Hell yes! Daily Kos top diary: We will not be brought to heel

[cali]

’s statements like this one by Ed Rendell, former Pennsylvania governor and current chair of the Democratic National Convention, that make my blood boil:

“I think it’s gonna be a great convention, but of course the key to it is the Sanders people. Bernie’s gonna have his name placed in nomination; we’re gonna have a roll call; there’s gonna be a demonstration in support of Bernie; he’s gonna lose the roll call,” he said. “His supporters have to behave and not cause trouble. And I think they will, and I think Sen. Sanders will send them a strong message.”

The Party could have been gracious in its seeming march toward a Hillary victory, and stand down on the constant belittling until *all* the voting was all done, but they just couldn’t do that. Instead, they just can’t help but throw more fuel on an already burning fire.

These are Hillary’s peeps doing this; her birds of a feather. Throughout this entire campaign season, even before any “Bernie Bro” incident, Hillary and her surrogates have treated Bernie and his supporters with arrogance, disdain, and condescension. It’s been implied that we, including Bernie, are naïve, immature, cultish, uninformed, and young, and it’s all been heaped on us with a large helping of an elitist patronizing attitude. And if we (including Bernie) ever pushed back, even just a little, we got called Bernie Bros, pony wanters, not real Democrats, and/or accused of sexism or racism.

This isn’t coming from one or two folks with Hillary; the list is very long. From Madeleine Albright, Gloria Steinem, Dolores Huerta, Claire McCaskill, John Lewis, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Joan Walsh, Connie Schultz, David Brock, Paul Krugman, Jonathan Capehart, Ed Rendell and a whole host of others, all the way down to Bill and even Hillary herself.

I can’t help but see that this – this is what the Democratic Party thinks of us. Sure you can’t take one or two isolated incidents and extrapolate out to that, but this is very much not one or two incidents; this is systemic. It speaks loudly and clearly what the Party stands for, and it’s not us.

<snip>
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/5/8/1524558/-We-Will-Not-Be-Brought-to-Heel

[monmouth4]

1. I just read an OP by one of their guys referring to us as "Bernie Brats." They think that will win

us over? Glad he's going to "depresurize"..It's all too much for him I guess..LOL.

[Buns_of_Fire]

4. Some of them are real good at generating enthusiasm, for sure.

But I don't think they realize that the enthusiasm they're generating isn't for The Chosen One.

[dreamnightwind]

5. They've already pivoted away from us Bernie supporters, we don't matter

Instead they are cultivating the disgruntled Bush/Romney Republican donors, some of who are loathe to donate to Trump and see Hillary as the more reliable center-right corporatist. More corporate money to buy more advertising to drive up their opponent's negatives, and present false hope to the people. That kind of money buys a lot of astroturf and social media socks.

The only role for the left to play is scapegoat, should Hillary win the primary and lose the general election.

[cantbeserious]

2. This Revolt Has Been Building For Years - The DWS, DNC, DLC, Third-Way Has Only Themselves To Blame

eom

[CobaltBlue]

25. The Rs could compete if they rebranded. (They won’t—due to their base and owners.)

[Katashi_itto]

3. K&R!

[stonecutter357]

6. when bernie fails to be elected it will be his fault no one else.

[Betty Karlson]

7. K&R for exposure. And for truth. eom

[hobbit709]

9. At which point the Democratic Party will go the way of the Whigs.

[hobbit709]

11. I can find my own door

And if you don't want us, don't come crying when you come up short.

[hobbit709]

14. "We need moderate republicans"

THAT tells me what you are about more than anything else.
I have voted D in every election since 1972 when I was old enough to vote-I turned 21 the year it was lowered to 18-and in the last 20 years, more often than not I had to hold my nose while voting.
If the party leadership wants to continue to be R-Lite and doesn't want my vote, then so be it.

I may be in the wilderness but at least I know I haven't sold out to the big money.

[hobbit709]

17. There's a big difference between compromising and selling out.

Personally, the 1% and their minions mostly need to be shortened.

I'm far from perfect but then I never claimed to be.

[libdem4life]

48. The privileged? Ideological purity? What planet do you come from?

[rateyes]

28. Squirrel doesn't get it Hobbitt. The revolution

is a marathon, not a sprint. The third way's days are numbered. Progressives have the power to take the party down if it doesn't change, and for the first time we are prepared to do just that!

[TransitJohn]

37. The Democratic Party didn't sell out, they bought in.

They're willing accomplices with the 1% and Wall Street in reducing the people of this country to debt peonage.

