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The Democratic Party’s moneyed and political establishment – backed by a screeching chorus of corporate media voices – are gloating that they’ve successfully ganged up to demonize Bernie Sanders, deify Joe Biden, and derail America’s youth-led progressive movement.

No, no… and Hell No!

While the old-line establishment has now twisted the Democrats’ presidential nominating contest to its advantage, (one) Sanders retains his enormous political integrity and popularity; (two) Biden remains woefully short of divine; (three) and especially noteworthy – the people’s support for enacting transformative progressive policies continues to surge. In short, Biden has won the most political delegates in the past two weeks, but Sanders has clearly won the policy fight, with people overwhelmingly favoring his Big Change agenda over the go-slow, don’t-rock-the-corporate-boat, minimalism being pushed by Biden and his forces of the status quo.

Take just one of Bernie’s big proposals: Medicare for All. The corporate profiteers in today’s healthcare system (which back Biden financially and, in turn, are backed politically by him) claim in a PR campaign that replacing the current immoral system with Sanders’ plan for a health system that fully-covers everyone in America for far less money than we now shell out is “radical.” Biden himself proclaimed that even Democrats were scared by Bernie’s idea that top-quality healthcare is a universal right, not a privilege for the few.

Earth to Joe (and the corporate media): Medicare for All is winning big majorities among Democratic voters in every state – not just in California and Massachusetts, but 53 percent in Tennessee, 55 percent in Oklahoma, 62 percent in Mississippi, and 63 percent in Texas. So do not pull back progressives – press on!

“NBC News Exit Poll: Most Mississippi Democrats support ‘Medicare for All’ ,” NBC News, March 12, 2020.

“South Carolina primary live updates: NBC projects Biden wins,” NBC News, February 29, 2020.

“This Is Not the Moment for Progressives to Despair,” New York Times, March 11, 2020.

“What Bernie Sanders Gets Right About the Media,” New York Times, March 8, 2020.

When dealing in matters of war and peace, shouldn’t a president sort of know what he or she is doing? But that’s not Donald Trump’s way.

On February 29, he grandly announced that he had cut a peace deal to end America’s deadly, costly war against Afghanistan’s repressive Taliban. But – oops! – only three days later, the war suddenly restarted.

What happened is that poor Donald is simply in over his head in dealing with the complex and perplexing collection of regional warlords who make up the Taliban’s fierce and treacherous fighting force. Indeed, just hours before his peace accord literally blew up in his face, Trump bragged that he had talked personally with “the leader of the Taliban” and been assured that they wanted peace. But it turns out that the guy our President called was not the leader of that fractious group of warriors, but a career Taliban politician who had long ago had a falling out with the warlords.

As the CIA’s former chief of counterterrorism could have told Trump, if asked, the contingent of dealmakers he was talking to “are largely disconnected from and disrespected by the Taliban’s senior leadership.” But, as we’ve learned, it’s not this president’s style to listen to people smarter and more knowledgeable than he is. So that’s why his peace deal lasted three days.

The larger lesson, though, is that brute military force by an outside power – whether in Afghanistan, Vietnam, or wherever next – is not a path to victory, much less peace. For years, even as Bush, Obama, Trump, and their political enablers were bragging that they were bringing democracy to Afghanistan, they were jiving and outright lying. As one strategic Army planner has now admitted: “We didn’t know what we were doing.”

Tell that to the thousands who’ve died from the ignorance and lies of our so-called leaders.

“A War Without Winners Winds Down,” The New York Times, March 2, 2020.

“The Taliban Will Never Agree to Real Peace,” The New York Times, February 29, 2020.

“US conducted airstrike on Taliban fighters following attack on Afghan checkpoint,” CNN, March 4, 2019.