I’ve never seen a political campaign like the Bernie Sanders campaign, especially one which I intend to vote for. It has generated a more counter-productive kind of support, support which the candidate himself continue to disavow.
I’ve been saying for months that Bernie’s political views are closer to my own and I intend to vote for him if I can see any evidence that he is building the kind of movement he would need to win a general election.
So far, I see little evidence of that. I’ll probably still vote for him because I don’t expect him to become the nominee and it is important for him to do well to keep pushing the Democratic Party to the left on economic issues.
But that has to be done in a way that builds a movement not a party tendency, cult, or sect.
Bernie clearly wants to build a movement, which means reaching out to those who do not yet agree with him in the party and beyond it in order to convince them that his policy ideas and his political analysis about how to implement them are correct.
I support some of those ideas and disagree with others. But I support their general tendency and at least think that his central political insight—that it will take a large grass roots movement to make change—is correct.
That agreement on political strategy is far more important than my policy disagreements about health care and regulating Wall Street.
But the tactics of many of his supporters seems to be quite different. They don’t really care about winning this general election. They care about taking over the Democratic Party. And they really don’t care about building a large movement, they care about building a pure movement.
Why do I say that?
Because if you don’t agree with their policy or political ideas or criticize them, you are immediately branded a “Corporate Democrat” EVEN if you say you are voting for Bernie.
Because they are not willing to engage in substantive debates at all. Single payer and breaking up the big banks are now icons to which everyone must bow down even if many progressive policy wonks and political analysts think they are either unnecessary as policy or problematic strategically.
Because far more energy is spent attacking Hillary Clinton than making the case for Bernie.
Because they run down the accomplishments of President Obama whose support remains extremely high among Democrats and whose support in the general election is absolutely critical.
Because they fail to understand that one builds a movement in large party by offering hope and you can’t generate hope if you continually criticize the accomplishment of Democrats and seem convinced that the world is going to to hell.
Because those attacks take the destructive form found in this KKK poster and in the constant repetition of dishonest right wing attacks about the emails, etc.
All these tactics are far too reminiscent of what the far right and Tea Party have done to the Republican Party. We now see the result of them in the Republican Party. No sane progressive can want that to happen to the Democratic Party.
Yet it is clear that many supporters of Bernie are modeling their activity on the far right. Some acknowledge it. Some are just useful idiots following that path.
Bernie Sanders to his great credit, has constantly opposed that kind of campaign. Most of his supporters do not support it.
But some do. And yes I mean to insult them by calling them Bernie Bots. And I mean to wake people up about how dangerous their activities are, first to Bernie’s campaign, and second to the Democratic Party as a whole.
And everyone who supports Bernie should be doing the same thing. Tell these folks to shut up. Start talking to people who worry about Bernie’s taxes. Make the case, over and over, that the overall benefit to working people and the middle class from raising taxes and providing health care and free college education will be great. Build the movement. Don’t tear down Hillary Clinton.