VT Insights: In New Hampshire, Bernie Sanders sets up Trump as opposite of democracy

[Uncle Joe]

(snip)

"The very concept of democracy is under attack by a president who seems intent on emulating the authoritarian leaders in Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, North Korea and elsewhere," Sanders told supporters at a campaign rally Sunday afternoon in Concord, New Hampshire.

(snip)

In calling Trump authoritarian, Sanders returned to an theme he has talked about since at least last summer. And unlike some top-tier Democratic candidates who often avoid mentioning the president by name in campaign speeches, Sanders never fails to bring up Trump.

Yet the language he used in Concord Sunday drew the sharpest picture of a president as a threat to democracy since Sanders launched announced his candidacy.

Calling Trump "a pathological liar," Sanders ticked off the president's sins against democracy:

Praise for "leaders who despise democracy."
Attacks on the news media, calling them "enemy of the people," and praising a Montana congressman who physically assaulted a journalist.
Support for efforts to purse voter rolls.
Reluctance to criticise Saudi Arabia for the killing of a Washington Post columnist.
Declaring a national emergency to pay for a wall on the Mexican border after Congress denied him the money.
"All over the world there is now a great struggle taking place between growing authoritarianism and democracy, and Trump is consistently on the wrong side of that struggle," he said.

(snip)

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/politics/elections/2019/03/11/bernie-sanders-2020-presidential-campaign-trump-authoritarianism-democratic-socialism-ocasio-cortez/3123570002/

[CrossingTheRubicon]

1. Yet, Sen. Bernard Sanders (I-Vt) has a history of praising Daniel Ortega, Fidel Castro...

and Hugo Chavez. His website claimed that Venezuela was the model for a new American Dream. He won't call for the Democratic Socialist Maduro to go.

His distaste for authoritarianism seems "highly-selective" to this liberal Democrat.

[Uncle Joe]

2. It's Foreign Policy That Distinguishes Bernie This Time

(snip)

What distinguishes Sanders is the same quality that distinguished him on domestic policy in 2016: his willingness to cross red lines that have long defined the boundaries of acceptable opinion. One clear example is Israel. Most of the Senate Democrats running for president have shifted left on the subject. Booker, after initially supporting legislation to criminalize boycotts of the Jewish state, voted against a similar bill last month. Warren, after defending Israeli military actions in the Gaza Strip earlier in her career, last year criticized Israel’s response to protests there. But Sanders has gone much further: He’s produced videos that call Gaza an “open-air prison,” he’s depicted Benjamin Netanyahu as part of the “growing worldwide movement toward authoritarianism,” and, most controversially of all, he’s suggested cutting U.S. military aid to Israel.

But Israel is only the beginning of Sanders’s sacrilege. He’s the only presidential candidate in recent memory who regularly describes the Cold War not as a heroic American victory, but as a cautionary tale. Sanders doesn’t just warn against U.S. military intervention in Venezuela, as Warren and Gillibrand have. He warns against it while invoking the United States’ “long history of inappropriately intervening in Latin American countries.” In his speech at Westminster College in 2017, he spent paragraph after paragraph detailing America’s disastrous 20th-century interventions: Iran, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, Vietnam—a litany that resembled a Noam Chomsky lecture more than a typical presidential candidate’s foreign-policy speech.

Sanders’s darker view of Cold War foreign policy isn’t mere historical revisionism. It’s linked to his critique of American foreign policy today. Now, as then, he wants America to shun the quest for global supremacy that leads it to overthrow regimes it can’t control and to instead pursue a foreign policy based on “partnership, rather than dominance.” That’s why, in his Westminster speech, Sanders did something Democrats have rarely done in recent decades: He called for putting the United Nations—which he called “one of the most important organizations for promoting a vision of a different world”—near the heart of American foreign policy.

