THE HILLARY CLINTON AND PETE ROSE CONNECTION

No, Hillary Clinton isn’t as good a hitter as Pete Rose (the player in Major League Baseball history with the most all time hits). I’m not saying that she deserves the nickname “Mr. Hustle” that Pete Rose earned over his long and illustrious baseball career.

I’m saying that the type of activity that had Pete Rose banned from baseball for life…and excluded from the Hall of Fame…is behavior that will not get Hillary Clinton punished, or even scrutinized; it's actually an institutionalized part of our election process. It is clearly not just Hillary Clinton, …it's any politician, even ones running for President of the United States. A politician who is accepting huge amounts of money from corporations who have a serious stake in how you make decisions while in public office is acting in much the same way that Pete Rose did....and that had him banned from baseball ....for life.

You can take steroids that allow you to hit twice as many home runs as you would otherwise hit (that's cheating) and it won’t get you banned for even a season…but if you show "conflict of interest", even as a non player...you are looking at a lifetime ban….even if you are one of the greatest baseball players to ever play the game…even if there is just the (appearance) of conflict of interest.

I’m not saying that we should let the Commissioner of Major League Baseball start running our country but we need to do something (now) to drastically change the way money and power influence our democracy.

For those of you who aren’t briefed on Pete Rose…Rose was banned from baseball for betting on his team while he was the manager. Players and managers cannot bet on games, for obvious reasons. Rose first denied it and then later claimed that he only bet on his teams to (win) the game…this is a clear violation of baseball rules but tell me how this is any different from Hillary Clinton going behind closed doors to make a speech to Wall Street…(a “special interest” group whose behavior contributed grossly to the greatest financial collapse since the Great Depression) and walking out with $600,000US. She has been asked to release the transcripts of those speeches to Wall Street but she refuses. She says, of course, that we should trust that she would never be doing any (favors) for Wall Street or make any decisions that were influenced by that $600,000. By the way…HRC was able to pocket the entire 600k. It did not go to a campaign it went into her purse.

Then, when her opponent (who btw, is taking NO corporate money of any kind and accepting no speeches to big corporations or Wall Street) suggests that it is a gross conflict of interest for her to take money from said sources…she shows outrage…Well, the polls repeatedly show that Hillary Clinton (is) considered dishonest by over 60% of the American public…38% of Democrats…and she has the audacity to show outrage?

How about if the home plate umpire for game 7 of the World Series accepted an invitation to go to dinner the night before that game by one of the starting pitchers scheduled to pitch the next day…and then, that umpire was given a check by that pitcher for $100,000 just as the dessert came out as a gift for all of his hard work and dedication as an umpire over the years… Imagine how outraged the opposing team and fans would be ….it would be completely inappropriate and you could be certain that the umpire and the player would be banned from ever playing or umpiring again….and this is just a "game.

But in national politics…an institution that affects the lives of every American..AND potentially the lives of everyone on the planet…we don’t care if the ump has dinner with one of the pitchers. We think it is no big deal…AND, the Supreme Court of the United States has codified it as “no big deal”.

Does anyone remember when Bill Clinton made a hunk of Presidential pardons on his last day in office? Many of these pardons were made for personal friends. Perhaps the most controversial and outrageous was given to a billionaire, Marc Rich who had fled the country to avoid prosecution. Rich owed $48 million in taxes and was charged with 51 counts of tax fraud, but was pardoned by Clinton. Rich had given over 1.5 million to the Clinton's. Bill said the 1.5 didn't affect his decision to pardon...OMG! Don't allow these doors of corruption to be open!!

Judges recuse themselves all the time when they have a conflict of interest. If a participant in a legal matter is a relative of the judge or if a ruling on a case would affect the judge's personal interests then the judge recuses himself from adjudicating the case. It is insisted upon...not because the judge IS dishonest...but because we shouldn't be expected to believe that any judgement rendered by a judge who profited from a ruling in one direction or another could be made without bias. It is an unfair expectation to ask of the judge and it is unfair to ask the public to trust that a judge will not act in his own interests. It is one of the oldest axioms in the legal system....but somehow it doesn't apply to politics?

