Tony Brasunas

Outlook on the day of an illegitimate presidential debate.

The problem with accepting today’s debate as a legitimate democratic event is that to do so would be surrender. In fact, accepting this entire election, as currently run by the two corporate parties in collusion with the corporate media, would at this point be surrender.

The debates are illegitimate because three-quarters of Americans want more candidates in the debates, and Jill Stein and Gary Johnson were barred via disingenuous rules and flawed polls. There is no legitimate reason the debates should be run as the two older parties see fit, rather than how we the citizens see fit. Yet that’s what’s happening.

The debate will be illegitimate also because it seeks to force us to accept primaries that were a sham.

Those who followed the primaries closely know that the Clinton campaign and the DNC lied, cheated, and stole their way to the nomination. Several prominent media pundits do argue that the primary was fair, but the endless and ongoing leaks of internal emails continue to show that the primary was rigged. Now even the DNC itself, after insisting for months on its impartiality, is arguing in court that everyone knew all along that they, the DNC, favored Clinton.

Trump, on the other hand, employed the worst tactics of demagoguery — inciting violence, racism, jingoism, and actual political ignorance—to win the nomination on the Republican side. (more…)

Millions of American voters will remember this 2016 election year as the year they left the two older political parties once and for all. After deeply problematic primaries, including epidemic fraud on the Democratic side, the two parties nominated the least-liked candidates in history. Never in modern politics has a candidate with either Hillary Clinton’s approval rating (-16) or Donald Trump’s approval rating (-18) won a nomination, let alone the White House. These two candidates are widely, historically disliked.

Meanwhile three-quarters of Americans want to see two other candidates in the presidential debates. You can’t find a lot of things that three in four Americans agree on, but polls show a stunning 76% of us want Dr. Jill Stein, nominee of the Green Party, and Gov. Gary Johnson, nominee of the Libertarian Party, to be included in the debates.

Not that this should be surprising. With our democracy fraying, corruption and election fraud on the rise, climate change encroaching on virtually every ecosystem, and income inequality at record levels, it’s a crucial juncture for the United States and for the planet. Citizens of all backgrounds long to hear a broad range of ideas before determining the optimal path forward.

With climate change a leading issue for many voters, the Green Party, which pushes for immediate action on climate change, should be heard. In light of revelations about domestic spying from whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, American citizens want personal liberty and privacy right now, and for this reason the Libertarian candidate should be heard as well. The two older parties inspire little trust on these 21st century issues.

Presidential campaigns are the only nationwide campaigns we have as a country. These political seasons are the most important avenue for large scale political exchange, inspiration, and expression. (more…)

The Democratic Convention fiasco has triggered an exodus to the Green Party

Back at the end of July, as I was leaving home and traveling to the Democratic Convention in Philadelphia, I wasn’t yet certain whether the leaders of the Democratic Party — the Democratic National Committee — were simply incompetent or actually corrupt. As a writer, as a progressive, and as a citizen inspired by the Bernie Sanders campaign, I was interested to see the workings of the DNC up close.

I had already witnessed in 2016 the DNC allocate and count “superdelegates” prematurely, which favored the Clinton campaign. I had also seen tremendous irregularities and probable fraud in the primary elections, which also favored the Clinton campaign. In short, I knew the DNC wasn’t running a fair primary between Sanders and Clinton, but I wasn’t sure exactly how unfair it was, and whether it was random incompetence and peccadilloes, or whether it was concerted rigging and intentional corruption to install Hillary Clinton as the nominee.

The future of our democracy, our country, and our planet hang in the balance here in 2016, so I departed for the convention knowing that the decisions of the DNC and the superdelegates would be extremely important. (more…)