Was Bernie Sanders' movement all for nothing?

[Hardkill]

What will be Bernie's legacy when he passes away?

I understand that progress doesn't happen as fast as many of us want.

However, what did Bernie Sanders really accomplish for the country?

None of his policies and ideas will ever get enacted in our lifetimes and he was in great partly responsible for the election of Trump in 2016 thanks to his whole widespread "Bernie or bust" effect.

So, then there is:

On 9/3/2020 at 11:43 PM, Leo Gura said:

....The chances now are better than ever of a new Obama or Clinton-like, but progressive, leader to emerge. I think we'll see exactly that in the next 8 to 16 years. It will happen regardless of whether Trump wins or Biden wins. In both cases people are going to see that neither conservativism nor neoliberalism are working. And they will be eager for something new. Someone like Bernie but with a younger, more charismatic face, and a fighter.

The function of Bernie was not to win the Presidency. The function of Bernie was to pave the way for a new, younger, charismatic progressive leader in the next 5 to 20 years.

Correct me, if I am wrong, but it seems like even Leo has been suggesting that he lately has come to the realization that he was wrong about that.

 

I liked Emerald about progress in the long-run:

On 11/25/2024 at 8:18 PM, Emerald said:

You're thinking too short term. 

"The wise man plants the seeds to trees that he will never sit under the shade of."

It's only when you set your vision for humanity outside of yourself and connect it to all the people of now and many generations beyond our own, that you can find motivation and meaning to move towards a vision for a better world.

Also, you're not seeing the cyclical nature of collective happenings... and that things always arise out of their opposites.

Things will ebb and flow within a proximal range during our lifetimes changing a lot in some ways and a little in other ways. Right now just happens to be an ebb period, which will probably last a few years or a decade. And it could be incredibly destructive... or more mildly destructive. 

But it is in these catabolic ebb periods that momentum gains for a pendulum swing towards the flow.

In the tale of the Chinese Farmer, there is a series of SEEMINGLY fortunate and unfortunate happenings. And with each successive happening, the positive event seems to turn into something negative. And the negative event seems to turn into something positive.

It starts with the farmer's horse running away. And the farmer goes to his neighbor and says "My horse ran away." And the neighbor says, "That's terrible!" And the farmer says "Maybe."

Then, the farmer's horse comes back home, along with several other wild stallions that the farmer comes to own. And he tells his neighbor. And the neighbor says, "That's wonderful!" And the farmer says "Maybe."

Then, the next day the farmer's son is riding one of the wild stallions, and it bucks him off. And the farmer's son breaks his leg. And he tells his neighbor. And the neighbor says, "That's terrible!" And the farmer says "Maybe."

Then, the next day the army comes to draft to farmer's son to go to war. But because his son's leg is broken, the army decides not to draft him. And he tells his neighbor. And the neighbor says, "That's wonderful!" And the farmer says, "Maybe."

If you want to preserve the current system for as long as possible, elect a Bernie Sanders progressive type. He has been the most conservative option out of anyone running in the past decade because he would make the current system a lot more livable and sustainable.

If you want to shake the system apart and introduce chaos and change, elect someone like Donald Trump. If his power is unchecked, his Narcissistic ways will erode the system away and in the chaos, the problems will become harder or impossible to ignore. And change will happen. And the Shadow of our current system will be laid bare for all to see and integrate.

We're getting the latter option. And it will suck in the short term. But if we're going to wake up and solve global problems like Climate Change, the current system has to become totally untenable. 

Yet, even if enough people finally begin to realize what a disaster Trumpism is, it might already be too late to fix all of the unfathomable damage that will be done to this country and perhaps every bit of progress ever made in this country since the 1930s will have been erased by Trumpism. Also, the country will still elect another center-left Democrat for president.

Also, attacking, neoliberalism, centrism, and corporate Democrats backfires.

So, in the end, was Sander's movement a complete failure and should progressives and Democrats move back to the center for the next 1 to 5 decades?

Edited December 10 by Hardkill

[What Am I]

Bernie and those who are similar seem to be inching their way towards the umbrella of Trump's camp. So I think it's even worse than you're thinking here. At least from your point of view.

Edited December 10 by What Am I

[PurpleTree]

No.

As Emerald said. Seeds get planted. Ground need to be fertile and so on.

[Raze]

Just now, What Am I said:

Bernie and those who are similar seem to be inching their way towards the umbrella of Trump's camp. So I think it's worse than you're even thinking here. At least from your point of view.

That’s smart, establishment dems are worthless, they should go where the attention is to keep the momentum of the movement 

[What Am I]

1 minute ago, Raze said:

That’s smart, establishment dems are worthless, they should go where the attention is to keep the momentum of the movement 

Yeah, but it's also possible he's finding genuine alignment with the momentum of Trump's populist potentials. It seems like a bunch of Bernie-like people are slowly switching up their thought process, and I have a feeling they're not all acting.

Edited December 10 by What Am I

[Leo Gura]

@Hardkill Please stop this doom and gloom just because you lost one election. Move on.

[Hardkill]

50 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

@Hardkill Please stop this doom and gloom just because you lost one election. Move on.

