2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumBernie broke the Bullshit Ceiling.
Win or lose, I think we WILL see more candidates like Bernie Sanders.
He did something that is, in retrospect, very obvious but also very rare. What? Well...
He spoke to the American People like adults, he did not tailor fit his message to appeal to and divide up specific groups of constituents.
He did not imply that rich people have more worth and influence by holding regular fund raisers where he bent his ear to the high and mighty in return for $10,000 for a plate of food.
He did not give secret speeches, to the very financial institutions that, out of greed, destroyed the lives of tens of millions of Americans.
But let's get right to how he broke the "Bullshit Ceiling":
He's not a big fucking liar and people know that. He tells it how he sees it without waiting for confirmation that it is a popular position or "plays well" with focus groups.
You can quibble here about bullshit like "But he said he would meet the Pope" and crap like that. But it won't work. And the reason that that little diddly crap won't work is the SAME reason that people know that Hillary is a liar and Bernie is not. Because there are lies and there are lies. People have good radar in general.
There WILL be more people like Bernie Sanders because Bernie showed conventional political wisdom is no longer appropriate. In the age that we live in now, with social media and such, it isn't as easy to be a fucking liar and a complete fake as it used to be.
The new politician will have to actually begin to mean what he or she says. Because people smell that shit.
Thanks Bernie, for breaking the Bullshit Ceiling.
Armstead
(47,803 posts)We need fewer lying weasals and more truthtellers
PowerToThePeople
(9,610 posts)A large part of me thinks this is the last nail in the coffin for the fascist oligarchy to completely take over.
Bernie started in another era, that is why he was able to make it where he is currently.
BillZBubb
(10,650 posts)The Clintons are recycling their negative, divisive, and race exploiting campaign from 2008 and it has worked for the most part.
Zira
(1,054 posts)If it's working why did Sanders just close 30 points on Clinton for NY in less than a month? He now only needs to close 15 points.
It's very possible he will do this because his momentum is growing every week, not staying the same.
BillZBubb
(10,650 posts)The fact that she still leads in the polls in NY or anywhere shows it has worked.
Will it continue to work? That is issue.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Adulation.
dchill
(38,505 posts)Reality is a real turn-off when you're so psychologically invested.
SoLeftIAmRight
(4,883 posts)he will open the way for democrats to be democrats again
CorporatistNation
(2,546 posts)A NEXT OPPORTUNITY... DO NOT BELIEVE IT...
MARTY TALKS A FAIR GAME... AND HAS THE LOOKS (UNLIKE BERNIE) BUT IS JUST AS CORPORATE AS ANY OF THE REST OF THEM! MARTY IS SUPPORTED BY THE FRACKING INDUSTRY. BUT... MARTY MIGHT JUST BE ... THE NEXT OBAMA!
TBF
(32,067 posts)it may work against some people but she'll never win the general. But then the money party doesn't care about that, it's just in their interest to put on the little show.
Prism
(5,815 posts)Are we to be governed from the top down or from the bottom up?
As long as I've been alive, the Establishment has been dictating top down. It is wrecking this country.
It's time to be a democracy again.
BainsBane
(53,035 posts)Crashed right through it and kept going.
sadoldgirl
(3,431 posts)of future hopes for another "Bernie" will be a
total illusion.
mhatrw
(10,786 posts)more active and involved in the political process than the people who only seek to enrich themselves at the trough that our current Democrap$ now stand knee-deep in.
CobaltBlue
(1,122 posts)No matter who wins the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, I want to thank every "liberal" and "progressive" who exposed himself/herself as a craven fraud with his/her voting support of Hillary Clinton.
Scuba
(53,475 posts)... his political revolution will not be stopped.
Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)But I fear that Bernie is our last, best chance to turn things around.
If Hillary wins, we get 4 years of kabuki bullshit like the last 7 years. The Republicans get what they want, the Democrats give away the (our) store. And if Hillary is a do-nothing who is subjected to investigation after investigation, it sets the stage for a Republican win in 2020, as no one will primary her. And if the Republicans win this year, it will just speed up the process.