What all this represents is a second phase of the assault on American exceptionalism that Sanders launched in 2016. Back then, Sanders challenged the domestic side of the exceptionalist creed: the belief that American capitalism—buttressed by modest regulations and welfare provisions—provides upward mobility. Now Sanders is poised to challenge exceptionalism in foreign policy: the belief that America, as a uniquely virtuous nation, can substitute its own self-interest and moral intuition for international institutions and international law. Once again, Sanders’s heresies mirror the anti-exceptionalist turn among America’s young. A 2017 Pew Research poll found that Americans over the age of 30 were far more likely to say that the “U.S. stands above all other countries in the world” than to say, “There are other countries that are better than the U.S.” But among adults under 30, the latter view predominated by a margin of more than two to one.

(snip)

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/02/foreign-policy-distinguishes-bernie-sanders-2020/583279/

[CrossingTheRubicon]

3. His foreign policy certainly does distingish him,

I'm equally certain that's not a compliment.

[Uncle Joe]

4. I believe that most Americans are tired of eternal war

and Bernie's message will resonate with the people.

But if we don't change our perception as to our role in the world from supremacy/dominance to partnership/cooperation based on the rules of international law, we will continue to stay on the hamster wheel; having our most needy Americans fighting and dying while our infrastructure deteriorates and our domestic social programs become increasingly cannibalized.

[CrossingTheRubicon]

12. I think Amemericans know that the surest path to war

and increased human misery is for the US and its allies to step off the world stage.

Neoisolationism would be a catostrophically bad choice.

We need statesmen, not isolationists.

[Uncle Joe]

13. I would refer you to my post #2 which I will re-post here for your convenience

(snip)

What distinguishes Sanders is the same quality that distinguished him on domestic policy in 2016: his willingness to cross red lines that have long defined the boundaries of acceptable opinion. One clear example is Israel. Most of the Senate Democrats running for president have shifted left on the subject. Booker, after initially supporting legislation to criminalize boycotts of the Jewish state, voted against a similar bill last month. Warren, after defending Israeli military actions in the Gaza Strip earlier in her career, last year criticized Israel’s response to protests there. But Sanders has gone much further: He’s produced videos that call Gaza an “open-air prison,” he’s depicted Benjamin Netanyahu as part of the “growing worldwide movement toward authoritarianism,” and, most controversially of all, he’s suggested cutting U.S. military aid to Israel.

But Israel is only the beginning of Sanders’s sacrilege. He’s the only presidential candidate in recent memory who regularly describes the Cold War not as a heroic American victory, but as a cautionary tale. Sanders doesn’t just warn against U.S. military intervention in Venezuela, as Warren and Gillibrand have. He warns against it while invoking the United States’ “long history of inappropriately intervening in Latin American countries.” In his speech at Westminster College in 2017, he spent paragraph after paragraph detailing America’s disastrous 20th-century interventions: Iran, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, Vietnam—a litany that resembled a Noam Chomsky lecture more than a typical presidential candidate’s foreign-policy speech.

Sanders’s darker view of Cold War foreign policy isn’t mere historical revisionism. It’s linked to his critique of American foreign policy today. Now, as then, he wants America to shun the quest for global supremacy that leads it to overthrow regimes it can’t control and to instead pursue a foreign policy based on “partnership, rather than dominance.” That’s why, in his Westminster speech, Sanders did something Democrats have rarely done in recent decades: He called for putting the United Nations—which he called “one of the most important organizations for promoting a vision of a different world”—near the heart of American foreign policy.

What all this represents is a second phase of the assault on American exceptionalism that Sanders launched in 2016. Back then, Sanders challenged the domestic side of the exceptionalist creed: the belief that American capitalism—buttressed by modest regulations and welfare provisions—provides upward mobility. Now Sanders is poised to challenge exceptionalism in foreign policy: the belief that America, as a uniquely virtuous nation, can substitute its own self-interest and moral intuition for international institutions and international law. Once again, Sanders’s heresies mirror the anti-exceptionalist turn among America’s young. A 2017 Pew Research poll found that Americans over the age of 30 were far more likely to say that the “U.S. stands above all other countries in the world” than to say, “There are other countries that are better than the U.S.” But among adults under 30, the latter view predominated by a margin of more than two to one.

(snip)

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/02/foreign-policy-distinguishes-bernie-sanders-2020/583279/

Bernie has never proposed nor stated that "America or its' allies should step off the world stage" or that we should become "neo-isolationists."

