Biden in November?

No antifascist savior of democracy!

by Charles Pierce / March 29th, 2024

Joe Biden and other Democrat politicians portray the upcoming Presidential election as a choice between fascism and democracy.  But Genocide Joe and most Congressional Democrats, like most Congressional Republicans, operate with an unadmitted mindset: that democratic rights are only for some people, and that oppressive fascistic rule is appropriate for certain others.

Biden et al evade the facts of Israeli persecution of Palestinians.  For them: Israeli lives (seen as white) matter, Palestinian lives (seen as other) don’t.  In fact, the Zionist state entitles Jewish Israelis to liberal civil rights such that they generally cannot be jailed without a fair hearing in a court of law.  Meanwhile, although Biden et al will not acknowledge it, any Palestinian in the West Bank or Gaza can be imprisoned and routinely tortured by Israel (nearly 10,000 at last report): for any, or no, reason with no court hearing whatsoever; or, if they do receive a hearing, it is in a military court where the conviction rate is over 99%.  Israelis elect their government; Palestinians are not permitted to do likewise.  Zionist Israelis can and do rob Palestinians of their homes and properties and/or murder them with impunity.  The Zionist state expels Palestinians from their homeland and bars their return.  Biden, notwithstanding his lip-service concern for suffering Palestinians, vetoes UN Security Council resolutions condemning Israeli crimes against Palestinian humanity, crimes which include the current genocidal mass murder in Gaza.  As a staunch defender of the Jewish-supremacist state, Biden (along with most Congress people of both Parties) obviously believes that democracy and rule of law are good for some people and that fascist-like apartheid and genocidal mass murder (until it becomes an electoral liability) are acceptable for others.  (For relevant background facts regarding Zionism, Hamas, and the current war in Gaza, see here!)

Whereas Trump panders to xenophobic racism, “humanitarian” Biden pretends to oppose it.  But Biden summarily deported some 20,000 Haitians in his first year despite the horrific conditions in Haiti and his authority to grant “temporary protective status”.  That 20,000 is more than Trump and his 2 predecessors deported in their cumulative 20 years.  More recently, Biden has agreed to proposed immigration and asylum restrictions nearly as onerous as those demanded by MAGA Republicans, restrictions which violate international humanitarian law, notwithstanding that the migrants are fleeing the economic and political havoc wreaked by Western imperialism upon the countries from which they come.  Biden also continues Trump’s economic sieges which are designed to starve and otherwise punish the peoples of Cuba and Venezuela, actions which also violate international humanitarian law (as well as driving even more international migration).  Evidently, Biden’s humanitarian sympathies are no more than minimally, if at all, better than Trump’s when it comes to Cubans, Venezuelans, Haitians, and desperate immigrant people of color.

Trump panders openly to xenophobic racism and every other form of bigotry which will appeal to his MAGA base.  But let us not forget: that Biden, pandering to racist white constituents, joined with segregationists in opposition to court ordered bussing for school desegregation; and that he, finding that Reagan’s tough-on-crime policies were popular with many of his white voters, spent a decade pressing for legislation culminating in the 1994 crime bill which has given the US the world’s largest per capita prison population (which is disproportionately racial minority).

Biden pretends to be pro-environment, but he prioritizes those projects which create jobs with income for capitalists.  Meanwhile, he defied the environmental community by acquiesced to pressure from the fossil fuel industry with his approval of drilling on the Willow Project in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve.  Biden also demands massive military spending plus weapons deliveries to fuel ongoing wars, both of which add considerably to global warming as well as being extremely wasteful and destructive.

Biden pretends to be pro-labor, but he stopped the rail workers from exercising their right to strike over oppressive attendance requirements and safety violations.

