My take on last night's election results from Kentucky [View all]

[Bernblu]

It was confirmation of what Bernie has been saying: Unless the Democratic party start representing the interests of working people they will not vote in the numbers needed for Democrats to win. Most working people, of all colors and ethnic backgrounds, are turned off by politics and that is why there was an abysmally low voter turnout in Kentucky yesterday and nationally in 2014.

When I was young, working people knew that the Democrats represented their economic interests and that is why the Democrats controlled the White House and congress for most of years from 1932 until 1980. We had a strong middle class and working people were optimistic about their future.

So, what did the Democrats do: They sold out to the corporations, first on deregulation and giving up on on full employment and Keynesian economics (ie buying into the Republican tropes on balancing the budget and fiscal responsibility).. Then they supported and implemented trade deals that sent good jobs overseas while giving displaced workers a voucher to retrain for jobs that didn't exist. If this happened to you would you vote for a party that worked you over in this way?

The Democrats then went along with the Republicans and gutted the safety net for the same people whose jobs went overseas. They also went along with Republicans and voted for minimum sentencing and other laws that put greater numbers of working people in prison, often for minor drug offenses. But God forbid if Bankers take down the entire economy! They get no prison time! Last but not least, many Democrats supported Bush in his war in Iraq, fought on the backs of working people while the wealthy got tax breaks.

Working people are not stupid. They will no longer be participants in this corrupt charade. Those who believe that Clinton is going to be a strong candidate have a surprise coming. The Democratic brand has been tarnished and working people simply will not support the same old politics as usual. Even if Clinton managed to squeak by a weak Republican candidate the problems of the Democrats with working people will continue until the party is no longer viable as a national party.

The Democrats must revive their brand as the party of working people. Over many election cycles, they need to, at every electoral level, back and support candidates like Sanders who unabashedly support and work for working people and not the pro-corporate agenda of the third-way and establishment Democrats.