title: iraqi soldier battling in mosul reunited with his family after two years of estrangement
text: it doesnt matter what the friggin legal and ethics people say we need to win this motherfucker  mr scott foval field director americans united for change retained by the clinton campaign and the democratic national committee  shares
     
  an elite stratum of wealthy and politically dominant people intends to make hillary clinton our next president these are the oligarchs the  whose wealth and incomes continue growing while most american struggle in her private life hillary clinton is wellpositioned among this cohort and they expect her as president to protect their wealth and maintain their dominance she will
  to assure the oligarchs success the democratic national committee is brutalizing the presidential electoral process willfully violating rules laws and precedent the strategy succeeded in the primary elections and it will win the general
  who are these people the top  of wealthholders numbers about  million predominantly they are citizens whose wealth depends on the huge american domestic and transnational corporations either directlyexecutives directors investors contractors suppliersor indirectly in other ways eg investment bankers hedge fund managers consultants top law firms two preeminent names in this grouping are hillary and bill clinton whose net worth about  million qualifies the couple for the  stratum by a factor of  others are wall street bankersthe clintons primal financial benefactors and firstname friends lloyd blankfein jamie dimon robert rubin brian moynihan michael corbat james gorman timothy geithner john stumpf etc a more accurate description of the  would be the corporate elite 
  candidate clintons relationship to her elite compatriots is one of rigid interdependence she needs their financial and political resources to win the election and they need her in the white house to sustain their privileged status
  this privileged status did not result from accident random chance or neglect it is a consequence of public policies consciously adopted over the past three or four decades which shift wealth and incomes systematically upward cutting taxes for corporations and the wealthy for example while exporting  of the nations manufacturing jobs in the process our democracy was transformed public policy is crafted today not primarily to advance the welfare of the nations people but to create protect or enhance the financial interests of american corporate enterprise this is acknowledged in the statements of public figures and supported in rigorous scholarly research 
  more a new email investigation on clinton could hasten the democratic partys demise the banana republic of america democracy be damned to the superdelegates stand tall in statesmanship anointment of hillary clinton exposes a democracy that never was though easily identifiable the corporate elite has not constructed a conscious conspiracy against the american people at large with a preplanned agenda strategy and tactics but they share a common mindset they are networked by personal acquaintance and they are driven by a common imperative their wealth and political dominance depend on the existing configurations of american domestic and foreign policy both of which must be maintained essentially intact to sustain the groups position of privilege alterations in the status quo can be tolerated only if they are cosmetic slight and at the margin
  instead of conspiracy the preeminence of the oligarchs is better seen as a malignant condition of contemporary american government resulting from years of institutional decay and corruption  the story of moribund democracy is detailed here  the economic and political power of megacorporationsincreasingly fewer but ever largerhas displaced functional democracy
  yes we vote as we always have but voting and democracy are not interchangeable terms the russian people voted for vladimir putin the iraqis voted for saddam hussein and voting isnt a prerequisite for democracy to function the ancient greeks chose their representatives by lottery
  the priority of corporate interests has been achieved by three powerful mechanisms
  perhaps the least recognized is the degree to which corporate personnel enter government to staff the highest levels of the executive branch
  a new book by political scientists bastiaan van apeldoorn and nana de graaff carries a sobering title american grand strategies and corporate elite networks  they looked into the grand strategy makers the  most influential people in cabinetlevel and senior advisory positions in the last three administrationsbill clintons bushs and obamas in the clinton administration  of the  grand strategy makers  were linked to  different transnational or financial corporations as executives directors senior associates or partners in law firms either prior to their public service or after it in the bush administration  of the   had connections to  corporations in the obama administration  of the  over  had such toplevel corporate affiliations with  companies
  smoking guns examples of wealthshifting upward to the already rich certainly  the repeal of the glasssteagall act rammed through in the bill clinton administration by treasury secretary robert rubin from citigroup this enabled the subprime loan frenzy enriching the new york banks but destroying  trillion in americans household wealth  halliburtons nobid obscenely profitable contracts in iraq served up by vice president richard cheney during the bush administration billions of taxpayers dollars to the corporation mr cheney once chaired  in the obama administration treasury secretary timothy geithner from wall street administered the troubled asset relief program bailing out his colleagues banks again with billions of taxpayers money
  for the last  years the executive branch has been dominated by the corporate elite
  two other mechanisms of corporate influence are far more familiar the corporate financing of political campaigns and the ubiquitous enterprise of lobbying
  the two practices are related in direct proportion the more you accept in contributions from boeing say the more you feel obligated to yield to their lobbyists wishes
  your policymaking independence will decrease then as the costs of campaigning rise and contemporary costs are staggering a representative today must raise on average  million in campaign funding a senator  million a presidential race runs in the hundreds of millions hillary clinton has taken in  million since citizens united corporate campaign funding has no limits and with candidates in need of so many millions the corporate capture of federal governance is undeniable and scarcely surprising
  undeniable but easily surmounted we once had a law on the books the uk still does limiting not campaign contributions but campaign expenditures the limits were  for a senate race  for a representative sums easily provided from personal assets and those of family and friends reenacting such a law would break the corporate stranglehold intense lobbying might continue but no senator no representative would feel the courteous urge to accommodate the welfare of the american people could regain priority the impact on the oligarchs however would be apocalyptic