Trump and his MAGA Republicans oppose (for their partisan and ideological reasons) more billions for Biden’s proxy war (using Ukrainians as cannon fodder) against Russia.  Trump lacks any firm commitment to the imperial NATO alliance, whereas Biden acts to consolidate its hold upon Europe and to expand its purview to the Asia-Pacific.  But for overwhelming opposition within the bipartisan US foreign policy establishment, then-President Trump may well have negotiated a long overdue peace treaty with North Korea; Biden clearly would never do so.  For thoroughgoing imperialist militarist Biden, the US’ 38% share of all of the world’s military spending, compared to Russia’s 3.1%, is not enough.  Trump pursued a trade war with China, and so has Biden; but Biden (despite the longstanding US commitment to the one-China principle) threatens a real war, if the independence faction in Taiwan secedes (which Biden and many Congressional Democrats are actually encouraging), and if China then responds with military action to stop it.

If returned to the Presidency, Trump can be expected to openly abuse (within practical limits) the powers of that Office; whereas Biden’s abuses are mostly with Congressional acquiescence.  Trump may be an aspiring autocrat; but, narcissist and opportunist demagogue that he is, Trump is no Hitlerian fanatic.  In pursuit of voters, he panders to Zionist Jews and also to Judeophobe racists.  He panders to bigotry for political gain, not to create a thousand-year Reich.  Trump wants another 4 years in the Presidency so that he can: personally profit from it, boost his ego, and escape accountability for his many partisan political crimes.  Meanwhile, red-state Republicans have been imposing marginal infringements of democratic liberties in their states; while Biden and Congressional Democrats, even when they had both houses of Congress, lacked the will to take decisive action on crucial rights legislation (police accountability, gun regulation, abortion rights, labor rights, voting rights, removal of rogue Supreme Court Justices, et cetera).  If Biden and his centrist Democrats deliver some limited progressive reforms (when under sufficient pressure and they can obtain bipartisan agreement); it is, out of necessity, in order to get the usual Democratic Party constituencies to vote for them.  Essentially, both Biden and Trump are agents of the rule of capital.

Liberal Democrat assertion, that a Trump Presidency will impose full-blown fascism, is a dubious proposition, which they are using as a campaign scare tactic.  Their assertion, that Democrat control of Congress and the Oval Office will preserve civil and human rights in the US, is belied by their records.  Moreover, what Americans would experience under another 4 years of Trump in the Oval Office is nowhere nearly comparable to what Palestinians are experiencing under Biden-backed Israel.

What of Trump’s fascist-minded associates who would retain some political influence beyond a second Trump Presidential term?  Whether Trump again or another 4 years of Biden, the real answer is the same.  Reliance upon politicians of the centrist-dominated Democratic Party is a recipe for failure, one which enables said Dems to mislead and use social-justice voters while persisting with their policies of militarism, imperialism, supremacy of capital, and political perfidy, and yet remain largely ineffective against MAGA-Republican abuses and obstructions.  Our real need is to build a social-justice activist movement which is truly independent of both major US Parties:

• one which does not give its allegiance to the Democrats;
• one which backs their election only selectively and for sound tactical reasons (such as to deny Trump a Congressional Republican majority in the House);
• one which allies with them only when and insofar as they actually act for social justice, one which backs actual pro-social-justice challengers in primary elections;
• one which does not abandon anti-imperialism and international solidarity with the victims of Western imperialism in order to pursue limited domestic reforms;
• one with grassroots people-power capable of seriously challenging the abuses perpetrated by capital and its agents (whether business firms, neoliberal ideologues, populist demagogues, fascistic MAGA Republicans, or perfidious and unreliable Democrats).

Both Trump and Biden are racist promoters of mass murder.  Neither is capable of earning the votes of activists for comprehensive social justice.  Unless we (like Biden and most Congressional Democrats) devalue the humanity and lives of Palestinians, Haitians, et cetera; how can we accept liberal “left” assertions, that Biden is any savior of humanity and democracy and must therefore be reelected?

Charles Pierce is a social-justice activist (since his youth in the early 1960s), a former/retired labor activist (union steward & local officer), and currently a researcher and writer on history and politics. He can be reached at cpbolshi@gmail.com. Read other articles by Charles, or visit Charles's website.