Draft Bernie? Democratic Party Takeover?

Strategic Concerns Paramount at People's Summit

Because criticizing the Democrats and ditching them are two entirely different things

By Medea Benjamin

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017/06/12/draft-bernie-democratic-party-takeover-strategic-concerns-paramount-peoples-summit

Even if you attended the 4,000-strong Peoples Summit in Chicago on June 9-11 organized by folks from the Bernie Sanders campaign and National Nurses United (NNU), you might have missed the most significant moment of the gathering. It was a seemingly offhand comment made by NNU Executive Director RoseAnn DeMoro during the Saturday evening session when Bernie Sanders spoke to an adoring crowd, but a comment that adds kindling to a potential 2020 fire.

The audience in the packed Chicago theater included volunteers for a new effort called Draft Bernie for a People’s Party. They waved Draft Bernie signs and throughout Sanders’ speech, urged him to launch a new party.

The group is made up mainly of young staff and volunteers who worked on the Sanders campaign but were so disillusioned by the Democratic Party that they are determined to start a new one. They are sympathetic to and want to collaborate with the Green Party and other existing third parties, but they want a new, fresh progressive party like the European ones that captured the public imagination and made sweeping gains. While their focus right now is getting Sanders on board, they say they’ll build a People’s Party even if he refuses to join.

At the end of Sanders’ rousing address at the Summit, he was joined on stage by his wife, Jane Sanders, whose Sanders Institute was launched this weekend, and by NNU’s RoseAnn DeMoro. DeMoro looked directly at the Draft Bernie people in the audience and grinned. “We’re going to take a few questions but I want to thank all the Draft Bernie people here,” she said. Then came the zinger. “I’m with you,” she added, as she turned around to look at Bernie and his wife. Then she pivoted back to the audience, “Nurses, are we with them?” As they roared their approval, DeMoro turned to Sanders again. “I always say: ‘heroes aren’t made, they’re cornered.”

“It was amazing,” said Nick Brana, Draft Bernie founder, who was former national political outreach coordinator for Bernie 2016 and former electoral manager for Our Revolution. “We knew that RoseAnn was supportive but had no idea that she would announce that support publicly, on stage, with Bernie Sanders standing next to her and in front of thousands of cheering fans.”

I don’t think most people in the audience realized the potential significance of the DeMoro’s endorsement. Her union has about 150,000 members and spent about $1 million on the Sanders campaign. It’s one of only six national unions that backed Bernie Sanders for president. Under DeMoro’s leadership, the nurses have become heavyweights in the progressive world, championing everything from universal single payer healthcare to a Wall Street tax to pay for free college education. Just imagine if DeMoro could get her whole union to back a new party, and leverage that to get other unions and progressive institutions on board.

Throughout the summit, speaker after speaker railed against the Democratic Party. TV personality Van Jones trashed Hillary Clinton’s campaign for failing to connect to working-class and minority voters. "Let's be honest," Jones shouted. "They took a billion dollars, a billion dollars, a billion dollars, set it on fire, and called it a campaign!" Author Thomas Frank said Democrats signed off on Wall Street bailouts, mass incarceration, and the Iraq War, giving up everything the party supposedly stood for. Former State Senator Nina Turner, who had the crowd on their feet during her entire speech, said the Democrats would have to follow the people to the left, or they’d be left behind.

But criticizing the Democrats and ditching them are two entirely different things. There are certainly sincere leaders still determined to change the party from within. The Summit heard from Congressman Mark Pocan, a progressive champion who was recently elected co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. And most of the Summit was focused on getting more leftist Democrats elected, from former NAACP head Ben Jealous running for Maryland governor to the dozens of attendees running for city councils and state houses.

Getting Bernie Sanders to break with the Democrats is a long, long, long shot. And even if he agreed, creating an effective third party in the US “winner-take-all” electoral system is a treacherous path littered with dead bodies, from Ross Perot’s Americans Elect to the Tony Mazzochi’s US Labor Party.

But for those who see the Democratic Party as unfixable and the existing third parties as ineffective, what have they got to lose?

