Live blogging the discussion by Our Revolution London (formerly London for Bernie)
The panelists are active in US and Uk politics on the left.
Travis: a Bernie supporter pitting forth Bernie’s position, which was to endorse Clinton. She has a adopted a left platform, largely put forth by Bernie supporters.
Trump is a fascist and a lot of voters don’t like Hillary. There are a lot of dodgy websites that look like legit media.
Writing in Bernie is a waste of time. The Libertarian is not a left choice. A vote for Trump is a vote for fascism. The Green Party is in disarray.
Trump could win. It is imperative to defeat him.
The Democratic Party has a history of left political victories. It is progressive to fight on the left wing of the democratic party.
Panelist #2:
The era of Clintonian politics lead directly to the rise of Trump. Neo liberalism created a vacuum that enables fascism.
Wiki leaks has given us insight into the inner workings of the DNC and the Clinton campaign. Many of these emails aer very concerning.
She asked herself if she should vote, should compromise, or should vote her conscience and vote for Stein despite her having no chance of winning.
Because she is from California, she feels her vote does not matter, so she is voting Green. Third parties are b not currently viable in winning elections, but are important when it comes to ideas, movements and change.
She has decided that voting Stein is a way to stay engaged in politics. Stein has 99% agreement with Bernie.
She finds Clinton to be untrustworthy given the emails leaked by wiki leaks. Support of Stein keeps the far left vital. She sees it as a way to move beyond horse race politics. In a swing state, she says people should vote for Clinton.
She claims there is a lot of disinformation about Stein. For example, Stein’s defence of anti vaxxers has been overstated or misinterpreted.
Stein is a scientist and is to the left of Bernie.
Neo liberalism must be challenged to fight the fascist vacuum.
Panelist #3:
This election went from inspiring to painful. It was Bernie who expanded the possible. The Bernie excitement is like Corbyn’s Momentum.
We cannot quietly accept neo liberalism and must solve the world’s problems. Change comes from below, from workers. From poc and women. The sanders campaign reflected the hopes and inspirations of the disenfranchised.
The surging movements for equality in the us are where change congress from. Change vines from movements. What happens between campaigns? We must build movements to hold politics and corporations accountable.
People must believe that change is possible. Bernie made people believe that change is possible. People were excited because of his content, not because of party politics. He allowed people to believe they could vote for meaningful change.
What have democrats done for her? Neo liberalism has been the policy of every us government she has lived under. Things have gotten more precarious and more unequal. No democratic president had done much for working class people.
The idea of humanitarian intervention was actually an advertisement for greater military adventurism. The Bosnia intervention paved the way for the Iraq war. Both parties are parties of the ruling class and the military industrial complex.
Chicago is a democrat town, but still had had massive privatisation and union busting. Democrats there have hurt workers. Organised workers are the only thing that fights the ruling class.
Voters must fight back independent of party politics, therefore the only real alternative is Jill Stein.
Remarks from the floor:
A labour party member says that brexitism will only get worse if someone like Clinton is elected.
Judith takes issue with that- she feels like trumpism is a flash in the pan. People have short memories. People will rise up to prevent this from happening again. This will lead to the Republican party splitting. The democrats may also split. The left wing may become a new, viable party.
Another commenter remembers FDR. In the late 40s, people learned ethics at school. But that doesn’t happen anymore. Young people don’t know the real purpose of trade unions. Despite being a socialist, he whole heatedly sorts Clinton because the path to power involves compromise. One must make decisions in life. He hopes that people will use knowledge and self examination to make good choices. He loves the UK, but held its important to vote on the US elections. It is vital to make a vote that will count. Clinton must win a massive popular vote to add legitimacy to her election. We must stay on top of issues and influence politics through unions and parties and other activism. This will slowly lead the US back to the left. This is more useful than voting for someone who cannot win.
A question from the back- Clinton had accused trump of being Russian stooge and is fond of Kissinger. Will she start ww3?
Kendra says: it’s ridiculous to vote for anyone but Clinton. There will be supreme court appointment. A trump victory would be a disaster.
A woman in back: it’s good that Clinton’s platform has been pushed left, but there needs to be more criticism of Clinton. Her lack of response to critique leads to trumpism.
A guy in the back: Trump is an idiot, but it’s worryng that the whole media has turned on him. The whole media attacking half of the us is propaganda. They are being insufficiently deferential to a us candidate. The RNC is less corrupt than the DNC.
Kyra: comparisons of media coverage of trump and Clinton are refiduculous. Party change can’t be something you dip your toe in every 4 years with presidential politics. Representatives have more ability to effect change.
A green party member: one wiki leaks email days she has a private position and a public position. She is on favour of fracking and wants a no fly zone in Syria, which would involve firing on Russians. Stein, however has been active in left wing politics for many years.
Another comment: the DNC cannot be transformed to be more left. Stein can’t work in a new left coalition because she is against that kind of party politics. The commenter wrote to hrc against the Iraq war, but she voted anyway. The democratic victories were actually victories of workers, co-opted by the DNC.
A woman at the back really dislikes Clinton. But voting for stein is silly, selfish and ignorant. Nader campaigners are full of regret. Clinton is not great, but could be worse. Climate change is never brought up at debates. It is so existential, in a way that other issues are not. Gore would have been better than Bush.
A guy says we need to vir for stein so she gets 5% of the vote to be in the debates.
Another guy in the back brings up campaign finance reform to get rid of the trump threat.
Judith, again: this discussion is very different than it would be in America. Trek Americans that the NHS is awesome and the trains ran better before they were privatised. We need to tell Americans that socialism works.
Kendra, again: you can’t tell people what to believe. Hour do we teach people in America that socialism is possible?
Now back to the panelists:
Speaker 3: Trump is vile. Sexism against Clinton is vile. Trump’s sexual assault is vile. Trump is a sociopath. So what is the best way to defeat the right wing and move people to the left? We must build on anti austerity policies. We cannot be wishy washy. We must support wealth redistribution. We must advocate for socialism. If there is no push back on the left, right wing populism takes off.
We must have pro immigrant policies on the us and Europe. Democracy must be increased. We must have worthwhile people to vote for. We cannot be asked to vote against our interests. Voting for the lesser evil moved the world to the right. Left wing candidates in the DNC are marginalised.
Panelist #2: People’s memories are sometimes short, but Trumpism will remain a risk. Indeed, his popularity is a consequence of forgetting. War is also a serious risk. Voting for Clinton is too personally shattering, as she would feel responsible for war deaths. There is wiki leaks evidence that suggests the DNC actually schemed to get trump the nomination. The party meant to save us from trump had created him. The v trump tapes were released on the same day as the wiki leaks document dump. At least trump has people talking about asexual assault. We are not having the right conversations, however. 5%of the vote for stein would be great.
Travis: Political purity is easy and attractive. It would be great if we could vote stein into office, but we can’t. The party is a coalition. There is, had been and will be a left wing in the democratic party. Our only hope to access power is to work inside the power structure.
The democratic party has changed over time. The left programmes of the party have come from lefty activism.
Jill already qualifies for matching funds whether or not she gets 5%.
The green party is great, but must be built from the v ground up, not the top down.
We must ask think about what reality we live in when we decide how to vote. We know that either Clinton or trump will win.
The next event is the democrats abroad election night watch. But a ticket.
It is possible to vote still.
