This is my last post before taking a hiatus from DU until after the election.

When the 2016 election began 14 months ago, I committed to support Bernie Sanders within minutes of the formation of the BSG. No one really knew what to expect. I thought it possible that Bernie would run out of money quickly and would have to fold his campaign in a short time. As we know, although as Camp Weathervane will admit it, the campaign was a great success, not in the sense that our candidate will be the next president, but in the sense that our candidate survived the process with the deck stacked against him to be the voice of disenfranchised Democrats in Philadelphia next month.

Make no mistake about it: the deck was stacked and the stacking continues as this is being written. David Brock’s lies, Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s unilateral decisions on debate scheduling and the obscene ploy of unilaterally cutting the campaign’s access to its own files on the DNC database, the lies coming out of the Nevada state party convention and the clearly rigged judgments of the voice by by a party chairwoman who is apparently deaf, the corporate media’s declaring Mrs. Clinton the winner of debates by rote, even after a ridiculous performance about her support for Wall Street being about the September 11 attacks and had nothing to do with millions in campaign funds and even exorbitant speaking fees going straight into Mrs. Clinton’s purse. Of course, there was all that coverage they gave Bernie. It was journalistic malpractice.

I paid no attention to the residents of Camp Weathervane and the nonsense they produced. For example, charging that any attack on Mrs. Clinton’s campaign finance ethics being a “smear.” I’ve got some beachfront property by the Sea of Tranquility at bargain prices for anyone who believes that. I also found Camp Weathervane’s mindset of primary-campaign-as-sporting-event annoying. They actually thought all this campaign was about was who would be the Democratic nominee. We Sandernistas have known all along that it is about much, much more. And we won because Mrs. Clinton failed to stop us. We won because we will continue to fight for our vision of America, a vision in which it is hard to see crooked bankers like Legs Dimon and Pretty Boy Lloyd. The only place for people like them in our vision of America is Fort Leavenworth.

I can’t say with certainty that, if it were not for the underhanded Mr. Brock, the scurrilous, biased behavior of Mrs. Wasserman Schultz, the tainted money of Wall Street banksters and other corporate criminals or the lies from the corporate media that Bernie Sanders would be the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee instead of Hillary Clinton, but it’s a sure bet that the vote count would have been even closer than it was.

We Sandernistas stand with people made of flesh and blood, not with corporations made of legal documents. We are the true heirs of the New Deal. We will continue to fight for human rights, a clean environment, political justice and economic justice. If that last element is a code word for socialism, then let us make the most of it. The Third Way is the way Reaganomics and neoliberalism, of income inequality, rising personal debt and austerity. It is doomed, perhaps not in this election cycle, but perhaps the next one or the one after that. Neoliberalism is an unsustainable model and it will crash. Adapt to the changing times with us, or die alone.

We are the future.

Hillary Clinton is about to win the Democratic nomination. Big deal.

The system is rigged. We all know that.

Mrs. Clinton is the banksters' moll. We all know that, too. Debbie Wasserman Schultz is crooked down to her socks and should be replaced as DCN chair and as the congressional representative of Florida's 23rd district.

She's still better than Der Donald, we all know that. At least Mrs. C could pass a high school civics exam. Trump could not. I'd really like to hear him explain separation of powers. I could use a good laugh right now.

Mrs. C will get my vote if that is what it takes to keep Der Donald from picking up my state's 55 electoral votes.

After that, I'll still oppose free trade and NSA spying, and I'll insist that communications and banking industries be re-regulated and payday lending outlawed. Wall Street bankers should be investigated for fraud and prosecuted. I will still demand that the government subsidize renewable energy and stop giving away money to oil and coal; I demand that the government put in place a plan to supplant and eventually supplant fossil fuels with renewable sources, the sooner the better. I oppose wars for oil. We don't need oil, we need to put this plan into effect and now. In addition, I insist that upper class tax cuts be rolled back pre-Reagan levels. If the forgoing is not implemented, Mrs. Clinton will not get my vote under any circumstances in 2020.

Whether this can be done within the structure of the Democratic Party or whether the party is now so corrupt that it is beyond hope for progressives to expect accommodation is a discussion that needs to take place, but is prohibited by the longstanding rules of DU. Therefore, for those who want to have this discussion, I'll see you at Jackpine Radicals, where this post is cro54rss posted.

Guys like Trump rub me the wrong way. He's a bully. I was the smallest kid in my class. How much do I despise Trump? I'll even vote for Hillary Clinton to block him from the White House. That's desperation, not a ringing endorsement of Mrs. Clinton.

I'll stay out of the campaign this year. I have little good to say about Mrs. Clinton, so I'll say nothing at all. I heard of bumper stickers in New Orleans during the gubernatorial election of 1991, Edwin Edwards vs. David Duke, proclaiming It's Important -- Vote for the Crook. That's exactly how I feel about this election.

Sure, I oppose the TPP, but not because it will help China. In fact, I can think of no way in which it will. It should be obvious to all that in addition to being a racist, misogynist, a sectarian bigot (although he's no more religious than my cat) and a climate science denier, Mr. Trump doesn't know what he's talking about. Hillary Clinton may have demonstrated poor judgment often, but at least it is informed poor judgment.