United States Democratic party presidential candidates update

This 28 January 2019 video from the USA is called [Democratic party] Richard Ojeda Drops Out Of Presidential Race.

This 28 January 2019 video from the USA says about itself:

Kamala Harris‘s Campaign Ad Is An Insult To Americans

[Democratic presidential candidate] Kamala Harris‘s campaign ad proved to be as tone deaf about the plight of the American people as she is.

This 15 January 2019 video from the USA is called Booker, Harris, & Gillibrand Seek Wall Street’s Approval Ahead of 2020 Run.

By Leslie Murtagh and Philip Guelpa in the USA:

New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Another right-wing Democrat enters the 2020 race

29 January 2019

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York announced January 15 on “The Colbert Show” her intention to seek the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. With eight declared candidates already, and as many as eight more expected to join the race, the number of Democrats hoping to cash in on President Trump’s unpopularity could well set a record. …

The video on the front page of her [Gillibrand’s] campaign website starts with her name being typed into a Google search bar, cutting to her children’s names on her Wikipedia page, followed by “mom” being typed into a new search bar, which brings up photos of her family and her cooking in a kitchen for them.

Answering host Stephen Colbert’s question, Gillibrand spoke of wanting to be the president of the United States because she is a “young mom”, who will “fight for other people’s kids as hard as I would fight for my own.” After making brief and hollow statements of her support for better public education, healthcare, and jobs, Gillibrand stressed that these issues will be impossible to accomplish without … “taking on the corruption and greed in Washington”—the latter, soon highlighted, being something with which she has first-hand experience.

Gillibrand, who is married to a financial manager and venture capitalist, was born into a family deeply connected in the big business political establishment. Her grandmother, Polly Noonan, was a confidante of Albany’s former Mayor Erastus Corning, who ran one of the most enduring and corrupt Democratic Party machines in the country. Gillibrand’s father, Doug Rutik, is a well-known conservative lobbyist with strong ties to the Republican Party.

Known for beginning politics as an ardent conservative and only shifting to the left in recent times, Gillibrand started her professional career as a lawyer at the David Polk & Wardwell law firm. There, she became a leading defense attorney for tobacco monopoly Philip Morris during the mid-’90s civil and criminal trials investigating the company’s knowledge of the connection between tobacco smoke and cancer. She played an instrumental role in the major legal work that sought to cover up the company’s conscious censorship of incriminating material.

In the early 2000s, Gillibrand heard Hillary Clinton—who was First Lady at the time—speak at a Democratic National Committee event, which she claims inspired her to run for office. To this day, Gillibrand proudly states that the 2016 candidate of Wall Street and big business is her “greatest role model in politics.”

In 2006, with the backing of both Clintons, Gillibrand successfully ran a right-wing campaign to win a seat in the House of Representatives for New York’s 20th Congressional District (Albany and Schenectady counties). She firmly ran against pro-immigration laws and “sanctuary” cities and advocated for the protection of gun rights, boasting an “A” rating by the National Rifle Association.

She received $23,000 in campaign contributions in 2006 from Philip Morris, and $18,000 for her 2008 reelection. She has also received substantial contributions from major Wall Street firms, including Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase & Company. During her 2012 reelection campaign, she was the third highest recipient of donations from the securities and investment sector, reportedly taking in more than $1.84 million.

In 2009, despite public opposition due to her right-wing views on immigration and gun control, Gillibrand was appointed US senator by New York Governor David Paterson to fill the vacancy left by Hillary Clinton, who left her Senate post to become Obama’s secretary of state. Gillibrand has been in office ever since, winning election in 2012 and reelection in 2018.

Gillibrand sits on the powerful Senate Committee on Armed Services, overseeing—and therefore playing a hand in—US imperialist military interventions abroad and military research and development at home. She has supported the funding and supplying of Syrian “rebels”.

In 2017, she supported the Israel Anti-Boycott Act, which sought to criminalize individuals for expressing their First Amendment right of participating in political boycotts against the Israeli government and its settlements.

…

Gillibrand also vocally denounced Bill Clinton during this period, saying he should have resigned for the Monica Lewinsky scandal, wholly ignoring the ultra-right politics that underlay the Republican impeachment campaign and the Starr investigation, as well as, of course, Clinton’s right-wing anti-working-class record in the 1990s.

While recently shifting her political positions on immigration, gun reform and gay rights toward the mainstream Democratic Party “left”—calling her previous views “shameful”—Gillibrand provided no credible explanation for these changes. Nor did she explain how abandoning right-wing views on social questions made her a more credible candidate for the presidency.

The one issue Gillibrand obviously will not shift on is national security. Since her 2020 campaign announcement, Gillibrand frequently asserts the truism that both big-business parties in Washington want strong national security at the border, and a strong military presence abroad: “We all want strong military readiness.” She states that ICE should be abolished only because of a ruined public image, while it should be replaced by new, fully funded enforcement agencies, in other words, ICE with a new name.

…

To burnish her ‘left’ turn, she has adopted, since entering the Senate, a number of liberal positions, such as Medicare-for-all, which … have no chance of being implemented by the parties of Wall Street.

Her embrace of Hillary Clinton, the candidate of Wall Street and the CIA … demonstrate clearly her adherence to the right-wing policies of the Democrats that are responsible for the accelerated deepening of economic and social inequality, paving the way for the Trump presidency.

A New York voter poll conducted by Quinnipiac University following Gillibrand’s presidential bid announcement found that the senator is at her lowest ratings for job approval and favorability in nearly a decade. Another recent poll by Quinnipiac University showed that the most important issues for voters across the board were the economy, taxes and healthcare—issues Gillibrand addresses only with platitudes and conventional boilerplate—jobs are good, taxes are bad, healthcare is necessary.

These candidates of the ruling class will never offer up any legitimate answers to the masses of exploited Amazon and other low-wage workers, underpaid and underfunded teachers, laid-off autoworkers, and federal workers facing a new round of furloughs and cuts.

Gillibrand’s role … is to confuse and divert workers and young people from the realization that only the revolutionary replacement of capitalism with socialism will put an end to inequality and war.

GILLIBRAND JUMP INTO 2020 RACE Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) is officially a contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination and will deliver her first major campaign speech this month outside the Trump International Hotel in New York City. [HuffPost]

HECKLER TO SCHULTZ: ‘DON’T HELP ELECT TRUMP’ A heckler lashed out at former Starbucks CEO [traditionally Democrat, now presidential candidate] Howard Schultz during a book event at a Manhattan Barnes & Noble. “Don’t help elect Trump, you egotistical billionaire asshole!” the heckler shouted. “Go back to getting ratioed on Twitter. Go back to Davos with the other billionaire elite who think they know how to run the world!” [HuffPost]

BLOOMBERG: SCHULTZ WOULD SPLIT VOTE A Schultz run for president as an independent would split the Democratic vote in favor of Trump’s re-election, billionaire Michael Bloomberg warned. [HuffPost]

On Thursday former Texas congressman Beto O’Rourke became the 15th declared candidate for the 2020 Democratic Party presidential nomination. The 15th so far. There are more nonentities, hucksters and reactionaries to follow: here.

O’ROURKE U-TURN ON DEATH PENALTY Beto O’Rourke, a former Texas congressman and Senate candidate seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, said last week that as president he would suspend capital punishment at the federal level. But as recently as May 2017, O’Rourke broke with the majority of his Democratic House colleagues to vote for a bill that supported the death penalty. [HuffPost]