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Sunday, July 10, 2016

Bernie Learns You Can't Win Them All as Berners Turn on Him

He has gotten a number of victories he can show from the $15 MW to an opposition to the death penalty in the platform and he has voiced satisfaction with Hillary college education and healthcare plans.

But there's no opposition to TPP in the plank-which we knew would be the case as this is something Obama fought for.

"Sen. Bernie Sanders may have claimed victory in the fight for $15, but he lost out on trade."

"The Democrats’ platform committee late Friday approved an amendment that formalizes the party’s commitment to a $15 minimum wage, with indexing for inflation, a Sanders campaign pledge. But Saturday, the Vermont senator was defeated on the Trans-Pacific Partnership: The draft platform will not include the strong language opposing the trade deal, which Sanders made a key plank of his run for the Democratic nomination."

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/bernie-sanders-minimum-wage-party-platform-225325#ixzz4E18dxkKu

"When Clinton-aligned DNC member Lee Saunders introduced an amendment demanding that trade negotiations be more transparent and calling to "significantly strengthen enforcement of existing trade rules," it set off a heated debate between some of the most high-profile Sanders delegates and Clinton supporters over whether that language went far enough in opposing the TPP."

"Sanders delegates Nina Turner, Ben Jealous, and Cornel West argued that Saunders' amendment did not go far enough to to specifically oppose the TPP."

"The majority of Democrats like the majority of Americans are against the TPP. Hillary is against the TPP. Bernie is against the TPP," Jealous shouted at one point. "Let's not be bureaucrats. Let’s be leaders. All we have to do brothers and sisters is come together and you know coming together requires efforts from both sides."

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/bernie-sanders-minimum-wage-party-platform-225325#ixzz4E18t0KzR

Right. Efforts on both sides. I think that the $15 MW and no death penalty shows some real effort on the Hillary side. What are the Berners willing to compromise on? Or is everything about being uncompromising?

In any case the American Federation of Labor is cool with the language:

"The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), which has endorsed Clinton, hailed the language passed as a "milestone" while acknowledging the problems with the TPP."

"The Democratic Party’s adoption of strong, pro-worker trade positions is historic, but didn’t happen by itself. The voices of working people put the brakes on TPP and forced a real, vibrant debate about ending corporate trade. Secretary Clinton has made clear that she opposes the TPP before or after the election and believes in a whole new approach to trade that shares our values," AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said in a statement on Saturday. "The Democratic Party has taken a strong position, but the threat of unfair agreements, including TPP remains. We will continue to point out TPP’s fundamental flaws and mobilize to defeat it, and any trade deals that don't work for working people."

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/bernie-sanders-minimum-wage-party-platform-225325#ixzz4E19StaZg

Bernie is now-finally-ready to endorse her this Tuesday:

"Sanders’ impact was also be felt in other ways this weekend.The Clinton campaign rolled out a set of progressive policy stances on healthcare Saturday, including a proposal to double the amount of primary care services funding at community health centers. Increasing funding for communities that depend on community health centers has been a key sticking point in Sanders’ healthcare proposals."

"That document was hashed out in negotiations with Sanders' policy team, leading the Vermont senator to hail its release as a sign that he and the former secretary of state were coming closer together on a range of policy areas."

"The proposal brought forth today by Secretary Clinton working with our campaign is an important step forward in expanding healthcare in America and expanding health insurance and healthcare access for tens of millions of Americans," Sanders said in a conference call on Saturday morning. "I congratulate Secretary Clinton for this extremely important initiative, it will save lives, it will ease suffering, it will improve healthcare in America and it will cut healthcare costs."

"His comments came ahead of his expected endorsement of Clinton next week, another sign that Sanders and Clinton were moving closer toward uniting in advance of the convention in Philadelphia. Earlier in the week, Clinton's campaign adjusted her proposals on college affordability effectively moving her closer to Sanders and his call for free tuition at public universities and colleges. That move by Clinton was also met with praise from Sanders."

"The Clinton campaign and I and our campaign are coming closer and closer together in trying to address the major issues facing this country which is what my campaign was all about," Sanders said in the conference call. "We look forward to working more with the Clinton campaign and we'll have more to say in the very near future."

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/bernie-sanders-minimum-wage-party-platform-225325#ixzz4E19wZhxq

This has led to a lot of consternation among some Berners who are now turning on Bernie himself. They want him to run with Jill Stein.

http://www.forwardprogressives.com/some-bernie-sanders-supporters-now-turning-on-him/?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=socialnetwork

Most Hillary supporters I speak to on Twitter are sort of like 'Whatevs, we don't need Bernie's endorsement.'

And it's true the party has unified a lot already with Warren, Obama, Biden all endorsing her.

Still, there's no way Bernie's endorsement costs votes. While his endorsement won't win over all the Bernie or Busters, it might get her some.

So I'll take it.

4 comments:

  1. I know this is unstable and won't work in America's traditional two party system, but I continue to fantasize about the GOP breaking into four pieces: Trumpists, warmongers/billionaires (AKA neocons), libertarians (who just join the existing Libertarian party), and social conservative extremists (like Erickson). But at the same time I'd like to see the Dems split (not 50/50 mind you, but maybe 90/10 or 95/5) and the radicals go join the Greens or something.

    That would facilitate a 5th split in the GOP (in my fantasy) of GOP people put off by the other four categories (non-racists, who don't fancy endless war, zero government or theocracy), and who would like to be part of a centrist governing majority or at least plurality: the Democratic Party. They could even rename themselves the "Central Democratic Party" perhaps.

    How could such a thing happen? If the other five parties in play actually held office of some kind here and there perhaps.

    Well, fantasy play time is over... but check out this interesting development at the RNC:
    http://theresurgent.com/breaking-rnc-surprises-everyone-with-meeting-that-could-toss-delegates/

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    1. In my fantasy scenario that 5th split might even attract anti-abortion and NRA people into the Democratic party, but anti-abortion and NRA people who don't hold those positions as being more important than any other. (That's the main problem with much of those groups now: they're extremists who put those single issues above everything else).

      Now I wouldn't necessarily want those non-traditional Dems to be a majority of the party, but I'd like to see it be a truly big-tent party... so a truly anti-abortion person working inside such a party might turn their attention to government actions to bring down the RATE of abortion, not fighting the legal basis of it (for example).

      I suspect that some anti-abortion activists now don't really care about the unborn... they just don't like the idea of human inventions like contraception and abortion messing with what they see as "God's law": i.e. God punishing women who don't behave sexually with pregnancy and shame, just like God intended it. This keeps families together, keeps women only having sex with their husbands, and let's men rest easy knowing that their children their wives give birth to are probably theirs (similar to what Islam is all about in these matters, only 10 times worse).

      People who actually care about fetuses being aborted would (to my mind) do better by focusing their efforts in promoting adoption and contraception.

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    2. ... to clarify, it's Islam that's 10 times worse, not the other way around. Islam is a genetic expression (made psychological and sociological) of men's abject terror that they might end up with somebody else's baby in their wife's belly and not even know it. Same goes for female genital mutilation.

      I don't believe in "tabula rasa" ... I think there's a genetic and evolutionary basis to psychology and sociology... one that is sometimes at odds with our own interests (i.e. the "interests" of my genes are not necessarily the interests of my brain).

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    3. The more I like at the UK and Europe, the gladder I am we don't have more than two parties.

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