[CrossingTheRubicon]

14. You are reposting the article in which Sen. Bernard Sanders (I-Vt) denounces

capitalism and his foreign policy is compared to that of Noam Chompsky?

Thanks for making my points for me.

[Uncle Joe]

16. Which specific quote are you referring to? I'm reading about authoritarianism and democracy.

Sanders set up his attack on Trump by referring to the New England tradition of town meetings, noting that the Norman Rockwell painting "Freedom of Speech" of a man standing to speak at a Vermont town meeting hangs in his Burlington office.

Communities across Vermont observed Town Meeting Day on March 5 to hold local elections.

"Town meeting to me is a reflection of what democracy is about," Sanders said. "We come together to discuss the major issues in our communities. We discuss, debate and often times disagree. That is what democracy is all about."

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/politics/elections/2019/03/11/bernie-sanders-2020-presidential-campaign-trump-authoritarianism-democratic-socialism-ocasio-cortez/3123570002/

[R B Garr]

5. Yes, and what about the pass on Russian sanctions.

The inconsistency doesn’t pass the smell test.

[Uncle Joe]

6. It does with Jimmy Carter

[R B Garr]

7. LOL, look at Jimmy Carter clapping for the "two" leaders,

but Sanders doesn’t bother to acknowledge Carter.

Random videos of people being in the same room have nothing to do with my post or the one I responded to.

[Uncle Joe]

8. Obviously you didn't bother to actually view the video. Even the first few minutes. n/t

[R B Garr]

9. Nothing to do with the post I responded to or my post.

Just a distraction.

[Uncle Joe]

10. Your post was about Bernie's "inconsistency" "not passing the smell test"

Jimmy Carter does believe in Bernie's consistency.

You commented on a still image from a video, throwing shade at Bernie without ever viewing even the first few minutes to get any context, President Carter and the audience were applauding Bernie, that's why Bernie wasn't clapping.

[R B Garr]

11. Wrong, the host welcomed the TWO leaders, and Carter

looked over and clapped while Bernie didn’t bother.

But thanks for confirming this is just a distraction from my post and the post I responded to. They weren’t discussing Bernie’s pass on Russian sanctions or his previous praise for the leaders in the post I responded to.

[Uncle Joe]

15. You are correct regarding the image, I was mistaken.

However the content of the video does reflect Bernie's world view which is consistent, mutually aligned with Jimmy, and both of them's respect for the other.

If the Russian sanctions bill also sanctioned Iran, Bernie didn't support it.

[R B Garr]

18. The facts are that the post I responded to which discusses

his praise of those “leaders” and his pass on Russian sanctions have nothing to do with Jimmy Carter. They were not discussing Russian sanctions or Bernie’s comments in the post I responded to.

[Uncle Joe]

20. I believe the video although prior to the Russian sanctions bill

explains Bernie's world view and understanding that should answer your general questions.

Bernie had no problem with a sanctions solely against Russia but he wasn't going to have Iran tied to it and endanger the nuclear agreement.

Bernie is pulling the U.S. away from militarism and he's damn sure not giving Trump ammunition to wage war with Iran or Venezuela.

[R B Garr]

21. That doesn't match his praise for the other "leaders".

It doesn’t match his goals for holding oligarchs accountable. Something doesn’t add up.

This has nothing to do with Jimmy Carter. Nothing. I’m tired of kicking this thread with these distractions.

[Uncle Joe]

22. Did Jimmy Carter know about Bernie's praise for these leaders and how long has

Bernie being doing it?

I believe at least since the 1980s, I imagine Jimmy knew/knows about it.

The full video is most enlightening on their views and I believe a long overdue course of action.

[R B Garr]

23. Jimmy Carter has nothing to do with Bernie's contradictions.

Jimmy Carter is not the voice of Bernies “foreign policy”. Jimmy Carter is just a distraction.

[Uncle Joe]

24. They totally agree in the video on foreign policy.

[Cha]

17. This smell test, RB?

Link to tweet

[R B Garr]

19. Exactly, Cha. How can someone claim to be all about punishing

oligarchs, and then let them slide when given the chance. Something in the “foreign policy” objectives don’t add up.