[Katashi_itto]

23. I agree, New Corporate Dem party you all have become will do fine. Your masters can bankroll alot.

[Armstead]

40. This sounds like Rush Limbaugh

Just substitute Clinton for Bush

[DonCoquixote]

42. fine at being a division of the GOP

You know, your call for "moderate republicans" and your insistence that the Democrats "will be just fine" reminds me of when Berliners all thought they would be fine, as long as Hitler focused on someone else that was not them. We know the speech "First they came for the Jews" then so on, until they came for the person that did not speak up when everyone around him was dragged off. Yes, compromise is needed, but like everything from food to prescription drugs, it can be ABUSED and it has been horribly ABUSED by people who say they will only give the GOP half the loaf, then act helpless when the Elephant snatches the whole thing, eats it and screams "I want more, yes, that includes EVERYTHING FDR got the last time!"

By the way, classy using someone's real name in a post, as a taunt. It is obvious you are not looking for friends or converts, which is fine, but when all the FDR era protections, from Medicare to SS, wind up being sold down the river because Hillary allowed the idea of "compromise" to become sacrifices, don't be surprised when we see you shivering in the cold with us, and laugh. It will not matter if you are rich atm, because frankly, China is offering wall street a new middle class that is one part slave labor, the rest mindless consumer.

In other words, Wall Street is looking for a trophy wife.

[unapatriciated]

27. right there with you, first vote was in 1972.

They are delusional if they think we are not needed.

If Clinton supporters continue on this dangerous path of denigrating long term Dems and new voting millennials it will be a self fulfilling prophecy. One that will be saying hello to President Trump.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/02/the-liberal-millennial-revolution/470826/

[libdem4life]

47. He, me too. I had my first teaching job before I could vote.

D down the line. We Boomers have seen a lot, but nothing as start as this election. Even the last big one in 2008 didn't, at least for me, have the baggage this one does. I voted for Obama because he earned it, IMO, but remember Hillary's concession speech and give her props for how she handled it, knowing she was torn up inside.

But that didn't make it Her Turn this election, so she can earn it just like Obama did. No harm, no foul.

[Amaril]

26. Wow. Just wow.

Did you seriously just say -- on Democratic Underground -- that you prefer Republicans to young Democrats? Are you fucking kidding me right now?

[BillZBubb]

29. Hillary fanatics are just that--fanatics.

They'll trash anyone, throw anyone overboard, who doesn't bow down to Ms. Golden Sacks.

They aren't Democrats, they're Hillarycrats.

[Amaril]

31. I just can't wrap my head around it

I never thought I would see the day when a faction of the Democratic party would feel more aligned with Republicans than with young Democrats / Progressives / Liberals, and openly admit it on this board. I feel like the older sister from Poltergeist when she was standing in the driveway, watching her house implode and screaming........

What is happening?!?!?!?!?!?!

[polly7]

30. Wow. Never expected to see this here.

You're trying to chase away posters who've been here on a site that supported the exact opposite of your and republican 'ideals' since it began?

That takes a lot of gall.

[lagomorph777]

32. Wow. Holy cow they're not even pretending any more.

They explicitly say they intend to merge the Democratic Party with the traditional GOP, and Democrats should leave.

Appalling and disgusting. In 34 years of voting Democratic, always held out hope that the Party would some day live up to its slogans, or at least make a half-hearted effort.

No more. The Party has become the blue branch of the Bilionaire/Potty Party.

[TransitJohn]

36. There are no moderate Republicans.

You must mean moderate conservatives, but they're already Democrats supporting Hillary.

[Turin_C3PO]

52. I don't mind moderate repubs

coming into our tent. But it should be because they embrace OUR ideas. Our party platform certainly shouldn't become more conservative to accommodate them.

[PotatoChip]

21. I don't know about our party, but the R's certainly appear to be imploding.

I can't help but wonder how this whole thing will shake out. Will the R's go the way of the Whigs? It is definitely possible.

So what would that mean for us? Hillary and her center-right band of followers, along with disaffected R's could conceivably become a new, sane version of the R party. The void on the left could be filled by a new D party with actual D's in it. Progressives are not really being represented right now anyway. We could (maybe) finally have a home where we are wanted and welcomed?...

[libdem4life]

49. It's a thought that more than one has considered. A real Democratic Party.

What a concept. It might take a cycle or two, so I hope Bernie stays or mentors a Leader to be there.

