A Letter to a Bernie-or-Bust Voter from Slate

[Brother Joe Observes]

By Darby Saxbe:

I get it. I was just like you once. In the year 2000, fresh out of college, I cast my second-ever presidential election vote for Ralph Nader. Later that night, I watched in horror as the contest between Al Gore and George W. Bush ended in an unprecedented electoral college toss-up, leading to a messy recount battle and the infamous Supreme Court decision Bush v. Gore. The chosen successor of a popular incumbent administration, Gore should have sailed to victory on the strength of the economy alone, yet he conceded the election to Bush, a candidate initially considered too unserious to be a true contender.

Gore lost Florida by 537 votes. Nader received almost 100,000 votes in Florida. And he actively campaigned in swing states, including Florida, in the lead-up to the election. If Nader had quit the race and thrown his support to the Democrats, we might be reminiscing about a Gore administration right now.

And I share the blame. Now, before you post mean things in the comments, let me clarify: I voted in New York state, which went blue in 2000, so my individual vote did not help swing the election. But I still feel complicit. I jumped on the Nader bandwagon and bought into a set of beliefs that seemed right to me at the time but were proven very wrong over the eight years that followed.

Chief among them, I thought that Gore and Bush were essentially indistinguishable. Carbon copies of each other. Both corporate insider candidates, beholden to big-money interests and out of touch with people struggling at the margins of the economy. I’m from the Rust Belt—I grew up near Cleveland—and I had seen factory closures turn a once-vibrant part of the country into a series of ghost towns. I blamed NAFTA and the Clinton administration’s failure to defend unions and stem the tide of outsourcing. In this and on other issues—welfare reform, prison sentencing—I thought the Clinton administration had bent so far backward to win over the right that it had lost its progressive conscience. The economy boomed during the Clinton years, but the gulf between the rich and poor, the haves and have-nots, only widened.

Nader voiced the discontent I was feeling. I was young and idealistic and wanted political revolution. It felt good to back a rabble-rouser, not the stiff, robotic Al Gore. I was annoyed with the Democrats for picking a predictable, incremental candidate who played not to the left, but to the mushy middle. I went to a Nader rally in NYC: Bill Murray, Michael Moore, and Susan Sarandon spoke. Eddie Vedder sang. I felt inspired, part of a movement to bring about real change, ready to cast my protest vote.

Alarmingly, some Sanders supporters seem to welcome the chaos of a Trump presidency.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2016/05/a_letter_to_a_bernie_or_bust_voter.html

Chaos? Naw! Just nuclear war, is all.

[Trust Buster]

1. Good OP. It's all about NARCISSISM.

[Cobalt Violet]

2. sorry but it's Clinton supporters who are risking a Trump presidency.

A vote for her in the primary is a vote for trump in general.

Don't blame Bernie supporter for your own choice of a terrible candidate.

[merrily]

3. Comparing a Democratic primary challenger to a third party candidate is either dishonest or dumb.

The piece as a whole is extremely condescending and not especially well-thought out or well-written.

Agreeing with the goal of a piece does not make that piece a good read. This is more GD: P than Good Reads.

But, welcome to DU!

[Brother Joe Observes]

5. Are you sure Bernie won't run as a TPC?

Who knows? Maybe he'd win!

[merrily]

6. Do you imagine that reply somehow improves the quality of the article you posted?

Or are you merely in Say Anything mode?

[Brother Joe Observes]

8. Honest Question

The way Sanders has been behaving of late, I cannot rule out the possibility. And if he did, millions would vote for him. Maybe tens of millions!

[merrily]

9. So....Say Anything mode. Thought so. Have a great night!

[Brother Joe Observes]

11. So,

will you state, here and now, that if Sanders ran a third-party/independent campaign, you would NOT vote for him? (And, before you send the alert, I assure you that I'm not questioning your creds as a Democrat. But this is one crazy election year!)

[Doctor_J]

13. Sanders stated that he won't. Unlike the other candidates, he doesn't lie

[guillaumeb]

4. Welcome to DU Brother Joe Observes

First, Al Gore won Florida. Nader's votes simply made it easier for the SCOTUS to steal an election.

But Gore basically ran from Clinton, and mounted such an uninspiring campaign that he lost his home state.

Then he backed down in the face of a SCOTUS coup-d'état and allowed George W. Bush to ascend to office.

Nader merely pointed out that the two major parties are both capitalist parties that receive massive money from the 1%.

[merrily]

10. What made it much easier to steal Florida than Nader's votes. The number of RW Democrats in FL who

voted for Bush. Also, Gore was no a great candidate--did not even carry his own state--and Bubba's conduct while in office didn't help Gore either.

Until Dimson, I never saw a candidate for the Presidency announce on the Trinity Broadcasting Network, promising to restore dignity to the Oval Office.

Blaming Nader is just part and parcel of the liberal bashing Democrats have done since Lincoln.

[SCantiGOP]

7. Article makes sense to me

Either Trump or Clinton will be President next January.

[1StrongBlackMan]

15. And, the results of their presidencies will NOT be the same ...

and, I would argue not "bad" in different ways, as is being argued on DU ... the election of the one, debatably "bad", in the best case; the election of the other will be debatably "bad", in the worst case.

[Doctor_J]

12. Unlike the supporters of Mrs Clinton, we're not children nursing a crush

"I was young and idealistic and Ralph spoke to me. Then I grew up."




Thanks snot-nose. Speaking down to lifelong working people, civil rights activists, union workers, working poor, healthcare advocates, and parents who have watched while the turd way has wrecked the party is really offensive and counterproductive. Go ask mom for some money to pay the rent, and stop the condescension

[1StrongBlackMan]

16. LOL ...

You claim to not be children ... then, refer to the writer as "snot-nose".

[SCantiGOP]

18. What an asinine post

You start out by calling someone a "snot-nose" and then close by saying something is really offensive and counterproductive.
Then you say "ask mom for some money" and close that by saying to stop the condescension.

Are you trying to be ironic, or do you just not think about what you type?
And, putting a rolling laugh emoji doesn't add any seriousness to your post.

[MisterP]

14. protip: when talking about spoilers, be sure and check who'd actually be the spoiler first

BTW, Gore won FL and said Nader had nothing to do with it

[world wide wally]

17. The bottom line is that IF the choice is between Hillary and Trump,

NOT voting is exactly what the GOP wants you to do.
Do you really want to make these assholes happy, give them all 3 branches of government and have to listen to an orange fascist, racist brag about himself for the next 4 yeas?