Sorry, I am not just trying to sound doom and gloom.

I am just trying to understand all this from both a pragmatic and rational viewpoint.

Do you think that Bernie's movement was a big mistake and should the Democratic party just reject the progressives and their ideas and just go back to full-throated centrism like Bill Clinton in the 90s moving forward from a strategic viewpoint?

If I am not mistaken, haven't you been implying that Democrats should run more on centrist ideas?

Edited December 10 by Hardkill

[Raze]

Just now, Hardkill said:

Do you think that Bernie's movement was a big mistake and should the Democratic party just reject the progressives and their ideas and just go back to  full throated centrism like Bill Clinton in the 90s for all practical purpose moving forward?

So what Hillary and Kamala did basically 

[What Am I]

4 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

Do you think that Bernie's movement was a big mistake and should the Democratic party just reject the progressives and their ideas and just go back to full-throated centrism like Bill Clinton in the 90s for all practical purposes moving forward?

That's the idea I've seen from Destiny and a few others. In my opinion, it's forgetting the simple fact of democracy, and the need to garner enough votes to actually win. Trump may have recently taken the opposite approach. Instead of rejection, he widened the scope of the type of person who'd be readily accepted.

Edited December 10 by What Am I

[Hardkill]

6 minutes ago, Raze said:

So what Hillary and Kamala did basically 

Yeah, like should Carville, Schumer, Pelosi, the Obamas, Manchin, and the Clintons, be like:

 "SHUT UP Bernie and AOC! You guys have done enough damage to our party! None of you have ever represented what the country really wants! All of you Greenpeace hippies with all of your pie-in-the-sky ideas never worked and are never going to work for us substantively or politically! Everything you touch turns to shit! Most of you guys can't even win elections! You either move more to the middle with us or your political careers will be over!"

Edited December 10 by Hardkill

[Raze]

4 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

Yeah

and how did it work out?

[Hardkill]

1 minute ago, Raze said:

and how did it work out?

It worked in the 90s and it worked during Obama's presidency; albeit Obama was more of a liberal Democrat than Clinton was.

[Hardkill]

32 minutes ago, PurpleTree said:

No.

As Emerald said. Seeds get planted. Ground need to be fertile and so on.

I don't see how those seeds will ever grow in our lifetimes.

[Raze]

1 minute ago, Hardkill said:

It worked in the 90s and it worked during Obama's presidency; albeit Obama was more of a liberal Democrat than Clinton was.

That’s in the past, how did it work in 2016 and 2024

[PurpleTree]

Ditch the woke ideology stuff. Many people just get annoyed when they hear it imo.

[Hardkill]

1 minute ago, PurpleTree said:

Ditch the woke ideology stuff. Many people just get annoyed when they hear it imo.

I think we may also need to be as racist and xenophobic as the Republicans are while running on either more economic populism or more pro-corporatism.

[Hardkill]

5 minutes ago, Raze said:

That’s in the past, how did it work in 2016 and 2024

It's the only thing that has ever worked in the past ever since big money in politics corrupted the whole political system.

I frankly don't see the Democratic leadership moving to the left anytime soon. If anything they might be more inclined more and more and more back to the center like what happened after George McGovern's failed presidential campaign in 1972.

I hope I am wrong.

Edited December 10 by Hardkill

[PurpleTree]

2 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

I think we may also need to be as racist and xenophobic as the Republicans are while running on either more economic populism or more pro-corporatism.

And then what would be the difference in voting Republican or Democratic?

 

Already the Democrats are quite right leaning compared to left in Europe for example.

[Hardkill]

Just now, PurpleTree said:

And then what would be the difference in voting Republican or Democratic?

 

Already the Democrats are quite right leaning compared to left in Europe for example.

There would be much less of a difference in voting for either party just like how similar the parties were during the mid-1900s. Maybe that could heal the country from the terrible divisions in our country while accelerating the destabilization of our existing system until the country is forced to radically transform into a more progressive country.

[Inliytened1]

56 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

What will be Bernie's legacy when he passes away?

I understand that progress doesn't happen as fast as many of us want.

However, what did Bernie Sanders really accomplish for the country?

None of his policies and ideas will ever get enacted in our lifetimes and he was in great partly responsible for the election of Trump in 2016 thanks to his whole widespread "Bernie or bust" effect.

So, then there is:

Correct me, if I am wrong, but it seems like even Leo has been suggesting that he lately has come to the realization that he was wrong about that.

 

I liked Emerald about progress in the long-run:

Yet, even if enough people finally begin to realize what a disaster Trumpism is, it might already be too late to fix all of the unfathomable damage that will be done to this country and perhaps every bit of progress ever made in this country since the 1930s will have been erased by Trumpism. Also, the country will still elect another center-left Democrat for president.

Also, attacking, neoliberalism, centrism, and corporate Democrats backfires.

So, in the end, was Sander's movement a complete failure and should progressives and Democrats move back to the center for the next 1 to 5 decades?

@HardkillBro it will be a completely different landscape in 4 years.  Let reality play itself out.

Edited December 10 by Inliytened1