I think context is everything.

If he cannot cram other issues into his Economic Revolution then he stumbles. It is a huge problem with his campaign and is most likely to be the cause of it ultimately imploding. The signs are already showing....it's just a matter of time now.

to enslave everyone. Bernie people understand that removing racism and its effects requires removing the power of the rich over our government, our economy, our Main Stream Media, and our history books. To do this, you cannot be working for them. And nothing signifies your allegiance too that group any more than their donations to your campaign and your position on Glass -Steagall. Hillary fails on both counts.
But never underestimate the power of economics to excite average Americans. Without substantial increases in income in comparison to inflation, our families are threatened and our children defeated. An economic revolution is long overdue. No amount of long chanted and unfounded mis-characterizations will change the facts. Bernie's position is the position of the people. MSM and Big money cannot silence the ideas and ideals we hold dearly. Hillary people make assertions and hope these assertions are self-fulfilling. Today the democratic party stands at a cross roads and the fight for its soul is on. Progressives have sen their favored candidates thrown under the bus -witness the fake video laugh of Howard Dean in the MSM, they have seen their views marginalized and taken for granted much as Democrats treat African American vote, and we now feel there is a recognition that the centrist is not a position but rather an election mechanism which primarily assures control of the process and our government by the rich, by banks and by Wall Street. There is a hunger within the base of the democratic party and especially among its activists which overwhelmingly are very progressive for a candidate that is not beholden to those Bankers and others for their election. We do not want another election between the choice of one evil over another. We want democracy and we know who stands with us. yes we dislike Hillary. We dislike her husband as welland see his sell outs via TANF and NAFTA. We are sick of the money control of democratic party organizations and want to return our party to the benefit of most Americans. At this time, it is clear that Bernie Sanders speaks our mind. His time may not be now but Hillary and politicians like her are becoming more and more divorced from benefit for our people and we will work to change that paradigm, no matter our candidate. The American people are progressive in nature and that nature cannot be artificially constrained much longer. Go Bernie!

Well said

We've been hearing about this massive tidal wave of support for Bernie that is building and will sweep everything establishment Dem away with it, and yet, after about a month or so (more like 6 weeks) he's managed to stay in the teens in all of the national polls.

The only place where there is anything resembling that kind of momentum is in the wild, and active imaginations, of Sanders supporters.

That would be the alienated people eligible to vote in 2014 who didn't bother. Clinton doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of appealing to them.

Show me where he's drawing in the folks who never vote.

The convener is a 26 year old woman who has never voted before. She just missed being old enough in 2008, and too disillusioned to vote in elections since then. Open mic consists largely of bashing of the Democratic party, followed by us oldsters trying to impart some historical perspective about the New Deal and the Great Society.

Last meeting I was accused of having battered spouse syndrome. "Obama just beat the shit out of you with TPA, and now he comes around with a nice bouquet of Iran deal roses, and all is forgiven, right?" Trying to get the notion of strategic voting across to this crowd is not easy. I at least made a couple of them think with the following analogy. "Sanders will put America in Drive, and Clinton will put it in Neutral. Any Republican is going to slam it into Reverse, possibly permanently. If we can't get the car in Drive, at least Neutral allows a mass movement to push it forward--and you DO want to build an ongoing mass movement, right?"

Still, quite a few will be sitting out the election if Clinton is the nominee. The worst possible outcome would be Clinton vs Bush, which they perceive as going straight back to the 80s and 90s where the groundwork for our present inequality was laid by the corporatists of both parties.

...you have no proof, just a fancy wish for your dream to come true.

I'll keep my feet grounded in reality if you don't mind.

I suppose you have some evidence that a war hawk and friend of banks can mobilize the alienated?

I'm Becoming a Democrat Today

http://www.democraticunderground.com/128028597

Bernie and BLM have been saying exactly the same things about police militarization, over-investment in law enforcement and under-investment in black communities. Ask BLM why their stated demands took a back seat to a cheap media ploy on Saturday. They're the ones who failed the test, not Sanders.

should read this article.

I was trending Hillary mostly on electability until her recent milquetoasty comments about the Iran deal. Gave me bad IWR flashbacks. I'm undecided.

I do oppose bankrupt arguments, roads to nowhere and gratuitous takedowns of good candidates for purely partisan purposes. Your non-response to my post is typical of the quality of "argument" that people are making against Sanders post NRN.

When what they were actually doing was speaking for each and every one of us.

BLM I guess doesnt get to do that

I am an Xer in Seattle...Our Occupy movement is still protesting...just more narrowed and more varied. There is rudeness to our protests but it chips away. They got a socialist elected and they got $15 minumum..
And legal weed.

It's effective.

At least when it comes to the part about getting a socialist elected. Backing up the $15/hr demand with ongoing protests once she was elected, of course, required ongoing protesting.

eom

response of Sanders supporters to those they deem "not showing the proper respect". Some of you don't seen to have any idea how you're being viewed out there. Start following prominent black voices on Twitter,you don't have to take my word for it. Here's Imani Gandy (https://twitter.com/angryblacklady) she's been accosted by angry Bernie supporters for two days now and she's not mincing words about Bernie's supporters and she's not the only one.

