Is it just coincidence that the derisive millennial slang “OK boomer” has crested just as an old billionaire with the similar-sounding name Michael Bloomberg has decided to bigfoot into the presidential race? Yes, probably, but the moniker “OK Bloomberg” certainly fits.
It gives me no pleasure to have become a serial chronicler of Bloomberg’s absurd flirtations with the presidency: here, here, and here, all the way back in 2008. Each time my point is the same: This is someone with no constituency once you take the elevator down from an East 79th St.penthouse or step out of the Morning Joe greenroom. This Twitter thread describing a speech he gave less than a year ago—coming out against marijuana legalization, minimum-wage increases (!), and retraining workers for tech jobs (“they’re just not wired that way”)—highlights the inanity of the exercise.
If anything, this strengthens the hand of Sanders and Warren by putting another competitor on the moderate side to split votes. Bloomberg also reportedly won’t “seek or accept campaign contributions,” a genius move which means, under current DNC rules, that he won’t appear in any primary debates. But that’s not the only show of ignorance on display here.
Bloomberg, speaking for his class, is terrified that popular ideas like the wealth tax are getting traction. For about $50,000, he and his pals could get Kyrsten Sinema, Joe Manchin, Jon Tester, Chris Coons, and a handful of other Senate Democrats to block any legislation to that effect (actually they probably don’t have to spend a dime, these aren’t exactly bold progressive thinkers). They’ve bought the Congress for decades and they’re afraid that somebody talking about soaking the rich will penetrate the iron fortress they’ve built? Do they think their corruption of democracy is that fragile?
Actually, that’s a paradoxical ray of hope. The billionaires are convinced that they’re small men behind the curtain, and anyone pulling that curtain back will rob them of their power. They know this is a country founded in rebellion to aristocrats, that fights Gilded Ages, and they’re desperate to stifle those voices, lest they start a fire. Maybe democracy isn’t quite dead yet.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
The issue isn’t Left vs. Right anymore. It’s democracy vs. authoritarianism. I’ll be very tempted to vote for Bloomberg because he has the best shot of beating Trump, the brazen dismantler of our democracy.
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You should vote for Bloomberg in the primary if you want him to be President over the other candidates. That is the only way to elect a winning candidate.
If the majority of primary voters want Bloomberg over other candidates, then vote for him in the general election.
No one would have voted for Barack Obama in the primary if they believed a year before the general election that they should vote for the candidate that Republicans and billionaires told them would win.
Trump would not have won the primary if voters had listened to the supposedly “smart” billionaires who told them Trump could not win.
If you want Bloomberg’s policies on education and taxes (i.e. keep the rich paying low taxes), then vote for him the primary. But only vote for him because those are the policies you want, not because you think he can win. That is the way to elect a losing candidate.
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I strongly disagree. “In the conventional view of American politics, Joe Biden is a moderate while Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are on the left and Donald Trump is on the right. This conventional view is rubbish. Today’s great divide is not between left and right. It’s between democracy and oligarchy. There are no longer “moderates.” There’s no longer a “center.” The most powerful force in American politics today is anti-establishment fury at a rigged system.-Robert Reich (An oligarch like Bloomberg is antithesis of what the electorate is looking for.)
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The divide in America is what it has always been. It is about race. Race has always been used by the Oligarchy to divert the anger of the masses away from them. The divide in the Democratic electorate is another story.
Trump will drive the racist Republican base out to the polls. Bloomberg would leave the Democratic base at home.
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If Dems stay home b/c Bloomberg’s on the ballot, they’ll richly deserve the sadistic, lawless dictatorship that follows.
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No one deserves the plutocracy that has usurped control of our democracy. No one deserves to have billionaires buying political power to further enrich themselves at our expense. A choice between two billionaires is not really a choice at all. Blame belongs squarely with the billionaires.
Sure, there are differences between Trump and Bloomberg, but there are far too many similarities. First, they’re both the same age, two years old: “Mikey, Donny, will you share?”
“No. Mine. Mine mine mine mine mine.”
Second, they both will continue to shift the tax burden onto the working class. Trump does it by cutting taxes for the wealthy. Bloomberg, like Macron, does it by raising taxes on the working class. Instead of carbon taxes to incrementally help the environment, we need to tax the wealthy to revolutionize the fight against climate change with something like the Green New Deal. They both suppress unions and wages.
