Yves here. Michael Hudson
provided us with this transcript of an August 4 interview with the Real News
Network. The video was not posted on the Real News Network site due to
technical issues.
SHARMINI PERIES: It’s the Real
News Network. I’m Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore.
Now that the Democratic and
the Republican Party conventions are over, the U.S. presidential campaign is
entering its last phase before the actual vote in November. Normally this
should the point at which each party is very internally united and focusing on
presenting its own program and attacking the opponent. However this time
around, it seems each party continues to be more divided than ever. More and
more Republicans are defecting from Donald Trump. And on the Democratic side,
the debate is still raging about who supporters of Bernie Sanders should vote
for in November. With us to present his analysis of the post-conventions and
the U.S. elections, is Michael Hudson. Michael is a distinguished research
professor of economics at the University of Missouri Kansas City. His latest
book is “Killing the Host: How Financial Parasites and Debt Bondage Destroy the
Global Economy.” Michael thank you so much for joining us today.
MICHAEL HUDSON: Good to be here.
MICHAEL HUDSON: Good to be here.
PERIES: So Michael, in a
recent article that you penned on your website, you argued that Hillary
Clinton’s campaign is using a very clever strategy in that it is trying to
associate criticism of Clinton with support for Trump and therefore support for
Russia, which in the end is anti-American. Now, this type of association game,
which is supposed to make it difficult for Sanders supporters to criticize
Clinton, what implication does this have on the overall politics in this
country?
HUDSON: Well, it certainly
changed things in earlier elections. The Republican convention was as is
normal, all about their candidate Trump. But surprisingly, so was the
Democratic convention. That was all about Trump too – as the devil. The
platform Hillary’s running on is “I’m not Trump. I’m the lesser evil.”
She elaborates that by saying
that Trump is Putin’s ploy. When the Democratic National Committee (someone
within it, or without) leaked the information to Wikileaks, the Democrats and
Hillary asked, “Who benefits from this”? Ah-ha. Becaue Trump opposes the neocon
line toward Russia, and because he criticizes NATO, Russia benefits. Therefore
Putin must have stolen the leaks and put them out, to make America weaker, not
stronger, by helping the Trump campaign by showing the DNC’s dirty tricks
toward Bernie’s followers.
Then Assange did an Internet
interview and implied that it was not a cyberwar attack but a leak – indicating
that it came from an insider inn the DNC. If this is true, then the Democrats
are simply trying to blame it all on Trump – diverting attention from what the
leaks’ actual content!
This is old-fashioned red
baiting. I saw it 60 years ago when I was a teenager. I went to a high school
where teachers used to turn in reports on what we said in class to the FBI
every month. The State Department was emptied out of “realists” and staffed
with Alan Dulles-type Cold Warriors. One couldn’t talk about certain subjects.
That is what red-baiting does. So the effect at the Democratic Convention was
about Hillary trying to avoid taking about her own policies and herself. Except
for what her husband said about “I met a girl” (not meaning Jennifer Flowers or
Monica Lewinski.)
The red baiting succeeded, and
the convention wasn’t about Hillary – at least, not her economic policies. It
was more about Obama. She tied herself to Obama, and next to Trump = Putin, the
convention’s second underlying theme was that Hillary was going to be Obama’s
third term. That’s what Obama himself said when he came and addressed the
convention.
The problem with this strategy
is it’s exactly the problem the Republicans faced in 2008, when voters turned
against George Bush’s administration. Voters wanted change. And they do today.
Hillary did not say “I’m going to have hope and change from the last years of
Obama.” She said, in effect, “I’m not going to change anything. I’m going to
continue Obama’s policies that have made you all so prosperous.” She talked
about how employment is rising and everyone is better off.
Well, the problem is that many
people aren’t better off than the last eight years. Ten million families have
lost their homes, and most peoples’ budgets are being squeezed. Obama saved the
banks not the economy. So Trump’s line and the Republican line in this election
could well be: “Are you really better off than you were eight years ago? Or,
are you actually worse off? Where are all your gains? You’re further in debt.
You’re having more difficulty meeting your paychecks, you’re running up your
student loans. You’re really not better off and we’re going to be the party of
hope and change.”
Hillary can’t really counter
that with the policies she has. Trump and the Republicans can say that even
though she disavowed the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the trade agreement with
Europe, all the Democratic representatives that voted for the TPP have won
re-nomination, and it’s still on the burner.
Most of all, Hillary is still
the war candidate. Trump already has said, “Look at what she did to Libya.” By
displacing Libya, she turned its arms cache over to terrorist groups that have
become ISIS, Al-Nusra, and the other terrorist in the Near East. So she’s the
Queen of Chaos. Finally, she’s the candidate of Wall Street, given the fact
even the Koch Brothers have said they’re not going to back Trump, they’re going
to back Hillary because she’s on their side. George Soros and most other big
moguls and billionaires are now siding with the Democratic Party, not Trump.
What did Hilary actually say
at the convention besides “I’m not Trump, Trump is worse.” She’s trying to make
the whole election over her rival, not over herself.
PERIES: Okay, so everything
you say about Hillary Clinton may be true, and it’s more in your favor that it
is true. She is a candidate of Wall Street and she is as you say, now being
supported even by the neocons. They’re holding fundraisers for her. And the
Koch brothers and so on. So when we opened this interview we were talking about
what the Bernie Sanders supporters should now do, because Trump is starting to
appeal like he’s the candidate of ordinary people. So what are they to do?
HUDSON: Well, if the election
is between the most unpopular woman candidate in America and the most unpopular
male candidate, the winner is going to be whoever can make the election fought
over the other person. Trump will win if he can make the election all about
Hillary, and Hillary will win if she can make the election all about Trump. It
looks like she’s able to do this, because Trump is even more narcissistic than
she is.