DanTex
(20,709 posts)fighting-irish
(75 posts)because they don't bother doing a thorough research.
Onlooker
(5,636 posts)Last edited Sun Apr 10, 2016, 09:50 AM - Edit history (2)
... He's scored a lot of Pinocchio's from fact-checkers, so many that his supporters are reduced to attacking the source.
He makes himself sound so anti-Iraq, but he did vote to topple Saddam in 1999 and voted for the war appropriations bill in 2001.
He certainly changing his tune on gun control and immigration. You no longer hear him talking much about gun rights or his opposition to the 2007 immigration bill.
He claims to have been for gay marriage early on, but the record shows that's not true. In fact, his argument against DOMA was the same one he used in opposing the Brady bill -- states rights. He did not argue against DOMA on civil rights grounds.
But, that's politics. Compared to Hillary, he's far more honest. So, he's certainly honest for a politician, but that's not necessarily saying much.
kristopher
(29,798 posts)They are twists of realty trying to smear an honest person, and they are the stock in trade of the dishonest person.
IT
DOESN'T
WORK
LIKE
IT
USED
TO.
George II
(67,782 posts)Response to Bonobo (Original post)
Name removed Message auto-removed
fighting-irish
(75 posts)Her bullshit is bullshit. Bernie's facts are true.
BernieforPres2016
(3,017 posts)Because we have all the old ones on ignore.
madokie
(51,076 posts)he has raised the bar no doubt
Sheepshank
(12,504 posts)He has a decent message, he and Weaver et al, have no idea how to get that message out in a big way to make the public sit up and listen without peppering the message with lies, innuendos slanders and half truths.
BernieforPres2016
(3,017 posts)I was just thinking yesterday that it will be tougher, at least on the Democratic side, for future Presidential candidacies for the typical robotic poll tested bullet point ambition driven candidates we have seen in the past. Independent and Democratic voters, and perhaps even Republican voters are going to demand more after Bernie's campaign. The internet blows up the triangulators pretty quickly, as we've seen with Hillary. If the DNC and the MSM weren't so in the tank for her and if Bernie hadn't started from nowhere, her campaign would be over by now.
libdem4life
(13,877 posts)for our times. Or perhaps a quantum leap. The people were ready ... many just dropped out. Most were cynical...the nose holders...the Left was ignored.
Bernie just happened to be the one who showed up and HRC just happened to play Nero while the Democrats burned. So sure of herself she just recently began to acknowledge him as a challenge to the throne.
And you can't put all the newly energized demographics back in the genie bottle. I keep remembering Plato's Cave, too. Lots of analogies that fit.
bvar22
(39,909 posts)It IS about The Movement that Bernie tapped in to.
The same Movement that spawned OWS, and every single other movement in our history for Equal Rights, Equal Protections, Equal Opportunity, Equal Access, Equal Justice before the Law,
Labor Rights, Environmental Rights, Suffrage, and more
Those are ALL a part of the same movement though with different names, and it is this movement that has become active again thanks to the unmitigated GREED of the RICH, and the abandonment of the Working/Middle Class and Poor by the Democratic Party Fat Cats.
If Bernie wins or loses, this Movement will NOT disappear. It will continue, and grow.
Thanks to our resources, we will be watching those who are supposed to serve us, and when they Fuck Up, they WILL be called on it Loudly by many voices. THAT is how democracy is supposed to work.
warrprayer
(4,734 posts)99th_Monkey
(19,326 posts)as being "hopeless".
People, sadly, had become pretty much resigned to the fact that
the game is rigged, most (if not all) politicians are corrupt, and that
there's not a whole hell of a lot that can be done to correct these
ugly facts.
He's doing a phenomenal job of raising the consciousness of the
entire electorate about how real social & political change happens;
and I'm forever grateful to him for doing that.
Thank you Bernie.
Uncle Joe
(58,366 posts)Thanks for the thread, Bonobo.