Democrat California Congressman John Garamendi is trying to unite Democrats around the idea that the first thing they would do, if and when they recapture Congress and the presidency, is to pass “Medicare for All.”

The Democrats’ leaders have continued to declare that their losses in every special election during President Donald Trump’s first 200 days were not due to any middle-class problem, economic problem, national security problem, religion problem, illegal alien problem or any other policy problem. As Paul Waldman claimed in The Week last month, the only reason Democrats have a problem is that they “don’t have a bunch of simplified messaging and pithy slogans that describe their agenda.”

With 43 years of government experience, Rep. Garamendi served in the State Assembly and State Senate; was California Insurance Commissioner and Lieutenant Governor; and has been a congressman from Northern California since late 2009. During Garamendi’s entire political career, he has constantly pushed the for a single-payer healthcare system — but that message has gone nowhere.

Garamendi was an original cosponsor of H.R.676, known as the “Expanded & Improved Medicare For All Act,” which was introduced on January 24 and now has 111 Democrat cosponsors, as well as the support of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT).

Garamendi and Sanders argue that Medicare is more efficient than private insurance companies, because the tax system would automatically collect the money and there would be no need to pay for private commissions, advertising, or profits.

But seniors over 65 years of age, who know Medicare best, are strongly opposed to Medicare for All, according to poll data. That opposition comes after Obamacare robbed Medicare by cutting $220 billion in payments to health care providers; raising premiums by $136 billion for the Medicare Advantage program; and requiring $36 billion in premium increases for higher-income beneficiaries.

The Democratic Party may have been able to drive President Trump’s favorability down to 43 percent, according to Rasmussen polling. But a similar Rasmussen poll found only 15 percent of registered voters believe Congress is doing a good job.

Garamendi and Sanders want the Democrat Party to stand for something positive. Medicare for All may have opposition that would prevent it from ever being passed by Congress. However, its simplified message and its pithy slogan may give the left something positive around which to unite.

CIUDAD VICTORIA, Tamaulipas — Cartel gunmen captured one of their rivals, tortured him, and used social media to disseminate a threatening video where they beat and behead their victim.

In the video, a group of hooded gunmen carrying various rifles stand before a kneeling, blindfolded victim and issue a short threat to the leadership of the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas. The gunmen claimed to be part of the Vieja Escuela Zeta or the “Old School” splinter of Los Zetas.

Soon after the gunmen issue the threat, they beat their victim with their rifles and another hooded man runs in with a machete to begin hacking away at their victim’s head. The victim has been only identified as “La Conequilla” a member of the CDN operations in Ciudad Victoria. Photos and videos of the beheading were via social media. The various messages issued threats against Raul “Borrego” Gamez Moreno and Elvis “Morelos” Santiago, as well as their families living in Ciudad VIctoria.

For more than a year, Vieja Escuela Zeta has fought with CDN forces for control of lucrative drug trafficking and distribution territories in the border states of Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon and most recently Coahuila, Breitbart Texas reported. Factions of the Gulf Cartel also joined forces with Vieja Escuela Z in their fight against the CDN. The ongoing fighting led to bouts of violence with executions, kidnappings, gun battles, and other attacks.

Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to the Mexican States of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities.  The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and in their original Spanish. This article was written by “M.A. Navarro” from Tamaulipas. 

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) reports that Jason Kessler, the organizer of last Saturday’s white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, is rumored to be a former Occupy Wall Street activist and supporter of Barack Obama.

The left-wing SPLC is often partisan and overzealous in targeting hate groups, lumping legitimate conservative organizations together with actual extremists. Therefore its identification of Kessler’s left-wing roots is significant.

The SPLC notes:

Rumors abound on white nationalist forums that Kessler’s ideological pedigree before 2016 was less than pure and seem to point to involvement in the Occupy movement and past support for President Obama.

At one recent speech in favor of Charlottesville’s status as a sanctuary city, Kessler live-streamed himself as an attendee questioned him and apologized for an undisclosed spat during Kessler’s apparent involvement with Occupy. Kessler appeared visibly perturbed by the woman’s presence and reminders of their past association.

The report goes on to say that Kessler’s right-wing views only became public in November 2016, though he himself says his change from left-wing extremist to right-wing extremist began in 2013, when a PR executive made a racial joke about Aids on her way to Africa, and found when she landed that she had lost her job in the ensuing backlash.

In related news, reports emerged Monday that James Alex Fields, Jr., the 20-year-old who plowed his car into a left-wing counter-demonstration in Charlottesville, killing one and injuring several others, had been diagnosed with schizophrenia as a boy and had been given antipsychotic drugs. It is not clear if he is still taking them.

Occupy Wall Street was a radical left-wing movement that began in 2011 in Manhattan and spread throughout the globe. It was committed to the destruction of the capitalist system, and included violent and extremist elements that waged confrontations with police in the fall and winter of 2011-2. President Barack Obama, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Media Matters for America, and other Democrats nevertheless embraced the Occupy movement.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. He is the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

Photo: file