I will not vote for Hillary Clinton.
This sentiment, I know, is blasphemous on the left.
But should the Senator from Vermont lose the nomination--especially should he lose due to some of that old fashioned Tammany Hall type chicanery we've seen in Iowa and New Hampshire--I will be resigning my membership in the Democratic party.
I will, perhaps, take Chris Hedges' cue--and migrate to the Green Party.
Yes, I am a radical.
It is not a label I appreciate, nor one that I sought.
But the opposition is such that radicalism seems to me the only workable solution.
We are now facing the very real possibility that Donald J. Trump will be the Republican nominee for president--and he will become the nominee solely through vicious attacks on our countrymen of color and by displaying a level of bravado more customary among toddlers than leaders of the free world.
And I firmly believe if Donald Trump goes into a general election against Hillary Clinton he will do so floating on populist momentum.
Stupid populist momentum, but sincere populist momentum.
We must not discount the part of the country that made George W. Bush president. Twice.
And neither do I decry them, or revile them.
I understand their concerns, I understand their utter lack of faith in the political establishment--and I understand this anger has been misdirected by the strategic deployment of hundreds of millions of Charles and David Koch's dollars.
Real Clear Politics has Secretary Clinton and Mr. Trump virtually tied.
Hillary Clinton may well lose to the lunatic fringe and the Tea Party.
But Occupy Wall Street won't.
The numbers are clear, we must fight radical with radical--that's what the left needs, that is what the nation needs.
And I say:
The Court be damned.
The Senate be damned.
The entire national program be damned--if we cannot have a better candidate, a candidate not bought and paid for by monied interests, a candidate willing to release the transcripts of their speeches given to Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street profiteers--then I say let the Republic burn.
If this results in a Donald Trump presidency then fine--we've gotten what we deserve for failing to lead.
Because it's going to come apart sooner or later if we don't change the machinery of our political system.
And I would rather it collapse under the weight of a Donald Trump than be pulled down over the next 20 years by Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio--and yes, Mrs. Clinton.
Because if Donald Trump wrecks the system, we may yet be able to build a better one from the ruins.
But if we let it linger the level of corruption and apathy that defines our current institutions will erode our nation down and through her very foundations.
I will not vote for Hillary Clinton.
And the Democratic Party must take note, because I am not alone.