Wednesday, February 10, 2016

Why Blacks Should Vote for Bernie Sanders

* Note: This is a follow up to my post: Most African-Americans prefer Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton (but many just don't know it yet because they have yet to know Bernie Sanders, whereas, Hillary is world famous.)

Michelle Alexander (author of The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Color Blindness) recently wrote an article called Why Hillary Clinton Doesn’t Deserve the Black Vote: "From the crime bill to welfare reform, policies Bill Clinton enacted—and Hillary Clinton supported—decimated black America."

I would add that, they decimated the white working-class of America as well, such as with Bill Clinton's horrible trade deals that offshored so many good-paying jobs that also drove the decline in our labor unions.

In her article at The Nation, Michelle Alexander doesn't endorse Bernie Sanders, but she does says he's the "lesser of two evils" when it's between he and Hillary. She also writes:

"...The biggest problem with Bernie is that he’s running as a Democrat — as a member of a political party that not only capitulated to right-wing demagoguery but is now owned and controlled by a relatively small number of millionaires and billionaires. Yes, Sanders has raised millions from small donors, but should he become president, he would also become part of what he has otherwise derided as “the establishment.” Even if Bernie’s racial-justice views evolve, I hold little hope that a political revolution will occur within the Democratic Party without a sustained outside movement forcing truly transformational change. I am inclined to believe that it would be easier to build a new party than to save the Democratic Party from itself..."

She also goes on to say:

"The game of lesser evils makes for great entertainment and can now be viewed 24 hours a day on cable-news networks. Hillary believes that she can win this game in 2016 because this time she’s got us, the black vote, in her back pocket — her lucky card. She may be surprised to discover that the younger generation no longer wants to play her game . . . Hopefully, one day, we’ll muster the courage to join together in a revolutionary movement with people of all colors who believe that basic human rights and economic, racial, and gender justice are not unreasonable, pie-in-the-sky goals. After decades of getting played, the sleeping giant just might wake up, stretch its limbs, and tell both parties: Game over. Move aside. It’s time to reshuffle this deck."

So if you're going to vote for "the lesser of two evils", then please vote for Bernie (who I believe doesn't have an evil bone is his body). And he is the nearest thing we have to a 3rd party candidate that Michelle speaks of. If anything at all, Bernie Sanders will have the bully pulpit to move all these issues front and center — and they won't just be swept under the rug again until the next election.

Hillary, on the other hand, will just give us more of the same — and white folks want change too.

8 comments:

  1. The Rev. Al Sharpton talked with Senator Bernie Sanders at Sylvia's Restaurant in Harlem the morning after Sanders' New Hampshire primary victory over Hillary Clinton. Sharpton said he also plans to meet with Clinton next week. An endorsement from him for either candidate would likely come after that.

    http://www.npr.org/2016/02/10/466276101/bernie-sanders-dines-with-al-sharpton-in-harlem

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    1. CNN:

      Sharpton has his reservations with Hillary Clinton — specifically, he is unhappy with Bill Clinton's disparaging remarks about then-Sen. Barack Obama's narrative in 2008, calling it "one big fairytale." Sharpton is also unhappy with the welfare reform policy Clinton crafted with congressional Republicans in 1996 and his 1994 crime bill that led to increased incarceration rates among African-Americans.

      Also on Wednesday, an aide close to longtime South Carolina Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn said he will not make an endorsement this week.

      http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/10/politics/bernie-sanders-al-sharpton-harlem/index.html

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    2. A photo Tweeted by Sharpton with his youngest daughter and himself with Sanders and his wife. On the wall is a photo of Sharpton and Obama in '07 at the same restaurant.

      https://twitter.com/TheRevAl/status/697517105990635520

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  2. John Lewis in a statement from the Congressional Black Caucus PAC, which endorsed Clinton:

    “In the interest of unity, I want to clarify the statement I made at Thursday’s news conference. I was responding to a reporter’s question who asked me to assess Senator Sanders’ civil rights record. I said that when I was leading and was at the center of pivotal actions within the Civil Rights Movement, I did not meet Senator Bernie Sanders at any time. The fact that I did not meet him in the movement does not mean I doubted that Senator Sanders participated in the Civil Rights Movement, neither was I attempting to disparage his activism. Thousands sacrificed in the 1960s whose names we will never know, and I have always given honor to their contribution."

    http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/john-lewis-clarifies-comments-bernie-sanders

    * But anybody who watched his earlier news conference could very easily see that Louis meant his earlier comments to be other than flattering towards Bernie Sanders. I suspect he got a lot of backlash, because he said "in the interest of unity" -- meaning Hillary would need Bernie's supporters in a general election in November if she were nominated. Too late. If Bernie's not nominated, I won't vote, because clearly all along the Democratic party machine has been trying to sabotage and hurt Bernie's campaign using lies and dirty tricks. They are going to try to STEAL the nomination with super-delegates.

    NO MORE CLINTONS AND NO MORE BUSHES. WE WANT REAL CHANGE!

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  3. VIDEO: Bernie Sanders talking with Cornel West, Killer Mike and Nina Turner about the legacy of Dr King

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcDtq993J-E

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  4. VIDEO: In 1988, Burlington Mayor Bernie Sanders endorsed the Reverend Jesse Jackson for President of the United States.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66fyBz2GhCA

    * In 1988 Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton nominated Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis.
    * In 1988 Vice President George H. W. Bush was elected President.

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  5. Mel Sandico, a.k.a. Mel Cavaricci, a.k.a. D.J. Mel, has become the house D.J. of Bernie Sanders’s parties ... and will be at Sanders’s election-night watch party on February 20 in Nevada, where he regularly plays at the Cosmopolitan hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. Until recently, Mr. Sandico said he was only slightly aware of Mr. Sanders, whom he had seen on “Real Time with Bill Maher,” and was torn between the senator and Mrs. Clinton. Then, Mr. Liipfert, who had begun putting together events for Mr. Sanders, contacted him and proposed the gig. “I was like ‘Hell, yeah, I’ll do it,’” Mr. Sandico said. Since then, he said, he has read up on Mr. Sanders, adding, “I feel the Bern.”

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/14/fashion/the-house-dj-of-the-bernie-sanders-campaign.html

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  6. Thursday, February 25, 2016

    Dr. Cornel West: "Hillary Clinton is a Wall St. Democrat"

    http://bud-meyers.blogspot.com/2016/02/dr-corel-west-hillary-clinton-is-wall.html

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