I don’t care if you hate and despise his supporters and the movement that’s grown up around his campaign.
I don’t even care if you detest anything associated with Socialism and want to turn the Democratic Party into a mass seance for the ghosts of Cold War Liberalism, with the Progressive Left being cast in the role of the defunct Soviet Union. Never mind that this betrays a political mentality over a generation out of date.
What I care about is defeating the Far Right, which necessarily means defeating the GOP in November. Consequently, l want to see the strongest possible opposition to Donald Trump.
However, defeating Donald Trump is not enough. Winning one election isn’t enough. Particularly if it is a narrow win.
As I said, I care about defeating the Far Right but not just in November and not for just one election cycle. I care about eroding and fragmenting their base. I care about destroying them and their reactionary backers politically for the long term.
That is a fundamental requirement for advancing the progressive program that we desperately need.
We cannot accomplish this with a politics that resigns itself to the very polarization that the GOP has battened off for the past 30 years. We have to attack that polarization at its poisonous roots. Chief among these being the assertion that what divides us is more important than what unites us.
“A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
This truth is as self evident today as it was when voiced by Abraham Lincoln more than a century ago.
It is true of Nations and it is no less true of political parties.
Sen. Sanders has developed a massive following based on championing a set of policy positions. He has been successful at advancing them to the extent that HRC has adopted a large number of them rhetorically, as her speech on Tuesday night showed. It was obvious from the response of her supporters that they enthusiastically approved of this. Just as it was obvious that they approved of her laudatory comments on Sanders and his campaign.
The question for Sanders’supporters is whether this is anything more than window dressing. That’s the crux of the problem.
Contrary to what so many Sanders critics have been asserting here, Sanders’ campaign has never been a personality cult. It’s always been about the issues. Consequently, Sanders can’t simply endorse Clinton and expect those who’ve supported him to fall in line. He has to be able to give some credible assurances that HRC won’t simply ditch those issues once the GE is over. That’s going to require some substantive action on HRC’s part.
I don’t know how you’re going to get that outside of the Convention.
That doesn’t mean that the Convention has to be some acrimonious free for all. That would only happen if the two sides can’t come to terms.
Again, that’s not simply a question of what Sanders wants but what he can credibly and convincingly present to his supporters.
People by and large do not vote out of altruism. That’s a privilege that relatively few enjoy.
People vote out of self interest for themselves and their loved ones.
If you want their votes, you have to demonstrate that it is in their interest to vote for you. If you don’t, they won’t.
That’s the ABC of electoral politics.
So for anyone who wants smash Trump and the inchoate Fascism that he is promoting, the way forward would seem clear. The two camps have to come together at some point. That can’t happen on the basis of a “winner take all” attitude, particularly if a noisy minority continues to pursue what is beginning to have the appearance of a political vendetta against Sanders and his supporters.
It seems evident that barring some unforeseen and unforeseeable seismic event altering the political terrain, HRC will be the Democratic nominee. At this juncture, continued attacks on Sanders and his supporters cannot be attributed to the bare knuckled realities of the primary campaign. We would have to look elsewhere for the motivation of those making them. Particularly since they are at odds with their ostensible candidate’s attitude.
If such attacks continue, they can’t be reconciled with assertions that the primary objective is the political destruction of Trumpism and the GOP. They can do nothing now other than sow division and alienate Sanders’ constituency. Inevitably,they would make any rapprochement all the more difficult. It would be hard to avoid concluding that is both the intent and purpose of those making them.
So between now and the convention, unless Sanders and HRC come to terms in the meanwhile, we may find that some Sanders critics are far more interested in defeating the politics that he represents and the movement inspired by them, than they are concerned with crushing Trump.
This isn’t a matter of anyone being “owed” anything. It is a question of political reality and political realism.
Thursday, Jun 9, 2016 · 4:20:56 PM +00:00
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WB Reeves
Apparently there needs to be some clarification. A number of commenters below seem to think this diary is some kind of threat. This is errant nonsense. I’ve attempted to point out some hard political realities. I understand that they may be unpalatable but that makes them no less real. Ignoring them will not make them disappear. One may disagree with my take but characterizing it as a threat is jumping the shark.