Statement from Bernie Sanders: "Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign?"
Statement from Bernie Sanders: "Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign?"
Full text of statement:
"It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them. First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defend the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they're right.
Today, while the very rich are doing phenomenally well, 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck and we have more income and wealth inequality than ever before. Unbelievably, real, inflation-accounted-for weekly wages for the average American worker are actually lower now than they were 50 years ago.
Today, despite an explosion in technology and worker productivity, many young people will have a worse standard of living than their parents. And many of them worry that Artificial Intelligence and robotics will make a bad situation even worse.
Today, despite spending far more per capita than other countries, we remain the only wealthy nation not to guarantee health care to all as a human right and we pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. We, alone among major countries, cannot even guarantee paid family and medical leave.
Today, despite strong opposition from a majority or Americans, we continue to spend billions funding the extremist Netanyahu government's all out war against the Palestinian people which has led to the horrific humanitarian disaster of mass malnutrition and the starvation of thousands of children.
While the big money interests and well paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign? Will they understand the pain and political alienation that tens of millions of Americans are experiencing? Do they have any ideas as to how we can take on the increasingly powerful Oligarchy which has so much political power? Probably not.
In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions.
Stay tuned."
sheepdog
Tbh, to me, this reads like “fuck you assholes. I’m founding a new political party right the fuck now, because you clearly cannot be bothered to pay the fuck attention to people’s actual fucking lives”. I hope I’m right. The DNC deserves to fully collapse for this result. It’s utterly damning.
The Green Party already exists as a Soc Dem party, I doubt Bernie alone can destabilize the DNC by jumping to the Greens or launching a new party. PSL is in a better position to attack the DNC's foundations IMO.
I think Bernie is too old to have a massive impact, even by starting a new party. Hes 83 now, 4 years older than the average life expectancy. I don't think there would be much faith in any new movement he tries to push, unless he can funnel all of his popularity into a younger candidate. A Bernie II if you will
I think that if he can form a party out of progressive democrats in congress or convince several progressive democrats in congress to defect to an established third party he’ll have a chance. That’s basically how the republicans formed from the whigs. The biggest problem third parties have right now is no faith. Dems currently have extremely low faith, and so if a new party starts campaigning from the democrats’ former members I might actually consider voting for them.
I shut my mouth for Hillary, I shut my mouth for Biden, and I shut my mouth for Kamala. Each time I tried to be enthusiastic for the opportunity to engage in anti fascism by doing something as easy and low risk as voting. But they kept heading rightwards.
I maintain that Biden was way better than I’d expected, but still I’m tired of this. I want someone who will campaign like Bernie. I want someone who will fight for me as a worker and as a trans woman and as an environmentalist who’s young enough for environmental concerns to be self preservation. And I want someone who will actually target the right wing violence I’m afraid of.
Every failure is an opportunity to fundraise.
There needs to be a purge within the Party. These corporate freaks and consultants and their pet politicians must be expelled from the Party. Democrats can't allow them to call the shots anymore.
No. The Democratic party deserves extinction. Can't say who or what would replace them, but they're dead.
Despair is typical of those who do not understand the causes of evil, see no way out, and are incapable of struggle.
-Vladimir Lenin
The Dems are failures, plain and simple, but there is a path forward that doesn't involve them. It is the number 1 duty of leftists to get organized, and read theory. I can provide an intro list to Marxism if you want, but Blackshirts and Reds is an excellent primer. It helps us understand what fascism is, who it serves, where it comes from, and how we can banish it forever.
Lol, Americans.
Wasn't it the Republican party that needed to be destroyed last cycle in your allowed thought-hamster wheel? I wonder what it'll be next cycle.
Maybe time to expand your solutions beyond that?
How do you purge 95% of a party and all of its power brokers and backers without just building a new party? It's not like the capitalists came in and hijacked it, they were always one half of the American single-party state.
That's like reforming the Nazi party, by the time you've fixed the Democratic party you'll have changed everything about it.
Vote in your down ballot primaries, and volunteer hard to get progressives in. People in those state/local offices often tend to move upwards in the party
Consider also running for office yourself https://runforsomething.net/
People in those state/local offices often tend to move upwards in the party
name a time this has worked to get a progressive into a meaningfully high office (and they didn't immediately capitulate and throw the working class under the bus in whole or in part)
Why insist on continuing to spend all your focus and resources on participating in a system that is functioning exactly as it was designed to, and expecting different results?
Those are the democratic party elite. We can no more remove them than remove one's own head.
Where was this months ago!?!?
He was too busy endorsing Harris..
As he does - support the best option that has a realistic chance of happening even if that's just because it's a lesser evil. He did it with Hillary too even after the DNC stabbed him in the back, and for the same reason: he saw the disastrous potential of a Trump presidency.
That ship has sailed and sunk, so now it's time for aggressive introspection in the hopes that we can make a better ship next time that actually does its job.
...assuming there's a next time.
Well the Democratic Party learn their lesson? No.
all out war against the Palestinian people
Say the 'g' word - genocide, you king cuck coward
What should we expect of a Genocide denier
Bernie is the modern day version of Bernstein. Bernie's emphasis on gradual reform and cooperation with the bourgeoisie is essentially an abandonment of the fight for socialism. Much like Bernstein did in hist time, Bernie prioritizes short-term gains for workers within the capitalist system instead of striving for its overthrow. He built a country wide movement that inspired millions of people, and then he made it all about the election. Once he lost the whole movement just fizzled overnight.