Third, they both engage in racially oppressive politics. They both want to privatize and keep privatized everything from education to health care. Both look the other way on segregation. They both support the mass incarceration of black and brown people with immigration restrictions, search and frisk policies, and cannabis criminalization. Neither wants to cut military spending or domestic surveillance.
There is only one difference between Trump and Bloomberg that really matters at all, and her name is Ruth Bader Ginsberg. That’s it. That’s all. Everything else about them just says billionaire.
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Well said, Arts Smart!
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LCT- “both the same age- 2 year olds” perfect description
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Joel
Part of the problem- AFP and state Catholic conferences working together for school choice. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops stated that they have been among the strongest advocates for parental school choice from the beginning.
Excerpt from a doctoral thesis (2014)
“…actually segregating the population and contributing to the growing social distances of American Society.” The title of the research paper,
“The Jesuit Social Justice Dialectic and the Cristo Rey School Model within Jesuit Secondary Education in the 21st Century”.
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Arts Smart
You (R.R. ) are assuming that the unease of the White Working Class voter has an economic basis. It does not. The fact that nearly half the American people voted for a Billionaire Oligarch who “earned his wealth the old fashioned way” ,
he inherited it. Who stated that Americans make too much , who made everything he sold in China …. should dispel that myth. The fact that they are still with him as every policy and appointment he makes attacks the working class, attacks Unions should certainly have driven the point home to his supporters. It has not and it never will . Because Marxian economic determinism as Mike Lofgren points out; is not what shapes the World View of his support base.
Thomas Frank asks “Whats the Matter With Kansas ” But his later criticism of the Limousine Liberal may be accurate but does not establish the causation.
The Times a few years back told the story of a Kansas resident whose wife is saved by Medicaid and yet he rants against Government welfare programs. Who does he not want to receive that assistance. Ask Ronald Reagan he ran on the same issue. As his attacks on workers devastated their unions. Leaving the entire working class worse off. Yet they voted for him again and then for Bush.
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Linda
Agreed. I watched an entire neighborhood change Parishes while they kept their address because the Parish they attended was” invaded” by people of color. ( The people of color were actually UN employees in the 90s )
And this was a working class area in Queens NY not Selma Alabama . School Segregation is alive and well. We tend to think it was just the evangelical South that flooded to Religious Schools to avoid integration.
On long Island we segregate the old fashioned way with real estate values and taxes. I had a real estate agent tell me “my district was not so good” The HSs. have won or been runners up in National science competitions for at least the last decade . Forget the rest of the metrics all tied toi wealth. His definition of not so good referred to the fact that about 20% of the HS population was bused in from a neighboring Community.
I wasn’t selling my house. He was advocating combining school districts to save on costs. My point the wealthy districts wanted no part of it. But he had a more narrow redistricting plan in mind that was based on Color.
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Thanks Joel for the comment,
I don’t know if it’s a fair assessment to write that commenters at this blog single out one religion for protection from criticism, or not. So, I’ll just sum up the situation by saying there is a threat that warrants greater exposure and reaction.
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How many of you are aware of the Indonesian genocide? One million “communists” summarily accused and slaughtered by right-wing paramilitaries in the course of one year. The paramilitaries still stalk the land and brag about their killings, 50 years later. They still terrorize anyone who dares to utter unorthodox views. They shake down Indonesians of Chinese descent (their “Jews”) for money. It’s as if the Nazis had won and continued to rule Germany. This kind of political violence happens, and Trump is pushing us in this direction. See the incredible documentary The Act of Killing for more background. We have such vicious souls among us. We are not immune.
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Ponderosa –
In 33 years, all U.S. national wealth will be in the hands of the rich (the projection based on Fed. Reserve data).
So, you are right. We are not only not immune to violence, it is inevitable without progressive income equality.
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This calms my nerves a little: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/11/08/how-spirit-sustains-hungarian-oppositions-fight-against-viktor-orban/
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Orban was praised at the U.S. site, Catholic Vote. A question posed by
the site was whether Orban’s policies would work in the U.S.
Orban forced the closure of a Soros funded university in Hungary. Ukrainian oligarch Firtash, who is aligned with Russia, funded a Catholic University in Ukraine.
It was recently reported that a U.S. foreign aid plan was delayed (unprecedented) so that funding for 2 Christian organizations could be added to the list of receiving organizations- one, a Catholic university.
