Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
The Voice of Violence
"My quarrel with the "no-win" tendency in the civil rights movement (and the reason I have so designated it) parallels my quarrel with the moderates outside the movement. As the latter lack the vision or will for fundamental change, the former lack a realistic strategy for achieving it. For such a strategy they substitute militancy. But militancy is a matter of posture and volume and not of effect."--Bayard Rustin in his book, 'Down the Line'
Hillary Clinton won Nevada in the state's caucuses in February. That's not in dispute, nor is a different result possible as some result of ANY of the voter complaints apologists for the Sanders campaign's sordid behavior at their convention this week (and afterward) are using as justification.
The Sanders campaign deliberately disrupted the Nevada convention in an attempt to reverse the results of that caucus in an amazingly elitist and establishment-oriented fashion. The hypocrisy of a campaign almost exclusively waged against the Democratic party infrastructure, and against any and all pols and who dare support Sanders' rival, looking to party insiders to overturn the results of an election they lost outright would be damning enough, but these Sanders activists came to the convention to subvert the democratic process, not uphold it, and that's a despicable and contemptible act, in and of itself.
There is NOTHING to defend about the behavior of the Sanders supporters involved; not at the convention, nor afterward when they were threatening state Democratic Party Chairwoman Roberta Lange and her family.
Jon Ralston ?@RalstonReports 11m11 minutes ago
The Berners have not just gone after NV Dem Chair @rlange w/ugly voicemails and texts; they even went after the business she oversees.
from NV's indomitable, indispensable Jon Ralston:
Irate Berne Sanders supporters did not just leave threatening voicemails and texts for state Democratic Party Chairwoman Roberta Lange but also launched an assault on the businesses she oversees, the owner says...
"Beginning about 3am on Sunday morning our bartenders at Porchlight Grille began getting non-stop phone threats from Bernie partisans," Gallagher told me via email. "The level of threats including death threats and vitriol was astonishing. One of our bartenders was actually a Bernie supporter and was stunned at the threats he was hearing on the phone. He began to respond telling people that he was just trying to do his job and pay off his student loans and their tactics were harming his livelihood. It made no difference to the callers. Their goal was to harass and as became clear....to shut down the business and Roberta’s job with it..."
In response to the inevitable defenses of this behavior from supporters, all that demands explanation was provided to the Sanders campaign in the form of a letter from the General Counsel, Nevada State Democratic Party, which read, in part:
"The explosive situation arose in large part because a portion of the community of Sanders delegates arrived at the Nevada Democratic State Convention believing itself to be a vanguard intent upon sparking a street-fight rather than attending an orderly political party process. Surprised and outraged at the idea of being out-organized and thus outnumbered in the convention hall by Clinton delegates, a portion of the Sanders delegation rushed the dais immediately upon the opening of the convention and halted the progress of any convention business for much of the day."
"Indeed, every point during which Sanders delegates did not agree with any aspect of the proceedings saw them press up against the dais and scream obscenities and threats at the Chair, First Vice Chair, and any other speaker. In fact, event security provided by the Paris Las Vegas Hotel & Casino took it upon themselves to increase the security perimeter around the dais so the convention could simply move forward with its routine business in relative safety. In other words, the hour-to-hour business of Nevada Democrats was necessarily conducted in an atmosphere of impending eruption of physical threats and intimidation for more than 12 hours. Scuffles, screams from bullhorns, and profane insults marked nearly the entirety of the event. Numerous medical emergencies among delegates pressed up against the dais had to be attended to throughout the day. To the great embarrassment and revulsion of the vast majority of attendees, Sanders delegates crowded the dais and shouted down universally-respected U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer of California, who had arrived as a guest of the party to deliver a keynote address in support of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The Sanders Campaign spent its time either ignoring or profiting from the chaos it did much to create and nothing to diminish or mitigate. It was clear to the NSDP that part of the approach by the Sanders Campaign was to employ these easily-incensed delegates as shock troops to sway the convention proceedings. At the very least, these delegates became a way for the Sanders Campaign to seek the advantage of disruption at any particular moment while trying to disavow any responsibility for their actions even as it was ongoing. At no time did any Sanders representative make anything more than token gestures towards peace in the hall, and at the times of most intense crisis offered little more than shrugs and smirks."
"The most egregious instance of the Sanders Campaign inciting disruption—and yes, violence—came as the State Convention’s Credentials Committee completed its work. Adam Gillette, part of National Delegate Operations Team for the official Sanders Campaign, drafted and arranged for a member of that committee to attempt to deliver an incendiary, inaccurate, and wholly unauthorized “minority report” charging that the Credentials Committee had fraudulently denied 64 Sanders delegates their eligibility. The final delegate count had provided the Clinton Campaign with a 33 delegate advantage in the hall; one can imagine the rage occasioned by this inflammatory charge, tossed into the tinderbox of a tense convention hall. Not only did this discredit the work of the Credentials Committee—which featured five Sanders delegates and five Clinton delegates and a Sanders co-chair, and who worked all day under extremely trying conditions to be fair and diligent in their duties—it called into question the entirety of the proceedings because it indicated to an irrational minority that the proceedings had been rigged against them. Forcing their way onto the dais to deliver this paranoid fantasy of fraud and delegate theft was clearly intended to throw the proceedings into disarray."
