Obama deported more undocumented immigrants than any other president, while accepting corporate demands for hundreds of thousands high-skill foreign workers. Many of those high tech jobs that former factory workers are training for are often either temporary/as needed or being done by imported workers at lower wages with no benefits. Belatedly, Obama pardoned a few hundred non-violent drug offenders in federal prison but, continued the "war on drugs" -----even as states began de-criminalizing marijuana.
Hillary Clinton promised more of the same policies with a few tweaks. A bit more child care and paid family leave, but, "welfare reform" remains. Undisclosed fixes to the hideous crime policies she and her husband pushed and passed but, a refusal to reconsider classification of marijuana (currently same as heroin) and her continued support for the death penalty---which, for me, reveals Hillary Clinton's core criminal justice positions. The utter contempt with which she interacted with Black Lives Matter activists confirmed how little she's changed since the 1990s.
As for addressing the institutional racism that's basic to so many policies named here: about the best that could be hoped for from Hillary Clinton was a repeat of the empty symbolism we've had from almost 8 years of Obama.
Seeing a beautiful Black family in the White House is a cultural affirmation, but, only a few of the 48% per cent of foreclosed homes owned by women of color have been saved. Obama's Department of Justice ignored police violence and the killing unarmed people of color as much as white presidents have. Despite outrageous hypocrisy of the last three presidents smoking marijuana as youths, Obama is an intractable drug warrior as Clinton. He and his fellow Democrats presided over closing hundreds of public schools, replacing them with for-profit charters---many of which reject or expel students of color.
To sum up, the bipartisan pro-corporate, racist policies continued by Obama were going to be continued by Clinton.
Clinton's shifts in positions were not credible and were accurately seen as campaign trail reversals, only a fake "Me, too!" to undermine Bernie Sanders. No one paying attention believed her. Many Clinton emails and speeches revealed by Wikileaks confirmed Hillary Clinton was the ultimate Establishment candidate---and her gender could not conceal that.
I'll be blunt: it was too much of a cultural leap to follow the first African-American president with the first woman in the Oval Office. Clinton's gender likely hurt her far more than it helped her---from both ends of the political spectrum: Beyond conservatives who'd never vote for her, Hillary's demographic of white, college educated women, 53 per cent voted Trump. Women under 35 didn't join "gender unity" based on issues they cared about. As a lifelong feminist, I'd sum up younger women's position: real feminism doesn't favor corporations over people, 21st century feminism addresses racism and racism+sexism and war is not a feminist value.
Hillary fails feminism on all those counts.
"Choice" offered by the two corporate-sponsored political parties is mostly illusion.
Foreign policy was barely mentioned---except to stoke fear of Trump---while Hillary Clinton's aggressive pro-war record was touted as "vast experience". Climate change was ignored and reduced to Clinton's "belief" that it's real and Trump's denialism. But, when it comes to actual policies, Fossil Fuels own both parties . The fact that must be faced is that differences between the two political parties are mostly minimal. If anything, the Republican Party is more honest about their side of bipartisan service to Big Business and Endless War while the Democratic Party distracts us with "spectacle of diversity" on full display at their convention and a few crumbs, like marriage equality---which Clinton only supported once it was 'safe' to do so (2013).
In the ashes of a presidential campaign in which those in power were only willing to offer the two most disliked and distrusted candidates ever, building a third party alternative is overdue. To do that, we'll have to be brave enough to cross all sorts of imposed boundaries between each other.
Too many white people remain racially isolated and see only two images of people of color: celebrities who confirm the post-racism myth and as criminals who perpetrate a racist lie.
But, what if rural white Trump voters and urban voters of color who voted Clinton or stayed home have more in common than they think? We'll never know unless we know each other.
Right now, white people and Christians must reach out to people of color and Muslims, offering protection. There are plenty of anti-racism, civil rights and civil liberties organizations to join. People of color are not served by claiming a monopoly on suffering. Dismissing other people's losses because they're white does not gain Black people more justice. It's overdue to learn justice, equality and an economy that works for all of us can not be won until we stop playing the Zero-Sum Game.
The "human Molotov cocktail" Donald Trump was hurled at the political establishment and it's too soon to know what lies under the rubble. I doubt that most Trump voters won much to make their lives better. One thing that remains is that the 1% (and the top 10% that enables them) have two political parties. We The People have none.
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