  the commitment of the corporate elite to sustain the status quo is apparently absolute by april of  the democratic national committee and the clinton campaign were one indistinguishable juggernaut intent on blitzing the presidential campaign like hitlers wehrmacht stormed through europe the watch words seemed to be first and most they amassed an early warchest of a hundred million dollars or so and lined up  superdelegate endorsementsall before there was a single announced opponent they invited  print and television journalists to meetings in early april to help in framing the hrc message and framing the race  among them were george stephanoplous and  others from abc rachel maddow and  more from msnbc gloria borger and  of her colleagues from cnn and  from the new york times bloomberg politico and cbs each sent along two
  the firstandmost strategy worked secretary clinton preempted the candidate space the only others attracted to the race were lackluster lightweights especially the wooly socialist from vermont but senator sanders electrifying rallies made tangible the disgust of the american people with the status quo  sanders proposals were anything but cosmetic slight and at the margin they posed a mortal threat to the corporate elite and its guardian the clinton campaign to minimize sanders exposure dnc chair wassermanschultz limited the number of debates and scheduled them on weekends and opposite football games sanders had to sue to gain access to the dncs voter database the deliberate tilting of the democratic primaries gained momentum
  to minimize sanders exposure dnc chair wassermanschultz limited the number of debates and scheduled them on weekends and opposite football games
  this may not be the first election in which ethics and law were abandoned but never before has it been so reliably exposed
  not by the mainstream media though they either ignored the increasingly evident fraud or were complicit in it from the iowa caucuses onward the press treated clintons superdelegate endorsements as tallied votes this continued even after the distortion and dishonesty of doing so were pointed out based on precisely that deception however the associated press announced clintons presumptive nomination on monday june one day before primaries were held in california montana new jersey north and south dakota and the district of columbia from iowa forward also the washington post and the new york times hammered the sanders campaign without mercy or interruption the story was detailed later by thomas frank in harpers magazine   frank concludes i have never before seen the press take sides like they did this year openly and even gleefully badmouthing candidates who did not meet with their approval 
  no the major media failed to expose the fraud but the social media and the internet abounded with skepticism sanders fans questioned the uncounted caucuses in iowa the  reduction of polling places in maricopa county arizona the disqualified sanders delegates at the nevada convention the cheapshot call by the associated press many were certain the clinton campaign and the democratic national committee were joined at the hip but there was scant factual evidence
  enter julian assange and the leaked dnc emails now the illegal collusion was documented the sabotaging of the sanders campaign exposed wassermanschultz resigns as dnc chair then the podesta emails and hillarys paid speeches you need both a public position and a private position my dream is a hemispheric open market with open trade and open borders dnc vicechair donna brazile a cnn pundit emails the clinton campaign prior to the debate from time to time i get the questions in advance the attempt to reschedule the illinois primary another tranche of emails arrives braziles complicity with the clinton campaign is broadened she is firedresigns from her cnn post the clinton foundation hosts pay to play the clintons personal enrichment the  million deal with king mohammed vi of morocco
  finally the compliant mass media did take note this is after all fine spectacle noted but not pursued no determined effort was undertaken to investigate to document further the deceit and dishonesty and to assess its magnitude
  once again that was left to the citizenry the first careful detailed study was published june   by two scholars axel geijel of tilburg university and rodolfo cortes barragan at stanford it is entitled are we witnessing a dishonest election they compared states whos voting systems produced verifying paper trails against states which did not sanders won the papertrail states where tampering with machine tallies could be quickly discovered clinton overpowered in states without paper trails where tampering could never be detected the authors also compared voting machine tallies with exit poll figures and found disturbing discrepancies they concluded these data suggest that election fraud is occurring in the  democratic party presidential primary election this fraud has overwhelmingly benefited secretary clinton at the expense of senator sanders the paper can be found here 
  then with the primaries concluded a group of outraged patriots with day jobs organized as election justice usa  published an exhaustive report the study is entitled democracy lost a report on the fatally flawed  democratic primaries  and it is available here  it details in  pages of carefully assembled and compelling evidence examples of election fraud uncovered in four categories voter suppression registration tampering illegal voter purging and fraudulent voting machine tallies in eleven states the group found discrepancies between exit polls and voting machine counts exceeding the statistical margins of error every single discrepancy favored secretary clintonand no such discrepancies occurred in the republican counts the groups conclusion was troubling  elected delegates their report argues persuasively were awarded fraudulently to clinton and denied sanders accordingly
  that gave her the edge in delegate count going into the convention in the end however she needed the additional votes of  unelected superdelegates those empowered by the democratic national committee even after a primary season documented as fraudulent then hillary clintons nomination was achieved by fiat not democracy
  but the corporate elite will not be denied given the clintondnc expertise and success in tipping the primary elections she will be elected president in the general election guaranteed
  the manipulation of the primaries was obscure but not invisible a backlash of outrage might have been anticipated the clintondnc people however are unmatched in hubris and geniuses in the practice of deceit scandals were not even acknowledged defiantly ignored and the language of progressive democracy is omnipresent in the campaigning brilliant deception hillary clinton promises to work for main street not wall street she promises to bring back jobs improve education seek equal pay for women boost the minimum wage expand civil rights provide free college education move toward medicare for all oppose tpp break up the toobigtofail wall street banks fine appealing proposals all but this is the language of sanders revolution and the corporate elite will stand for none of it
  but folk wisdom tells us to take campaign promises lightly and the american people are forgiving and trusting hillary clinton is a woman of long experience and we want to believe our democracy is robust
  here now we need to be vigilant
  endnotes
   see testing theories of american politics elites interest groups and average citizens by martin gillens and benjamin page they conclude economic elites and business interests have substantial independent impact on us government policy while average citizens and massbased interest groups have little or no independent influence
   see httpwwwfurynewswikileaksleastmsmreportersbustedhelpinghillary
   thomas frank swat team the medias extermination of bernie sandersand real reform harpers magazine november 