Welcome folks, this is the place to talk about tonights Seattle rally.
Current link (will fix if anything changes):
Try this if that does not work: http://livestream.com/...
Shameless plug of the Bernie News Roundup.
Sanders Statement On Seattle
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:19 PM PT: Sorry I got started a little early, be patient ,enjoy the Bern!
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:25 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:26 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:30 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:33 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:45 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:52 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 6:59 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:01 PM PT: Audio issues with the stream... doh!
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:07 PM PT: The stream continues to have problems and I cannot find others so please be patient. Still in introduction phase
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:09 PM PT: http://livestream.com/... better stream here
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:14 PM PT: Sorry I dont have this speakers comments (or name) available but she is speaking on #BLM. 'People want racism to be called out' (cheers)
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:16 PM PT: 'It is not enough to care, we have to call out racism every chance we get'. 'I have worked with the labor movement my entire life, people do not want to be pawns of corporations'. Bernie Sanders is in this unique movement going to bring together our movements for racial, economic, immigrant, worker justice. To make sure we are lifting these issues and demand a different vision.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:18 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:19 PM PT:
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:25 PM PT: Major issues with connection. Have found another stream:
https://www.periscope.tv/...=
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:28 PM PT: Sanders takes to the stage, cheers abound.
Thank you for the wonderful introductions, thank you very much.
What a turnout, thank you for being here. It doesnt seem true but we started this campaign 3 and a half months ago and the momentum has been unbelievable. We have had huge turnouts. We have 12,000 people here, amazing.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:29 PM PT: A few minutes ago I spoke to 3000 outside. The media asks me whats going on. Across this country people are sick of establishment politics and economics and want real change.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:30 PM PT: People of america understand that corporate greed is destroying our country. That politics is dominated by big money interests and the interests of the MSM is prepared to talk about everything but that which is most important.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:32 PM PT: Another point I want to make in opening is to tell you that I will tell you what nobody else will.. that nobody can do it alone. Can take on wall street, corporate America. We need to do it together. We need a grassroots political movement from the east to the west. To tell big interests that government belongs to all of us, not just a handful.
No president will fight harder to end the stain of racism on this country and reform our criminal justice system
(big cheers)
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:33 PM PT: Brothers and sisters, today we are living in the wealthiest country in the history of the world and almost nobody knows it. THe United States now has more income inequality than any major country on earth and it is worse than anytime since 1928. The issue of wealth and income inequality is the great moral issue of our time. It is the great political issue of our time. The great economic issue of our time and together we will address it.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:35 PM PT: There is something proufoundly wrong when 58 percent of all new income goes to the top 1 percent. There is something profoundly wrong when in recent years we have seen a proliferation of millionares and billionares while average americans work for longer hours for less wages. That is unacceptable and must change.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:36 PM PT: We need an economy that works for working families and the middle class not just a handful of billionares. We are sending a message to the billionare class and that message is simple and straightforward, you cannot have it all. You cannot get huge taxbreaks when children in america go hungry. You cannot continue to send our jobs abroad when millions of americans are in desperate need of work right here. You cannot hide your profits in the cayman islands. You will pay your fair share.
(massive cheers)
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:38 PM PT: We have got to be honest and understand that for the last 40 years the middle class of this nation, once the envy of the world, the great middle class is dissapearing. Gross medium incomes are less than in 1999. In Vermont, Washington people are working not 1, but 2, 3 jobs trying to cobble together income and healthcare. That is not an American Economy we can accept, we must do much better.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:40 PM PT: Here is something else that nobody is talking about. One of the fun things about running for president is you can raise issues that nobody chooses to talk about. We have a horrendous tragedy in the terms of youth unemployment. Last month I asked the Economic policy institute to do a study and they found that kid who graduate hs who are white have 33 percent unempoyment. Hispanic 36 percent. African American 51 perecent.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:42 PM PT: It makes more sense to invest in education and jobs than in jails. I want the US to have the proud distinction of having the best educated population on earth. Too many lives have been destroyed by the so call war on drugs. Too many lives have been destroyed by incarceration. We need to educate and we need to put people to work. when we talk about the economy it is important to put on the table that too many people work for inadequate low wages. The federal min wage is a starvation wage and it must be raised.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:44 PM PT: The min wage should be 15 dollars an hour. You did it for Seattle and we need to do it for the country. Nobody who works 40 hours a week should be living in poverty. When we talk about fair wages I want every man in this room to stand with the women of this country and demand fair wages. (big big cheers)
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:46 PM PT: Many republicans talk about family values, you heard them the other night.. they looove families. I have seven beautiful grandchildren and I have been married 27 years. We lead a family. Our view of family values is a littlebit different. Republicans talk about family values and lets be real, they believe that women should not have the right to control their own bodies and I disagree. They believe that women in America should not have the right to buy the contraception they need, and I disagree. They believe our gay brothers and sisters should not have the rights of all Americans and I disagree.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:49 PM PT: The United States must end the embarrassment of being the only country on earth that does not offer paid medical and family leave. Im going to tell you about real family values. In the state of Vermont if a woman is having a baby its a big day for the woman and a big day for the baby as well. Bonding with a baby is one of the most extraordinary moments of our life. But if that mom does not have sufficient income she will be forced to go back to work in days, and they will be seperated. Seperating a bond with her baby because she does not have sufficient income to stay at home is not a family value. I will fight for 12 weeks.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:52 PM PT: We talk about the economy and people care about jobs. People understand how fragile their job is, how you can be replaced with someone at half the age with half the rate. That if you are young it is hard to get a job equivalent to your education. The truth is the government needs to develop a federal jobs program to put our people back to work. Our roads, wastewater plants, dams, bridges used to be the best in the worlds. No longer. Let us invest in them. Rebuild our infrastructure and create millions of jobs.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:54 PM PT: It is not just the need to create jobs, but the need to stop the loss with disastrous trade policy. You are looking at a senator who voted against NAFTA, CAFTA. Who will do everything he can to defeat the TPP. Trade should benefit working families not just the CEO's of major interests.
