My non-vote for Biden
Israel is totally ignoring the UN Security Council's Ceasefire Resolution
Day 173 of the war on Gaza
Ignoring the U.N. Security Council resolution demanding a Gaza ceasefire: UNICEF says “a double-digit number of children [were] killed overnight...only hours after the resolution was passed."
Fifty-five percent of Americans disapprove of Israeli military action in Gaza, according to a new Gallup poll. This marks the first time the survey has found a majority disapproves, a rise of ten percent since November 2023.
I’m glad I was one of the relatively few Chicagoans who voted in the near-meaningless IL Presidential Primary last week. For one thing, the down-ticket race for States Attorney to replace Kim Foxx is so close, that they are still counting the ballots and it could even require a recount. In the lowest-turnout election in memory, my choice, Clayton Harris has now closed to within 1,600 votes of corporate-backed, great-white-hope candidate Eileen O’Neill Burke with several thousand more still uncounted.
For another, I felt like my non-vote for president in the bogus Dem presidential primary, finally meant something. It was intended as a show of solidarity with the thousands in Michigan and Minnesota who voted “Noncommitted” or “Ceasefire” in disgust over Biden’s support for Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.
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In yesterday’s Sun-Times reporter, Nader Issa raised the question: Did Gaza protest vote make a mark on Illinois primary, impact support for Biden?
In all of Cook County, there were only 553,867 Democratic ballots cast and counted as of Tuesday evening. But 67,350 of those, or 12%, didn’t vote for a certified presidential candidate — that is, they either wrote in a phrase, “Gaza” or they left the presidential line blank as I did.
12% may not seem like much, especially in a Democratic state like IL where a Biden win in November is a sure bet. But the growing discontent among Democrats over Gaza could kill Biden in the battleground states and the party leadership knows this.
Amid a growing split in the Democratic Party over the war in Gaza, Palestinian and Muslim community leaders called on voters to protest President Joe Biden in the Illinois primary last week by writing in “Gaza” or leaving the presidential line blank.
It’s hard to gauge the success of an effort during last week’s election to protest President Joe Biden over his handling of the war in Gaza, but he appears to have gotten less support from Cook County voters than any incumbent Democratic candidate for president since Jimmy Carter 44 years ago.
I’m not sure what impact, if any, our non-votes for Biden will have in terms of forcing a shift in Biden’s murderous foreign policy, or in driving a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, but it gave many of us a way, along with street protests, to have our voices heard and grow the movement.
Clones
Eylon Levy, the “face of Israel”, wasn’t fired for posting fake videos at the beginning of the war. It was pissing off British Foreign Minister David Cameron and auditioning for Dancing with the Stars that got him shitcanned. — Jerusalem Post
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I almost feel sorry for Levy’s clone over at the US State Department, Matt Miller who is forced to admit that State Department’s bullshit is…bullshit.
When asked the tough questions about US support for the Gaza genocide, he wears a sheepish grin and seems embarrassed, knowing that the few non-embedded reporters in the room, like Intercept’s Ryan Grim, know full-well that he is lying and just regurgitating the self-contradictory White House line.
Here, Miller confesses WH’s bewildering Israel-Rafah strategy to Grim:
Grim: "2021, you have Joe Biden telling Netanyahu hey, man, we are out of runway here. It's over.... Why can't he say it's over this time? Does that mean he supports the continuation of this war, even if it means going into Rafah?
MM: "We support Israel's legitimate security objectives. We support them ensuring that October 7th can never happen again."
Grim: "What's the assessment on why Hamas wouldn't be able to just create new battalions in the absence of a political solution?"
MM: "Your underlying question is exactly right. Ultimately, something that we have learned in our counterterrorism experience around the world is that while you can accomplish counterterrorism objectives on the battlefield, ultimately when it comes to winning the larger battle, you have to offer a political path."
Mathew Miller is not telling the truth in the quote you give; it's the part he doesn't say that counts - we're going to completely destroy Gaza, every last living thing, so no negotiation will be needed.