Who Let the Clowns Out?

So there was a debate last night. The insane clown car posse was in the usual bat shit crazy, fiction spewing, hate and distrust mongering form.

A friend summed it up for those of us who couldn’t bear to watch:

"Because I hate myself, I stayed up last night for the GOP shit-show again. Here's what you missed: Cruz' father sailed from Cuba & breathed the 'salty air'; Kasich has a daughter; Paul will spend no money, not a cent; Bush will save the VA from Clinton (wha ?); Fiorina likes to say "crushed" - and have you heard abt her 3 page tax code?; Rubio is the American Dream & ISIS is coming now for yr family; Carson (snorting Valium before debate) just wants you to stop lying abt him; Trump asks, are we a country? Oh, and he is special & will make America GREAT!”

Some of the live tweeting from Stonekettle

 This is what we’re up against. A bunch of players who’ve no goddamned interest in making America great for anyone but themselves and their corporate backers. They all seem like buffoons to me but one of these freakazoid fuckwads could win. Of course they could. President Trump? President Paul? President Rubio? It could happen especially if we on the left splinter. We need to hang together and stay focused on the immediate goal—getting a Dem, NOT a Tea/Repub, in the White House

On that note, looka here, I’m sick of the Feel the Bern crowd telling me that my potential vote for Hillary is akin to a vote for Trump/Rubio/Shit-on-a-Stick-Du-Jour/Darth Vader and then continuing on to note that the only reason I’m, potentially, casting my vote for her is that I want a female president.

Guess what—that’s NOT why I think Clinton would make a great president AT ALL.

Here’s why I may vote for her—she’s qualified.

I’m not saying that, in contrast, Sanders is an inept poltroon. No, no, NO I am not! I like him. I like what he has to say. His resume rocks! I believe, however, that Clinton's, quite likely, a better, more skilled champion against the lunatic, enslave-the-poors, rape-the-planet "right." Her performance at the Benghazi Shit Show nailed it for me.

I like Clinton's stance on issues (from Blue Nation Review):

She’s pro equal rights for LGBT Americans
She opposes using “religious freedom” to justify cutting access to healthcare and discrimination
She understands economic inequality – and wants to fix it
She thinks anti-vaxxers are stupid
She supports gun control
She knows the criminal justice system in this country is broken
She wants to fix Citizens United
She supports other women in the climb towards equality
She supports American Workers
She’s Pro-Choice

Stephen Charbonneau on Quora wrote an excellent response to the question Why should one vote for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election?

Hillary Clinton is hyper-competent, highly intelligent, and well connected. She has all the skills necessary to be a great President...

 He then makes eight solid points on why it makes obscene amounts of sense to vote for her.

Think about what the Supremes’d be like if one of the cracked crop gets to replace even one. Just think on that for a moment.

Justices Anthony Kennedy and Antonin Scalia will be 81 years old in 2017 and will likely retire during the next president’s tenure. Ruth Bader Ginsburg will be 84 and Stephen Breyer isn’t getting any younger either—he’ll be 79. Imagine the decisions made by a Tea/Repub dominated Supreme Court. Citizen’s United? McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission? Roe v Wade? Equal rights for those who flash a darker shade of pale? Phbbt—I want a sane, just court, not a bunch of extreme right wing puppets.

Think about what's at stake. Blasting Clinton because she’s not pure enough and tellin’ me that the only reason I’ll, most likely, vote for her is because she’s rockin’ the lady bits is utterly reductive, disingenuous bullshit.

 Clinton and Sanders voted the same 93% of the time when they were both senators. In response to one of those ugly, divisive viral memes which makes Clinton out to be some hawkish DINO, I ask you to read this very clear Politifact column.

I will vote for whoever wins the Democratic nomination.

Habib Fanny, at that same Quora page, nailed it.

I support HRC because even though she's not my dream candidate, she offers the best chances of maintaining a left-of-center domestic policy and I care more about winning than I care about ideological purity.

Barney Frank had it right:

We're not perfect, but they are nuts.