Russell Simmons endorses Clinton, slams Sanders

[monicaangela]

69. Listen to the entire speech

or read the transcript, it explains what he is talking about and why. He is not talking as a democratic presidential candidate, he is speaking as an independent that appears to be fed up with the BS. His comments on the African American community as you have placed them are out of context:

INSKEEP: When you say the working class, are you thinking about the white working class specifically?

SANDERS: I'm thinking about the working class in general. When you talk about unemployment, do you know what real unemployment is? In counting those people who have given up for looking for work and are working part-time, when they want to work full-time. For African-American kids, it is 30 percent. Who is fighting for these folks?

INSKEEP: Here's why I ask about the white working class. Of course, President Obama has assembled a coalition that depends heavily on minority voters. You have argued in the past that Democrats are losing too much of the white vote. There were states in Senate races in November where Democrats couldn't even get 25 percent of the white vote.

SANDERS: That's correct.

INSKEEP: Why have you been focusing on that?

SANDERS: Well, I am focusing on the fact that, whether you're white or black or Hispanic or Asian, if you are in the working class, you are struggling to keep your heads above water. You're worried about your kids. What should the Democratic Party talking about, Steve? What they should be talking about is a massive federal jobs program. There was once a time when our nation's infrastructure - roads, bridges, water systems, rail - were the envy of the world. Today, that's no longer the case.

INSKEEP: Haven't Democrats been raising some of these issues...

SANDERS: Yes.

INSKEEP: ...And weren't they raising them in the election that they just lost?

SANDERS: Some candidates did raise some of these issues. But I don't think you see the kind of forceful development of this idea and forceful need to raise the issue about job creation that we should be talking about. I would say, if you go out on the street and you talk to people and say, which is the party of the American working pass - class - people would look to you like you're a little bit crazy. They wouldn't know what you're talking about, and they certainly wouldn't identify the Democrats.

INSKEEP: Help me understand what's going on here though because you have mentioned the white vote in the past. The African-American working class has been voting for Democrats. If you looked at single women, who were often working class...

SANDERS: You're going into this - Steve, you're going into this demographic stuff, which I reject. That's not my cup of tea.

INSKEEP: Although, you talked about it.

SANDERS: Yes. Well, here's what you got. What you got is an African-American president. And the African-American community is very, very proud that this country has overcome racism and voted for him for president. And that's kind of natural. You got a situation where the Republican Party has been strongly anti-immigration. And you've got a Hispanic community, which is looking to the Democrats for help. But that's not important. You should not be basing your politics based on your color. What you should be basing your politics on is, how is your family doing?

There is lots more, but this kind of clarified the statement for me.