"It succeeded. From that moment on, there was little hope for any peace or mutual understanding and respect between Sanders delegates and the NSDP; the mantra became simply that the convention had been stolen from the Sanders Campaign. Never mind that six of the 64 potential Sanders delegates referenced had been seated after investigation, or that most of the remaining 58 potential delegates had been disqualified—appropriately, and by a panel evenly split between the campaigns—for not being registered Democratic voters in Nevada. Never mind that the same Credentials Committee had disqualified Clinton delegates for various reasons as well. Never mind, further, that just eight of those 64 potential Sanders delegates even attempted to register for the State Convention. All that mattered was the creation of a narrative of fraud and dispossession, which the Sanders Campaign fomented intentionally for its own political gain. This was an unconscionable act by an official Sanders Campaign representative, with full knowledge of its likely impact on the convention."
Carissa WomanCard ?@bluelyon
On the left, patient @HillaryClinton supporters. On right disruptive Sanders supporters. #nvdemconvention
Here's the thing, DU, in my lifetime, the Democratic Party has been pretty steadfast in carrying and advancing those ideas I support and believe in. Those ideas haven't always prevailed, even among Democrats, but I have lived long enough to see some of those ideas revived, presented, and advanced after all, despite an earlier rejection or defeat. I fully intend to keep pressing my ideas and concerns until they can generate the support needed to enact them legislatively or otherwise.
I never expected to get my way with 100 senators and 500 representatives, but I'm gratified for the progress we've made in achieving the numbers needed to gain the majority. There is obvious value in holding the majority, including the important ability to keep republicans from setting the agenda on the floor and in committees.
In all, the Democratic party remains the most effective and representative vehicle for my ideas and concerns, despite the disagreements I may have with the actions of this Congress or any other I've witnessed. Most of our Democratic senators and representatives work hard to represent us as we continue pressing them for recognition and advancement of those ideas and concerns. I've personally had more than that opportunity. That's all I've ever expected.
Why do we court and accept voters with different views in the general election, and then, accept and support the actions of some in the party to marginalize and censor the Democratic legislators they elect to represent them? All of the different camps in the party do this, right, left, and center. Must we respect the votes from the many different sectors of the nation which come with a myriad of solutions and strategies?
Congress is supposed to be the place where we reconcile the many different ideas from around the nation. It's a given that these legislators will sometimes have radically different ideas about how to best effect - in many cases - shared goals. I believe we put our party in the same hole every election cycle where different camps within the party struggle for ideological purity and set out these litmus tests for membership and acceptance, as if there was some benefit in marginalizing one group of Democrats or another.
What needs to be remembered is that our party's representation among voters would be rather small if we expected members to adhere to one narrow ideology, or to one strategy. There are, of course, principles which we all feel we must adhere to. But, we needn't be so defensive of our own positions, so much that we neglect to recognize that other legislators have been sent to Congress under our party's banner, ready to organize and advocate for the goals and priorities we all share, but, sometimes adopting and advocating a different strategy for success.
Our party thrives on the diversity of opinion that Democratic voters bring to the general elections. We welcome that diversity in those periods to advance our party's ability to effect our shared goals. I think we should have the same respect and accommodation of those legislators with different viewpoints in our party's deliberations that we extend to the voters who elect them.
That doesn't mean that we abandon our own principles and values in the political debate. It's just a recognition that many of our positions are not sufficient to generate a majority on their own. That's why we coalesce behind our party. Our only political strength is in the amount of support we generate to elevate our party in a position to do more about our ideals than just talk about them. Our political system provides for both protest and compromise. There's little room for dictators or absolutists when it comes time to vote on initiatives and legislation.
The purpose of our political system is to have a place where we can collectively enact those things we feel are necessary, We do that with legislators from many diverse regions of the country with a divergence of needs and concerns motivating them to vote. We should remember these diverse and disparate voters, as we deliberate those differences, who sent these legislators to organize and advocate under the same Democratic banner. It's not easy to accommodate different points of view, especially if you feel the issue or concern is critical and paramount. But, that's what most voters send these legislators to Congress to do; to reconcile all of the voters' different strategies for success to effectively advance the goals we all share. That's what most voters in our party expect from these candidates.
See, folks, no matter how you hard you try and to spin about the events of the day of the NV convention, the Sanders campaign's supporters went so far over the edge that their camp has lost the ability to communicate whatever grievance they might have had that day. The Sanders campaign doesn't get a platform for their complaints after that sordid performance.
The Sanders campaign has devolved into little more than a rabid, anti-Hillary effort which is as boring as it is lurid. We're not listening to the voice behind all of that violent behavior. Not listening, and increasingly anxious for their campaign to just go away.
33 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
