It is not Hillary vs. Bernie

[oberliner]

It is Hillary and Bernie (and Martin and Joe and other Democrats) vs. the Republicans.

I think it is important not to lose sight of this.

In fact, Bernie makes exactly that same point on the campaign trail quite often.

We Democrats are all going to work together to defeat the Republicans in November.

That is the fight we need to win.

[Motown_Johnny]

1. Agreed

But, in the end.. There Can Be Only One!!!

We are fighting over who we want to lead the party against the Republicans. Not if we will fight against the Republicans or not.

There are a few who have gone over to the dark side and claim that they won't vote for the nominee, but they are a minority. I also think that once they have time to cool down, they will change their minds. If only to vote against whoever the Republican nominee is.

[oberliner]

3. Let's think of it as discussing who would be our best choice

I think it is great for people to feel passionately than one candidate or another would definitely be the best choice - and to advocate for the candidate as strongly as possible.

But I think it is possible to do that while still respecting that we are all on the same side.

[Tommy2Tone]

2. I agree

[randome]

4. It is on DU.

I can't understand it, either. We have 4 Supreme Court justices who will likely need to be replaced. I don't care if it's Sanders or Clinton who does the replacing but it's far more important to have a Democrat in the White House no matter who it is.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font][hr]

[peacebird]

5. In a way it is, because Hillary is DLC/3rd way & Bernie is a true liberal progressive

Hillary is for status quo, continuing Obama & Bill's path of corporatist support with social justice as a side

Bernie is for a change, supporting the 99% instead of the corporations.

It is kind of H v B for the soul of the Democratic party.

[restorefreedom]

6. that is why

this primary "discussion" is so important

we are not just choosing a nominee, we are choosing the direction that we want the Democratic Party to go in for the foreseeable future. And some of us really want to return to our progressive roots, while some want more wars and stay in bed with the corporations. It really is a critical juncture.

[smilingwen]

8. Absolutely!

It is more than the Hillary vs Bernie. I vote for democracy for and by the people, not or and by the big money interests. Hillary has my vote if necessary to keep a Republican out of the White House, but it will break my heart if democracy does not win

[oberliner]

9. Bernie speaks favorably of Hillary

While also highlighting some important policy differences between them.

He has said he would fight her victory, were she chosen to be the candidate, while at the same time he is passionately expressing his case for why he would be the best choice.

That's one of the things I admire most about Bernie's campaign - he focuses on the issues and on his proposals and does not engage in attacks on other candidates.

[peacebird]

11. Yes, another reason I prefer Bernie. He also does not send surrogates to attack her.

[aidbo]

7. That is admirable.

But we as big d Democrats should remember not to define our party as only an opposition to big R Republicans.

[oberliner]

13. Agreed

But we also, I think, need to remember how much we have in common - and how starkly we disagree with the Republican side (especially this particular crop of them) on fundamental issues on which Bernie and Hillary and other Democrats agree.

[Armstead]

10. True, and we should be civil. However there is a lot at stake.

It's important to air the issues and differences. It's a fine line, because disagreement and criticism is going to be inevitable, and is not automatically "bashing." At the same time, we should try and keep our emotions under control and not get into personal animosity. It's not always easy, (I certainly am a sinner, despite good intentions) but we should try.

My own thoughts on this balance are in the posts below:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251622937

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251627242

[Zorra]

12. No. It is Hillary vs. Bernie, and Hillary vs. Bernie = Oligarchy vs Democracy. nt

[oberliner]

14. That is definitely not the way Bernie sees it

And I am inclined to agree with him.

[AOR]

15. No...that is the narrative of the status quo, bread and circuses, and political impotency....

the battle lines are drawn between the working class (most of us who have nothing but our labor to sell to survive or starve in the streets) and the ruling class (a very small minority of parasites and owners who own and control the commons and distribution of production and profit off the institutionalized theft of labor of the rest of us). Your narrative is one that many struggling on the ground and in the trenches are tired of. Which side of that line - do those who claim to be on the side of the struggling working class - stand on. D vs R is a useless and impotent meme of status quo political football contests.

Nothing has changed since Debs spoke these truths. Absolutely NOTHING.

"The Republican and Democratic parties are alike capitalist parties — differing only in being committed to different sets of capitalist interests — they have the same principles under varying colors, are equally corrupt and are one in their subservience to capital and their hostility to labor."

"What the workingmen of the country are profoundly interested in is the private ownership of the means of production and distribution, the enslaving and degrading wage-system in which they toil for a pittance at the pleasure of their masters and are bludgeoned, jailed or shot when they protest — this is the central, controlling, vital issue of the hour, and neither of the old party platforms has a word or even a hint about it. As a rule, large capitalists are Republicans and small capitalists are Democrats, but workingmen must remember that they are all capitalists, and that the many small ones, like the fewer large ones, are all politically supporting their class interests, and this is always and everywhere the capitalist class."

"Socialism is very properly recognized by the capitalist class as the one cloud upon the horizon which portends an end to the system in which they have waxed fat, insolent and despotic through the exploitation of their countless wage-working slaves."

"There has never been a free people, a civilized nation, a real republic on this earth. Human society has always consisted of masters and slaves, and the slaves have always been and are today, the foundation stones of the social fabric. Wage-labor is but a name; wage-slavery is the fact."