They didn't learn when Hillary did it, they squeaked by with Biden because nobody could stomach another 4 years of orange man, and they shit the bed in entirely the same way with Harris. They'll keep the same quislings in control, propping up the Republican monarchists and throw a bunch more elections to make sure there's a supermajority the next go around to get some real work done for the fascists. This is the way.
Awww, they let the doggie off his leash!
Oh fuck right off Bernie. You solidified yourself as one of their satellites when you went down without a fight after super tuesday 2020. I remember you standing side by side with them lying to us about Gaza just fucking weeks ago. Retire. All the good that could come out of you is tapped.
Populism clearly wins elections, which is why the Democrats would shun a platform like this
Why win elections when you can lose elections and have your policies implemented anyway?
Unfortunately, I don't think any of this bothers them. As long as politics is controlled by money, this is the ultimate destination for any major political party.
If Bernie Sanders and Jon Stewart run in 2028, we might have a chance to install people that would actually attempt to remove blatant bribery from politics. Otherwise, this is it.
Bernie's gonna be in his 90s by then. He won't run and I won't blame him.
Dude litterally spent his entire life trying to help us. We consistently turned him down. He did all he could, the blame is not with him.
Despair is typical of those who do not understand the causes of evil, see no way out, and are incapable of struggle.
-Vladimir Lenin
Bernie and Jon Stewart will be too old by then. More than that, ceding defeat without fighting to begin with is the height of foolishness. It is the number 1 duty of leftists to get organized, and read theory. I can provide an intro list to Marxism if you want, but Blackshirts and Reds is an excellent primer. It helps us understand what fascism is, who it serves, where it comes from, and how we can banish it forever.
No, fuck no. Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is like, their whole deal.
Marx and Lenin are vindicated every time the dems fumble what was supposed to be an easy election.
This might be the last chance if even there is one. No centrist Democrat should ever be looked at again until this is corrected.
The Democrats are incapable of moving left, they draw their resources and legitimacy from their donors.
no no they will not
In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions.
Fucking tell them Bernie. Too many people are still in denial about the truth of that happened in this election. Hint: It's not Americans hating women. It's not Americans hating black people. It's not Harris being handed an impossible situation. It's not whatever excuse you came up with or heard (seriously why do people feel the need to make excuses for political candidates' failure).
They always will fail, they serve the same donors and bourgeois powers as the republicans. That's why they threw away their voterbase and catered with Liz Cheney. Marx and Lenin are vindicated by the passage of time. They were not clairvoyant, they just accurately analyzed the systems around them and saw what necessarily follows from their directions.
Everyone, get organized, read theory, learn self-defense and self-sufficiency. A good primer is Blackshirts and Reds. Defend yourselves and protect each other. I can provide an intro list to Marxism if anyone wants to read up on theory.
Bernie starting a labor party?
He'd ruin any labour party he touches.
kinda doubt they care overmuch as theyre making money either way
I'm fucking tuned Bernie.
We need a revolution, the democrats are a failure.
Where the fuck was this version of Sanders for the last 8 fucking years.
Haven't been paying attention, eh?
Present and speaking similarly.
Too true. Listening to Sanders from the 80s is the same as listening to him today. It's shocking how little his views and rhetoric have changed while being absolutely correct from the beginning.
Endorsing every move the dems made.
Betteridge's Law says they won't
Maybe releasing a video begging people to overlook genocide and vote for the cop wasn't very smart of you bro.
By the time that video was released the course was already locked in. That was just trying to make the best of a horrible situation. It's what any sane, rational person should have done.
It’s what any good German should have done.
GenZ had pretty much no impact on this election, the younger demographics all showed up in the same ratios they always do.
This election was lost by the dems because they assumed white Neoliberal men would vote for a woman
If they are going to ram through protectionist type tarrifs and similar laws they should just make it federal law that US Pharma companies legally can't sell drugs to any other nations health system for a penny less than what they charge any uninsured US citizen. We currently are in effect subsidizing systems like Canada or Britain's NHS. The companies use our framework to develop and bring drugs to market, charge the US citizen (or their Rx plan) full freight while other systems get a negotiated lower price. Canadians and Brits should be defraying the development cost of expensive drugs by the US, rather than simply benefiting from them.
I too support destroying American pharmaceutical industry.
So, I'm supposed to believe that working class people care about policy and that's why they abandoned Democrats.
And because they care so much about pro-worker policy they voted for Trump?
Working class people generally care that their rent and groceries doubled in five years without raises to cover the difference, yes. If you can't provide an answer to those problems as the incumbents, then it's hardly shocking when no one shows up to vote for you.
No one went to trump, dingus, he got the same amount of voters that he did last time. People chose to stay home over voting for either.
Half the country doesn't vote at all.
Of course not, it's not about policy, it's about vibes. MAGA wraps itself in the false appearance of populism. The Democratic party generally speaking is very institutionalist and makes no attempt to cater to such attitudes whatsoever in its campaigning.
I think his argument is not about vibes, though.
So they picked the worst possible option? That doesn't even make sense. I doubt he would have won either at the time, even if he wasn't sabotaged. Do you think the RNC wouldn't have gone after him worse?