Naomi Klein: How to Resist Trump's Shock Doctrine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTcELLklap4

Wind, solar produce 10 percent of US electricity for first time

By Devin Henry

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/337831-wind-solar-produce-10-percent-of-us-electricity-for-first-time

Wind and solar produced 10 percent of the electricity generated in the United States for the first time in March, federal energy officials said Wednesday. 

The Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) monthly power report for March found that wind produced 8 percent of the electricity produced in the U.S. that month, with solar producing 2 percent. 

The two sources combined to have their best month ever in terms of percentage of overall electricity production, EIA said. The agency expects the two sources topped 10 percent again in April but forecasts that their generation will fall below that mark during the summer months. 

Due to the way geographic wind patterns affect the generation of electricity, the two sources typically combine for their best months in the spring and fall. Annually, wind and solar made up 7 percent of electric generation in 2016, EIA said. 

EIA’s report comes the day after an annual energy report from BP found renewable energy to be the fastest-growing source of electricity in 2016, growing by 12 percent and producing 4 percent of the world's electricity. 

Renewable energy advocates have cheered the industry’s growth, calling it a clean, increasingly inexpensive source of electricity. 

Some conservatives, though, contend its prevalence is a threat to grid reliability, an issue the Trump administration’s Energy Department is currently investigating.

DAPL Ruling & Reckless Spills Push Pipeline Company Shares Below $20

Judge's DAPL Ruling, Reckless Spill Record Pushes Pipeline Company's Shares Below $20 for First Time

https://www.ecowatch.com/energy-transfer-partners-stock-2442760591.html

Energy Transfer Partners, the company behind the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline and the fracked gas Rover Pipeline, has quite the extensive spill history, a new analysis shows.

After crunching the numbers from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), TheStreet revealed that the Dallas-based company spilled hazardous liquids near water crossings more than twice the frequency of any other U.S. pipeline company this decade.

According to the report:

"The company has spilled hazardous liquids five times near water crossings since 2010 when PHMSA started collecting detailed data. The company's spills account for almost 20% of all hazardous liquid spills near water crossings since 2010, primarily because of a 55,000-gallon gasoline spill in 2016 near the Susquehanna River in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania. TheStreet only included onshore spills in its analysis, and included subsidiary companies.

"Since 2010, the company has spilled hazardous liquids 204 times in all, ranking only behind Enterprise Products Partners LP (EPD) and Magellan Midstream Partners, LP MMP, according to TheStreet's tally."

Energy Transfer owns about 71,000 miles of natural gas, natural gas liquids, refined products and crude oil pipelines across the country.

Alexis Daniel, an Energy Transfer spokesperson, defended the company's safety record.

"Not only does Energy Transfer Partners adhere to the approved regulatory standards, but it is always Energy Transfer Partners' priority to go above and beyond when building pipelines and is a common practice on all projects," she told TheStreet. "For example on Rover, the pipeline route will be flown every ten days, weather permitting, versus every 14 days which is the current requirement, for visual inspection of the pipeline."

Still, it's been a rough few months for Energy Transfer. In May, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) rejected the Energy Transfer's request to resume horizontal directional drilling at two sites for the Rover Pipeline after numerous leaks into Ohio's wetlands (including 2 million gallons of drilling fluid spill near the Tuscarawas River) in addition to various Clean Air and Clean Water act violations across the state.

And earlier this week, a federal judge ruled that that the Trump administration failed to consider the Dakota Access Pipeline's impact on the hunting and fishing rights of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. While the ruling did not shut down operations on the oil pipeline, which started flowing earlier this month, the judge has ordered a new environmental review.

A day after the judge's order, Energy Transfer shares fell to $19.53 on Friday—the first time it fell below $20 a share. The stock also slid 11 percent after FERC's order last month.

Earlier reports have also highlighted the company's frequent spill and accident rate. A February analysis from the Louisiana Bucket Brigade and DisasterMap.net found that Energy Transfer and its subsidiary Sunoco have filed 69 accidents over the past two years to the National Response Center, the federal contact point for oil spills and industrial accidents. That's 2.8 accidents every month, the analysis noted.

However, spills are not the only problem. A June study by Oil Change International highlighted how the Rover Pipeline will fuel a massive increase in climate pollution, causing as much greenhouse gas pollution as 42 coal-fired power plants—some 145 million metric tons per year.