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And who can forget all that money the Bloomberg spent to oust Steve Zimmer and help elect Nick Melvoin for LAUSD school board. He’s everything I don’t want in a democrat.
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Ah the terrible wealth tax, that Thomas Jefferson proposed as a means of funding public education. The one we are stuck with today as the biggest factor in segregated communities and inequality in school funding . The one that many working class residents already pay every year at two percent or more.
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Thomas Jefferson’s quotes about separation of church and state are insightful as are those of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, James Madison, and John Adams.
The ramifications of the self identified role that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have played in promoting school choice is ignored, only with peril.
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This!
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Trump. Then Bloomberg. Let’s start calling it the Offal Office.
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Well it would be nice to call the oval office again. I stopped calling when Trump came in. I figured I best keep my thoughts to my self, rather than get a visit from the FBI.
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I have wondered about this. Given the level of animosity against IQ45 in the country and the number of people who are unable to express themselves diplomatically, they must be very, very busy these days.
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Just no.
No. No. No.
But it also begs the question, do you need to be a millionaire, or, at least, very, very wealthy, and have a job which allows you to take a leave (and still draw a salary) in order to run for President?
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“…do you need to be a millionaire, or, at least, very, very wealthy, and have a job which allows you to take a leave (and still draw a salary) in order to run for President?”
It sure helps. Of course, that is part of the reason why wealthy benefactors can buy influence. It’s past time for publicly funded campaigns.
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Ask Pres. Obama what permitted his candidacy. I presume that the continuation of Clinton’s legacy- privatization of America’s most important commonly held asset -played a part. Anti-democracy Bill Gates received the Medal of Freedom while Obama was in office.
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Montana Senator Jon Tester is listed in this article. He is a man of utmost integrity–a farmer, a former teacher, a former school board member, a champion of veterans issues. He speaks his mind. He speaks the truth. He represents his constituents. He is able to win re-election in a state dominated by Republicans. Don’t knock him. He’s the real deal.
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The writer was making the point that Tester would be likely kill progressive legislation such as a wealth tax. If this is true and Tester votes down a wealth tax, can we really say that he’s representing his constituents? Montana voters are on the side of billionaires? I see that he recieved $136,000 from Goldman Sachs. Herein lies the problem. He can be the best guy in the world, but if he has to rely on huge donations from big business to get elected he will vote on their behalf in order to continue financing his campaigns. This is why Bernie Sander’s issue of not taking money from Big Business is so important. I see that the good people of Montana had the wisdom to vote for Bernie in the Democratic primary, so they might not be as red as you think they are.
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This is the problem with candidates that are so wealthy that they can essentially self-fund their campaigns. On the one hand, they are not beholden to the denizens out there buying votes. On the other hand, they don’t answer to the every day, ordinary people either. Wealth seems to give people the mistaken assumption that they are somehow better and smarter than most of us. I seem to remember that King Midas’ golden touch did not lead to a good outcome.
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Just what I was afraid of, considering all that’s gone down w/Joe Biden–the gaffes being the biggest part of the establishment Dems realizing he’s not the guy.
& Bloomberg, of all people. Former Republicannot & doesn’t even pretend to be a Demoncrat (can’t even, IMO, call him a DINO). Ruined the NYC public schools.
Just. NO.
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Bloomberg was invited to speak at Hillary’s 2016 Democratic convention. Nina Turner was denied her promised speaking time.
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I’m pretty sure that if Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders wins the nomination, there will be no speakers given prime at the DNC to talk about how Warren or Bernie is one of the most dangerous candidates in history, how they will bankrupt America and take away your health insurance and how all Americans who love this country and don’t want to see it destroyed should vote for Mike Bloomberg, running as 3rd party candidate. And I would support Warren or Bernie in not giving such a speaker a prime time spot for their speech. Even if that speaker really and truly believed that Joe Biden was the savior of America and felt that she needed to attack Bernie or Warren so that Americans understood how corrupt and dangerous they were.
It is also clear that Bernie’s campaign knew in advance that Turner was going to be “denied” her spot — which was specifically to introduce Bernie! — and apparently they hung her out to dry and didn’t even bother to notify her in advance so that she was humiliated by showing up at the DNC thinking that she was speaking. I think that speaks very poorly about Bernie and his staff, but I am more than willing to forgive him because I understand that it is possible to make a mistake without it being a sign that you are totally corrupt and dishonest and dangerous and should not be President.
