LWolf
LWolf's JournalDo you really want an answer?
Or are you just using rhetorical questions to put that movement down?
On the off chance that you really want an answer, I'll give you what I've got. I don't speak for the movement or the revolution, just myself.
I am one of a number of people that have been disenfranchised by my own party during the neo-liberal takeover of the Democratic Party. Those not affiliated with partisan politics: independents and small 3rd parties with little power saw it first, the slowly building erosion of progressive values and support for the 99% within government and the Democratic party. For a long time, we were just discounted as "fringe" and tossed under the bus when it came to political representation.
Some people spoke up, and were made pariahs.
Then, though, as neo-liberal policies continued the destruction of the 99% begun under Ronald Reagan, and more and more people were disenfranchised, there began to be a rumbling.
We saw it in the response to the IWR and the Patriot Act, and those who turned out to protest, and were ignored. Of course, we could blame all of that on Republicans since it happened under the illegitimate GWB administration. No matter how many neo-liberals and other scared Congressional Democrats jumped on to the war and security bandwagon; people's fear was used against them.
We saw it further in the occupy movement, which lasted a very long time and was more public than tptb would have preferred before going more underground.
Then the primary season began. For myself I can say that I didn't really care WHO stepped up to the plate, as long as someone who was not a neo-liberal DID. Anyone. They are getting rarer and rarer within the party. I just didn't want to be faced with more neo-liberal choices that I couldn't, in good conscience, support. I wanted some hope.
When it was Sanders, I was fine with that. I wasn't holding out for Warren or anyone else. I just wanted SOMEONE. Sanders stepped in, and he's done an amazing job. He's run a powerful campaign and connected with all of us who are sick of neo-liberalism and corporate control of our government. In the beginning, I just wanted someone to represent me, so that I could vote FOR someone instead of AGAINST someone. That rarely happens. Then, the campaign did so amazingly well that I actually began to hope that we had a chance. That's my experience.
As far as "movement" and "revolution" goes? The Sanders campaign is a natural continuation of OWS. Win or lose, the sentiment, the anger, the determination, and the movement has been there before his campaign, and it will continue after.
With or without the Democratic Party.
I'm one who thinks that it is a fundamental error for the Party to have worked so hard to put that movement down. It renders them, at best, irrelevant, and at worst, an enemy of that movement. Beating it out of the party in 2016 will be costly in the long run, because it's not going away.
That's my answer, fwiw.
Let me be clear: I am not grieving.
The repeated posting of an article suggesting that I am? More bullshit propaganda.
I don't give up, so if there were to be any grieving, it would happen after the convention. At that point, I wouldn't be grieving about Sanders, but about the party and the nation. Sanders has done an incredible job, win or lose, and I won't be grieving.
Denial? I don't think so. But then, I see all those who think Hillary Clinton as somehow liberal or somehow a good idea for the nation as in denial. 
Isolation? Sure. I'm a Lone Wolf, and have never pretended any differently, since long before I'd ever heard of Bernie Sanders. That's nothing new, and I gave up grieving and accepted it decades ago.
Anger? You bet. I've been politically angry since the 80s. My anger is not about Sanders, but about the way power brokers manipulate and use the 99% to make sure they remain in power, and about the way some of that 99% allows fear to keep them complicit.
Bargaining? With Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party? NO FUCKING WAY. This was the opportunity to do so. If and when HRC takes the nomination, I'm done, I'm gone, and y'all can play party politics without me. There are other ways to add my efforts to effect needed change.
Depression? Sure. Politics in the U.S. is mostly depressing. Sanders has brought hope back into the process for the first time in a very long time. Happily, hope will abide. It doesn't just rest with the WH.
Acceptance? of HRC...just no. Of our corrupt system...no. No acceptance here. I'll be adding to all of that young energy that has been fueling political revolution, and helping them where I can.
I "get" that the article refers to the usual process of working through a primary loss. The author of the article doesn't "get" that this isn't a typical primary season, but a turning point, with more on the line than which candidate is nominated. HRC supporters who keep posting this article? I think you, and they, "get" it, but are desperate not to acknowledge it, and are determinedly attempting to shove the election and the voters back in their assigned, approved boxes in the hopes that your candidate can pull off a win in November.
I don't see that happening, but you do what you have to.
No.
I don't think that, and I don't agree with your point of view on the topic.
Nobody, NOBODY, is saying, or has said, that they would only "proactively vote" if they get 100% of what they want. Because, as you mentioned, that NEVER happens, and nobody expects it to.
