The last thing I want is a candidate to challenge Hillary Clinton from the left. What I want is a Democrat to be elected president in 2016 and Hillary Clinton is that person.
Currently Hillary is the front runner for the presidency because she can attract the support of independents because of her mainstream ideology.
The last thing Hillary needs is a socialist like Bernie Sanders pushing her to the left. The GOP are always inappropriately and demonizing democrats as socialists. The last thing democrats need is a real socialist running in their primary. It will provide the democrats with an image they cannot afford to have and will not be able to shake. If Sanders runs as an independent he will take votes away from Hillary like Nader did to Gore in 2000 and help elect a Republican like Rand Paul or some other rightwing crackpot.
Sanders in 2016 will be 75 years old. Americans will never elect an elderly Jewish man who is a socialist. Sanders is a spoiler and nothing else. Primaries are disruptive and divisive and only damage the party's eventual nominee.
Hillary has a the right experience to be president. She is wise, hardworking, intelligent and compassionate. She has the potential to be elected president in 2016.. Why should democrats want to hurt her chances. Remember there were those like Nader who said that it did not make any difference who was president Bush or Gore. However we know that was a lie. If Gore had been elected there would be no Roberts Supreme Court, 9/11 would not have happened, the economy would be booming and we would not have gotten involved in two unnecessary wars. Democrats should not make the same mistake twice.
Reba Shimansky
New York, N.Y.
Thank you for publishing Hal Crowther’s article “One Nation Under Fire” in your 8/15/14 edition. It was excellent except for some inconsistencies with regard to the intentions of the Founders. I can envision some people saying that if we cannot accept the Founders’ views on slavery and the place of women in the US, then why should we accept their interpretation of the Second Amendment?
Although I did like much of what Crowther wrote about the police, sometimes it seems as if our police forces primarily serve the powerful rather than all of the people. The current gun craze is frightening, and I am grateful that I do not live in a state where people are openly carrying weapons, so that you can’t tell the “good guys” from the “bad guys”.
Why is this happening? I think that the end of white male supremacy is a major factor, but I also think that it must be the sense of helplessness and powerlessness that so many people have today. How can we change this?
Sheryl Zabel
Fairport, N.Y.
Re: Frank C. Rohrig's letter, "Gender Equality Now!" in 9/1/14 TPP, which said, "It’s not surprising that the similarly male dominated body of the Protestant hierarchy in the Church of England recently announced that women would finally be allowed to become Bishops in the church after their 20-year quest to share in participation/authority."
I applaud the sentiments of the letter: but not his facts. Concerning women bishops, see "Church of England General Synod Backs Women Bishops" <http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-28300618>.
Extracts include:
A previous vote in 2012 was backed by the Houses of Bishops and Clergy but blocked by traditionalist lay members.
The crucial vote in the House of Laity went 152 in favor, 45 against, and there were five abstentions. In November 2012 the change was derailed by just six votes cast by the lay members.
In the house of Bishops, 37 were in favor, two against, and there was one abstention. The House of Clergy voted 162 in favor, 25 against and there were four abstentions.
The Archbishop of York Dr John Sentamu read the result. (He is of African origin.) So the hierarchy and clergy had led the way and were delayed by the laity!
Not only does the CofE have a black African Archbishop, Queen Victoria's favorite Prime Minister was a Jew named Benjamin Disraeli, anti-slavery was led by clergyman William Wilberforce and the nursing profession was created by Florence Nightingale, who became a friend of Queen Victoria. Conservative Margaret Thatcher became the first female Prime Minister of the UK. Not bad for a stick-in-the-mud country!
Chris Robinson
Madras, Ore.
We need to get Postmaster General Patrick Donahue out of the US Postal Service before he privatizes it. In our area, they have closed down two postal facilities that were close to the Senior Citizen residences and now the seniors have to take buses to the nearest facility. Some people are not able to get to a bus or able to ride a bus.
One person I know of has almost lost track of her family because of the cost of phone calls and the lack of postal facilities.
The USPS needs someone who is human and understands that not everyone could afford privatization.
I am boycotting Staples stores [in response to Donahue’s plan to put mini-post offices in the office-supply stores] and encouraging my friends to do so as well.
David Fullerton
Kent, Wash.
Open residiential schools for those refugee orphans coming into the country without parents. Stephen Girard in Philadelphia, back in the 1800s, opened a residential school for just such children without parents.
Graduates who were boarded and educated turned out as solid citizens, often going to college or technical schools. Girard understood that if you gave young children "a chance at an education" they would thrive and give back what benefits they received as youngster by becoming a cooperative citizens and very grateful for the opportunity.
Stephen Girard had the right idea and his school graduated thousands of grateful American Citizens. This model could serve as a national model for incoming orphans without parents or relatives. As a Christian nation, we must be generous providing the opportunity all immigrants appreciated down through American history. It should not stop for any reason offered by politicians or those ignorant of addressing this serious problem we face that we could do so much to improve.
Fred R. Petrone, a member of the Stephen Girard Class of 1950
Cherry Hill, N.J.
Although you have already been magnanimous, and printed a large part of a missive sent to you by my alter-ego, Marge Johnson [“Convince Yourself,” 8/15/14 TPP], I’d like you to print this, too, because it’s a message to someone I owe a great debt of gratitude to, but have no idea of how to reach him. It also plays into something else you published in your 8/15/114 issue, “A Poor GOP Die-Hard Leaves Politics of Shame,” that was written by Edwin Lyngar, in which he told of seeing the light politically, and how it changed his life.
My life also, was changed back in the 1970s, when I was working as a clerk in the Boulder, Colo., Post Office, with a man whose name was Dave Elliot, who I think told me once that his dad was a union organizer. And he himself was very interested in those matters, and in the presidential election that was going on at that time.
One day he asked me who I thought I was going to vote for, and whether I thought of myself as a Democrat or a Republican. The truth was that I didn’t think of myself as either one, but when I’d voted I usually voted for the Republican candidate because that’s how my parents voted. So I guess I inherited my politics like most people inherit their religious beliefs, and I really hadn’t thought much about it. But I didn’t tell him that, or that I’d voted twice for Nixon.
Then he startled me by saying that whatever I thought I was, he could tell me one thing: I was not a Republican. And that was because he knew me and how I thought, and I didn’t think like a Republican.
Wow, that was a shock! And when he said it, it angered me. Who was he to tell me who and what I was? But when I thought about it, the more I wondered if he could be right, and that was why I often found myself arguing with far-right thinkers, and thought they were wrong about lots of things that were very clear cut for me, and I hated. hypocrisy above everything else, wherever I found it. This led to a lot of soul-scouring on my part, and strong convictions I didn’t even know I had, and to expressing them in my later life.
So, Dave, wherever you are, I want you to know you really changed my life in profound ways, because I’m very “out there” about what I believe, and I’ve been told by many people that they agree with what I’ve said or written, so in a sense I’ve acquired fans or followers. But I’ve told myself not to let it go to my head. It has nothing to do with who or what I am, and all I am is a messenger passing a message on. And for that I can thank the Daves of the world, whose wisdom was far superior to mine.
Marjorie Johnson
Eckert, Colo.
From The Progressive Populist, October 1, 2014
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