Unlike Baxter, even super progressive Cornel West understands
"American voters, rather than courts, should determine the outcome of
elections."

from
https://www.newsweek.com/cornel-west-warning-donald-trump-colorado-warning-1854569

Cornel West Issues Warning About Colorado's Donald Trump Ruling
Dec 21, 2023 at 10:47 AM EST

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By Andrew Stanton
Weekend Staff Writer
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Independent presidential candidate Cornel West issued a warning about
the Colorado Supreme Court ruling that removes former President Donald
Trump from the 2024 Republican primary ballot.

The 4-3 ruling determined that Trump, the front-runner for the GOP
nomination, is ineligible to appear on the state's ballot over his
alleged role in the January 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. Critics
allege that his speech culminated in the violent protest in which his
supporters illegally entered the Capitol in an attempt to block Congress
from certifying President Joe Biden's Electoral College victory.

The court ruled Tuesday that his actions violated Section 3 of the U.S.
Constitution's 14th Amendment, barring any individual from holding
federal or state office who has "engaged in insurrection."

West, who is running as a progressive alternative to President Joe
Biden, expressed concerns about the ruling in a post to X, formerly
Twitter, on Wednesday evening.

Cornel West warns Colorado Trump ruling
Independent presidential candidate Cornel West speaks at Harvard
University on October 22, 2019, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. West issued
a statement expressing concern about the Colorado Supreme Court ruling
that Trump is disqualified from the state’s Republican presidential
primary ballot.
PAUL MAROTTA/GETTY IMAGES
He wrote that while Trump is a "bonafide gangster and neofascist,"
American voters, rather than courts, should determine the outcome of
elections.

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"We must be very careful in celebrating this decision by the CO Supreme
Court. It's true that brother Trump is a bonafide gangster and
neofascist who must be held accountable. At the same time, we don't want
the courts deciding the outcome of elections - this power must reside
with and for the people," West wrote.

He warned that the Democratic Party should "not rely on the courts as a
mechanism to circumvent Brother Biden's anemic poll numbers."

The Colorado lawsuit was filed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics
in Washington (CREW) on behalf of four Republican and two independent
voters.

READ MORE
Supreme Court hands Donald Trump a lifeline
Donald Trump rages at "insurrectionist" Joe Biden
GOP governor pushes back at plan to remove Joe Biden from state ballot
Newsweek reached out to Trump's and West's campaigns via email for comment.

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Steven Cheung, spokesperson for Trump's campaign, vowed to file an
appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court and slammed the Colorado court's
decision in a statement previously reported by Newsweek.

"Unsurprisingly, the all-Democrat appointed Colorado Supreme Court has
ruled against President Trump, supporting a Soros-funded, left-wing
group's scheme to interfere in an election on behalf of Crooked Joe
Biden by removing President Trump's name from the ballot and eliminating
the rights of Colorado voters to vote for the candidate of their
choice," Cheung said in a statement.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., another independent presidential candidate
challenging Biden, released a statement expressing concern about the ruling.

"Every American should be troubled by the Colorado Supreme Court's
decision to remove President Trump from the ballot," he wrote on X. "The
court has deprived him of a consequential right without having been
convicted of a crime. This was done without an evidentiary hearing in
which he is given the basic right of confronting his accusers."

Trump is facing more ballot challenges in several other states ahead of
the Republican primaries next year.

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a425couple <a425couple@hotmail.com> wrote in
news:F03hN.56115$yEgf.33055@fx09.iad:

> Unlike Baxter, even super progressive Cornel West understands
> "American voters, rather than courts, should determine the outcome of
> elections."
>
>
> from
> https://www.newsweek.com/cornel-west-warning-donald-trump-colorado-warn
> ing-1854569
>
> Cornel West Issues Warning About Colorado's Donald Trump Ruling
> Dec 21, 2023 at 10:47 AM EST
>
Cornell West is just a crank
===========

r/TheMajorityReport
�
AussieHawker
Cornel West is not progressive (or not anymore).

There has been a lot of discussion about Cornel West because of his
announced campaign. With a wide variety of reactions. But one reaction
I've noted is people who do know how stupid splitting the vote is, but
say that he is championing progressive causes or that he is very
progressive.

Now he acts Progressive. He says certain buzzwords. But is he? Or is he
really just a crank who has gone right?

Splitting the Vote for Trump

This campaign is nothing new for Cornel West. From his own mouth

Brother Bernie and Brother Trump are authentic human beings in stark
contrast to their donor-driven opponents.

In the 2016 campaign, he was praising Trump over Clinton.And then
endorsed Jill Stein. You don't have to like Clinton, to know how high the
stakes were. And of course, as we now all know the stakes were high. 3
Supreme Court Justices, hundreds of lower federal judges, endemic
corruption, criminalisation of immigrants, rise in hate crimes, and Trump
utterly botching the crisis that happened under his watch, Covid killing
over a million Americans.

But lots of people made that mistake as well. However, he is doing it all
over again, after all this shit happened.

And Now Trump is even worse. He is explicitly campaigning against
democracy itself because of his grudge about losing, he has made a
campaign promise to invade Mexico, Ukraine will almost certainly get cut
off reviving the Russian invasion and he explicitly wants to purge the
Federal government of all non-loyalists, including bureaucratic roles.
Cornel West has no hope of winning, all he is doing is taking away
Democratic votes.

DeSantis, Chris Rufo and Cornel West

However, Cornel West doesn't just have an unfortunate past of praising
Donald Trump. He also has a current history of praising Ron DeSantis and
working with evangelical right-wingers, and their education causes.

