A review by jiujensu
No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump's Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need by Naomi Klein

hopeful informative reflective fast-paced

5.0

So I'm waiting on Naomi Klein's Doppleganger (audio) from the library, so I got No Is Not Enough - it was written when Trump was elected. Some is old news - but in many ways, we're repeating it! So you should read it, lol. She's one of a few pubic figures I agree with on most things - a rare stress free listen/read. I love how she connects anti-capitalism, anti-war, healthcare, human rights, feminism, racial justice, environmentalism where many liberals will put several of these in competition. She reassures us that we CAN have nice things! (At the end) 

Check this out, though. This quote describes exactly what we're seeing with how Democrats are treating Palestinians. Democrats, both voters and officials, believe they are entitled to the Palestinian and Arab vote, despite US funding genocide and doubling down on discrimination (free speech/assembly/employment). Democrats are preemptively blaming Palestinians for Trump. Go to Mars, i say!

I like the way Michelle Alexander (via Klein) puts it here. 
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"Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow, came out strongly against Clinton during the primaries, arguing that her track record on criminal justice and welfare meant she did not deserve the Black vote. But she also chose not to publicly endorse Sanders. The most urgent message of the 2016 election, she told me, is: "If progressives think they can win in the long run without engaging meaningfully with Black folks and taking racial history more seriously, they better get Elon Musk on speed dial and start planning their future home on Mars, because this planet will be going up in smoke." 

It's a message we need to learn fast. Because if Left populist candidates keep missing the mark, and Democrats keep putting up establishment candidates in their place, there is every reason to expect an increasingly belligerent Right to keep on winning."
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That last bit is perfect. Trump and his ilk will keep winning if the Dems keep offering up crap centrist candidates with no substance. It won't be black people's fault. It won't be Palestinians' fault. It won't be the fault of idealistic, self-important, performative, uppity leftists like me (or so I've been called) who oppose genocide, apartheid and occupation. The blame rests with the Democratic Party. 

In the quote: ~engage meaningfully~ with Palestinians - treat them as equals, oppose genocide, oppose occupation, oppose apartheid, boycott/sanction/embargo Israel until it complies, learn why the two state solution is dead, learn about the one secular democratic state option. 

Examine those biases - why don't you accept any Palestinian or Arab news sources as objective or legitimate as CNN, NPR, NYT or even JPost? Why does it take one Israeli death, but 10,000 - 40,000 Palestinian deaths to warrant national attention? Why do you say Israeli self-defense and Palestinian terrorism? Why does Israel 'have a right to exist' but Palestine and Palestinians do not? How can you call it a war when it's against the population you occupy? Why do you share Israeli sources who don't fact check their government propaganda (40 beheaded babies, babies in ovens, most moral army, they don't bomb hospitals, etc) and refuse to share Palestinian journalists on the ground? Why are Israelis hostages, but Palestinians are prisoners? Why do you only start the clock when a rocket lands in Israel (and not at 1918 or 1948 when it began)? Why do you believe Israel is the perpetual victim responding despite the fact that it can turn the electricity and water off at the drop of a hat? Why do you allow Israel self-defense from the people it OCCUPIES, but Palestinians aren't allowed to resist occupation? Why do you demand Palestinians (and the world) recognize Israel as a Jewish only apartheid ethnostate, but do not require everyone to recognize a basic level of humanity or self-determination for Palestinians? Why is Palestinians basic humanity perpetually on trial - we *may* think about talks that will lead to other talks about a possible state IF they do x, y, and z (usually - give up Palestinians right to resist, accept Palestinian administered/funded occupation, and celebrate Israeli generosity when you can have a few disconnected bits of land, no right of return, no control of borders, and of course no real authority).

***Anyway, I know some of you don't think this way (I appreciate you!) - I'm reacting to infuriating to annoying conversations I've had when I was less judicious with my time and social media connections as well as the US media environment generally. What  🗑.