We bailed out Wall Street because they destroyed the US economy and were too big too fail. Now most of the major banks are bigger now than they were when they were to big too fail. A bank that is too big to fail is too big to exist.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:57 PM PT: Let me be blunt, if I havent been already. As a result of the disastrous supreme court decision Citizens United the political system has been corrupted. Make no mistake that the foundations of democracy are being undermined. That the court said that that you can buy the US government, and that is exactly what they are trying to do. We have a situation where one family, the Koch Family, extreme right wing.. a family who believes medicaid, medicare, postal service need destroyed. They will spend nearly a billion dollars to buy republicans to represent the rich and the powerful. Brothers and sisters that is not called democracy, that is called oligarchy.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 7:59 PM PT: Any nominee of mine will infact have to pass a litmus test. That test is that he or she will vote to overturn Citizens United.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:01 PM PT: Ive talked to countless men and women who have put their lives on the line to defend Democracy, and we cannot let the Billionare class destroy it. We must not only overturn citizens united, we must also establish public funding of elections. I believe in my heart, I love Democracy, I love that everyone can participate, that we should have serious debate and respect differences of opinion. Without public funding candiates have to beg the rich and powerful, and I want to see that end. I want to see people here tonight, and others regardless of their political views, say I want to run for office on my ideas, not on the ideas of the billionares I collect money from to run.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:03 PM PT: The Supreme Court gutting of the Voting Rights Act was unacceptable. Literally hours after the court ruled, states went to work trying to make it harder for people of color, poor people and older people to vote. How disgraceful. It has never occured to me to keep people from voting because they disagreed with me.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:03 PM PT: Those people are political cowards. (Massive cheers)
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:10 PM PT: Let your politics tell people why they should vote for you, dont try and limit others participation in Democracy.
As all of you know we are all living in a highly competitive economy. If we are to succeed we need the best educated workforce in the world. It is absolutely absurd that in the year 2015 hundreds of thousands of bright qualified young people cannot go to college simply because their families lack the income. That is why I have introduced legislation that says in the United States of America every public college and university will be tuition free. (cheers)
(still cheers)
We will say to kids whos family or friends have never gone to college, that if you take school seriously you will be able to go regardless of your income.
When we talk about higher education we have to talk about the absurdity of student debt. Last year I met a woman whos crime in life was she wanted to go to medical school and practice medicine on low income people. She left school in massive debt. Millions of others are the same. On top of that they are paying 6, 7, 8 percent interest rates on the debt. My legislation will do something about that, we will get the government out of profiteering on student debt.
As human beings, parents, there is nothing more important than leaving this planet inhabitable. The republicans may disagree but scientists tell us that Climate CHange is real, that human activity is causing devastating problems in our country and throughout the world. What they tell us is that we have a short window of opportunity to prevent horrendous things from happening to this world.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:14 PM PT: The CIA tells us that climate change will result in more wars as people fight for resources. We have a moral responsibility to leave the world in transforming our energy system away from fossil fuels. Investing in wind, solar, geo thermal and others.
I have strong disagreements with Republicans on many issues. On this they are an international embarrassment. I understand their party is funded by the Koch Brothers, Exxon Mobile and the fossil fuels industry and that if you talk science they may cut your funding but they need to (crowd got loud but I swear he said 'listen to their brains')
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:17 PM PT: (Missed a big chunk on the republican budget....)
Republicans want cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, healthcare programs even WIC. To add insult to injury they proceed to provide tax breaks to the richest two tenths of one percent. That is not a set of priorities that is moral, or that the American people want.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:19 PM PT: What this campaign is about is to bring together people that have a different set of priorities than republican priorities. To do that we will have to build a strong grassroots movement, and reach out to people who do not agree with us on every issue. My guess is that most working class republicans do not believe we should be giving tax breaks to billionares while cutting social security and medicaid. Our job is to reach out to those republicans. To young people who do not understand the significance of politics in their lives.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:22 PM PT: Too many live in the shadows. We must be about bringing families together not dividing them. We need comprehensive immigration reform and a path to citizenship.
Many of my republican colleagues and candidates for president have forgotten the lessons of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. They forget the real cost of war. Not just 6700 brave Americans who died, but 500,000 came home with PTSD. We must make sure that every veteran gets the care they need.
I believe that a great nation must do everything it can to resolve things without conflict rather than going to war, even with major disagreement on issues. I voted against the war in Iraq, I had a sense of the kind of destabilization it would bring about. I want to give peace a chance at every opportunity. I am going to work with the President with his agreement in making sure that Iran does not get a nuclear weapon, and we can do that without going to war.
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:25 PM PT: Let me conclude, and I hope very much that the thousands of people here tonight are prepared to think big, not small. To imagine the kind of country we can create when the government works for all of us and now just a few. We can live in a country where healthcare is a right for all people. We can live in a country in which we have the best childcare and pre-k system in the world. We can live in a country where everybody has the ability and the desire to get a higher education regardless of their income. We can live in a country where our seniors can retire with dignity, and do not have to choose between food and medicine. And that is why we have to expand social security and not cut it. Brothers and sisters this is not a utopian dream, this is a country we can create if we are prepared to stand together, prepared to take on the billionare class, prepared to create a vibrant, powerful, political movement. Thank you all.
(BERNIE BERNIE BERNIE BERNIE)
Sat Aug 08, 2015 at 8:26 PM PT: #FuelTheBern