[Peace-discuss] Proving Bruce Dixon right, years after he wrote that Sen. Sanders was a "sheepdog" for the Democratic Party

[Brussel, Morton K]

The question is: What do people do in the present situation, people like me. Vote Green?  

You appear to be certain about what a Sanders could (not) do if elected. I do not have that certainty, and I retain some “hope” that he could move things more forward, more justice and empathy, more consideration of the environment and global climate effects, than to have a Trump triumph, the likely outcome if Biden were to become the Dem nominee. 

Another thought: The power brokers of the Dem establishment, may well know that Biden would be a disaster for the party's chances in the election and will arrange for somebody else to take his place. Otherwise, one can cynically believe that they don’t care what happens to their party, as you seem to suggest, not unhappy with a renewed Trump presidency.

A pretty dreadful state of affairs. I’d take my chances, with all the valid criticisms of him, to Sanders. A lesser apocalypse.

Perhaps the economy or the coronavirus will render its judgements. 

> On Mar 13, 2020, at 8:16 PM, J.B. Nicholson via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
> 
> The late Bruce Dixon in https://www.blackagendareport.com/bernie-sanders-sheepdog-4-hillary was correct. Change a few of the names in that essay and you've got a better explanation (offered well before Sanders supported Clinton's 2016 candidacy) than anything Jimmy Dore & co. offer in either of the following videos:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0swg5PD0tvw -- Jimmy Dore & co. on a recording of Sen. Sanders being asked about the nonsensical things Sen. Joe Biden says during his run for POTUS (or Senator, according to an appearance Biden made).
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVaNY4THm90 -- Jimmy Dore & co. on a Sanders interview with CNN's Jake Tapper where Sanders says "Biden can beat Trump" and that if Biden is the nominee Sanders will help Biden do that.
> 
> Jimmy Dore & co. barely get into explaining what's really going on. They talk about Sanders' campaign choices as if they think that Sanders ran to win. I disagree. That party continues to be part of the problem and there's virtually no point to distinguishing it from the other major corporate party because the Democrats & Republicans work together to continue a neoliberal and neoconservative agenda (pushing for permanent government ends).
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BVDZELQ370 -- Lee Camp interviewing Chris Hedges on the elections & the economy.
> 
> Sanders' campaign exists to draw people into the Democratic Party (hence 'sheepdog'). The Democrats would rather lose to Trump than win with Sanders (as Hedges rightly says in the aforementioned interview, the 1% might prefer Biden but they can live with Trump).
> 
> I'm convinced that even if Sanders somehow won he'd face the same problems as Trump and be useless to the public overall, never accomplishing the relatively mild set of agenda items with which he associates himself (Medicare for All, for instance). I don't see that the public (which likes him, would vote him into office, and likes Medicare for All) would stand behind him on Medicare for All by voting out any Congressperson who opposed those ideas or weakened extant Medicare for All legislation. Sanders won't work to do other things we need including ending wars, bringing troops/contractors & weapons home, establishing a Universal Basic Income, or establishing a National Jobs Program (all parts of why Sanders is no threat to establishment power).
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