Long Time Gone

How is it that fifty years after Robert Kennedy's assassination, the divisions in the country that he hoped to heal as President and the unjust foreign policy he hoped to end still haven't been addressed?   How is it that the United States has only become a meaner, nastier place?  How is it that we Americans have become more violent, more complacent and indifferent, and more cynical?

Don't expect me to say that there's any hope to build a better America after half a century, and not just because Republicans, in response to President Barack Obama's call of "Oh yes, we can," yelled back, "Oh no, you don't!"  And not just because of that clown now in the White House or the Republican ringmasters who sustain him and egg him on to make America the country the world loves to hate.  I blame the Democrats too.  Obama couldn't count on support at low moments of his Presidency from top Democrats, whose game of politics as usual disappointed and disgusted Obama's enthusiastic and idealistic supporters - but, truth be told, Obama himself never articulated what he meant by "hope and change."  And when Democrats vying to succeed Obama sought to pick up Bobby Kennedy's mantle and bring people - black and white, working class and professional class, native-born and immigrants, Christians and Muslims - together, they were undermined by a Democratic establishment who went  and got Hillary Clinton the nomination based on identity politics (the female candidate, the candidate for blacks, et. al.).  Bernie Sanders was dismissed as "the white candidate" despite his efforts to appeal to the 99 percent of Americans, and Martin O'Malley, despite his own outreach to different groups, had his experience in government held against him to discourage blacks and young people from giving him a hearing.

And if Bobby Kennedy had campaigned for President in 2016?  His interest in the poor would have been laughed at by corporate centrists and his reputation as a "law and order" man would have had identity liberals holding him in contempt.

These same Democrats - the people who helped Trump win the presidential election by brushing aside everything RFK stood for - want me to support another corporate establishment presidential candidate in 2020 so I can stand with them against Trump in brotherhood.  May I say one thing to corporate Democrats? Don't give me that brother-brother-brother, brother! >:-( 

Below is a clip of the end of Robert Kennedy's last speech - his victory speech in the June 4, 1968 California presidential primary - moments before he was shot.

  

It's still a long, long, long, long time before the dawn.