"The very moment a workingman begins to do his own thinking he understands the paramount issue, parts company with the capitalist politician and falls in line with his own class on the political battlefield."

"Deny it as may the cunning capitalists who are clear-sighted enough to perceive it, or ignore it as may the torpid workers who are too blind and unthinking to see it, the struggle in which we are engaged today is a class struggle, and as the toiling millions come to see and understand it and rally to the political standard of their class, they will drive all capitalist parties of whatever name into the same party, and the class struggle will then be so clearly revealed that the hosts of labor will find their true place in the conflict and strike the united and decisive blow that will destroy slavery and achieve their full and final emancipation."

--Eugene Debs excerpts from assorted rallies and speeches.

[oberliner]

16. While Debs is clearly someone Sanders admires, there is a critical difference

That being that Debs decided to leave the Democratic Party and run for president as a third party candidate.

Sanders, on the other hand, is running to be the representative of the Democratic Party in the general election.

That important distinction ought not to be taken lightly.

[AOR]

18. I can assure you the distinction isn't taken lightly...

that's why most leftists don't support Sanders while they're certainly not supporting Clinton or Republicans either. The narrative in your first post is another. Most leftists put the struggles of the working class as a priority over party affiliation and token victories that the Democratic Party views as "progress" for the masses.

[oberliner]

19. I believe in the basic principles and values of the Democratic Party

Last edited Mon Sep 28, 2015, 08:48 PM - Edit history (1)

Whoever our representative in the general election ends up being - they will be embracing a party platform that I also embrace and going up a candidate who embraces the Republican Party platform which I loathe.

Thus, I feel it is important to understand that we in the Democratic Party are not just Democrats in name but rather we are Democrats who support those important principles and ideals that inspired us to choose such a party in the first place.

[AOR]

25. That's fine... you are not alone...

and certainly not alone on a forum that's for the Democratic Party in all things political. Leftists are mostly outsiders here and it is what it is. When you post things like your OP it gives a chance to add a different perspective and maybe challenge just what exactly the basic principles and values of the Democratic Party are and how they compare to leftist political ideas in regards to the working class and class struggle.

[Populist_Prole]

17. It's corporatists vs the rest of us n/t

[dreamnightwind]

20. I think you misrepresent where Bernie is at

It is very much a fight of monied interests vs. the peoples' interests, make no mistake about it. Bernie's mode of working with the Democratic Party has always been to very politely but firmly work in their interests so as not to enable Republicans, while finding ways to move things to the left. He is in no way part of the Democratic Party's ruling corporatocracy, and he is hell-bent on defeating it.

Please don't mistake his refusal to attack his fellow Democrats for approval of their mostly corporate agenda, that's simply not the case.

Part of it also is just that Bernie buys into a civil and respectful manner of discourse, as most Senators used to before the current hyper-partisan divide existed.

I don't see us as all on the same team or the same side of things, or simply a vehicle to defeat Republicans, it's not enough, we have to also defeat the control of big money over our own party, our government, and our lives. We'll grudgingly lend a hand in the general if Hillary wins, most of us anyway, but that isn't the fight we're waging, at all, we're trying to reclaim ownership of our government, and Hillary is in no way a vehicle for doing so.

[oberliner]

22. Bernie has explicitly said exactly what I wrote

He has characterized the primaries in exactly this way. That we are trying to find the best candidate to go up against the Republicans.

[dreamnightwind]

28. Either you miss my point or just prefer your own framing

Have it you way, I expressed my opinion and it's in tune with where Bernie is at. Regards.

[sabrina 1]

21. No offense, but we've heard that argument over and over since the beginning of the Bush era

and went along, because we thought just electing Democrats would begin the changes people had hoped for.

It didn't happen, except in a few small ways, but always when the people got something, see Gays in the Military eg which should have passed in Jan 2009 but was held up in order to USE to try to convince us that we had to support an extension of the Bush Tax Cuts IF we wanted to get that passed.

It was a lie of course, because in Jan we had the votes for that, so I guess I'm saying that these crumbs that then result in big pie slices for the bad guys, aren't enough, never were, and we've had enough.

So I guess the Dem Party shouldn't expect the same routine we've all played into if they want to win. And the WH isn't the only important race. People are working to get real Dems not Third Way dinos with a 'd' after their name, elected so that no matter who wins the WH, a Progressive agenda will pass and anything will be blocked.

Thankfully we have a choice now for the WH. And it's looking good for people who won't hold their noses anymore because they won't have to.

[jkbRN]

23. Yeah I thought the ad was pretty disgusting

To leave OMalley out. Biden is understandable--he has not announced.

Also, the portrayal by CNN in the pictures (within the ad)--Hillary, nice pic and for Bernie a pic where he looks like he's yelling. Bias much?!

[TheKentuckian]

24. No, it is a choice if we will even consider not being feed for the predator class

or if we will once again collectively willingly roll over to be prey in a vain fear driven effort to "hold on to the gains we have".

[brooklynite]

26. ...but Hillary Clinton IS a Republican

...or so I'm told by some folks here.

[6chars]

27. Remember 2000 and Nader?

Gore and Bush just the same? Not quite.