Plenty of rational and liberal people have, and will, talk about the perceived differences and commonalities between Hillary and the other party. What you might not be getting, or at least might not want to acknowledge, is that those BOB voters aren't focused on Republicans. They are focused on the state of the Democratic Party, and the long-term harm caused by repeatedly electing neo-liberals. Those who won't vote for her should she get the nomination? For many, it's not about who ends up in the WH, but about who ends up at the head of the party. AND...having a neoliberal in the WH harms the cause of justice, because Democrats in Congress won't fight harmful policy when it springs from a Democratic administration.
That understanding doesn't come from being "new at this." The BOB voters are not ALL young people. Even if they were, I applaud them for their energy, enthusiasm, and determination. I don't think they are naive, needing the rest of YOUR story to be informed. If the Democratic Party wants to be relevant to that wave of young voters, the Democratic Party will sit up and pay attention, not patronize them, and explain how they "don't get it" in condescending terms while not "getting" the reasons why they reject a nominee.
I am a 56 yo Sanders supporter. I have not signed on to any BOB movement. I'm also not signing on to any loyalty oath. I'm not going to engage in fear-based politics, partisan bullies simply spark opposition in my mind and heart, and I don't support the neo-liberal establishment at the head of the current Democratic Party.
You are correct: if all you're bringing to the conversation is cliche political talking points that neoliberals have been using to keep voters in line for decades now, then nothing you say will matter to me. Or to the voters you are concerned about.
Realistically, I expect that,
should worse come to worst and Clinton win the nomination, Sanders supporters will carefully consider their options AFTER the convention and each individual will come to their own conclusions about how to vote in November.
What seems to be missing from your OP are a few key points:
1. Clinton supporters tend to fall into a few categories: partisan Democrats who would vote for a dead donkey carcass if it had a "D" next to its name; liberals who like Sanders policies and supported Clinton because they're afraid to buck the establishment; people who are simply so afraid of, or feel so much hate for, Republicans that they would, again, vote for a dead donkey carcass if it had a "D" next to its name; neoliberals who actually like and support the neoliberal takeover of the Democratic Party and Clinton as the neoliberal figurehead; women and others who will cast a symbolic vote for a woman president; and people who actually think Clinton would actually do something for liberal causes rather than working for her corporate masters.
Most of those people would vote for anyone other than a Republican in November, with the exception, maybe, of some of those neoliberals who are more Republican than not outside of their voter registration. The attacks on Sanders from the Clinton camp have been mostly ludicrous; there's no credibility for almost any of them, and a great deal of time has been spent attacking his supporters rather than Sanders himself. We get that; there's very little to say when it comes to issues and record, since Sanders beats her handily in both. That focus on Sanders' supporters is going to backfire in November, though, since the attacks have been vicious enough, and false enough, to engender some strong backlash. The attacks on Sanders himself, though, won't stick, because, as previously pointed out, they are beyond ludicrous.
Are Clinton supporters, when she loses, going to admit "that their negative statements, images, and attacks were unwarranted"?
2. Sanders supporters are not monolithic, either. Some of them will vote for the D nominee in November for most of the same reasons listed above. Those that Sanders has brought in from outside the party won't. This is why we've been saying, repeatedly, that Sanders has a better chance in November. He'll get most or all of the D vote, PLUS crossover votes that HRC will not. Some of the left wing of the Democratic Party, sick of being taken for granted and thrown under the bus, will not vote for Clinton. They don't have to worry about being ethically unable to support Clinton; they won't be supporting Clinton, and wouldn't have anyway. She never had their support, and can't earn it.
Many of those attacks on Clinton ARE warranted. Why would anyone, if Sanders loses, pretend that they are not? That would be unethical.
This primary has been, is, about more than Sanders and Clinton. It's about the identity of the party, and whether or not the party will be wrested back from the neoliberals, or whether the neoliberals will complete their takeover. A line has been drawn in the sand. The neoliberal establishment can no longer rely on party loyalty to bring the left to heel in November, because they've worked to hard to disenfranchise and purge the left. Either the neoliberals are defeated, or much of the left is going to look elsewhere. And, if that doesn't work out well for the neoliberal establishment, they'll have only themselves to blame, regardless of how aggressively they play the blame game to deny and deflect.
This doesn't bother me in the least.
I've always known that Gore's loss in 2000 was not because of Nader, but because of election fraud.
I've always considered the attacks on Nader voters and supporters to be:
1. Dishonest
2. Denial
3. Slimy
I VOTED FOR GORE IN 2000.
And, at one time, I would have considered your username to be an oxymoron. Not any more, unfortunately, but hopefully we're going to be changing that.
Sarandon? I support her right to support, and speak out in support of, whomever she wishes. That's democratic. It's too bad the party that calls itself by that label doesn't practice democracy.
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Member since: 2003 before July 6thNumber of posts: 46,179