To preface this opinion piece let me identify myself. I have been a Bernie Sanders supporter since he declared himself as candidate for President. I was more familiar with him than most, having listened to him for years on Thom Hartman and Ed Schultz radio shows on Air America.
I am currently a delegate to the Colorado State Convention, which is being held tomorrow, Saturday, April 16. I intend to be there despite the prediction of possibly as much as 14 inches of snow starting tonight and continuing all day tomorrow. While my drive will "only" be 55 miles in a straight shot up nearby Interstate I-25, other delegates are expected to drive hundreds of miles, some across the Rocky Mountains where up to 4 feet of snow may be falling to be there for a 7:30 AM registration. This, of course, in a state where actual elections offer mail-in voting, makes me wonder just what type of catastrophic event would be just cause for postponing the convention. However that is a related but separate issue when it comes to discussing the lack of true democracy in this nation.
Having given my bona fides and apologizing in advance for the lack of links to provide support or validation of what are purely my opinions herein, I have to question whether Bernie Sanders, if unable to attain the nomination, will show himself to actually be a revolutionary.
I do not feel the need to write a long history of Bernie's career as I am addressing this piece to those who believe in what he has stood for and is calling for in his campaign speeches. Suffice it to say that I accept that Bernie, unlike any other politician I can think of in the last 50 years, has remained remarkably consistent in the causes and issues for which he believes in and has fought for.
That said, it cannot be denied that he has been, for more than two decades, waging that fight entirely within the corrupt system that he knows must be overthrown. And, as much as he has tried to fight the good fight, he certainly has seen that system become more and more corrupt during his years in Congress.
Bernie has shown that he is a pragmatist by choosing to run for President as a Democrat rather than an independent, acknowledging the futility of attempting to buck the overwhelming obstacles set up by our political duopoly. Yet, as a candidate for the Democratic party's presidential nomination, he has found the deck stacked in favor of Hillary Clinton, the intended beneficiary of an expected coronation. Virtually the entire party establishment, on the federal, state and local level, is aligned in lockstep with the Clinton campaign. The same is also true of the MSM and even, to a significant extent, those media outlets which are ostensibly progressive/liberal in their bias.
While it is beyond remarkable what Bernie has accomplished to this point, the real question about Bernie himself is his continued willingness to close ranks with Clinton and support her if she wins the nomination. It is easy to say that it is "infinitely better" to have Clinton as President than whomever her Republican opponent may be. That, however, is most definitely NOT what a revolutionary would say.
Bernie Sanders' political career began in 1981 when he was elected mayor of Burlington, Vermont, by a mere 10 votes. His election coincided with the onset of the dismantling of the middle class and the inexorable upward transfer of wealth under President Ronald Reagan who took office in January of 1981. Throughout 8 years of Reagan, 4 of Bush I, 8 of Clinton, 8 of Bush II and now nearly 8 of Obama, that march toward greater and greater financial inequality has continued unabated.
This is something that Sanders certainly knows quite well. He is also fully aware that, whatever potential negative consequences to various social issues a GOP President might effect, a Clinton Presidency will, IN NO WAY WHATSOEVER, do anything to reverse the inequity that has transpired over the last 36 years.
As a lifelong Democrat who was never going to vote for Hillary Clinton even before there was a Sanders candidacy, I can only define his choice - if that is what it comes to - of supporting Clinton, urging his followers to do so and continuing to be a gadfly within the system, as nothing short of a betrayal of his call for political revolution.
Much as is Elizabeth Warren's apparent choice to do the same, although, admittedly, she has never joined the call for political revolution.
