Open Discussion by & for Berners re: Funding Bernie's long-term GE win.

[Peace Patriot]

5. It needs to be done RIGHT! Here are some thoughts...

It needs to be done right because Bernie has so often spoken against Superpacs and billionaires buying elections.

1. The donors need to COME FORWARD, show their faces to the public and explain what they are doing and pledge absolutely no tit-for-tat.

2. I wish this could take place on a stage with Bernie Sanders, who also pledges no tit-for-tat, but I think that, for Pacs, that is not allowed. (No coordination with the campaign.) So Bernie needs to separately state that he has nothing to do with whatever Pacs are formed, and pledges absolutely no tit-for-tat, well beyond the legal requirements (no coordination).

I WISH that he won't need billionaire money to win the GE. I WISH that the American people will come forth with sufficient small donations--will respond to this honest man in this way--and overcome the money thrown against him. How great that would be!

However, I don't want to underestimate the corruption of our entire political world, including not only most office holders and candidates, all corporate media, alleged public media, the financial institutions under threat of regulation, the medical and insurance institutions under threat of "single payer," war profiteers threatened with peace, the boards of colleges and universities under threat of having debt-free students, many non-profit and union uppermucks and boards--virtually all of our institutions of any kind are opposing or will oppose a Sanders administration. Add the 10% to the 1% who own everything and run everything, all digging deep to prevent a new New Deal in Washington.

So I don't know. We are dealing with a very, very, very bad establishment. And we do need to be wary of even nice billionaires achieving access in a Sanders White House that we, the people, don't have.

IT HAS TO BE PRISTINE. There has to be a clear, unequivocal, VISIBLE answer to all the buckets of mud that will be thrown at him and OUR campaign if billionaires come forth to support him.

1. I want to know who they are. Each and every one of them. No secrets!
2. I want to know that there is no tit for tat, no access, no favors, no tickets to Inauguration balls, nothing, now or in the future, that only uber-rich Pac donors will receive.
3. There has to be some kind of visible guarantee that will shut the mud-throwers up, and that will satisfy Bernie's supporters.

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One other thing: It's not just the corrupt money that will be against Sanders. It is the corrupt vote counting process itself. We are facing an extremely corrupted and riggable vote counting PROCESS. I'm talking about the machines themselves--beyond massive purges of black voters, voter ID requirements, beyond gerrymandering and all of it.

The electronic voting process that was spread like a plague all over this country, during the 2002 to 2004 period, with no outcry (not even a peep!) for our Democratic Party leadership, is run on 'TRADE SECRET' programming code--code that the public is forbidden to review--with NO AUDIT AT ALL in many states and only a miserably inadequate 1% audit in most of the others Furthermore, this 'TRADE SECRET' code is owned and controlled by a handful of far rightwing-connected corporations (mainly ES&S which bought out Diebold).

Maybe these friendly billionaires should put their money into a thorough investigation of these machines to try prevent of a rigged election.

This needs to be done anyway, with regard to elections for Senate and House. This Congress has an EIGHT PERCENT approval rating! I'm convinced that the reason Congress is so unrepresentative and so despised, by so many, is that most of them were NOT elected. That is where the fascist coup d'etat occurred in 2012, in my opinion. The 'TRADE SECRET' code has been used in various ways--that was one of them.

Remedies:

Independent exit polls, all over the country! That would be truly great!

Legal challenges especially in states with no audit (comparison of electronic totals with ballots--no audit because they have no ballot at all, just a screen). We could use such exit polls in SC right now. Last I looked, they were all electronic with no ballot and no audit. It is true of much of the South. (But remember that the vote is riggable even with a paper ballot.)

The billionaires could entirely avoid any blowback on Sanders by funding independent election experts (such as Jonathan Simon) to do these and other needed things, to prevent both rigged primaries and a rigged GE. But I think it's the GE that is most in danger from the 'TRADE SECRET' code.

That's my two cents: PRISTINE, or not at all! And the other peril: extremely riggable vote counting.