Two days after I announced the End of Jeff Mackler's Campaign (posted 9/15), the candidate resurrected himself with a short piece entitled Socialist Action 2020 Presidential Candidate Jeff Mackler: No to Trump’s Coup Threat! (posted 9/17). He repeats every Democratic talking point in the book:
Socialist Action is in no way indifferent to Trump’s threat to cancel the 2020 election or to ignore its results on election day should he lose, or attempts to undermine the right to vote by defunding the Post Office to make the prompt counting of ballots difficult or using U.S. Supreme Court rulings to approve racist gerrymandering of districts and other undemocratic measures aimed at reducing the vote of Black and Latinx people. While we have always exposed the reactionary nature of bourgeois elections and all their anti-democratic aspects, we are far from the point of ceding this institution to would-be tyrants like Trump.
Mr. Mackler's supposed defense of free elections is hypocrisy on steroids. Trotskyists--including Socialist Action--put no faith in "bourgeois elections," and participate in them only until they can put together a big enough mob to overthrow the system illegally, after which all elections will be banned. Or if not, then after the Revolution Mr. Mackler will win with 99.9% of the vote. The remaining 0.1% will be put in front of a firing squad.
My original post elicited a comment from UNAC Blog (United National Antiwar Coalition), which looks like an ultraleft front group for Socialist Action. The comment reads in full,
It seems that during this time, as we go through COVID, have had a massive response to cop killings and racism, as jobs are lost, rents coming due and the capitalist parties moving to the right and showing no way forward, the example of an independent socialist campaign - even a small one- is better than none at all.
I have no complaint about a small, independent socialist campaign--I only insist that it be competently run, especially if it claims the Trotskyist banner. "Competent" means, among other things, choosing a candidate with some minimal level of charisma.
I'll suggest that the Socialist Workers Party campaign of Alyson Kennedy and Malcolm Jarrett fits the bill. They're small, socialist, and in the larger scheme of things completely inconsequential. But they're out on the campaign trail, they seek endorsements from outside their own movement, and I believe they'll be on the ballot in at least a few states.
If you don't like them, then vote for the Green Party.
True to form, Mr. Mackler hasn't been heard from since Sept. 17th--so I'll stand by my claim that the campaign is moribund. (By the way, whatever happened to Heather Bradford, who was initially chosen as his running mate? Unfortunately she left in the Socialist Resurgence split (h/t commenter John B)and is now a designated non-person--likely one of those destined for the firing squad after the Revolution.)
But back to the Democratic talking points that Mr. Mackler so proudly regurgitates in his lede paragraph.
Mr. Trump has never vowed to remain in office illegally. He has promised to appeal close election results all the way to the Supreme Court, which is his right. This becomes "undemocratic" only if he disobeys a court order--which he's never done and almost certainly won't do. (If he does then everybody, including me, will oppose him.) The Democrat's fearmongering about Trump organizing a coup is just that--fearmongering. (Indeed, it looks more plausible that the Dems organized a coup against Trump beginning in 2016.)
Likewise, the post office is not being defunded. It's got plenty of money through the end of the fiscal year, i.e., through the election. The debate is over next year's funding.
For somebody who is trying to "reduc[e] the vote of Black and Latinx people", Mr. Trump is sure spending a lot of time and money to recruit them as voters. He's gone out of his way to blame only Antifa (the all-white fascist grouping) for the violence, only rarely mentioning Black Lives Matter (the half-white fascist grouping). He's made numerous promises to help the Black community economically--and unlike the Dems, Trump tries hard to keep his promises.
It's worth noting that both Blacks and Latinos are very much in support of the police--unlike the white fascist-types that want to "defund the police." Not even Al Sharpton supports BLM on this issue. Kamala Harris can't make up her mind, and Joe Biden has no mind to make up.
Just recently, Joe Biden compared Mr. Trump to Joseph Goebbels. In other words, the accusations against Trump have gotten so extreme and so far removed from reality that it looks likely to backfire on them.
The New York Times claims to have detailed information about Trump's tax returns, from which the bottom line is that there's nothing in there that we didn't know already. He has no big investments in Russia. He didn't launder money through Russia. He took a big loss on his casinos, which he has been able to deduct from his subsequent income meaning that he's paid no income tax in recent years. He's being audited because of a large refund he got ten years ago, which if he loses he'll be on the hook for $100 million.
He has done nothing illegal--or even unethical. He's simply followed the rules the way they were written, which is what taxpayers do everywhere.
I predict Mr. Trump will win reelection, perhaps by a large electoral vote margin. The reason is (as Conrad Black puts it) that the Biden-Harris ticket is unfeasible. Biden is clearly in mental decline. He can't speak extemporaneously to the media--not even friendly media. He's increasingly unable to even read from a teleprompter. He is simply incapable of being president, regardless of any ideology. He can't state any reason for his candidacy except that he hates Trump.
The Democratic strategy is to a) let Trump destroy himself with his supposedly outrageous comments, and b) to tar him with whatever scandal they can come up with. Meanwhile, Biden is supposed to sit in his basement and appeal to his image as being "a nice guy" who's "one of us." The problem with this is that Trump is a known quantity--the man is an open book. There is no new information to be had about the man, and the notion there's some smoking gun somewhere is an illusion.
This won't work. Trump-hatred will not win a majority of voters, and without a positive reason people won't vote for Mr. Biden. The basement campaign will fail.
What's more mysterious to me is why they're keeping Ms. Harris under wraps. After all, given Joe's age and obvious infirmities, Kamala is likely to be president within the first term. Nobody really knows who she is, and I think the public is too risk averse to take a chance on a complete unknown.
So here's Mr. Mackler's chance! As bad as he is as a candidate, he is better than Joe Biden. At least he had the courage to go up against Paul Duddridge, which is more than I can say for cowardly Joe. And even though his program is completely wacko, at least there is one. The man has something to say.
Mr. Mackler's meager virtues notwithstanding, this blog endorses Donald J. Trump for President.
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