What happens next will tell us if Sanders supporters are in
this for the long haul, or just along for the ride.
I voted for Bernie Sanders.
He stands for most of the things I’ve stood for my whole life. A foreign
policy that respects other countries. Domestic policies that put the poor and
working class first. Addressing climate change with the urgency that this aching
planet demands. He is demonstrably the candidate who understands these issues best
and has the commitment to address them. Whether that means he would make the
best President is an open question, but I voted for him on the issues.
Now that his fight for the nomination has failed, his
supporters have a choice to make. We can howl that the process is rigged
(pointless), we can vilify Clinton as a Wall Street lackey (yawn), or we can act
as if we actually believe the words and the example of Bernie Sanders.
I’m not talking only about the Bernie Sanders who enchants
with his straight talk, who pals around with Pope Francis, who charms tiny
sparrows. I’m talking about the Bernie Sanders who has spent a lifetime as part
of a movement for social justice, a pursuit that has always been secondary to
his personal political aspirations.
The choice for Sanders’ supporters will be whether we can
transform the organization and the energy of the campaign into a lasting movement.
It will be about whether the Sanders’ followers, often criticized for being too
young and too idealistic, can show the Democratic establishment and the rest of
the country, that we are serious about radical change. We have to decide if we
are in this to feel good, or to do good. (We also have to make sure that those
in our ranks understand that we will be paying for the changes we hope to bring
about – no small task).
Real change, as Sanders points out relentlessly, can only
begin when we remove money from its central role in our politics. Sanders’
campaign, funded by folks with twenty-seven dollars to spare, nearly propelled
him to the nomination. Now we must unite behind the Clinton candidacy from now
until November, and, come January, be prepared to push her to uphold the
campaign promises that Sander’s movement has forced her to make.
We will have to hold President Clinton’s feet to the fire on
campaign finance reform. Every change that progressives hope to see is
dependent on serious campaign finance reform, an end to what Sanders rightly
calls a corrupt system and which many of us see as legalized bribery. No one
has articulated this issue more clearly than Sanders. It is the key to
returning power to the people and not just the people who can afford it.
Overturn Citizens United. Banish the notion that corporations are people.
Provide public financing for campaigns, and let ideas, not fund raising power,
lead our public discourse.
It’s not an idea that we can let die just because more Democratic
primary voters chose Hillary Clinton, with her ties to big money, as their
candidate for President. It is far too important.
But how can a defeated Sanders hold sway over his one-time
opponent’s policies? As Vice President, as some of his supporters suggest?
Worst idea ever. Why lock Sanders away in the White House when he could be in the
Senate and out in the country campaigning for change? Sanders has laid the
groundwork for a movement that combines support for progressive causes, and
support for progressive candidates with a fundraising power that can rival a
Super Pac. Imagine a movement sweeping into key Congressional districts and
swing states to turn out voters and flip some key Congressional seats this
fall. Imagine what that movement could do in 2018 with a similar strategy.
Can Sanders’ supporters make this adjustment? Presidential
candidates have tried to convert their campaigns into movements before. Jesse
Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition comes to mind; President Obama’s Organizing for
America group was somehow supposed to keep the grassroots involved even as
their man sat in the Oval Office. Usually they end up as top down entities
serving their leadership, and they peter out or lose relevance.
This time it could be different, because of the type of campaign he ran.
Many of the Sander’s troops seem to so enjoy vilifying
Clinton that it makes unity seem unlikely. But a united Democratic Party this
fall could open the door to progressive changes no one was even talking about
before the Sanders surge. All because of the campaign he ran. A mature movement
would recognize its victory even while conceding the failure of their
Presidential campaign.
Clinton devotees must recognize that they will not win over
the Sanders’ voters by simply noting that she is the lesser of two evils. We
have heard that lullaby too many times. They must fully recognize that Bernie’s
brigade not only rejects the triangulation politics that made the Clintons so
successful in the 90’s, but that they are speaking to the concerns of a new
generation.
A friend of mine who loves Bernie posed a common complaint –
he just doesn’t trust Clinton. That is an excellent first step. Our political
system is not based on trust. If we think our job is to vote once every four
years and then let the elected run the country, we have misunderstood what it
is to be a citizen of a democracy. We should not trust any politician to do
anything other than what we have to power to make them do. Barack Obama in
meeting with a group of environmentalists early in his first term was reported
to have quoted FDR to them. “I agree with you. Now make me do it.”
If Hillary Clinton is our next President, Bernie Sander’s
aroused following don’t have to like her or trust her. As Sanders has made clear,
his political revolution is not solely about deciding who sits in the Oval
Office. It really is about mobilizing the millions who have rallied to his
cause, and then continuing to organize pressure that will keep a progressive
agenda on track.