Time Warmer is the 8th largest contributor to the Hillary Clinton campaign. Time Warner OWNS CNN. CNN is a news organization which claims to present the news in an unbiased way. That is a tremendous responsibility. Should they be allowed to give money to a politician? Are you kidding me? That is leaving the Fox in charge of the chicken coop. We allow this? In America?

Tell me how it is not a clear conflict of interest for CNN to be covering the democratic primary race? It's the Goddamned definition of "conflict of interest" and that is why thousands of Bernie Sanders supporters were out protesting at the CNN building in Los Angeles last week.

These are conflicts of interest…temptations that the Greeks have been telling us about since before Jesus…you don’t trust a mouse to watch the cheese..you don’t leave a 20 year old female intern in a room with Bill Clinton, you don’t let Catholic Priests have private meetings with an altar boy….if I’m not trusting ANY Catholic priests to be in a room privately with an altar boy…then why would I trust a politician, least of all the most distrusted politician in America today. The rule is “protect me from (having) to trust”.

I was a Little League coach for 7 years and I took no offense whatsoever at the rules that prevented me from having a player in my car unaccompanied. That rule exists to protect the kids and why would I show outrage or be defensive about it…so, why don’t we equally protect the interests of the American public and not allow big money to corrupt politics? We are trying to have a civilization here. The stakes are unbelievably high…even higher than that wall that Trump wants to build.

Don’t call it a democracy…not even close…this election season has demonstrated more clearly than ever how this is a democracy in name only…have you see the voting lines? Have you seen the voting laws that allow some states to make it harder for minorities and young people to vote?--Appalling! Have you seen how delegates are able to mock the system behind closed doors…it is absolutely corrupt and to think that this has been going on for decades is an embarrassment…..

It is all about money and power…it is not about you and me….Bernie Sanders tried to make it about you and me…no money, no corporations, no peddling influence, no SuperPacs…no Wall Street speeches…he did it even though he didn’t have to…he set an example and he has been a beacon of light on this election process. This is what a LEADER does…he leads..he does things that others say are not possible. He does the right thing when no one is looking. And, I find it offensive that when Bernie turns down opportunities to exploit the corruption in the system and points out that his opponent is taking money from special interests he is scolded by his opponent in a “how dare you” type of tone…

The arrival of a Maverick like Bernie Sanders has been long overdue…he is the Susan B. Anthony of Campaign Finance reform…he didn’t wait until the laws changed….he acted in accordance with the way the laws should be…laws that should be defending democracy and the integrity of our election processes and the integrity of our government. On that issue alone he makes all the other candidates look like sheep…sheep that are complicit in a corrupt system…and yes, even Barack Obama, a person I respect, cannot get any credit for taking the oath of integrity the way Bernie Sanders has…

So why is it even slightly inappropriate to say that if Hillary Clinton (or anyone else) takes millions and millions from Wall Street that it is a clear and dangerous conflict of interest? We should be carrying Bernie Sanders through the streets with a laurel on his head...not because of his politics, but because of the light he has shined on the corruption that exists in our country. He has pulled back the curtain on an outrageous flaw in our elections process, AND set an unprecedented example to do what is right even when you have the legal support to do what is wrong...

America...don't just call yourself a democracy...ACT like a democracy......get corruption and money out of our political process, out of our government...and while you are at it...find a way to make sure that the 3rd most powerful person in the United States isn't another sociopathic pedophile....Yes, the Speaker of the House of Representatives is the third most powerful person in America and former Speaker Dennis Hastert is a serial sociopathic rapist.....can't we do better than that? We have to do better than that.

Sometimes it takes just one person for us to look at something we have been doing for years and years and say..."What was I thinking?". Believing that the earth was flat was one of those things....and allowing politicians to accept money from big corporations is yet another. There will be many more to come I can assure you.

Food for Thought.....