We all win when Bernie Sanders runs.
We need him to continue through the Democratic Convention and beyond.
You can pardon my enthusiasm, but I'll now be sending him my $27.
That Bernie came in second in this past Tuesday's primaries doesn't mean much. He got more than enough votes to justify an ongoing campaign. And the longer he runs, the better for all of us.
This stuff about him being a "single-issue candidate" is nonsense. The corporate media and the regular Democrats can't handle the complexity of what's essentially a nuanced class and counter-cultural analysis. They're desperate to avoid the realities of what's being said.
The campaign, of course, is about way more than just Bernie.
And the calculations of delegates and vote counts and much of the rest of it have their place. But we need not lose heart when Hillary seems to get more votes. And she, above all, should be deeply grateful to a genuine grassroots campaign that's been the only thing sparking any real life into an otherwise excruciating mainstream slog.
Every speech Bernie gives, every day his campaign proceeds, every moment of media time he gets is a plus for all of us.
He is, above all, educating and energizing a new wave of activists and ordinary citizens of all ages. The impacts are essential and incalculable. They will be with us for decades.
This past Sunday I watched Bernie speak to about 5,000 mostly young, very diverse citizens at Ohios State's Schottenstein Arena. State Senator Nina Turner opened for him with amazing verve.
Bernie then talked for about an hour on a wide range of issues near and dear to us all: social justice, Social Security, Medicare, fair taxation, killing free trade agreements, climate chaos, Solartopian energy, native rights, women's rights, LGBT, true family values, corporate power, the 1%, militarism, the power of activism, and more.
Of course he began by denouncing Donald Trump's fascist demagoguery.
At the end, he simply pointed out that love is a more powerful force than hate.
In between, the speech was completely BS-free. There were no throwaway lines, no hokey begs for applause, no contentless filler (he did say something was HYUUUGE, but it was in reasonable context and genuinely endearing).
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