Why Bernie Sanders' movement is much larger than this election [View all]

[Lodestar]

A political revolution can’t be built in a single election cycle. What matters is that the movement continues after the election – whether or not he wins

The US media and political establishment insist on reading Bernie Sanders’ presidential run as a Don Quixote story – an underdog’s doomed, if poetically heroic, challenge to an immutable status quo that offers little hope to the poor.

But Sanders’ performance and prospects can’t be assessed by the metrics of traditional electoral politics, because he has always set the goals of his campaign on terms that defy the yardsticks of campaigning as we know it.

Despite the “Bernie” thing, Sanders presents his persona as no more than the sum of the ideas and principles he puts before the electorate in pursuit of a “political revolution” against a political system in thrall to corporate cash. It’s a project he hopes will outlive his candidacy, and even his person. Like Stanley Kubrick’s Spartacus, he is inviting any citizen running in local, state or nationwide elections – or waging local-level citizen campaigns – to be Bernie Sanders.

That’s not a win-or-go-home presidential bid.

A campaign has got to be much more than just getting votes and getting elected,” he told an interviewer soon after launching his run. “It has to be helping to educate people, organize people. If we can do that, we can change the dynamic of politics for years and years to come.”

Sanders won’t be involved in politics for “years and years to come”, of course. Nor does he need to win the Democrats’ nomination to validate his campaign’s investment in political education and organization.
A “political revolution” can’t be built in a single election cycle.
cont'd
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/18/bernie-sanders-movement-larger-than-election


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True - A “political revolution” can’t be built in a single election cycle

But do we have the luxury of time? There is an urgency to climate change decisions,
potential escalation of conflicts around the world, etc. that can't wait four years. We
cannot tolerate any more delays and obstruction. Too many things are at critical mass.
The time is now.

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