Tag: Bernie Sanders Page 2 of 3

I go where the logic and numbers take me, which is why I said that Donald Trump’s economic plan will work if he actually follows it.

But Trump is beyond the pale, and I’m not talking about his support for deportations and various racists statements and policies, I’m talking about this:

The water fills the hole in the saran wrap so that there is either water or vaccum in your mouth. The water pours into your sinuses and throat. You struggle to expel water periodically by building enough pressure in your lungs. With the saran wrap though each time I expelled water, I was able to draw in less air. Finally the lungs can no longer expel water and you begin to draw it up into your respiratory tract. It seems that there is a point that is hardwired in us. When we draw water into our respiratory tract to this point we are no longer in control. All hell breaks loose. Instinct tells us we are dying. I have never been more panicked in my whole life. Once your lungs are empty and collapsed and they start to draw fluid it is simply all over. You know you are dead and it’s too late. Involuntary and total panic. There is absolutely nothing you can do about it. It would be like telling you not to blink while I stuck a hot needle in your eye. At the time my lungs emptied and I began to draw water, I would have sold my children to escape. There was no choice, or chance, and willpower was not involved. I never felt anything like it, and this was self-inflicted with a watering can, where I was in total control and never in any danger.

…

I didn’t allow anybody else to try it on me. Inconceivable. I know I only got the barest taste of what it’s about since I was in control, and not restrained and controlling the flow of water.

But there’s no chance. No chance at all.

So, is it torture?

I’ll put it this way. If I had the choice of being waterboarded by a third party or having my fingers smashed one at a time by a sledgehammer, I’d take the fingers, no question.

It’s horrible, terrible, inhuman torture. I can hardly imagine worse. I’d prefer permanent damage and disability to experiencing it again. I’d give up anything, say anything, do anything.

The Spanish Inquisition knew this. It was one of their favorite methods.

It’s torture. No question. Terrible terrible torture. To experience it and understand it and then do it to another human being is to leave the realm of sanity and humanity forever. No question in my mind.

This is the torture that Trump thinks is mild.  He’d do worse things.

This is my bright red line. I don’t know where yours is, but when a regime starts torturing or raping as a matter of policy, I’m out.  This is why I have no tolerance for any bullshit about Pinochet with his rape rooms and trained dogs to rape women. This is why I have no time for George Bush.

One can make lesser-evil arguments, and I have with respect to various despots–Saddam tortured, Qaddafi tortured, Assad tortures, the Egyptian regime tortures.

(I am fundraising to determine how much I’ll write this year. If you value my writing, and want more of it, please consider donating.)

These people all cross the line. They are all evil. One can then say, “What will happen if we invade is worse,” and be right, but that does not signify approval of the regimes.

It would be easy enough to rid ourselves of such regimes if we were willing to run a rich world, where things were getting better for everyone. Look at pictures of Kabul from the 70s, or Pakistan. A world order which believes in a genuinely good ideology, which provides better futures, which doesn’t torture and rape itself can deal with such regimes. The great flaw of the post-war world was that it was offering prosperity but refused to offer it evenly to everyone (though it was better than the neo-liberal era), and certainly didn’t believe in Democracy.

Your ideology, your stories, only work properly for you if you actually fulfill their requirements.

But back to America. I don’t know if Clinton will torture. I know Bernie Sanders won’t. I know there are options available in the American election that don’t sell the tattered remains of America’s soul.

Yes, Trump’s economic plan will work, but the cost is your soul. Bernie Sanders’ economic plan will work too, and it doesn’t cost you your soul.

Let’s be explicit: For a time, fascism works. It worked in Italy, it worked in Germany.

It is time-limited, which is why Germany had to start grabbing, but it works.

You get yourself Trump, he’ll make the economy work. But his plan has leaks, like his insane tax cuts, which will show up in time. If he only wants eight years, no problem. If he wants more, he’ll have to find victims to prop up his economy. War is the ultimate stimulus, so is looting.

But he’ll be very popular. America will follow him off the cliff. They followed George W. Bush after all, and he wasn’t half as popular as Trump will be.

In the macro sense there is no free lunch. You cannot run a good industrial economy for long without determined recycling of money and without controlling the oligarchy. That means high tax rates. The only other solution is looting.

And in the meantime, Trump will be torturing people.

Americans have a real, progressive option on the domestic front. I have my problems with Sanders, but if you want a chance at a good economy without giving up all human decency, I suggest you go for him.

As for Clinton, I cannot in good conscience endorse her. I believe there is little that Clinton wouldn’t do. A woman who embraces Henry Kissinger has claimed her circle in Hell as well.