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Twisted -blaming Bernie for the cancellation that came from the Hillary camp. Before your rationale, I just thought Hillary’s team was out to win and incompetent. After reading your rationale, I think her team are/were snakes in the grass.
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Why are you twisting what I said?
I did not blame Bernie for the cancellation. That was clearly a decision by HRC’s camp. What I said is that the fact that Turner came to the convention hall to introduce Bernie and was blindsided demonstrates that no one from Bernie’s camp informed her about that decision even though they admitted they knew it in advance. Wouldn’t it be common courtesy to pick up a phone and tell her as soon as they knew? (PS, I don’t think that’s a crime, just not considerate of Turner.)
I also said – and I hope you agree — that if Bernie Sanders wins the nomination, he has no obligation to have a pro-Biden speaker given a prime time spot to warn people that they shouldn’t vote for Bernie because he is corrupt and should instead vote for the third party candidate. How can anyone possibly think that Bernie would have some obligation to give a prime speaking spot to someone who will tell voters how evil and dangerous Bernie would be as President and they should vote for the 3rd party candidate Mike Bloomberg?
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Are you trashing Turner’s reputation by speculating, in the most negative vein possible, what her words at the convention would have been? That’s shameful. Bernie worked very hard to get Hillary elected just as Michael Moore did. Moore initially supported Bernie. After the primary he said the most flattering things possible about Hillary in his televised program, Trumpland. Moore even publicly advised Hillary’s campaign what was required to win because he knew her campaign was blowing it.
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NYC, after this exchange, I can’t foresee how a candidate’s image would be enhanced as a result of your support for him or her.
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He drove out experienced principals and replaced them with MBAs at the top and newbies in the schools.
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The billionaires are affecting every state in the union just like the furtive sprawling trusts of yesteryear. But the greatest wealth is now derived not so much from growing coffee, extracting copper or distilling whiskey as it is from collecting and mining student data. This – the control and exploitation of immense and varied student information – is the new currency of the billionaire.
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Is there any chance whatsoever that traditional Democratic primary voters are going to vote for Bloomberg?
He’s in it to spoil it for Trump. He is a Republican. And of course his job is not to win as he has no chance of that, but to provide a way for the media to do what they always do to the Democrats and start the mantra “even a Democrat like Mike Bloomberg knows how dangerous Bernie and Warren and xxxx are”. “Even a Democrat like Mike Bloomberg knows what a dishonest liar Bernie, Warren and xxx are and he knows they plan to sell out the country or destroy it.”
Having someone who the media can present as an unbiased Democrat (or an unbiased progressive) attacking the Dems as corrupt and dishonest is how the Republicans always win — they convince voters that whoever is nominated is a corrupt, lying, sell-out Democrat who should not be trusted. See, even the great Bloomberg (who is mischaracterized as a wildly popular and successful liberal Mayor just like William Barr is mischaracterized as a long-time honorable and upright and ethical man) knows that the Democrats are all frauds/terrorists/liars/cheats/etc. who are no better than Trump.
We’ve heard this before. Bloomberg could never come close to winning the Democratic primary. But the media has been looking for a way to undermine Democrats and they need “real Democrats/progressives who know how evil and awful the Democrats are” to do it. I think they hoped Tulsi Gabbard would do it, but so far she is not. And the attacks from Republicans don’t carry any weight since everyone knows they are biased.
This time, progressives like Bernie and Warren and their supporters are not smearing the entire party to get people to hate Democrats (which explains why the Dems won so big last week).
In fact, it is surely not a coincidence that Bloomberg entered the race right when it was clear that voters did not embrace the propaganda that every Democrat was an evil and corrupt sell-out. While a few self-described progressives (most likely trolls) tried very hard to claim that the Russia investigation was a sign of Democrat corruption and evil to try to get more people to hate Dems and not vote, fortunately those voices were called out as the right-wing purveyors of propaganda they really are. Democrats won big.
So now the people who want Republicans to win have to make Bloomberg a “Democrat” so when Bloomberg repeats the right wing talking points about Democrats, they can be reprinted over and over again as “so many Democrats themselves know how awful and dishonest and corrupt Bernie/Warren/XXX is”.