All the Democrats have to do
is goad him, as they did with the Afghan parents of the American soldier who
died. Trump should have bounced the ball back into Hillary’s court and said,
“Wait a minute. The soldier died in a war that you voted for Hillary. A war
that you want to continue to escalate.” Instead, he talked about himself.
And at least Hillary is
coached enough so that when he attacks her, she bounces the ball back and makes
him the issue. She doesn’t try to defend herself. So people are beginning to
think, wait a minute, here’s a personality of Mr. Trump who doesn’t even know
the first thing about political strategy. You don’t let the other person win by
making you the issue. You make them the issue. In an economy where people are
angry, you want to steer their anger toward the other candidate.
So in this election, unlike
earlier elections, it’s not about whose positive program is better. Neither
have a positive program. Neither have really any policy that they’re
announcing. It’s about whose policy is worse. Who’s the lesser evil? It’s
almost an inside out election.
PERIES: Let’s turn to
Sanders’s strategy here. Now, Sanders is, of course, asking people to support
Hillary. And if you buy into the idea that she is the lesser of two evils
candidate, then we also have to look at Bernie’s other strategy – which is to
vote as many people as we possibly can at various other levels of the elections
that are going on at congressional levels, Senate level, at municipal levels.
Is that the way to go, so that we can avoid some of these choices we are
offered?
HUDSON: Well, this is what I
don’t understand about Sanders’s strategy. He says we need a revolution. He’s
absolutely right. But then, everything he said in terms of the election is
about Trump. I can guarantee you that the revolution isn’t really about Trump.
The way Sanders has described things, you have to take over the Democratic
Party and pry away the leadership, away from Wall Street, away from the
corporations.
Democrats pretend to be a
party of the working class, a party of the people. But it’s teetering with
Hillary as it’s candidate. If ever there was a time to split it, this was the
year. But Bernie missed his chance. He knuckled under and said okay, the
election’s going to be about Trump. Forget the revolution that I’ve talked about.
Forget reforming the Democratic Party, I’m sorry. Forget that I said Hillary is
not fit to be President. I’m sorry, she is fit to be President. We’ve got to
back her.
That means backing Wall
Street, the neocons and the TPP. Shame on him! He told his followers to think
of pie in the sky in the decades it will take to take over the Democratic Party
from below, from school boards, etc.
Labor unions said this half a
century ago. It didn’t work. Bernie gave up on everything to back the TPP
candidate, the neocon candidate.
What on earth is revolution if
it doesn’t include either remove the rot in the Democratic Party, the Wall
Street control, or start another party? It had to be one or the other. Here was
his chance. I think he missed it.
PERIES: I think there’s a lot
of people out there that agree with that analysis, Michael. He did miss his
chance. Some people were suggesting that he should walk and form his own party.
Particularly how the party treated him. But there is another choice out there.
In fact, we at the Real News is out there covering the Green Party election as
we are speaking here, Michael. Is that an option?
HUDSON: It would have been the
only option for him. He had decided that you can’t really mount a third party,
because it’s so hard. The Democrats and the Republicans together have made it
almost impossible for a third party to get registered in every state. To run in
every state. To get just all of the mechanics you need because of all the
lawsuits against them. The Green Party is the only party that had already
solved that. Apart from the Libertarian Party.
So here you have the only
possible third party he could have run on this time, and he avoided it. I’m
sure he must of thought about it. He was offered the presidency on it. He could
of used that and brought his revolution into that party and then expanded it as
a real alternative to both the Democrats and the Republicans. Because the
Republican Party is already split, by the fact that the Tea Party’s pretty much
destroyed it. The oligarchs have joined the Republicans and the Democrats are
now seen to be the same party, called the Democratic Party. Here was his chance
to make an alternative.
I don’t think there will be a
chance like this again soon. I believe Hillary’s the greater evil, not Trump,
because Trump is incompetent and doesn’t have the staff around him, or the
political support that Hilary has. I think Bernie missed his chance to take
this party and develop it very quickly, just like George Wallace could have
done back in the 1960s when he had a chance. I think Chris Hedges and other
people have made this point with you. I have no idea what Bernie’s idea of a
revolution is, if he’s going to try to do it within the Democratic Party that’s
just stamped on him again and again, you’re simply not going to have a
revolution within the Democratic party.
PERIES: Well, I think you’re
making a very strong point in terms of Hillary Clinton’s hawkish foreign policy
and her being the candidate of the Wall Street hawks. I also do think that Donald
Trump’s unknown factors in terms of how he will fall on some of the very
important critical issues out there still remain a problem, because we actually
don’t know how he will act. So advocating that he might be the lesser of two
evils might be problematic too, no? Michael?
HUDSON: I think there’s a
difference in unknown factors. I think in Trump’s case, he doesn’t know what
policy he’ll do. I think he hasn’t thought it through yet. So we don’t know.
Whatever policy he has, I don’t think he could get it through Congress. And the
president can’t do all that much without congressional approval.
PERIES: So you think he’ll be
ineffective? You think he’ll be ineffective and won’t be able to–
HUDSON: And that’s what
America needs. America needs an ineffective president. That’s much better than
an effective president that’s going to go to war with Russia, that’s going to
push for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, that’s going to protect Wall Street,
and that’s going to oppose neoliberal austerity. I would much rather have an
ineffective president than someone who’s going to do these bad things that I
fear is going to come from Hillary and the Democratic Party. It’s a
counter-revolution, not a revolution.
PERIES: All right, Michael. I
thank you very much for joining us today, and we’ll look forward to your report
next week. Thank you.
HUDSON: Good to be here.
PERIES: And thank you for
joining us on The Real News Network.
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