The Democratic party is at a dangerous low point. The 2016 elections were a horrendous disaster for the Democrats, the United States and the whole world. This disaster was caused by a series of policies and decisions that the Democratic party leadership must fully own, take responsibility for and apologize for. It is essential that the Democratic party literally go through the process of truth and reconciliation.
Here's how Wikipedia describes Truth and reconciliation :
"A truth commission or truth and reconciliation commission is a commission tasked with discovering and revealing past wrongdoing by a government (or, depending on the circumstances, non-state actors also), in the hope of resolving conflict left over from the past."
South Africa created the most famous example of a truth and reconciliation (T&R) commission. Here's what South Africa says about its T&R commission:
The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was set up by the Government of National Unity to help deal with what happened under apartheid. The conflict during this period resulted in violence and human rights abuses from all sides. No section of society escaped these abuses.In order to regain any semblance of credibility, let alone to recover seats in the house, senate , state legislatures and governorships and the White House, the Democrats must go through a similar process-- confessing to and apologizing for their abuses of democracy and justice and betrayal of constituents, workers, the middle class and America.The South Afrcian TRC was based on the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, No 34 of 1995(pdf)
The South African T&R act states:
"it is deemed necessary to establish the truth in relation to past events as well as the motives for and circumstances in which gross violations of human rights have occurred, and to make the findings known in order to prevent a repetition of such acts in future;"Here are some of the truths the Democrats must confess to:
Betraying constituents by protecting the interests of corporations over people Top down directing and influencing primary elections at all levels, instead of allowing the people, the constituents to choose candidates Abandonment of Democratic principles of fairness, social and ecological justice, peace Abandonment of the middle class, of workers, of the 99%, instead favoring transnational corporations and trade deals like TPP, NAFTA, CAFTA, etc. Abandonment and votes for policies which adversely affect consumers and workers, while favoring corporations and their lobbyists closing primary elections to independents, rigging the system so weaker, but more loyal candidates would be elected intentionally interfering with and rigging the 2016 Democratic primary election-- via:
top down backing and inflicting upon Democratic voters the most disliked and mistrusted presidential primary candidate in modern Democratic party history use of super delegates to skew results of delegate counts more than one year out from the election DNC coordination and collaboration with the Clinton campaign knowingly allowing the Clinton campaign to collaborate with mainstream media networks allowing, even encouraging and failing to address election irregularities at the state level Please help me expand this list with your comments
Those are the truths the Democratic party and leaders must confess to and acknowledge. That doesn't mean they get to keep their jobs. It means they tell the truth to save the Democratic party, to regain the trust of the millions of Americans who are disgusted by the Democratic party, including Bernie Sanders Supporters and independents and recent Republican converts who voted for Trump as a way to repudiate Hillary Clinton and the Democratic party's betrayals and misconducts, as described above. Many of these leaders must step down from their leadership positions as part of the healing process.
This Democratic Party Truth and Reconciliation process offers the best way for the Democrats to win again in 2018 and 2020. It is highly unlikely that the current leaders of the Democratic party will willingly engage in the above described truth and reconciliation process. The only way it will happen is if we the people, the bottom up grass roots constituents take back the Democratic party. This has begun. Bernie Sanders reported, at the SisterGiant conference this past weekend, that progressives have already taken control of the California and Washington state democratic parties.
And there is a powerful surge of organization and activism working on taking back the Democratic party.
Cenk Uygur, of the Young Turks TV network, which now exceeds the reach of CNN, told an audience of 1800 at the SisterGiant conference that there are two new projects aimed at taking back and taking over the Democratic party:
First, there's Wolf-pac , which aims to take money out of politics. Their stated goal is to get money out of elections and
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
6
5
5