That is a stretch.

Every single time another AA is harassed, abused, imprisoned for BS offenses, murdered and the harassers, abusers, imprisoners, murderers are allowed to walk away scott free often times on paid leave, the rage will grow stronger and the protesting more aggressive. And, it goes much further than that.

Walk in our shoes. We are still fighting the same bullshit bigotry and racism. It is entrenched in American society. We are tired and honestly, I hadn't even realized how damn tired and frustrated I have gotten myself.

It feels like a heavy load you put on everyday. You get so used to bearing the load that you forget it's there and it is normal. Suddenly you wake the fuck up and realize this is about as abnormal as it gets and say to yourself, ENOUGH. I've experienced this epithany myself. What a moment that is!

Someone on DU said black people did not write the laws that oppress. Why are you (generally speaking) asking black people to list every single thing we want changed? This crap has been going on for decades, centuries.......we can certainly begin the list with the here and now but the task in its entirety is almost impossible.

I might as well bow to the inevitable. Hillary wins the primary, and the Koch brothers wheel out the Attack-the-Clinton machine, and we end up with Dweebpuppet as pres...

Yeah, I'm discouraged. Two movements that seemed hopeful and aligned are pitted against each other. Politics just sucks and it's better to just stay out of it and read novels or watch meaningless sitcoms instead. Because we don't have a billion dollars, and apparently we don't stick together either.

Only someone that hasn't been following politics very long would thing it would matter.

Way more people per capita at DU are in an uproar about this than the political populations of either Twitter or Reddit. There's a little buzz, but not much.

"Sanders’ Netroots Nation confrontation took over Twitter on Saturday night. But for the most part, instead of acknowledging that the conflict illustrated a real problem, his online supporters attacked Sanders’ critics by insisting they didn’t understand the real issues driving black poverty and disadvantage, which are merely economic, they contend."

(from the article)


I think we Bernie supporters need to BACK OFF,
and LET BERNIE DO THE TALKING on these particular issues.


Some of us have said way too much already,
and it is not helping matters at all.

that's causing this problem. I just don't get why some can't see that.

they are too busy defending against all of the FUD, lies, and bullshit that Clinton supporters are posting in order to take advantage of a small error in his campaigning.

If y'all truly cared about BLM, then I would expect to see less usage of the movement as a campaigning cudgel and more about a real discussion among progressive allies wanting the same outcomes for POC.

After all, I repeatedly see that loyal Democratic party members claim that they will vote for which ever Democrat wins the primary whether it is Clinton or Sanders.

Live up to that for moment, and I will believe that these Clinton supporters genuinely care about me and my community.

You are your own worst enemy. At this point I fear what this "clueless white people" crap does to the party.Step out of the DU bubble and pay attention.

And it is disingenuous to say otherwise.

Well, hopefully you are not calling me a clueless white person because I am neither. However, I do not see clueless white people here. I see progressive allies.

I don't live in any bubbles, sorry to burst yours.

This thread would make us all millionaires.

Sen. Sanders has a 50 year history of being strong on civil rights. We are still almost 6 months from Iowa, then New Hampshire (both of which Sen. Sanders could win). If he waits to make a big speech on race until he has won the media coverage he deserves, it will have more impact.

I am not worried about it. I think he will do well with minority primary voters.

because then you're "lecturing." Besides, everybody already knows everything about Sanders, except who he is and what he stands for.

(I've actually seen this crap posted non-ironically.)

From the Article:

Sanders is understandably irritated that 50 years of work on civil rights – going back to attending the March on Washington with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., fighting segregation with CORE in Chicago, endorsing Rev. Jesse Jackson’s presidential run in 1988 – don’t seem to count, especially with people who were born a generation after those events. Asked Saturday what he’d done for African Americans more recently, he cited voting for Obamacare."Update: he also talked about making sure the program included funding for community health centers in low-income neighborhoods, which I hadn't seen when I wrote this piece. That makes it a less tone-deaf response, though it still didn't satisfy the protesters


---------

I also wonder why she mentioned Bernie without mentioning that Martin O'Malley was also taken to task by BLM. Her concentration on Sanders leads me to believe she supports either O'Malley or Hillary.

Did she even watch the Video of the BLM activists confrontation with both Candidates? If she was so hasty to leave out some of Bernie's Legislative initiatives in the US Senate...it leads me to believe she didn't take the time necessary to watch the encouter to report accurately but immediately jumped to a conclusion on heresay or perhaps bias against Bernie.

There are alot of things he could do to help improve his image with African Americans but it will be a challenge.

Another hatchet job on Bernie from Salon. Why, who else would it be?

I am not Joan Walsh fan.

Bernie is fine, though he has to course correct with his one size fits all campaign.

His supporters, not so much.

Definitely a lot of good folks who are sensible, but there is a pretty virulent component of his supporters who most definitely are self righteous to the point of alienating anyone who does not bow at his knees.

Bernie has a lot of work to do...