I love Bernie Sanders but he is 100 percent NOT electable.

[truebluegreen]

159. Are you that naive?

"Voting" hasn't mattered in this country for decades, and neither has public opinion. The people's wishes are barely acknowledged, let alone respected. Last year saw the release of a study on the state of American democracy, based on data from the years 1980 to 2000:

'Their study further concluded, “When the preferences of economic elites and the stands of organized interest groups are controlled for, the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”

Finally they conclude, “…Our analyses suggest that majorities of the American public actually have little influence over the policies our government adopts. Americans do enjoy many features central to democratic governance, such as regular elections, freedom of speech and association, and a widespread (if still contested) franchise. But we believe that if policymaking is dominated by powerful business organizations and a small number of affluent Americans, then America’s claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened.” '

<snip>

The study verifies with ample empirical data what I have witnessed during the course of my own life as an American over the past four decades. There has been a silent coup d’etat of the monied class, an American oligarchy. Names such as Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, David Rockefeller, Sheldon Adelson (main financier of Mitt Romney for President), the Koch Brothers (main financiers of the Tea Party political movement), George H.W. Bush and family. The top 1% have reshaped the fundamentals of American life, culture and above all politics. A decision to wage war today against Iraq, Afghanistan or Syria depends not on the will of average Americans. Obama was elected on a pledge to close the US Army torture center at Guantanamo and six years on has yet to do. He won a Nobel Peace Prize in his first month and proceeded to wage more war in Afghanistan, Egypt, Libya and most recently Syria and Ukraine.

It is important to have this in mind when judging “America.” The United States of America today bears little resemblance to that I knew when I grew up in the early 1960’s, when a used good Chevy cost $650 and college tuition could be afforded by ordinary Americans if they were willing to study. The oligarchy that has taken policy control behind a thin façade of “democracy” has ultimately ruined the industrial and social fabric of the United States. They are the ones behind the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, or bank deregulation so they can loot the planet. This new study by Princeton’s Prof. Gilens is a refreshing attempt, even if academic and from one of the most elite academic universities, to shed some light on what is fundamentally wrong with America over the past three decades.

http://journal-neo.org/2014/11/11/princeton-makes-it-official-usa-has-become-oligarchy-no-democracy/ (my bold)

I was one of those people who voted enthusiastically for Obama in 2008. I did not, did not, get what I hoped for--not even lip service!--and neither did many others....do you think the debacle in 2010 was an accident? And before you "J'accuse!" me of staying home, I didn't...but many people who dared hope in '08 did, because the hope didn't change much did it? And won't as long as we keep settling for brave defenders of the status quo.