2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Post removed [View all]Armstead
(47,803 posts)I have been paying attention to Sanders for years, as he was one of a handful of people in Congress who actually were expressing my own observations and beliefs and values. (See my icon for another, and there have been others on either specific issues or in general -- Kennedy, Sherrod Brown, Jan Schiakovsky, Barbara Lee, etc. pardon my spelling.).
Sanders campaign has actually taken those aspirations -- and critiques of the problems -- and injected them into the mainstream presidential campaign.
The underlying problem -- and related issues -- transcend the usual partisan division. It is much bigger.
IMO, what he is doing is expanding the dialogue of the campaigns, and taking it beyond the same old, same old bi-polarized nature of elections. He is pressing to include both the bigger problems and bigger goals. IMO that is crucial if we are ever to shake off the gridlock and apathy and political stagnation that prevents real reform.