“They will not even pretend to care about Palestinian human rights”, Stein tells Haaretz.
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Eyeing her supporters, Stein says the USA presidential election, which has been especially unpredictable this year, might also bring new opportunities for Israel. She calls Clinton a warmonger and Donald Trump a bigot, and won’t say which she believes to be worse.
More than a dozen protests and marches – some permitted by the city and others not – took place around Philadelphia Monday.
Ernest Rando, a volunteer organizer for protesters there, was helping orient arrivals.
He urged his supporters, many of them vocal, not to disrupt the convention’s proceedings, saying outbursts would damage the political revolution’s credibility.
“The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a ideal example”, Rando said, speaking of the Obama administration’s signature worldwide trade agreement. The Bernie Sanders supporter is leaning toward Mrs. Clinton, but he will use the run-up to Election Day to survey the options.
“We do not recognize her as the legitimate victor of this primary”, Connery explained to me.
“I’m with her”, said Julian Mack. “That’s why we like Bernie, because he’s so transparent”. They raise their heads every four years to grandstand when all seems to fail us – yet in between we never hear from them. The Greenes said there was nothing Clinton could do or say to win their support, despite the Democratic Party’s adoption of some signature policies they support, such as a $15 minimum wage and student loan debt forgiveness. If your candidate really is that great, just say how great they are, no need for theatrics and intimidation. “Then all bets are off”, she said, because voters will have a chance to decide for themselves who best represents their values.
Connery ideas, which he backed up by citing Infowars-style conspiracy theory sites like TrustVote.org and Election Justice USA, reminded me quite a bit of the 9/11 truther theories that were popular with the folks at the Alex Jones rally in Cleveland.
But Clinton wasn’t without any support. Asked what she thought of the talk of unity from speakers on stage at the Democratic convention, she said: “It’s all a bunch of bullshit”.
“We are against the Republican Party for being so wrong about our community”. We’ve been warning them. As your beloved leader said today, “BROTHERS AND SISTERS, THIS IS THE REAL WORLD WE LIVE IN”.
As the day went on and the heat increased, so did the liveliness of the protests. She connected with Sanders supporters disillusioned by their candidate’s endorsement of Clinton.
Bob and Rachelle Van Wyk, a husband and wife from St. Petersburg, Florida, were among them.
Bob Nelson, a Sanders delegate from Pasadena who is at the convention, says that the California delegation, which includes factions of people including those who say they will in the end stay in the Democratic Party and ultimately will back Clinton (as Sanders is asking them to do, often to loud boos), those who will stay in the Party but who will only support down-ticket candidates but not Clinton, those who will quit the party – perhaps as part of a public walk-out from the convention hall – but who will still vote for Clinton in November so as not to allow Trump to win the state in a close contest, and those who will quit the party entirely, and probably support the Green Party. We share two lawsuits between our two parties, we are both suing the Commission on Presidential Debates.
Green is in Philadelphia trying to foment further discord among irate Sanders delegates who have threatened to break with the party rather than support the former secretary of state for president.
She later told RT in an interview that her campaign’s fundraising efforts have skyrocketed since Sanders endorsed Clinton ahead of the DNC. “In socialism, you eventually run out of other people’s money”, she said. “We are leaving behind the corruption, the backstabbing, and the lies”.
Bernie worked so hard to get his ideals into the Democratic platform and he did it. The least us Bernie supporters can do now is to continue to follow him and not give up on him. He grew up in Missouri and could, maybe, appeal to Midwestern white males who have deserted the Democratic Party.
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Though Donald Trump is “uniquely repulsive in various ways” in the eyes of the average Sanders supporter, he says, behind Trump’s brash bravado is a platform with “very similar themes” to previous Republican platforms.
