By all accounts, Bernie Sanders is running a strong, solid, inspiring campaign for president. There can also be little doubt that his overall call for a political revolution, though perhaps a bit too strong, is basically right. In particular, his call to focus on increasing turnout and reaching out to working people is spot on. What should be absolutely obvious to everyone, however, is that a President Sanders would not be able to achieve his goals unless a Democratic House is part of his political revolution.
For the Sanders Revolution to be successful he will need a Democratic House. And to get a Democratic House he will need to help recruit the candidates that can win those seats. In the 82 House seats that a Democrat could possibly take from a Republican, challengers are missing in at least 27 of them. Although it is true that it takes a lot of work to run for president, Bernie can’t punt on this problem. Bernie’s Presidency is premised on the entirely reasonable, if incredibly difficult revolutionary concept. To even come close to meeting the promises the campaign is making he needs candidates to rally his revolution.
Thus the Sanders movement must turn its attention to the recruitment and support of Democratic candidates in what could be vulnerable Republican districts, and the movement can’t wait. . Given filing deadlines, time is not on the side of the Revolution. If the Sanders campaign cannot begin to do this, it becomes clear that the Revolution is too dependent on the efforts of one man and one man alone.
Not only is this bad for the party but it also undermines the core of the Sanders argument. As we know, his team has 750,000 unique donors on the path to a million. Some of these people must be willing to run for Congress because it would strength Senator Sanders or because he asked, or simply because they never thought they should run until Sanders put it into their ear.
The party needs the candidates and Sanders needs them to prove the core of his message. It is win/win and it needs to happen now.