Sanders is one of the most popular politicians in the US, and his political analysis and messaging remain as relevant and compelling as ever. But while his Tour to Fight Oligarchy is inspiring and important, the broad left badly needs a political vision that goes beyond Sanders.
Sanders works with democrats while voters paint democrats as evil. If you love Bernie then ask yourself why does he keep such company? Vilifying the dem party ain’t helping and your Bernie recognized that a long time ago. What are you accomplishing ?
Something needs to change either people pull their head out of their ass and cut this shit out, or they get better at shit and stop it. But wtf
Sanders is the american Jeremy corbyn and if it looks as though he might get near to power, the establishment will take him out, smear him and try to remove him from politics and the democratic party, just as they did corbyn.
They used the excuse of antisemitism in the labour party, which was total lies, he’s the most stalwart anti-racist in UK politics and has been for decades. His record speaks for itself. He’s still barred from the labour party now.
Couldn’t insult Corbyn any harder
I’m not sure what you mean, but I seem to remember corbyn and sanders were friendly and spoke at the same demonstrations etc. For a while there it seemed we would have decent politicians running things on both sides of the pond.
I believe the left needs to start listening to Sanders. This man is a genuine champion. He, for decades, has been shunned by his colleagues, and yet he has never wavered in continuing to fight for all of us. I wish I had a fraction of the courage this man has.
Bernie has many good ideas, but listening more to him won’t get you anywhere. I’ll just copy paste another comment I wrote about this:
Just voting for progressive candidates won’t fix things. I don’t know if there was any point where that was enough to fix things, but if there was it definitely isn’t now. Therefore, Bernie—who did not, does not and will not recommend any method of resistance beyond simply voting—is incapable of leading a progressive movement. Bernie and politicians like him need an independent progressive movement behind them to win elections; if you put them in charge of the movement they’ll sit around doing nothing for most of the year.
The US progressive movement needs real leadership willing to take action (and occasionally get their hands dirty) and it needs it fast.
Yeah what does Bernie know about getting his hands dirty?
Who would be best suited then? I genuinely would like to know, because I feel like there isn’t anybody right now.
Okay full discloser I am not American and very much not familiar with prominent figures in progressive American politics other than the Squad, so I have no idea. However, it’d likely have to be the leadership of a coalition of progressive groups and third parties uniting for a more equitable and just society and against fascism, in which case they can just elect whoever. I also think the best/only path forward is a broad progressive coalition founding a third party and both competing for elections and resisting in the streets at the same time, so the leadership would naturally emerge from that third party. The leftist activist base whose only direct interaction with politics until now has been to endorse candidates and vote needs to contest and win elections. Unite the left on that basis and you’ve won half the battle.
Bernie should be running “here’s how to run for office in your area” drives on his oligarchy tour. The only way progressives will kick out corporate democrats is by the common person running more. Bernie should be pushing more people to run instead of just getting up on a stage in front of people and being a politician. He’s not a good organizer. Great talker. Horrible at getting people out to vote. Dude couldn’t even get enough people out to vote in the Democrat primary in 2016 to defeat Clinton. She beat him by a larger voting margin than Trump won by last year.
Oh no, every fuckin person In line to vote with me just said they were voting for Clinton because they were told he couldn’t win. Everyone agreed with him yet I couldn’t convince the 20 people in line that if we all voted for him it could all work. The dnc did him wrong, the media coverage wasn’t great (never is take that as it is), and people thought Clinton was a shoe-in. I dont disagree with your statement for teaching people how to run, but don’t disregard how the dnc didn’t want him there at all.
The DNC definitely didn’t want him there. But the RNC didn’t want trump. Trump was able to convince voters to vote for him despite him being a long shot candidate. Bernie wasn’t. Bernie, if he was a better organizer, would have been able to convince more people to vote in the primary either to outnumber the people who voted for Clinton or convinced the Clinton voters to change to his side. Obama was someone who was able to convince voters to come out and vote for him in the primary and was able to convince Clinton voters to switch sides. Again, Bernie couldn’t.
I also think a core part of this is just him running for the nomination for the Democrat party despite not in fact being a Democrat. I had many people around me who also agreed with him but voted for Clinton because he wasn’t a Democrat and obviously only wanted to be able to be a part of the party when he needed them as opposed to always being there.
I personally think if Bernie had always been a part of the Democrat party he would have had an easier time convincing enough people to switch to his side. It’s not like he needed a blowout to win the nomination. This is also why I think someone like AOC would have an easier time running for the nomination since she is and always has been a Democrat.
