By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
sundin13 on 16 March 2020
Edit Thread
SpokenTruth said:
sundin13 said:

I agree that there are negatives to such a position, but there are also positives, especially when you don't like what an individual has previously stood for. Like I was saying, if you are a Bernie or Bust voter, you can do a lot more good by staying engaged and working to elect Biden and push him to the left, than disengaging and letting Trump have another four years.

Conversely, Biden supporters who know that Bernie or Bust people exist are they themselves electing Trump.  Wouldn't it then stand to reason that Biden supporters should then rally behind Sanders for the same reason? 

This is why the "rally behind candidate" logic fails. Because you can equally state one group or the other is inadvertently electing the other party by not getting behind who they support.

The one difference here is that Sanders already has those left proposals...Biden doesn't. 

So what is the easier scenario?

Sanders being Sanders and Biden supporters rally behind him?
or Biden accepting Sanders platform and Sanders supporters rally behind him?

Biden just threw M4A under the bus last night.  Along with many other Sanders policies.  That tells me Biden has no intention of moving any further left that he's already done as outline by last night's debate.  That's as far left as he'd going to go.

Further, if we Sanders supporters started to show support to Biden, what motivation then would have have to move further left....he'd have the support.  The only way to get him to move left IS by saying we won't support his current policies.  So he absolutely must move to the left on his own to get the progressive support. If we move first by supporting him, he has no need to move left...he gets the vote anyway.

At this point it doesn't matter what anyone thinks about the Primary. It's as good as in the past. We could complain about those damned Biden fans all day, but it won't change anything. Biden is the candidate. You ask about the easier path, but have you seen the odds for Bernie? He doesn't have a path anymore. It isn't easy to get leftist policies in the White House when he has already lost. So how do we move forward from here?

Again, progressives showing up is a good start. You complain that Biden isn't moving to the left anymore, but I can only assume you haven't really been paying attention. In the debate yesterday, Biden pledged to not deport anyone who hasn't been convicted of a felony. That is a pretty big step to the left. And before the debate (and as discussed during the debate), Biden just supported Warren's bankruptcy bill. Another step to the left.

Does that mean Biden is suddenly going to support M4A? Of course not, but what Bernie supporters often seem to miss, is that this isn't a binary choice. It isn't either M4A or the destruction of life as we know it. Biden's healthcare plan is already pretty far left compared to what we've been seeing for the past couple decades. If this was 2015, we would be saying that this was a pretty huge jump. The reason that happened is largely because Bernie succeeded in pushing the party. The fact that this is where the center lies shows just how impactful progressives can be even when they aren't holding the presidency.

And again, the input of the people doesn't stop as soon as someone gets elected, unless the people let it. However, if Biden doesn't get elected we are effectively preventing ourselves from being able to influence the politics of this country for four more years.