RIP AccommoGreen David Keith Cobb

 Cobb and Ruthi Engelki, 2021, screengrab off a public Facebook post.

Saw the story via Ballot Access News, then went to his Wiki.

"AccommoGreen" is the Green Party version of "ConservaDem" in my book. Here's a search return, since I never created a tag. Another way of putting it is that they're one step left of DSA Roseys. They exist to push Democrats left, first, to focus on the needs of a third party, only second.

Cobb pledged a "safe states" strategy in 2004. That said. St. Ralph of Nader promised the same in 2000, and lied about it. (People like Jeff St. Clair at Counterpunch, still butthurt over the 2004 Green nomination process, won't tell you that, nor will they tell you that Nader isn't that much of an environmentalist, and that he's not at all pro-labor, being in fact a crappy boss. For a whole shitload of reality on St. Ralph of Nader, go here.)

I briefly referenced Cobb in my "hello world" Blogger post, and not much else. 

Otherwise, as a now-ex Green, yes, it's time for a moment of reflection.

The first part is the "if only," per that link.

If only I had started on Blogger, if not a full year earlier, even six months earlier, to write more fully about the Democratic nomination process for president that year. Maybe, like Josh Marshall getting lucky with his pretending to be a New New Democrat or whatever, then spouting bullshit about third parties in 2004 (link rot at my link), I would have had a small bit of "empire." Not his, of course.

I'm not sure which of the "big three" was the most hypocritical. I was banned by Kos (well, frozen out, to be technical, because that's the way the tech world works) for being too Green. Josh didn't have a contributors' forum, but he has shown his not-totally-liberal Zionist colors in the decades since then. Atrios? Good snark, but how much depth did he ever have?

Meanwhile, in the Green world?

AccommoGreen Cobb. He later became an advisor to Gang Green Sierra Club. In 2009, when they were promoting natural gas as the "bridge fuel" and getting payola to do that promoting. Remember that? "Beyond Coal"? Funded by Aubrey McClendon, the disgusting founder of Chesapeake Energy. It ran from 2007-2012; Cobb joined Sierra's "Corporate Accountability Committee" in 2009 as noted. The Liberty Tree Foundation? DSA Rosey types.

Then Cynthia McKinney, for whom I voted with extreme holding of my nose. And, here she is today, Libertarian, and as antisemitic at times, not just anti-Zionist, in good company with the Mises Mice.

Then Jill Stein three runs in four elections, the last one doubling down on her investments hypocrisy.

In between, one run by the earnest Howie Hawkins, generally good, generally too close to the left hand of the duopoly on Russiagate. 

I dropped everything above on Substack to knock something out. I wanted something longer here, after a bit more marination time. I'm not sure how much more I'll let this marinate before I post. 

I will say I wasn't that familiar with his background at the time. (He ran for Texas AG in 2002, and had been legal general counsel to St. Ralph's 2000 run, per the Wiki about his 2004 run.) 

I already knew that he and Libertarian Michael Bednarik — The Man Who Drove Without a License™ — asked for a recount in Ohio in 2004. That wound up bringing conspiracy theory nutters out of the woodwork. Badnarik died four years ago.

More on the reality of Ohio 2004 from Mark Hertsgaard. (Sadly, he's a duopolist Biden greenwasher.) Anyway, I wrote more about the Bob Fitrakis nuttery in that 2004 recount here. Let's also not forget Brad Friedman of the Brad Blog. (This is what started leading to my separation with Brains.)

It also had a semi-bright line to Stein's recount request in 2016. That was bullshit I refused to co-sign. AND, doubled down on that. In turn, Stein started grifting off that. 

Before that, in that same election cycle, Cobb was jumping into bed with Caity Johnstone and her red-black alliances. Fallout from that is when I first started really looking askance at David Bruce Collins as well. (Collins still loves himself some Caity, or at least he did a year or so ago, per his most recent Shits on Shitter.)

Finally, for one last swift kick? Cobb was a 9/11 Falser, or at least a "just asking questions" Falser Lite. The petition he signed was 3 years after, and distributed by the odious 9/11Truth. Plus, since I am both somewhat skeptical and somewhat cynical about him? That was less than two full weeks before the 2004 election. Politics, anybody? The statement/petition isn't a false flag in the narrow sense of "America did it"; it is in the larger sense of insinuating the US government deliberately let this happen.

Most the actual questions are bullshit. (I refuse to link, even with a "no follow.") For example, Flight 77 turned around unnoticed because hijackers turned off its transponder. The Pentagon did not, "supposedly" or actually, have special missile batteries. Yes, the Counterintelligence center said the terror dashboard was "blinking red," but it did not know in advance about the specifics of 9/11. Bush kept reading "My Pet Goat" to avoid mass panic.

(Oh, the rest of that link shows Cobb not a Green any more, or so it appears, but a DSA Rosey. Shock me.) 

This all gets to my Venn diagram in this piece:

 

Can't we get less nutty leftists? 

The answer is, probably not. Actually, the "better" answer is, almost certainly not.

As an ex-Green, looking ahead to the 2028 prez run? I'll take a non-AccommGreen, non-hypocrite. If not, I'll most likely undervote. Voting for Claudia de la Cruz was itself a bit of nose-holding in 2024. 

(Sidebar: Can we once again get less sucky Firefox? I still can't post pictures by URL on Blogger in Fuckfox; I have to use Google. I'll admit I haven't tried Safari on that in a long time.)

One last thought or two going back to 2004, and moving through 2016.

I still didn't know much about the Green ecosystem then. I learned more since then. I'd say it was two-thirds the party trying to screw Ralph, but one-third Ralph had made his own bed, and even invited the screwing. I don't know if Cobb played any personal part in that or not. After all, he might have been playing nice with Ralph and shivving him at the same time. 

On the Stein recounts, and her claiming they weren't plumping for the left hand of the duopoly, even when they were, I see Cobb's AccommoGreen fingerprints on that. I have long seen Stein as some degree of AccommoGreen herself, anyway. 

==

I have posted this, harder-hitting than my Substack piece, as a comment to the Green Party US Substack's RIP piece. We'll see how much I get flamed there, or blocked, or whatever. I made sure to note the 9/11 Falser issue (and I called it that there) because I posted it on Sept. 11.