“… It (Red Flag) raises warning bells to me about intelligence community buzzwords…”

The Red Flag, in this instance, refers to a suspicious activity like meeting privately with a corrupt industry, while preaching transparency to the rest of us.

…especially since you claim to be sending her money. Though such a contribution doesn’t make sense to me given the rest of what you say about her going to be a sellout with the same outcome as others…”

I said, up until now. Actually, it was up until a couple of months ago, when she agreed to endorse the DNC Establishment pick, even after they screw us.

But I sent her another donation in October, in gratitude for her ass-whipping of that lunatic who accused her of Russian Pupeteering. In fact, I had planned to start up the donations again after that — until she contradicted her transparency claims, and met privately with Wall Street.

“I will say that despite my little Obama bashing I recognize he “tried” for Main Street. He succeeded “a little” in bringing relief in the Great Recession after the banks got their bailout.”

As Chomsky pointed out, you can often predict the outcome of elections by the donors. Obama was largely funded by the financial industry. There should never have been a doubt, about what he would do in the event of a crash.

“War War War War War War War War WAR FOR PROFIT! She might not compromise there and that matters to me.”

It’s important, for sure. However, I don’t believe that it can be fought with merely a strong leader, ATrigueiro. I think we have to hit the monetary system — which incentivites Killing for Profit. Otherwise, it’s an endless battle, we’ll be chasing that tail for eternity.

“She might stop the (War) profiteers and that has to matter to me. “

No doubt, that’s what Congresswoman Gabbard wants to do. She’s not lying about that. But it’s a fool’s errand, as long as Capitalism has a grip on our society and our psyches.

“Finally, what do you mean by no change can come through the electoral process when you are contributing over $1k a year to the process?”

Because I don’t support candidates, in order to bring about change. I support candidates out of respect for them as a person. Ron Paul deserved that respect, Nader did, Stein did. Sanders seemed to deserve it, but he was probably given an offer he couldn’t refuse, after the private meeting with Obama.

Similarly, we could respect Bill Maher, when he got fired for a dissenting opinion about 9/11. But after a nice little private meeting with Bill Clinton, it’s reasonable to have doubts about his current ‘politically incorrect’ rhetoric.

The one thing that IS worth supporting in the slim hopes of real change, are technical or artistic ventures like Peter Joseph’s InterReflections. He’s in debt after producing the damn thing, but it’s the type of project that *could* (with luck & timing) lead to the kind of awareness & activity that makes a real difference.

Systemic change isn’t going to happen by electing the next good person to lead. It might come from what Hedges keeps recommending i.e. Civil Disobedience on a scale unheard of. Or maybe a crash or a technological breakthrough or some other unknown event would have to trigger a total breakdown & rebuilding of our economy. As long as there is an incentive structure to continue sucking away our resources, the Financial Industry & War Machine will continue rearing their ugly heads with new schemes, even if we think we won by bringing in someone of Tulsi’s caliber.

“I disagree and believe paper ballots and a unified vision for a large majority can make some change happen.”

I don’t know about this, ATrigueiro. Paper ballots are a patch. They might solve a few problems as far as validating the electronic ballots go, but they also are an inconvenience. We SHOULD be able to use the most convenient technology available, to make voting as easy as walking to the corner store.

The real problem, in my opinion, is the proprietary nature of the electronic voting machinery. If they were open source, and could be validated & monitored by our best hackers for breaches, then we could get realtime status & demographic reporting on a scale we’ve never had before. And more importantly, convenience for voters without the risk of chicanery.

Temporarily, paper ballots are fine. Just as UBI is a welcome patch, temporarily. But they don’t solve the actual problem, in my opinion. UBI does NOT fix Inequality.

Thanks for the discussion, gotta do some programming, and joke with the wife.

Regards,

DC