The R's chasm is more easily identifiable than the D's. Trump is not shady...he is way out there in your face. Our "problem" is just the opposite...shady, shifty, flipfloppy, et al, so it will take time, and a real earthquake-type chasm to identify the values that the Fair Deal Democrats believe in and want.

The Third Way can go to the Moderate Republicans...bon voyage.

[Fawke Em]

38. The Democratic Party dwindled from 40 percent of total voters to 29 percent in four years.

Even if only the stated percentage of Bernie or Bust supporters - 33 percent of 46 percent of 29 percent - leave the party, there is no way the Democrats win in the Fall.

Don't count your chickens before the fly the coup.

[Adrahil]

13. I think the Bernie or Busters WAY overestimate their power.

Many of my friends here in Indiana voted for Sanders. All intend to vote for Hillary in the GE, and they knew before the primary last week that she was going to be the nominee.

At this point, they are going to do what they are going to do, and I don't think we should spend any effort placating them. We have an electin to win.

[hobbit709]

15. They're not the only voters out there turned off by government of, by, and for the corporations

and the candidates of the same.

[Adrahil]

19. Yeah, I don't buy that meme.

I won't tell you that I think Clinton is free from the influence of Big Business (I won't use the term corporation.... it's become a boogeyman scare word, and guess what, the small ballet studio I site on the board of is a corporation), but I WILL say that I think Clinton represents a way to advance the causes the I care about in realistic fashion. Anyone who has actually looked at the details of Sen. Sanders' plans has to admit they are optimistic at best or, more realistically, completely unattainable short of a dramatic realignment of our American politics. And that's just assuming he gets them passed. If they DID pass, we are left with plans that that depend of ahistoric economic performance (exceeding any know period of economic performance in history).

I get that people like what he promises. Hell, I like what he promises. But those who think he somehow can deliver on those changes are, IMO, living in a dreamworld. And if they refuse to support Clinton because they just won't give up on those promises, then I don;t see the point in trying to woo them. They are probably folks who hate Obama already anyway. I still with those folks who voted with their heart in the primaries, but are now using their heads to know they must support Clinton and defeat Trump.

I wish you peace!

[BillZBubb]

33. That's the difference between us.

You dismiss Bernie's stated objectives because they just aren't possible now. He can't deliver on them. That's the short term view.

The Clinton spin is that Bernie is making wild promises. That his supporters are naïve. That is bullshit.

We who support Bernie know that isn't the case. He isn't making "promises" like the standard politician. He is saying these are the things we should be fighting for as a party. It's the long view. We fight for these things and we will eventually win over enough of the voters to actually bring them about.

If we don't fight for them, they'll never happen. Hillary supporters are deluding themselves (or maybe don't care) thinking some incremental changes will suffice, or even that Hillary is the vehicle to achieve these sort of goals.

[libdem4life]

51. Yes, he's showing a path forward...something to work for...a direction.

That's the definition of a Leader...one who sees the future and leads others toward and into it.

I had free college back in the 70s in Los Angeles, California. That's not such a socialist idea. I paid off my student loans by teaching...25% each year. There were other plans, too. Reagan stopped that.

Free health care...where I lived in Northern California, they had ample free health care clinics.

So these things are not pie in the sky or just things that Sweden has.

[Armstead]

55. I think a "dramatic realignment of American politics" is quite possible

IMO we're at a 1980-style tipping point. That was when the Great Pendulum of History started moving to the right.

Now the chickens from all of that have come home to roost, and people want t change from the status qup. That includes moderates who say "I like Bernie's goals but...."

I believe the pendulum can be pushed back in a leftward direction IF that "but" were removed and the Democratic became a truly liberal/populist party in terms of fundamental issues of wealth and power, and how they affect average people.

But that's going to be a missed opportunity, if we stick with the stale status qup.

[Mike__M]

58. "a dramatic realignment of our American politics"

Your "realignment" (which Sanders likes to call a "political revolution&quot is exactly why many of us are supporting him, to reverse the last realignment we got in 1980.
Did Reagan do anything because he was an intelligent master of realistic policies, or did he do it because he had a vision for a dramatic realignment of American politics? What we need is to counter Ronald Reagan, not George H. W. Bush.

[Snarkoleptic]

20. Conservadems are why we are penned in and forced to settle for a

half of a half of a half loaf.

[Fawke Em]

39. So the 10 or so people you know offsets the nearly 100,000 people who've

signed the BernieorBust pledge?

OK.