I hope Bernie and Warren and everyone running for the nomination simply repeats one talking point over and over again:
Bloomberg is a Republican and if he thinks he would do better than Trump, he should run in the Republican primary and let the voters decide. Bloomberg is not and never has been a Democrat, and Bloomberg corruptly arrested peaceful protestors at the RNC convention where he proudly endorsed Bush and Cheney. Bloomberg is a Republican and he should run as one instead of pretending to be something else.
Bloomberg doesn’t have a chance at winning, but he there is spoil the win for the real Democrats. Making it clear he is a Republican takes away his credibility and makes it harder for him to do what he wants to help Trump win by attacking the Dems.
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I don’t think Bloomberg is a Democrat. But neither is Sanders.
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Sanders caucused with the Democrats during his decades in Congress. Bloomberg arrested Democrats who peacefully protested Bush and Cheney. So it certainly makes sense for Sanders to run as a Democrat rather than the man who believes Bush and Cheney were wonderful.
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NYC: it’s absurd to say Bloomberg is trying to be a spoiler. He hates Trump. He’s passionate about climate change and gun control. He’s a liberal Republican Never Trumper who is terrified of what another Trump term would do to our country, as am I. We should all feel this terror, and I’m surprised and dismayed that so many don’t.
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Bloomberg doesn’t want to be a spoiler. He wants to win. But he will draw votes from Biden, who is currently leading in most states.
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The self-proclaimed God, Bloomberg, feels terror? Income inequality is going to spiral the country out of control before climate change. Bloomberg decided to exacerbate that problem with privatized education.
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ponderosa,
Bloomberg is a Republican. He knows without a doubt that there is no chance a guy who embraced Bush and Cheney and oversaw the arrests of the people peacefully protesting Bush Cheney policies (and innocent bystanders as well) should be running as a Democrat, but he doesn’t care because his goal is to keep the Republicans in power, period. He should run as a Republican.
ponderosa, maybe you aren’t old enough to remember that there was a time when Republicans embraced environmentalism and gun control — they were mainstream issues that only the far right John Birch Society and their financial supporters the Koch Brothers hated.
Bloomberg despises FDR and Harry S. Truman and he despised Eisenhower for wanting high taxes. He is a Nixonian Republican which makes him a ridiculous candidate for the Democrats.
Just because the media is so blinded by right wing propaganda that they believe any Democrat offering the economic policies of Harry S. Truman, FDR and JFK is a “socialist” does not make it a fact.
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NYCPSP,
I have yet to see an article outside the NYC media that praises Bloomberg’s candidacy.
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Diane,
I still believe Bloomberg’s candidacy is about spoiling a Democrat win, as it is clear he would rather Trump win than a progressive Democrat in the mode of Truman or FDR. Bloomberg doesn’t have a chance of being the Democratic nominee and it is ridiculous that the NY media is treating his candidacy seriously instead of with the laughingstock coverage they gave de Blasio. If anything should be made fun of, it’s the notion that a billionaire Republican who wasn’t even popular in NYC when he left would run in the Democratic primary and not the Republican. I suspect that is because Bloomberg would rather spoil the Democratic’s chances than spoiling Trump’s chances.
I suspect Bloomberg would run a 3rd party campaign if Bernie or Warren wins the nomination.
It was notable that every right wing Republican columnist in the NY Times thought having Bloomberg in the Democratic primary instead of the Republican primary was a good idea. Those are the same ones who claimed if Bernie or Warren won the nomination, they’d have to vote for Trump. I am sure Bloomberg feels the same way, and people who wouldn’t vote for any Democratic candidate – whether Biden or Bernie – over Trump should not call themselves Democrats or progressives.
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The reason for Bloomberg’s candidacy is to stop Warren, whose tax on billionaires terrifies the .00025%. The real effect of his candidacy will be to undermine Biden, the centrist candidate.
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The plan may be for Republicans to cross over and vote for Bloomberg in the Democratic primary.
As things look now, Trump’s primary election is assured. Why waste their votes on an irrelevant ballot?
Bloomberg as bait to get Republicans, explained his speech at the Democratic convention in 2016.
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An “election” featuring Bloomberg and Trump is the final proof to the world that the U.S, is an oligarchy.
Until the rise of the corporate monopoly economy, choice among consumer goods was a citizen freedom. Now courts, laws and tax policy blend profiteering with government.
Until the rise of the religious right, life without religious dictate was a citizen freedom.
Now, courts, laws and tax policy blend religion with government.
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