Quote:
Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
The reasons are at least four fold:
(1) He and his people love to demonize other people; it's a cult, and if you don't worship St. Bernie you're not a progressive. We've all been called names by Bros along the way, and we've all had them question our integrity.
(2) He undermines good candidates, whether it is past races in Vermont, local races he decides to get into, or Hillary Clinton. He is particularly nasty to minority and women candidates; watching the Bernie Bros feed on Elizabeth Warren when she didn't do as she was told by them was one of the recent stomach turning escapades. One side effect of this is he has no long term alliances - try to think of another elected official who has worked closely with bernie for years - there are none, if you work with him too long, there will be a knife in your back.
(3) He's really shallow - everything is a bumper sticker, there is always an easy solution. I'm sure you like this about him. This makes having an argument with the Bernie Bros as frustrating as having an argument with Trumpsters (example: I have asked innumerable Bros how M4A would impact the development of innovative drugs - there are good answers to this question by the way - and have never gotten anything but a man, you must be a neoliberal shill to question M4A, what is wrong with you)
(4) He's gotten shit done. Other than staging big rallies and basking in adulation, he's accomplished next to nothing.
Compare the above to, say, the squad. They operate in a completely different way. Really, one thing you don't want is Bernie to be too firmly in your camp.
As to this "you can't hate Bernie and call yourself a progressive" crap - fuck you, that's Bro-speak. As I've noted before, I was in Burlington with Bernie the night he was first elected Mayor, I was campaign manager for a progressive Member of Congress in an adjacent district, I was a member of DSA back when he first joined. I know whereof I speak.
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1. I agree. Bernie people can be cultish and they are incredibly naive. But they are also kind of pure in this regard. They seem to really believe we need massive, systemic change. Their thinking is somewhat akin to Adder's assertion that one is either racist or antiracist. Or to cite Kesey, on the bus or off the bus. This may be pitiable, but a basis for hatred?
2. Hillary was not a good candidate. The most exercised voters in 2016 wanted to blow up the system, not incrementally modify it in a way that keeps you and me and all of our richer friends happy while people looking for work are left holding their dicks in their hands. Bernie understood this. Trump understood this. Hillary was clueless.
More generally, however, I do agree that Bernie kneecaps more moderate candidates, just like the Tea Party kneecaps moderate Rs. But again, these insurgents are doing it because they believe people like us - moderates, neoliberals - won't give them the radical change they desire. I hate that the Tea Party has turned the GOP primaries into crowning ceremonies for right wing lunatics. But I don't hate them for doing so.
I think "hand grenade" candidates like Bernie, the Tea Party, AOC, and Trump open up necessary debates we'd otherwise avoid. They question incrementalism. Maybe that's needed?
3. He's shallow by design. He wants to kick down the barriers of debate by simply repeating extreme positions until they become part of the mainstream conversation. It's marketing genius. And it serves the interests of true progressivism, as opposed to Clintonite faux progressivism, quite well.
4. I could not disagree more. Bernie and Trump have completely upended modern politics. They've gelded the forces on the right and left which kept policy debates within tight little bands, so no true radical change could occur. Bernie shoved open the door for the progressive movement to acquire a very large seat at table of the Democrat leadership. Where they could once be ignored as fringe players to at most be placated, now they're a serious power bloc. And a growing one as well. Biden and Harris might be a resurgence of the corporate wing of the Democratic Party, but it's a last dance for their kind. If Biden tries to run the place as a triangulator, he's going to feel the wrath of both the Bernie and Trump factions in the midterms, and beyond.
