While I would have preferred to not write about this topic, it is clear that the democratic elite and MSM are still flogging what is obviously still a very dead horse. As some of you might remember, my previous post on this topic was about how the narrative surrounding Russia hacking the 2016 election demonstrated the intellectual bankruptcy of the democratic establishment and their MSM lapdogs. At that time, I had hoped that the passage of a couple of months would lessen the desire of the democratic establishment to peddle this ridiculous narrative, especially since it was not gaining any traction among voters who were not already highly partisan democrats.

Well.. we are in late-April 2017, and the democratic establishment is still busy pushing this comical narrative, while simultaneously ignoring the many other unpopular actions taken by Trump since he assumed office on Jan 20. Consequently, the democratic establishment and party are now widely seen as an ineffectual opposition to Trump at best and an irrelevant, if entertaining, freak show at worst. It is therefore not surprising that all substantive and successful opposition to Trump’s many brain-farts have come from places other than the official opposition. For example, it was pressure from pissed-off voters rather than concerted actions by the democratic establishment which scuttled his first attempt to repeal ‘Obamacare’. Similarly, it was the judiciary rather than the democratic establishment has taken the lead in opposing Trump’s many executive orders.

Moreover, the democratic establishment has been more than eager to support Trump’s ill-advised saber-rattling against Syria, N.Korea and Iran. It is also establishment democrats who cheer the loudest when Trump breaks yet another one of his populist campaign promises. It is therefore not surprising that the democratic party brand has become less popular with voters since the election. It is also no secret that their massive and sustained loss of power at multiple levels of elected government over last 8 years has not helped the situation. You might have also noticed that the losses of 2016 and prior years have not resulted in any real change in the general direction or strategy (if they had either to begin with) of the democratic party. I should also add that the most popular politician in USA is Bernie Sanders, who still rightly calls himself an independent.

My point is the democratic establishment has more in common with a cult in terminal decline than a functional political party with a future- unless they want to be the nominal opposition in perpetuity. But what does any of this have to with the core reason behind the desire of the democratic party to continue believing in the myth of Russian interference in the 2016 election. As you will soon see.. a lot. Let us start by trying to list all the main reasons that most people give for the seeming obsession of the democratic establishment with finding some evidence, however weak and phony, to link Trump with Russia and Putin.

There are those who point out, quite correctly, that democrats obsession with finding a Russian “connection” to Trump have their roots in a modernized version of cynical red-bating such as that practiced by McCarthy in the 1950s. While that analysis is generally correct, I see it as a second order symptom of a much deeper systemic problem. Another possibility is that democrats are so desperate and short of ideas to get rid of Trump that they are literally grasping on straws and tweets of an unstable performance artist like Louise Mensch. Once again, there is a lot of truth in that view but it is at best a second order symptom rather than the root cause. Still others see the whole “Russian interference” sideshow as a way for the deep-state to control Trump, and they too have a point but not the root cause.

The root cause (in my opinion) stems from the fact that establishment democrats are still unable to understand, let alone come to terms with, the loss of HRC in the 2016 election. I am sure that, by now, some of you must have read or heard undeserved hagiographies of HRC by establishment liberals and wondered if the authors in question actually believed a single word of what they wrote or said. Here is what I think.. In most cases, all those “liberal” celebrities and intellectuals who peddled those HRC hagiographies did (and do) actually believe most of what they said or wrote. But why would that be the case? Why would supposedly smart and credentialed people be so blind to the many glaring flaws of HRC as a presidential candidate?

I think that is comes down to their professed religion aka neoliberalism. HRC was the perfect neoliberal candidate in that her public profile put a checkmark on every point in the neoliberal scoresheet. She was white, female, rich, from a well-known family, “credentialed”, had a full resume, center-right on all issues except a few social ones, fiscally conservative, hawkish on foreign policy, in favor of stealth privatizing everything, capable of endless empty platitudes. In other words, HRC was a neoliberal wet dream- even more so than Obama. Furthermore, she hired mostly ivy-league people for her campaign team, invested in big data and every other fashionable bullshit scam and presented a very “polished” and “professional” public image.

And yet she lost to a reality TV host with a bad comb who had the hots for his own daughter and a style of speaking that made more in common with pro-wrestling than “serious” politics. Her loss to Trump, you see, is totally baffling to all those who believe in the religion of neoliberalism. They are simply incapable of mentally processing the idea that there might be people who do not want to vote for this living breathing epitome of american neoliberalism. It is as if the greatest saint of their religion was defeated by an underling of the Devil before their very eyes. They are therefore doing what most people whose belief system has been thrashed and defeated do.. find a scapegoat and then blame it on the devil.

As far as establishment democrats are concerned, Bernie Sanders is the scapegoat and Putin is the Devil. Thinking in this manner is far easier than admitting that their belief system was defective and prone to failure. You might recall that in the middle-ages, Christians in Europe blamed Jews and the Devil for massive plague epidemics. Oddly enough, they were never able to come up with a convincing rational explanation for why either of the two alleged culprits might be the cause of their misfortunes. I guess it was just easier for them to think like that than consider alternate possibilities which would question their existent belief systems.

What do you think? Comments?