"Mr. Obama nominated Judge Garland to the Supreme Court in March 2016, praising him as a moderate and nonpolitical judge. The choice was partly a calculus to appeal to Republicans, since Judge Garland had a record of often siding with law enforcement in his criminal rulings. He had only tepid support from the liberal wing of his party, particularly Senator Bernie Sanders, who said in his primary campaign for president that year that if he won the White House, he would ask Mr. Obama to withdraw the nomination." I'm sure Mr. Garland is a fine gentleman but at this time we don't need a "Centrist" as attorney general. The forces of fascism are gearing up under the false flag of American "patriotism," the Republican Party itself is taking the fascist road and millions of Americans are set to follow the Pied Piper of racist extremism Donald Trump as leader of that party. It is the nature of centrists to look for ways to compromise and make deals that both sides can live with but the progressive movement cannot compromise with racism and fascism. Lenin said it was infantile not to make compromises in the face of realpolitik but those compromises could not be unprincipled concessions to an implacable foe but were compromises that allowed us to work with other working class progressives who did support our views but would work with us against a common enemy. He did not think we should work with elements of the ruling class itself whose differing factions would unite against us the minute any real threat to the dominance of the capitalist system arose. The history of centrism is, that when push comes to shove, it sides with the fascists only tempering down the most extreme elements so as not to arouse opposition to its betrayals. Of course, Biden/Harris and company are centrists themselves, so we can't expect a really progressive AG to be appointed (even Bernie distrusted Garland when the centrist Obama nominated him for the Supreme Court) but we can refrain from fooling ourselves and rhapsodizing over this appointment, we can leave that to the centrist New York Times.
Sunday, February 21, 2021
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