Ta-Nehisi Coates: Why Precisely Is Bernie Sanders Against Reparations?

[Prism]

216. Depends how it's framed

Saying, "You will pay an X tax increase for a Y reduction in health-care costs," is a potential political winner. Potential, because it depends how it is framed, how trustworthy the candidate is, etc.

80% of Democrats support single payer. I see in other posts in this thread, you claim that Sanders is trying to tear apart the party and the status quo. But how is pushing for something 80% of Democrats want tearing apart the party?

If we're being straightforward, I would argue that the candidate dismissing what 80% of the party wants is the one artificially messing with the party's dynamics.

The problem in this conversation - and I don't think you and I will find middle ground on it - is that your image of Sanders is a strawman at its heart. How a politician who is finally pushing for what the party and voters repeatedly say they want a pie-in-the-sky radical?

I mean, I know calling the democratic socialist a crazy radical may seem good politics when trying to build Clinton up as a pragmatic incrementalist, but it's becoming apparent that people are starting to believe the artificial construct of Sanders they've created.

He's just not this crazy radical you're insisting he is. You're getting upset at a self-invented fiction.

Anyway, bedtime. Thank you for the exchange. Even if no national candidate currently supports it, I vigorously support of system of government programs aimed at economic reparations for the African American community.