Why (or why not) to vote for Bernie Sanders

I see your point. It wasn’t my intention to insult the Green Party. I like the Green Party and in an ideal world, I’d prefer if there was a viable Green Party candidate that could run right now against Sanders without helping to usher in yet another Republican administration or corporatist Democrat like Clinton.

That said, it’s Hedges that’s saying Sanders should run as an Independent and that’s why I’m addressing the issue in that manner. My point about Nader was that most Americans think he ran as an Independent. They really don’t give a shit what party it was called. That’s our reality. All they care about is that they think Nader helped to spoil the election and Sanders will do the same thing if he runs as an Independent right now.

If we had to sit and explain to people all the nuances of Nader’s campaign on top of convincing them that Sanders wouldn’t be a potential spoiler, we’d be wasting valuable time and losing mass amounts of potential voters in the process. There’d be zero hope for Sanders. There’d be no point.

I think it’s highly debatable that Nader spoiled the race, but that’s beside the point. The point is if Sanders ran as an Independent or Green Party candidate, he might as well had not run at all. There’d be very little support and I know for a fact there’d be critical, powerful grassroots organizations who wouldn’t have wasted their time on a plan guaranteed to fail. Sanders and Hedges would be sitting in a bubble together bitching about all the dire problems within the United States instead of performing lasting progressive actions with the power and influence of the executive branch emboldened by a huge grassroots movement.

I’m already seeing where Hedges’ bullshit is already causing internal nitpicking and distractions that are only going to help Hillary and/or Republicans win against Sanders. I’ve already given Hedges too much of my time already on this and the more I think about Hedges, the less I’m able to contain my anger with him. I’ve got real work to do. Hedges can spin his wheels within his defeatist, pipe dream bubble in the meantime.

I’m not going to wait on that pipe dream “revolution” that Chris Hedges called for some time ago. Yah know… the one that makes the rich “panic” overnight with bullshit platitudes and zero real-world strategy? Get real, Hedges, you’re in a bubble.

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I can’t speak for @MikeTheBard, but it’s been distorted over time within the United States:

more:

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/noam-chomsky-kind-anarchism-i-believe-and-whats-wrong-libertarians

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Meanwhile… here’s yet another reason why Americans should vote for Bernie Sanders:

Do we want a pandering flip-flopper who is funded by banksters who expect quid pro quo? Or, someone who has been consistent for decades and shuns bribes?

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I guess I am suspicious about how “real world” party affiliations are in the first place. Would most of the people who voted for George W. Bush preferred somebody else if he had run in a different party, such as Libertarian? Would those who favor Hillary avoid her if she was not a Democrat? How much of the average voter’s choice is really based upon what a given candidate stands for and brings to bear on issues? And what difference does the average voter assume that their party affiliation makes?

I have been in the US for 40+ years, and it still surprises me how precious little sense this makes.

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Also don’t forget it as one of the axis on the political compass: Conservative<=>Liberal, Authoritarian<=>Libertarian.

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I think it’s about infrastructure to some large extent. One can have ideas that resonate with most of their potential, ideological base — however, most Americans will never hear those ideas if one doesn’t have access to an infrastructure that can properly disseminate those ideas.

For example, If GW Bush had run on a Libertarian ticket, very few conservatives would have heard his message of tantalizing fear and macho warmongering.

Link above goes to Bush brochure I have that the Republican party mailed to their marks before his first presidential election.

I took a close look at the brochure back then before Bush was elected. Afterwards I said to my GF at the time, “If Bush gets elected, this clearly shows he’s going to take us into war in the Middle East based upon a repeat of Pearl Harbor.”

That’s why I saved the brochure. I wanted to see if it was a blueprint. Yep, it was.

I guess that resonated with 'merica and here we are today with mass deaths, trillions spent and ISIS.

Depends… If she ran on a Republican ticket, for example, I think plenty of progressives would avoid her. I mean, there’d be much more truth in advertising if she did that, but that would certainly work against her. Right now she gets to be a moderate Republican pandering to the left as a Democrat. I just hope that trickery stops working as well by 2016 for all our sakes.

We’re about to find out.

Sanders is pushing a mostly issues-driven campaign. Watch his interviews with the corporate media who keep attempting to derail him. He waves them off and gets back onto the topic of the issues even against their will. It’s his thing. It’s obvious the corporate media wants him to stop discussing the issues. So does Hillary Clinton and most of her minions, for that matter.

Are voters going to be about cult of personality yet again or someone who speaks about the issues and has a lengthy track record to back him up? I guess we’ll find out soon.

I sell the things you need to be
I’m the smiling face on your TV
I’m the Cult of Personality
I exploit you
Still you love me
I tell you one and one makes three
I’m the Cult of Personality

Cult Of PersonalityLiving Colour

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[quote=“Kimmo, post:166, topic:59394, full:true”]
Hmm…
[/quote]Meh…

Meanwhile… Bernie’s gonna need a bigger boat… again

The Vermont senator originally was to appear Saturday night at Comerica Theater, but now will speak at the Phoenix Convention Center.