[pdsimdars]

22. Here's the line that hit me

"Throughout this entire campaign season, even before any “Bernie Bro” incident, Hillary and her surrogates have treated Bernie and his supporters with arrogance, disdain, and condescension. It’s been implied that we, including Bernie, are naïve, immature, cultish, uninformed, and young, and it’s all been heaped on us with a large helping of an elitist patronizing attitude."

That sums it up perfectly. . . and HERE is the picture that sums up the excitement and enthusiasm Hillary generates. . . see how far that get you.





That tells it all .

[LiberalArkie]

34. Well you have to admit though, being a HRC supporter is easy. HRC does not expect

her supporters to contribute to her campaign, or attend rallies, or canvas for her, or make phone calls for her she only wants her supporters to denigrate other candidates supporters.

Being a Sanders supporter is difficult. He wants us to contribute to his campaign and others like him. He wants us to phone bank, he wants us to attend rallies and to talk to people on the street about Bernie, he wants us to canvas neighborhoods and give voters rides to the polls.

Yep being a HRC supporter is a hell of a lot easier for people to be.

[pdsimdars]

46. Yes, but in the big picture, it's easier to contribute to people and talk to people

than to give up your conscience and morality.

[Land of Enchantment]

35. Yep, agreed. Even Smerconish questioned how weird it is that

Bernie draws thousands to his rallies, has millions of individual small donations and enthusiasm unseen before now and somehow manages to 'lose' in the closed primary states.... Weird, indeed!

I've held my nose since 1972, they apparently don't want my vote or money anymore....

[CobaltBlue]

24. Ed Rendell is ‘uniting the party’!

[Fawke Em]

41. YYYUUUGGGEE mistake Third Way Eddie.

He's just riled up Bernie's supporters more than they already were. The Facebook counting the number of attendees to protest the convention has doubled since this statement came out yesterday.

We're not children or dogs. Telling us to "behave" was like pouring kerosene on an open flame.

[oasis]

43. The "street" saying, "Don't start no shit and there won't be no shit"

will apply at the convention.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

44. Is Rendell playing the Mayor Daley part in a replay of the '68 convention?

No, I don't think there rioting police and broken heads this time but there will be protests against politics-as-usual and the all too obvious corruption of the party. Not just in the streets but in the voting booths.

"Brought to heel"? I think not.

[JPnoodleman]

45. Well they are working hard to ensure my vote is lost. n/t

[Uncle Joe]

50. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, cali.

[anigbrowl]

53. So what are you gonna do? It's unlikely that Bernie can actually win on the roll call

Possible, but vanishingly unlikely. So if he doesn't, then Clinton wins since there's only 2 candidates, one of them must get a majority. Then she's the nominee. Either Sanders endorses her or not, but what then?

I'm asking because I understand perfectly well that you would be unhappy with such an outcome, and why, but the fact is that the numbers don't go in Sanders' favor right now barring some miracle, and I'm sure you're smart enough to know this. There's a gap between what you want and what's likely to happen, and I hear a lot of Bernie people saying they're going to fight at the convention or do something, but nobody seems to be able to articulate what. Trash the convention hall? Moon all the hillary Clinton fans? Walk out en masse? Is there any actual goal or plan here other than just dreaming about spoiling the nomination party in order to express your disappointment? I totally understand if that's what you want to do, but let's be clear about it if so.

[brewens]

54. Roger that! Especially some of Bernie's proposals that we know work. Single payer. Works

well in civilized countries. No college tuition. Used to work well here. It sure as shit did when I went to school and finished with zero debt. I lived at home and went to a community college for part of that and worked part time. It wouldn't be easy to do that now.

Break up the big banks. They used to be separate before Glass Steagle was repealed. If it worked well for 70 or so years, it would work well again. Raise taxes on the rich. Some see the 50's as like the golden age of our country. Wasn't so good if you were a minority of course, but we were looking good overall. The big boss at the plant had a nice house on a golf course and a new Caddy. He was still a rich guy but he paid a higher tax rate.

Those are not freakin' "ponies".

[bbgrunt]

56. their intentions are plain.

[brooklynite]

57. I've noticed that the #BernieSanders hashtag at DKos has dropped from 1st to 5th in last week...

[Contrary1]

59. "Rather Than Campaign As Liberal Alternative To Trump, Clinton To Run As Smarter Republican"

Says it all.

[pmorlan1]

60. Hell Yes!

Kick and Recommend

[iandhr]

61. What is the difference between Bernie supporters and Hillary supporters?

You have top rated diaries on websites. You have hashtags.


We Hillary supporters have 3 million more votes.

[emsimon33]

62. K&R