2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: There's no good reason to anathematize Bernie and his supporters. [View all]BainsBane
(53,154 posts)I suggest you google Old Towne Media. That addresses a and d. https://medium.com/@VonEbsy/old-towne-media-llc-buying-a-political-revolution-40cbac5cb4c3#.oncuhoc1c https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=olde%20towne%20media
A person with a net worth of $300k doesn't buy a third home at a purchase price of $600k. Your claim is demonstrably false. There is a reason he refused to release multiple years of tax returns, including 2015.
c. Those are called excuses. Legislators have reasons for voting for and against bills. In Bernie's case, you absolve him of responsibility for his actions but take his excuses at face value. He chose to vote for the bills so he owns them, just as Clinton owns her Iraq War vote. You chose to uncritically echo his excuses. I do not take such an approach to anything, let alone politicians. Then there is the fact he has on a number of times made blatantly false claims about his voting record. He got his supporters running around parroting his excuses for voting against the 2007 immigration reform bill, yet none of them bothered to discover that he had voted against every immigration reform bill before then as well. Voters chose to remain underinformed rather than looking at his voting record, which is unfortunately far too common. This was despite the fact that I myself many times provided links to that voting record. The fact is his supporters didn't want to know. They chose to BELIEVE uncritically. My own approach to politics and life generally could not be more different. Frankly, that tendency on the part of Americans frightens me.
b) He is on television more often than just about any other politician. At one point he was tied with Trump, who no longer makes those appearances. Sanders does well with voters more interested in politicians as entertainers than actually getting work done. He has used the election defeat to make increasingly divisive comments, attacking even his own supporters, as is the case with the unfortunate Latina in Boston who dared to mention her ethnicity, only to be told by Bernie that meant she would be running on nothing but being a woman and Latina, because what other contribution could she possibly make?
And really, you claimed you were interested in my views, and now you tell me how I am wrong because I deviated from his primary campaign's talking points. My role as a citizen is not to promote a politician's career. I'll leave that to his fan club.
Sanders is the status quo. His skill lies in convincing people that despite thirty years in DC, he bears absolutely no responsibility for anything that has transpired there, including his own votes, which evidently are the responsibility of someone who was first lady at the time. Yes, he's only divisive because I fail to accept my place as a second class citizen, because I fail to understand my rights pale in comparison to the angst of the white "working class" voter who earns twice what I do.
Anyone who believes radical change comes through the US presidency should not make claims about being a historian. I hope you meant history buff or perhaps a BA history major.
Empty claims: I will overturn Citizens United. Single payer, pretending that was an option and attacking Clinton when it 2009 he conceded it was a non-starter when the Dems controlled the House, Senate and the Presidency. Yet suddenly when the GOP controlled both Houses of Congress, Clinton was too "establishment" for not lying to voters about getting single payer passed. That was craven opportunism.
As for your nevers, the statements I referred to came from actual quotes he made during the campaign. Somehow you managed to ignore all of that. I could provide quotes, but it would be pointless. Clearly you've decided to block out anything that doesn't promote Bernie.
Next time, don't ask for an opinion when it's obvious you're singular concern is advancing a politician's talking points. Whenever one finds themselves sounding like a politician's campaign spokesman, they've got a problem. Why you think repeating his litany of excuses would be remotely useful, I have no idea. We were fed that stuff non-stop during the primary. It hasn't gotten any more useful or truthful in the ensuing months.
I forgot to add one very important thing: the personality worship he engenders and enforces is unacceptable to me because it is incompatible with democracy and people's movements. The elevation of the great man above the people is as conservative of an ideology as exists. I loathe cults of personality and find it impossible to respect subsuming oneself to one man's political ambitions.
Bernie is only divisive because people like me refuse to accept that our role is to revere in absolute obsequiousness, that we have no right to think for ourselves, ask about policy, or concern ourselves with our own inferior lives and the fiction that our rights actually matter.