Recently he wrote an Op-ed

DeSantis�s Revolutionary Defense of the Classics

By Cornel West and Jeremy Wayne Tate

Gov. Ron DeSantis just gave a welcome boost to the classical-
education movement. He signed legislation allowing high-school students
to qualify for Bright Futures scholarships, a state fund for college
education, by submitting scores from the Classic Learning Test instead of
the SAT alone.

This move will likely be portrayed, wrongly, as partisan and
conservative. But the greatest works of civilization have always been
about spurring�not preventing�radical change. They teach us about the
revolutionary ideas of the past and help us better understand the
present. The richest ideas of what it means to be human are those that
have stood the test of time.

Many of the seminal works of literature, history, philosophy, science
and theology were revolutionary in their respective ages. Turn the pages
of Galileo Galilei�s �Two New Sciences� and you�ll experience the
alteration of humanity�s view of itself in relation to the heavens. By
disproving the then-common belief that the planets revolved around the
Earth rather than the sun, Galileo laid the foundation for modern
science. Isaac Newton, swept aside what remained of the Old World�s
scientific superstitions�only to find himself upstaged two centuries
later by Albert Einstein�s �Relativity.�

Like revolutionary ideas today, the ideas of yesterday were
provocative and, in many cases, much more consequential. Galileo was put
on trial because he upset the status quo. In the 13th century, Bishop
Stephen Tempier of Paris condemned key works of theologian Thomas Aquinas
for being too radical. Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn and civil-
rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. were imprisoned for their views.
In colonial America, James Madison and his co-authors feared printing
their names on the Federalist Papers, so they hid under aliases. Even the
most mild-mannered of philosophers stirred trouble for thinking against
the grain. Plato watched his great teacher Socrates put to death for his
teachings.

Revolutionary figures of the past give us insight into the present
and allow for reflection on the consequences of their choices. Julius
Caesar, one of antiquity�s most recognizable leaders, teaches us the cost
of revolution through his histories. By crossing into Rome with his
armies, he ended the republic and created the Roman Empire, a crime for
which he paid with his life. But in his firsthand descriptions of the
often-brutal tactics he employed to achieve political transformation, he
left behind deep insight. Caesar�s direct and simple prose conveys the
reality of going to war�all without reference to contemporary conflicts.

That�s one of the virtues of the classics: They are a means of
considering what is true without invoking the blind partisanship that
encourages thoughtless action. There is nothing we need more today than
the cultivation of reason and understanding.

That�s why Mr. DeSantis�s support of classic education has universal
merit that transcends partisanship. Education based on values, logic and
discipline isn�t Republican�it�s timeless.

Mr. West holds a chair at Union Theological Seminary and serves on
the board of academic advisers of the Classic Learning Test. Mr. Tate is
founder and CEO of the Classic Learning Test.

In this article, he praises DeSantis for introducing the Classic Learning
Test (CLT) to Florida schools. He has a lot of fancy words about the
various historical thinkers who went against the grain. Sounds nice. I
wonder how Ron DeSantis is treating free inquiry in Florida?

But in reality, this is really just a handout to an incredible niche test
used by a handful of Evangelical right-wing schools. The CLT dates all
the way back to ... 2015. It's just a way for Republicans to spend
education money fattening the pockets of the CLT advisors to provide
these tests, and to push students away from real universities to ones
that teach them nonsense. And the guys profiting from this, is Cornel
West's co-author on this article who started the test and Cornel West
himself.

But also, pushing the 'Western Classics' didn't happen in a vacuum. Ron
DeSantis pushed the CLT, as part of his plot to get rid of African
American Studies and other 'woke' courses that are part of the AP
studies.

TALLAHASSEE � In February, when Gov. Ron DeSantis went after the
College Board�s new Advanced Placement course on African American
studies, he hinted that Florida might do without the organization�s
courses and tests.

Two months later, Republican state lawmakers are preparing to head in
that direction.

Using their budget proposal and a bill (HB 1537) that�s viewed as the
Florida Department of Education�s legislation, the House and Senate are
looking to pivot from the College Board�s Advanced Placement courses and
SAT exam to other alternatives.

For the SAT, the state is considering a �classical and Christian�
exam alternative called Classic Learning Test. It would be used as an
optional graduation test requirement and to determine Bright Futures
scholarship eligibility, as well as a college entrance exam at Florida�s
public colleges and universities. Schools would have the option to
administer the SAT, ACT or Classic Learning Test starting next school
year.

For AP, the chambers have agreed to spend millions creating Florida-
based alternative courses and tests, asking state universities and
colleges to help establish the materials. A third-party organization
would help create the exams.

Cornel West's own books would likely be in the firing line of Florida
schools for writing about the Black experience in a way that wasn't
completely stripped of all real history.

And who else is on the CLT Board?

Christopher Rufo, listed as Senior Fellow, The Manhattan Institute. Rufo
was also appointed by DeSantis to destroy Florida's New College.. So he
isn't just a think tanker, but directly on DeSantis's payroll.

Also included is Kevin Roberts, the President of the Heritage Foundation.

If you look at the photo the CLT board posted, its literally just a sea
of White Republicans.

So Cornel West has no problem writing a public article praising Ron
DeSantis for helping free inquiry, as he tries to get rid of any books
about LGBT people or Black people and working alongside Chris Rufo, the
guy who managed the Right Wings Critical Race Theory panic. Seems bad.