With the 2024 election fast approaching, MAGA Nation is amping up its propaganda machine by attacking its usual Democratic suspects as Marxists, traitors, globalists, etc. At the top of their hit list is George Soros, the 93-year-old Jewish billionaire and a top liberal contributor. Just who is he?
Born in Hungary, his family changed their name from Schwartz to Soros with the rise of The Third Reich. They also purchased documents saying they were Christians. These twin moves helped save George’s teenage life. After the war, the “liberating” Soviets imposed their own brutal regime. Having experienced dictatorship from both ends of the political spectrum, young George emigrated to England, went to the London School of Economics, and embarked on a successful investor career. He now had a lifetime hatred of both fascism and communism.
Soros later emigrated to the US, where he became a citizen and financial contributor to causes fighting tyranny. He supported Solidarity in Poland and opposed communism in the USSR, thus helping to bring down The Iron Curtain.
Soros then became more involved in the US, fighting poverty and underwriting educational scholarships. For this, MAGA attacks him for doing the same thing their conservative deep-pocket corporate elites do—writing checks to elect candidates of their own political cloth.
Forbes Magazine estimates Soros’ 2024 wealth at $6.7 billion. Impressive, but not even in the Forbes 400, now topped by Elon Musk ($195 billion) and Jeff Bezos ($194 billion). Forbes called Soros “the most generous (charity) giver” as a percentage of net worth. Compare that to the Trump Foundation, shut down by court order in 2018 as “a shocking pattern of illegality.”
In the 2022 midterms, Soros was the #1 contributor at $128 million. The next three, Jeffery Yass, Kenneth Griffin and Richard Uihlein, all Republicans, collectively gave $184 million. Ever hear of them? Didn’t think so. Americans For Prosperity, deeply Republican, may top them all, since “dark money” contributions aren’t included. Yass is a major TikTok shareholder, which might explain the recent Trump flip to supporting, not banning, the Chinese app.
Next time you read deceptive MAGA rants about Soros, including being a Nazi and antisemitic (?!), remember that MAGA has its own stable of money thoroughbreds whose checkbooks expect political wins at the finish line. Just like George Soros.
ED ENGLER, Sebring, Fla.
President Biden succeeded in accomplishing good policies for our future, recovering from Trump’s chaotic disaster.
But, presidents don’t get to create and administrate good policies unless they can communicate them well to the public, and debunk the opponent’s “policies” and character. Biden failed to do that during the “debate.” Repubs will play and replay the debate’s many cringe-worthy moments endlessly.
A wise man knows how to see himself. Wise people understand that aging is inevitable and final. Wisdom knows when to step aside, victorious, rather than remain in a final competition that will crush one’s reputation into ignominy.
Democratic accomplishments need another standard-bearer who can represent, with vigor, the values and vision our country needs to continue. The threat of losing this election requires putting the good of the country above personal ambition.
Some kindly suggestions to Joe Biden are necessary. The question is: From whom will he listen?
BRUCE JOFFE, Piedmont, Calif.
In the 6/15/24 TPP, Katrina vanden Heuvel lays out her dream of a left populist agenda. What a bubble she lives in! If Trump wins, there will be no left populists.
Robert Reich asks will there by a second civil war. Then in smaller print says we are not on the verge of a civil war. Well, call it what you will, but if the November election is close, with long recounts in crucial states, there will be dozens, probably hundreds of violent deaths.
JOHN D. PALMER, Huntington, W.V.
Do you recall the Walkaway Movement, a few years ago, encouraging people to stray home and not vote? Turned out, the only voters it wanted to stay home and not vote were those likely to vote Democrat.
Right Wing social media campaign started by Brandon Strake for the 2018 midterm election. Russian Propaganda, said David A. Lore of CNN
And what about the same-sex restroom issue when Hillary Clinton ran against Trump? How many votes did she lose to Trump over that, because people feared for the safey of their female loved ones in women and girl’s restrooms?
And there is the so-called Green Party. Just do a search of Republican funding of Green Party candidates.
Now we have Robert F Kennedy Jr. Can’t anyone figure it out by now?
The only thing people are going to end up doing by voting this way is to help Trump win. And that is a fact you can take to the bank.
Ted Ralls’ proposal in favor of expanding the right of free speech to private sector employees (“Age, Race, Sexual Orientation, Should Political Expression Be a Protected Class Too?” [7/1-15/24 TPP]) is long overdue. Ralls correctly argues that the right of employees to express political opinions, at least outside of the workplace, should have federal protection from suppression and discrimination by employers.
Public employees’ right to freedom of expression is protected by the First Amendment, unlike employees working for privately owned corporations. The First Amendment, of course, only applies to government institutions.
There is some precedent for recognizing free speech rights in some segments of private organizations. The National Labor Relations Act protects the right of employees to advocate and associate with other employees promoting unionization. The Labor Reporting and Disclosure Act gives unions the right to criticize labor leadership and to freely express political opinions at union meetings or in informed settings in association with other members.
Congress should amend Title VII for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination in employment based on race, sex, sexual orientation, religion, national origin and ancestry, to add freedom of political expression as a protected clause.
JAMES PHILLIPS, Wichita, Kansas
Jesus of Nazareth taught that peacemakers are blessed. No modern moralist needs add a ninth Beatitude. Yet the ghastly paradox that warfare remains conspicuous, vicious and usually defeating continues apace.
Cynics will assert that so long as greed prods the human psyche, the strife will go on, largely unabated. The moth will be mesmerized by the thermonuclear flame—fascinated to instinctive demise. Still, we see science, through deepest dread, our rationality precludes destruction.
We can and shall eventually quell the fevered nightmare, as we have progressed from superstition to scientific understanding. If the bright angels of our distant delight fade from view, so shall the obscene hobgoblins and horned demons from our consciousness.
WILLIAM DAUENHAUER, Willowick, Ohio
I must disagree with Les Leopold’s criticism of the book “White Rural Rage” by Tom Schaller and Paul Waldman in the 5/15/24 TPP (“Raging Against ‘White Rural Rage’”). What people say they believe in a survey is meaningless. What matters is their actual behavior. And when it comes to the behavior of how White rural Americans vote, they consistently vote Republican because Republican politicians give them the raw meat of bigotry that that turns them on. That is why, as the book points out, in the 2020 election the more rural the county the greater the percentage of votes went to Trump. And you had better believe that the same will happen this November.
I think a big factor is that many rural Whites have hardly had any contact with people of color. And most humans are instinctively fearful of anyone who looks different, comes from a different place, or speaks a different language. A lack of education and fundamentalist Christianity play a role as well. There is a reason why polls show that Trump has a huge lead among those who lack a college education as well as evangelicals. I don’t see an easy answer to this problem but thinking that if Democrats just push progressive economic policies then rural Whites will vote Democratic is naive.
STEVE JONES, Landisville, Pa.
From The Progressive Populist, August 1, 2024
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