I agree with a lot of this article, but it doesn’t really acknowledge the reality of the Democratic leadership’s obstruction. The party is, generously, a slightly left-of-center organization that prioritizes stifling their own left wing over defeating their far-right opponents. They’ve successfully held off two of Bernie’s presidential runs, redistricted Bowman out of his seat, and Pelosi has spent so much time and effort undermining the squad (and AOC personally) that it borders on pathological.
I agree with a lot of the criticisms of Bernie in this article, and beyond that, he’s just too old to be in the Senate, much less the standard bearer for the entire left, but the Democrats have spent decades making sure there’s no viable alternative. We need to move past Bernie, but we need to build an actual progressive movement that can get past Democratic obstruction to do that, and for now, Bernie is still the de facto leader of that movement.
No.
The Left needs to get rid of fucking Schumer.
Let Bernie retire, because the man was there for the signing of the declaration (pretty sure his signature is just below Adams’s.)
Let the man retire. Get rido f the Quaislings that seem content to be ineffectual opposition.
Do stuff other than beg the base for money and give people somethign they can be involved in. Start looking at community efforts. Build ties at the base’s own level so the base SEES the Democratic party Doing stuff locally that HELPS them.
I mean, that’s basically what the article is saying, too. Just a lot more detailed, with a lot more research and evidence to support their assertion.
Always good to have facts backing up what was already a ‘known.’
Schumer has turned the democratic party into a top down mess that is ineffectual and will continue to be ineffectual because nobody expects the Democratic party to be able to do anything, and for that to change there needs to be a bottom up restructuring.
we can’t get more than what sanders wants if we can’t even get what sanders wants
Fuuuuck you. I’ve been hearing more and more from Democrats saying you better get the fuck on our boat, like this is some kind of cult and not a political party I’m tangentially associated with.
The best part about this country is no one gets to tell me a goddamn thing. You don’t get to tell me “forget Bernie!” because fuck you, I’m an American and I’ll hold out hope for as long as that fucker is alive, especially so when we live in a time when we’re electing people well into their 80s to political power–and he’s still within that strike zone.
Don’t like it? Then let’s talk about maximum age for service and term limits. But until we do, literally shit into your hands and eat it.
Read the article, you agree with it
We need more like sanders. Fuck the democrats. I want independents and I want all those who aren’t on board with the Democrat party to recognize it’s time for a change. Especially now in this time of rebuilding while conservatives are in power.
Sanders has been saying that longer than most of us have been alive…
Yes, and no. Yes, we do need to move beyond him and seek out fresh, new voices. No, because we still need him to provide his own opinions while he is still here. We can have both.
Republicans control all three branches of federal government, and are using that power to dismantle and privatize the entire federal government, and this author’s suggested response is #walkaway.
Give your money to third parties that have no influence in federal politics whatsoever.
Impose a leftist purity test so strict no elected Democrat can meet it.
Withdraw support from congressional Democrats who, as shit as they are, are the only people in a position to slow the Republicans down.
In other words: abandon the Democrats to their fate and accept complete Republican control of the federal government in the hope that whatever leftist third party they come up with will be allowed to compete in a fair election? Will even have a fair election to compete in?
Sorry, but the time to redirect energies to leftist third parties was 2021, not 2025.
What we need now are more people like Bernie - people with the guts to fight Trump - in Democratic leadership positions. That means finding the Democrats who are fighting back the hardest, encouraging them to fight back harder, throwing our support to them and against Schumer and the appeasers.
The Democrats may be shit, but they’re the only opposition party we have.
We can talk about building a third party when the existence of a second party is safe again.
Bernie is an independent. The Dems are compromised. Schumer got nothing for passing CR.
Schumer got temporary safety from prosecution - he knows the Trump FBI is about to go after the leaders of the opposition, and he also knows just how much insider trading and lobbyist bribery they’ll find in his bank accounts. The threat of political prosecution is terrifying to generic corporate Dems because so many of them are actually corrupt af. The corrupt ones are the ones falling in line.
I still think some Dems are genuinely fighting for the people.
It’s going to be easy to spot them. They’ll be the ones actually fighting.
It’s possible the whole party is compromised and both Democrats and Republicans are working together to end democracy. But in that case we’re so completely fucked it’s worth the gamble to support the Dems who at least seem to be taking leadership positions in the opposition. At least for now.
Trash article.
Their foreign policy criticism of Bernie is that he told people to vote for Kamala, and she didn’t do enough to stop the genocide in Gaza.
Like Jesus Christ, people like this are why the Democrats cants win.
This article states pretty much everything I believe about American politics far more articulately than I ever could. I’ve decided; if I ever open an American branch of the NoneOfUrBusiness party I’m making this my manifesto.
Sanders’s problem isn’t policy, but organization. He’s great at advocating policies, but there needs to be a better organization in creating more progressive politicians.
