General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Joy Reid goes below the belt, Jane Sanders responds [View all]Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)But we do need his supporters and we do need to incorporate as many of the ideas his campaign was about(especially on economics) as possible if we are to be relevant.
At a bare minimum, the whole "he should never have been allowed in our primaries" thing needs to stop.
There were many flaws in Bernie's campaign, but he HAD to run in 2016.
There was a compelling need for an economic justice candidate.
The times called for it.
And his campaign was not a plot to wreck the party, nor is there any real evidence that Bernie's presence in the primaries made any meaningful difference for the worst in the general election result.
What his campaign fought for HAS to be part of where we go from here. We need to find the way to connect with voters who've been screwed economically in the post-1981 economy, and there's no reason that trying to connect with them would have to mean abandoning or betraying any of the voters in our base. A lot of the voters in our base were among the victims of the post-1981 economy, and it can only help them to incorporate the idea that, in a decent society human dignity, human value and human need should matter as much as profit for the few-that being on the losing end of corporate greed, being discarded because taking your job away makes the rich richer, is not AS bad as being a victim of racism, sexism, anti-LGBTQ prejudice or xenophobia, but it is a wound and it is a form of oppression.
We need ALL of the people who were drawn to different Dem primary candidates in 2016, and we need the ideas they were all drawn to(ok, with the exception of maybe the three people who backed Webb-we can probably take a pass on winning them over).
That's all I'm saying...it's time to get past the whole "it's YOUR fault!" thing and to move on to finding common ground and winning in '18 and '20.