finally, if there is democracy in Ukraine, why did Zelensky ban 11 “pro-Russian” political parties, limit the media’s access to war coverage and cancel elections? This is the “democracy” that President Biden wants to waist U.S. taxpayer dollars to defend?
On November 29th, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer gave an impassioned 45-minute speech on the floor of the Senate during which he decried the rise of antisemitism in the US and Europe and pushed for support for the Biden administration’s Israel support package. Schumer said, “No matter where we stand on the war in Gaza, all of us must condemn antisemitism with full-throated clarity wherever we see it…” He also said, “From October 7, 2023 in Southern Israel to 2018 at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh to 1999 at the Los Angeles JCC…to 1492 in Spain, 1394 in France, 1290 in England … the Jewish people have been humiliated, ostracized, expelled, enslaved, and massacred for millennia.” The first problem with his rhetoric as well as Biden’s is the conflict in Occupied Palestine did not begin on October 7, 2023.
Schumer is correct. All of us must condemn antisemitism. However, that’s not what this 75-year struggle is about. Schumer, Biden, Blinken, et al are trying to conflate or equate the Palestinian struggle against Zionism (a racist political ideology) with the historic struggles of Jews and Judaism (one of the three Abrahamic religions). Blinken said recently in Israel, “If you’ll permit me a personal aside, I come before you not only as the United States Secretary of State, but also as a Jew.” Biden is on record as saying, “I don’t believe you have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, and I am a Zionist.” The Palestinian struggle is anti-Zionist, anti-oppression and anti-genocide. It’s not antisemitic. Contrary to the dominant rhetoric, the two are not the same.
Just as we must condemn antisemitism in all of its forms, we must also condemn genocide, apartheid, the dehumanization of Palestinians and collective punishment. This is what the settler-colonial government of Israel has been inflicting upon the Palestinians for seventy-five years with the help of the US. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant is on record as saying, “We are fighting against animals, not people…” Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich is on record saying there was “no such thing as a Palestinian” because “there is no such thing as the Palestinian people”. Palestinian people are “an invention” of the past century. This in in direct contradiction to the Balfour Declaration of 1917, “His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine…” Take note, the “homeland” is in Palestine not Israel.
During his speech in the Senate, Schumer specifically called out the phrase ” from the river to the sea,” saying it alarms Jewish people to hear it used. This phrase is not a call for extermination, it is a call for freedom and equality among all inhabitants of the region. When does the sensitivities of Jewish people outweigh the genocide of Palestinians? This differs from the first Zionist claims of ‘a land without a people for a people without a land’ which ignores and/or denies the very existence of the people that are indigenous to the area. This sounds eerily reminiscent of South African apartheid (and Israel was one of the largest supporters of South African apartheid) and the US genocide of Native Americans.
Schumer also added that because many of the incidents targeting Jewish people have come alongside left-wing demonstrations against Israel, liberal Jewish people “are feeling singled, targeted and isolated.” If this is true, why are “left-wing” organizations such as Jewish Voice for Peace, American Council of Judaism and IfNotNow speaking out in support of Palestine? Are they not Jewish enough for Senator Schumer? This is a not so veiled attempt by Schumer to turn the opposition to the genocide and atrocities being committed against the Palestinians from a moral imperative to a political discussion.
Stefanie Fox, Executive Director of Jewish Voice for Peace, has criticized Schumer’s speech. “At a time when white supremacists and white nationalists take advantage of this moment to sow confusion and promote antisemitism, Islamophobia and racism, misstating what antisemitism is harms all of our work for justice and endangers our communities…This is reprehensible.”
Schumer said that his “heart breaks for the thousands of Palestinian civilians who have been killed or are suffering in this conflict.” If that’s true Senator Schumer and not some trite talking point in a failed attempt to show balance; the solution is very simple. Stop rallying support for and voting to fund the apartheid and genocide of Palestinians. Stop voting to send US taxpayers dollars (in violation of American law) to Israel. Why don’t you stand in the Senate and oppose Israel’s National Security Minister Itamir Ben-Gvir handing out assault rifles purchased from the US to settlers in the West Bank so they can murder Palestinians?
Now, one of the Zionist’s main problems is that Israel is losing support for it’s oppression from all corners of the world. Israel’s asymmetric and disproportionate response to the Resistance is bombing the world into reality. As with the 1972 photo of Phan Thị Kim Phúc OOnt referred to “the napalm girl” that helped to turn world’s opinion against the Vietnam War, images of people suffering (mostly women and children) before and after Israel’s war declaration are turning their support towards Palestine. AntiWar.com reports, in a poll from Data for Progress found that 61% of American voters support the idea of the US calling for a “permanent” ceasefire in Gaza and a general de-escalation of violence, including 76% of Democrats, 49% of Republicans, and 57% of independent or third-party voters.
As Miriam Makeba aka “Mama Africa” sang about in “Piece of Ground”:
“White man don’t sleep long and don’t sleep too deep
Or your life and your possessions, how long will you keep?
For I’ve heard a rumor that’s running around
That the black man’s demanding his own piece of ground”
The tide is starting to turn from supporting apartheid in the Occupied Territories. What was previously a blind eye is now being focused on the genocide. Biden, Blinken, Schumer, et al have to lie. Otherwise, how do they sell genocide, ethnic cleansing and war crimes to the American people and the world? They are entitled to their opinions but not their own facts.
Dr. Wilmer Leon is the Producer/ Host of the nationally broadcast call-in talk radio program “Inside the Issues with Leon,” on SiriusXM Satellite radio channel 126. Co-Host of “The Critical Hour” on Radio Sputnik and host of “Connecting the Dots” podcast and author of Politics Another Perspective. Go to www.wilmerleon.com or email: wjl3us@yahoo.com. www.twitter.com/drwleon and Dr. Leon’s Prescription at Facebook.com © 2024 InfoWave Communications, LLC
Requiem For a Failed Presidential Campaign and a Party
How the world sees the Trump election victory