The Comerica Theater seats 5,000 while the Phoenix Convention Center has rooms that can hold about 12,000 people.

Last Saturday, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump moved his Phoenix rally from a luxury hotel’s ballroom to the Convention Center.

Trump reportedly drew 4,200 people inside the hall and countless more (CowEdit: pretty sure it was countable) people outside the event.

Sanders drew a reported 10,000 people at a Wisconsin appearance two weeks ago. (CowEdit: there was more outside the event, however the media doesn’t want to mention that, I suppose)

Meanwhile…

More people have contributed to Sanders’ campaign than to any other candidate running for president, Democrat or Republican.

Think about how that above sentence is worded.

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Meanwhile… speaking of donations:

source: http://mic.com/articles/122405/hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-donors-2015

Hillary reminds me of another candidate:

New campaign filings reveal that an astounding portion of Jeb Bush’s donors gave the maximum contribution

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FYI:

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FYI:

Bernie Sanders Sets A New Record As 11,000 Show Up For Rally In Red State Arizona

Yep.

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That does seem like an interesting perspective on political dialogue - take over someone’s event (when they actually support you), drown them out and accuse them of derailing when they want to talk about things that actually affect black lives.

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Bravely done.

#BlackLivesMatter has managed to maintain some independence from the machine.

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How else do you think you get attention for an important issue? the comments on the story were interesting, because it wavered between people calling out Sanders (and O’Malley) and those pointing out that Sanders marched with King (hence rolling their eyes at the black lives matter movement)… well, that’s great and all, but he ties the problems too much to economics. I know that’s his focus, and I agree, but to think there isn’t something else that needs focus is a bit myopic. I too would like to see a far more nuanced discussion on race and police violence from him, that acknowledges that it’s not just an economic problem or the militariziation of the police that is at fault here.

That being said, Sanders handled it far better than O’Malley. He seemed far more inclined to let them speak than O’Malley, and did not seem upset that he was interrupted.

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I only have the Buzzfeed summary to go from, but that seems to suggest that the forum was completely dominated by this one issue, while there were a number to discuss. Holding candidates to clear and meaningful policies and not allowing pat answers is one thing, but there were other issues to be discussed during the forum - such as that of immigration, which also affects non-whites. Note that these activists were not sidelined at all - they were actually invited to the stage, so it’s not like they weren’t given time to express their views. These issues were also being discussed during the multi-day event.

That could come from a number of places. It could be a form of “Sanders has friends who are black” or pointing out that he does have a long history of being aware that black lives matter, and shutting down a progressive forum because you want to focus on one issue is not particularly productive. As for a nuanced discussion, that’s difficult to achieve when you’re being heckled. As I said though, I haven’t heard the whole forum and may be getting a one-sided view. It’s quite possible that groups like this are insufficiently acknowledging the issues and overconfident that they are addressing them:

“It’s like a political rally, a think tank retreat and a non-stop party with your best friends all rolled into one. It’s a celebration of the past achievements and future goals of the ever-expanding Netroots. It’s an event where progressive leaders and candidates come to hear, in person, what you have to say. You’ll leave the convention deliriously proud of how far we’ve come … and where we’re headed.” —Bill Harnsberger aka Bill in Portland Maine, Daily Kos

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Maybe this isn’t quite the right place to put this, but I wonder if anyone has been following the UK Labour Party’s leadership election?

Grimly amusing, as the party is getting really worried that the old-school left winger, Jeremy Corbyn might win, as they’d much rather have a Tory-lite candidate like Liz Kendall, who they think is more electable (despite the fact that people who want a Tory government will just vote Tory).

You end up with a metropolitan party that is clearly embarrassed by a lot of its support.

And at the same time, the LibDems have just elected an evangelical Christian who refuses to deny that he thinks gay sex is a sin as their new leader. Not that they had too much choice, the other guy was pretty much just Nick Clegg again.

Progressive politics in the UK is a shambles.

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I think this is the perfect place for it, since Sander’s is considered a progressive/social democratic voice. Also, isn’t his brother a British politician? There is something to say for talking about these issues as global and interconnected, given the reach of the neoliberal mindset. But of course it’s “think globally, act locally”.

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Fair enough, and the buzzfeed summary does indeed mention that one of the topics on the agenda to be discussed was immigration.

I think that Sander’s did not try and sideline them, rather O’malley clearly did. But I can understand the urgency of the issue, given the long, long, long history of black issues being sidelined, especially by the American left. I understand their anger and frustration, and I’d really like to see Sanders address it head on, rather than obliquely through his economic bent. While these issues are interrelated for sure, there is room for a very specific address of race in America.

Once again, I think that of the two Sanders showed far more engagement than O’Malley. I appreciate that.

I think I might try and make it out to the local Sanders even on the 29th (the nationwide parties for him), as there is one really close to where I am.

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Is he? A British politician? I didn’t know that.

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Larry Sanders (honestly!)

Stood in Oxford West this year.

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