The impervious cycles of American history predicted a 2016 Republican victory as I wrote in February of that year with 17 candidates in the GOP race and Donald Trump a joke. They likewise predict a Democratic win this November.
As the old saying goes, Democrats don’t win elections, Republicans lose them. The Elephantines are well on their way. But the capacity for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is hard-wired into Donkeykong DNA.
Corporate America and Czar Vladimir are now ganging up on Sen. Bernie Sanders who slamdunked Nevada last week. I was appalled to see a seasoned campaign manager like James Carville say on Monday that the Russians want Bernie in November. Nonsense. As I wrote last week, they want Pete Buttigieg who breaks the Democratic base with fundamentalist African-Americans, Latinos and Republican union members.
Worse, if Democratic cowards begin to subvert Bernie as they did when they rigged the primaries in 2016, Bernie’s base will walk and not show up in November, as many did not four years ago. Had the Green Party not screwed up and failed to make the Nevada ballot, I would have voted for Jill Stein instead of Hillary.
Baby steps toward equity and equality don’t work. Delay is the devil and serves the overlords of power.
Donald Trump is political Teflon because he has attained rogue folk hero status. The only folk hero the Democrats have is Bernie and he’s a better one, an honorable one whose basic principles have been the same for decades, invulnerable. (That’s why I like retired Sen. Joe Neal, D-North Las Vegas.)
From my talk radio days, I know that the best way to start a fire on the air is to say the magic word “insurance.” Everybody has a gripe about their insurance company. The idea that Medicare for All will divorce you from your hallowed co-dependency with your insurance conglomerate is one of the great pieces of successful corporate propaganda.
Bernie’s America’s best and perhaps last shot at maintaining a representative democracy. Otherwise, start watching the news on how the in-name-only democracies of Turkey, Poland, Hungary, Venezuela and the Philippines operate. It can’t happen here? It’s already in the White House waiting to morph into its true self: Dictatorship.
CONFUSION JUNCTION: SCHOOL DISTRICT BIZ AS USUAL. Two Washoe school board members just announced they would not seek re-election and that’s by no means the biggest news out of the 9th Street Green Monster.
The school board could have put the elongated Hug High School re-naming fight to rest last November but chose bureaucratic chaos instead. Four votes were announced for former Reno-Sparks NAACP president and matriarch Dolores Feemster. Instead, thru pure bureaucratic manipulation, the board flipped the matter back to its naming committee for more review.
They thus pitted the Feemster family against that of late State Sen. Debbie Smith, D-Sparks, folks who have long loved each other. The committee did not issue a split decision on Feb. 5, opting to recommend only Sen. Smith when Hug is re-tooled as a tech school. This despite a compromise discussed in November: Hug for Feemster, and AACT for Smith. (The alphabet soup describes the current Academy of Art Careers & Technology in Reno.)
That was just too easy. Now, the school board stands accused of conflicts of interest and breaking the open meeting law.
Adrienne Feemster, one of Dolores’ many grandchildren, has filed charges both with district staff and the Nevada Attorney General. Details with the expanded Barbwire web edition at NevadaLabor.com/
A vote on the Hug renaming has thus been bumped from this week to March 31. Which means I’m gonna have a busy day. That’s César Chávez Day at which former Tribunite Dennis Myers will be the first Nevada journalist inducted into the César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame.
When it rains, it pours. Stay tuned.
HAPPENING WEDNESDAY AT RENO CITY HALL. The city council will commemorate National Eating Disorder Week with a proclamation and a preview of the locally produced, double-Telly Award winning documentary “Love, Chantal” about Reno High graduate Chantal Hager who lost her life to the disease. You may view the proceedings on the city’s cable channel at Charter/Spectrum 192 or thereabouts. Monitor ChantalCoalition.org for ongoing community outreach updates.
The council will also vote on a $1,000 contribution to the RenoSparks NAACP’s health and environmental justice program, facilitated by councillors Neoma Jardon and Devon Reese.
IT HAPPENED AT SAVEMART (a good union shop, of course): I could not resist giving the young man behind me in the checkout line a little Valentine’s Day advice. He was purchasing just two items, a beautiful bouquet of fresh flowers.
And a bag of Cheetos.
“Sir, I compliment you on your obviously good intentions, but your choice of romantic dinner menu needs a little work.”
Be well. Raise hell. Esté bien. Haga infierno.
Andrew Barbano is a 51-year Nevadan, executive producer of Nevada’s annual March 31 César Chávez Day celebration and editor of NevadaLabor.com, SenJoeNeal. org and ChantalCoalition.org/ He serves as first vice-president of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his comments are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Tribune since 1988.
Mark Kelly says
Television Advertising
Large corporations are making the most disgusting ads they can. They’ve become senile.
Example, All States ad.
A man turns into a dog an licks a womens face while shes driving her car.
They have to be put under the same control as the movie industry.
GP, R, X rated, etc.