Acceptable Candidates and Supportable Party Platforms

Biden’s approval rating hits its lowest with 33 per cent in new poll by Eric Garcia in UK's Independent.

Although the message I take away from this article is likely not the primary message most people will take away from it, the message being conveyed which I consider to be most important, is that we need to do a much better job of offering up qualified acceptable candidates and party platform policy recommendations so that we are not electing people through the process of voting against "the lesser of the evils".

I wish numerous people would write articles that actually state this clearly and plainly, to hammer home a message it is vital for all to understand. Not everyone is willing to become an expat for however long it may be necessary, otherwise, when they do not consider either candidate to be acceptable.  And of course not everyone can afford the luxury of choosing to be an expat for an extended time.

Many consider the lack of acceptable candidates, and supportable party platforms, to be due to a lack of participation.  However,the lack of participation problem at the grassroots level is not necessarily reflective of what people want to do, or prefer to do.  I have made a successful effort to participate in other places I have lived.  That is not how it is where I currently live.  If inquiries about attending a local meeting do generate a response, they are met only with a response  about "pay to play" meetings and cost requirements for party membership.  What!?  I was astounded to be presented with "pay to play".  I honestly thought it was illegal.

It has never been mandatory, elsewhere, to pay dues to be a party member before being participating in discussions at local caucus meetings.  I do wonder how widespread the problem is, nationwide.  Not only can I not afford the "required" cost, more importantly, in principle, I am unwilling to pay a required cost to participate!  Of course a pay to play response discourages many people - and is obviously intended to do so.  It is no wonder people increasingly truly believe that elections and election processes are being bought.

Note that I use the term "caucus" to indicate local meetings, although other folks may use other terms.  I use "caucus" according to the inclusive definition (rather than the limited exclusive definition), that being: "any political group or meeting organized to further a special interest or cause"

Participating in local caucus meetings where platform policies and potential candidates are discussed and eventually agreed upon, should be freely open to everyone who selects a party when registering to vote, and wants to attend local meetings.  In other places I have lived caucus meetings are organized at the local community level, like the the radius of a neighborhood of many blocks.  The grassroots participation I refer to here, is not city, sector, county, or state wide - but on a much smaller neighborhood scale .  Each of the smaller local meetings then sends representative to the less frequent next larger consolidated meeting -  be it sector, city, county, or state wide.  And no one registered for  the party of the meeting they wish to attend and participate in, is prevented from attending those either - even though each local area selects representatives to speak for the group.

Local neighborhood caucus meetings really are the way for grassroots participation to be as diverse and as representative in all ways as the local areas in which folks live.  As such it is a way to develop a more acceptable slate of candidates and policy recommendations.  That is why "pay to play", in every form, should be illegal.  

Allow me to once more emphasize that in too many elections, too many people have no other choice than to vote against candidates instead of for candidates.  And this is simply an unacceptable situation. 

Ultimately, taken to the extreme, when there are no acceptable choices - and this holds true universally, not only with political candidates and party platforms - then no matter the situation it precipitates insurmountable problems.  Worse, when there are repeatedly no acceptable choices and instead only damaging choices - then depending on the scale of the collusion that limits choices to all being unacceptable (and it will always be a collusion limiting choices in that way), the repetitive problem of unacceptable choices eventually leads to conflict, armed combat - the atrocities of war.

ethically reprehensible egregious hypocrisy

"Coalition of Holocaust Museums Condemn Russian ‘War Crimes’ in Ukraine" is an article about "An open letter signed by 17 Holocaust museums worldwide equates Russian violence to 'Holocaust by Bullets,' when Jewish people were 'shot and buried in shallow grave' in Ukraine in WWII"

Ethically Reprehensible

It truly is an ethically reprehensible attack.  It is surely reminiscent of WWII in Ukraine, and of the holocaust of the pogroms targeting Jewish people in the 18th and 19th centuries in Ukraine.  That earlier genocidal holocaust, as a reflection of anti-Jewish sentiment in Europe at the time, resulted in a huge influx of Jewish refugees from Ukraine being allowed by the Ottoman Empire to settle in Palestine which was part of that Empire at the time, even though the Ottoman's were at war with Russia part of that time.

Notice how the term "genocide" is carefully avoided in the article.  It was used days ago, in an earlier article.  Someone commented that to be considered a genocide requires more time.  That is not necessarily the case according to the internationally agreed upon definiition of genocide. That previous comment draws attention to the change in the current newer narrative from an Israeli news paper, even though the inference is genocide.  The intention is for others to claim it is genocide, instead.

Let's Be Clear

War is not necessarily genocide, even though it is almost always a holocaust.  

A holocaust that occurs during an armed conflict,is sometimes also a genocidal attack because of intent, without the armed conflict being a series of armed conflicts like war is.

Intention looms large in the agreed upon international definition of genocide:  "intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group"

WWII was a genocidal holocaust.  So were the earlier pogroms in the "southern and western provinces of the Russian Empire" i.e. Ukraine with a large Jewish population then and now. (see "Pogroms")

Egregious Hypocrisy

As many are rightfully pointing out, the coverage of the attacks is also egregious hypocrisy, regarding the ongoing slow, long-term genocide of Palestinians in Occupied Palestinian Territory (oPT); moreso because of the extension of sympathy of the Israeli government to the Jewish folks in Ukraine, although this particular article does not exclusively focus on only Jewish folks in Ukraine.

Many are asking where the coverage is of the genocide and holocaust in oPT - ongoing for over 70 years.  I am not expressing an opinion, one way or another, in referring to what continues to be oPT until or unless the genocide succeeds and/or all of oPT (with or without Palestinian people) is annexed and one nation is recognized.  I am pointing out the hypocrisy of media coverage about oPT which magnifies the egregiousness of the holocaust attacks everywhere - pertinent to the media bias being pointed out here, in oPT and in Ukraine.

For over 70 years the Palestinian people in oPT have been  targeted with a genocidal intent, as defined by the five acts specified in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide Article II.  Intent and actions recognized as genocide have been openly and arrogantly stated many time throughout the past 70+ years and mirrored by actions. 

Because of being slow but consistent for over 70 years, the genocidal (because of openly stated intent) attacks and violence perpetrated on Palestinians in oPT, are not necessarily recognized as a  holocaust, although the devastating military attacks in Gaza during the ongoing long-term genocide of Palestinians in oPT have all been genocidal holocaust attacks - as part of a series of genocidal attacks.  So too was the rampage of 9 April 1948, 74 years ago, known as the Deir Yassin Massacre at the start of the war that was intended to claim all of Palestine, only ~four months after the recent, at that time, partition of Palestine 29 November 1947 

It is way past time for media coverage, after 74 years, about the long-term series of ethically reprehensible genocidal attacks on Palestinians in oPT.

                                         -30-

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide

Article II

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such:

    a.  Killing members of the group;
    b.  Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
    c.  Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its
        physical destruction in whole or in part;
    d.  Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
    e.  Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.