Why I Work Against Bernie Sanders During the Primaries

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

42. I'm with you; and if you would, please allow me to add my observations.

I was an enthusiastic supporter of Sanders during the 2016 primaries. I didn't think he'd get the nomination but I agreed with a lot of what he had to say; I liked the enthusiasm he was generating, and I hoped he'd influence Clinton and the party itself to take on some more progressive positions. I also thought it was important to have contested primaries that would force the favored candidate to work to defend her positions. That said, I was always going to vote for the nominee (just as I will this time), and I always assumed it would eventually be Clinton.

Bernie started to lose me when he refused to withdraw after it became mathematically impossible for him to win the nomination. Then some of his supporters tried to disrupt the convention because they didn't like the result. After that it was several weeks before Bernie did anything to campaign for the winner when he really should have been the first one on the bandwagon. By then I was solidly behind Hillary (but my bad for not working harder on her behalf; I, like a lot of others, didn't think an ignorant, hateful buffoon like Trump could possibly win - I'm not making that mistake again). And I also assumed Bernie wouldn't run again.

But four years later he's baaaack, and he's following the same playbook - only more so. The OP accurately reflects my own dismay at his hiring of the likes of Sirota, Gray and Turner, people who spend more time trashing Democrats and the Democratic party than they do attacking Trump. This does not indicate good judgment on the part of the candidate; it suggests to me that he's more interested in furthering his own rigid ideological views than in actually winning the presidency, and that "the revolution" will occur when the people rise up. Which they won't. Most people are not, in fact, singing from Bernie's hymnal.

Another thing that troubles me is that I don't think he'd be a very effective president if he actually were to be elected. He has boasted about being uncompromising, but politics at all levels is essentially the art of compromise. Compromising isn't the same as folding like a cheap lawn chair, as some people seem to think; it's recognizing that in order to satisfy the interests of the entire nation - not just the people who voted for you - you are going to have to give something to get something. Furthermore, if Bernie and his surrogates keep trashing the Democratic Party and its members, how can he expect to have the support of Congressional Democrats in order to get his proposed legislation passed? Since it's a given that he won't have any GOP support, he will desperately need the Democrats in Congress and in the population in general to have his back, so maybe he should tell Sirota et al. to stop kicking them in the nuts at every opportunity.

Finally, there is a level of devotion among some Sanders supporters that has become a bit cultic in its intensity. No candidate is perfect and none deserve anyone's undying and unquestioning allegiance. That way madness lies. We all need to recognize that our favorite candidate, who is an actual human like us, will have a history of failures, baggage, missteps, misstatements, dumb ideas, and poor judgment. The sun does not shine out of anyone's butt - not Bernie's, not anybody else's. I will, of course, move heaven and earth to get him elected if he is the nominee because Trump is worse by orders of magnitude. But I'm not going to worship at anyone's altar.