LONG
& WINDING ROAD TO THE WHITE HOUSE
BERNIE OR BUST!
By Jack Random
In
the much awaited trial of the president Democratic members of the house took
aim at Donald Trump’s manifestly crooked dealings in Ukraine. In response, the president’s defenders took
aim at Joe Biden.
Both
were previews of the campaign to come.
The prosecution of the president was a three-day, 36-hour attack ad
against the presidency of Donald Trump.
The defense was an attack ad against Joe Biden via his son, Hunter Biden.
The
mainstream of both major parties presumed that the coming presidential election
would be a match of elders, a contest between the corrupt incumbent against the
entrenched Democratic challenger. The
smear machines are revved and ready.
Not
so fast.
Bernie
Sanders may be elderly but he represents the young. He brings the vitality, energy and resilience
of the young to a stodgy old process that embraces structural
conservatism.
The
old politicos had a hard time coming to terms with the fact that a
non-politician without governing experience could win a presidential election
by exploiting the flaws in an antiquated and eminently inequitable system. They are having the same trouble with Bernie
Sanders.
In
so many ways Sanders represents the existential threat that Trump posed but has
not delivered. Trump plays the game and
makes no excuses. Sanders tells it like
it is.
With
his rise in the polls and his victory in the Iowa caucus (where I come from the
one who gets the most votes wins) the operatives and dealmakers of the
Democratic Party are beginning to panic.
They miscalculated badly by having Hillary Clinton deliver her attack
against Bernie. To this day they don’t
seem to realize that Hillary is not popular among the majority of Democratic or
independent voters. Hillary holds the
political class. She can’t hold a candle
to Bernie when it comes to political activists.
Next
they managed to persuade Elizabeth Warren to deliver an attack designed to
weaken Bernie’s appeal to women. It
backfired. People saw through the staged
maneuver and moved to Bernie’s camp.
Warren may not recover.
Now,
just like the last campaign, the party is working overtime to find ways to stop
the Bernie train. One by one the
surrogates step to the camera to deliver a tired old speech: Bernie can’t possibly beat Trump. Bernie’s a socialist. Bernie is too far to the left. Bernie’s a radical with radical ideas.
Maybe
they believe it. Maybe they’re just
doing their party’s bidding. They seem
to forget: Hillary was the mainstream
moderate who lost to Trump. Why would
they be so eager to try it again?
After
the impeachment trial Joe Biden is damaged goods. Act One of the trial that wasn’t a trial was
an attack on the president. Act Two of
the trial was a counterattack on the integrity of Biden. The attack ads are already written. When Biden calls out Trump for his dirty
dealing in Ukraine, the forces of Trump counter with Burisma. How much was it Hunter Biden made? More in a month than working people make in a
year? What were his qualifications
again?
In
the age of Trump it is not enough to be clean.
You have to be above the appearance of wrongdoing. The old school politicians know this and
Biden fails the test.
When
the Democrats finally accept this fact they will look to another option: anyone
but Bernie. There was a time when I
would have included Warren on the list of unacceptable presidential candidates
to the Democratic machine. To all
appearances she took essentially the same positions as Bernie but something
changed along the line. The party
decided they could work with Warren.
Apparently they don’t feel the same about Bernie.
Why? Bernie is the most consistent candidate in
the field. Whether you label him a
Democratic Socialist or a Social Democrat or an Independent, he believes now
what he believed decades ago and he’s held his ground.
Little
noted in the mainstream cable media that looks more and more like a subdivision
of the DNC there was a diversion of response to international crises in recent
months.
First
came the coup in Bolivia. Bernie
condemned it as a coup and called for an international response. Warren, Klobuchar and Buttigieg took the
standard line, condemning the victim and supporting the usurpers. It was an insult to democratic values and
democracy itself. Warren came around but
only after Bernie led.
Second
came the events that threatened another forever war in the Middle East, this
time with Iran. The candidates tripped
over themselves condemning the assassinated Iranian commander. Only Bernie took a more measured perspective,
stepping back from the precipice of war and condemning targeted assassination
as an instrument of foreign policy.
Third
and most recently: the Trump administration’s dead-in-the-waters proposal for
peace between Israel and Palestine. Once
again Bernie took the lead, calling out the proposal for the farce that it
is. He took the opportunity to call for
an end to Israeli occupation and the establishment of two viable states,
guaranteeing Palestinian self-determination as well as mutual security. To her credit Warren followed suit with her
own condemnation of Israeli annexation of Palestinian territories. Buttigieg talked in his usual doublespeak but
criticized the deal as one-sided. Biden
engaged in similar talk, criticizing the deal but emphasizing a long-standing
loyalty to the state of Israel.
More
and more I am left with the conviction that Bernie is our best hope both at
home and in foreign affairs. He stands
ready to make the fundamental changes that our times demand. Moreover, he is the best candidate to expose
the failures of the Trump administration.
For while the Trump years have seen a dramatic decrease in the
unemployment rate, well-paying middle class jobs have been transformed into
low-paying service jobs. While the
corporations and the wealthy have made a fortune, the rest of us still wonder
how we’re going to make it to tomorrow.
Bernie
has been saying it for years: It’s time
for a political revolution. It’s time to
fundamentally transform an economic and political system that works extremely
well for the ones at the top but not so well for the poor and the working
people.
I
have not given up on Elizabeth Warren.
She remains my first choice as an alternative to Bernie. But my confidence has been shaken not only by
her politically reckless attack on her progressive rival but her stops and
stumbles on policy and events in the daily news. I fear she may be too anxious to modify her
policies to please the party.
Andrew
Yang remains an intriguing choice and one that I would not only support but
work for were he to win the nomination.
It would take a tsunami for that to happen.
The
other candidates, including Joe Biden, would be a major disappointment to
anyone who believes as I do that the next president must enact historic
change. Would I vote for a Biden, a
Buttigieg or Klobuchar, a Bloomberg or Steyer over Trump? Of course.
But would I work for them, write for them, contribute and serve as a
warrior for the cause?
No,
I would not.
I
am old enough to know that change happens.
Sometimes it happens when you don’t expect it. Sometimes it happens overnight.
But
for now: It’s Bernie or bust!
Jazz.
JACK
RANDOM IS A WRITER LIVING IN CENTRAL CALIFORNIA. HIS WORKS INCLUDE EIGHT NOVELS AND THE
JAZZMAN CHRONICLES.
