Jeff Mackler Quits 2020 Race!

Jeff Mackler (Source)

It appears that Socialist Action's (SA) candidate for president, Jeff Mackler--the most pathetic presidential candidate ever in the history of presidential candidates--has dropped out. 

It was the honorable thing to do.

The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, Fox News, and Breitbart have all failed to mention the auspicious event. Indeed, an announcement hasn't even appeared on Socialist Action's own website! Mr. Mackler's campaign was that unnewsworthy.

So the scoop is mine--I'm apparently the first (and only) media channel to report Mr. Mackler's withdrawal. For that matter, I was nearly the only place besides SA itself where his campaign got any mention at all.

I'd be happy to reprint, link to, or comment on any press release or article post explaining the move. But there has been none.

One wouldn't have to make excuses for the decision. SA, a grouplet of about 60 people, simply doesn't have the resources to run an election campaign--not even one that compares favorably with other Trotskyist grouplets. And then they chose a uniquely bad candidate--an 80 year old with a hacking cough whose YouTube videos are about as interesting as watching paint dry.

Even Joe Biden is a better candidate (though I suppose that's arguable).

Anyway, I infer the event because all mention of Mr. Mackler's campaign has been dropped from the SA website. The wayback machine still works--I don't think they've deleted anything. But you'll find no mention or links on the front page.

They do post an article written by Mr. Mackler (The Democratic & Republican Conventions: A Socialist Fact Check) dated September 3rd, which ends with this ridiculous exhortation:

For the first time in a long, long while, the fighting forces to do so are in motion as never before. They have appeared in the streets in unprecedented number – estimated at 15-26 million – and won the hearts and minds of tens of millions more. They carry with them the potential to achieve wondrous victories that can be coalesced in new and independent forms of struggle aimed at a direct challenge to capitalist rule, including the organization of a mass, independent Black political party and the rebirth of a fighting labor movement free from its current stifling bureaucracy and advancing on the class struggle road. Join us! Join Socialist Action! Vote Jeff Mackler for president in 2020!

So some time between Sept. 3rd and today the Political Committee, or the Campaign Committee, or the National Committee, or some other Brezhnevian committee decided to airbrush Mr. Mackler's campaign out of history.

You can get away with that if you control all the media, as Mr. Brezhnev himself did. Or you can get away with it if nobody cares what you say or holds you to no account. And but for me that latter appears to be the case. So there you have it--it is my honorable task to preserve those 15-26 million potential SA sympathizers from serious folly!

The consequential decision that remains is Who are the five dozen SA comrades gonna vote for in November? My suggestion would be Donald J. Trump, but I doubt they'll take my advice. 

My second choice for them are their former comrades in the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), who are running Alyson Kennedy and Malcolm Jarrett for prez and veep, respectively. Apart from SA's antisemitism, their campaign platform is identical to whatever Jeff Mackler was doing. Yes--the SWP's campaign is just as quixotic and silly as Mr. Mackler's, but at least it's competently executed. They'll even be on the ballot in a few places.

Anyway, good bye Mr. Mackler. I'll miss you--you were good for laughs. But I don't think anybody else will. May you enjoy your retirement.

Further Reading:

• Jeff Mackler Interviewed by Paul Duddridge
• Boring Jeff Mackler Runs for President Again
• Old White Man Runs for President