Sanders, YIKES!

Junior High

There is a bad turn in the Democratic primary.   Another fight broke out.

It could do lasting damage, and it was egged on by a bystander.   The headline writer at a Washington Post blog took what Hillary said and translated them into fighting words.   

And so a fight broke out.

Sometimes I think everything I need to know about this campaign I learned at Hedrick Junior High School where a remark turns into a fight because of something someone thought someone else said, egged on by someone else.  

I heard she said something about me

Bernie has some popular lines in his speeches, among them "If a bank is too big to fail it is too big to exist."   Crowds love it.  Big banks nearly destroyed the world back in 2008 through the greed and stupidity, something I write here as simple objective truth.  Big banks made awesomely poor decisions regarding mortgage loans.

Bernie had a New York Daily News editorial board meeting and his answers there to questions on how he might actually in fact--through legislation and executive authority--accomplish breaking up the banks were vague and lacked detail.  The editorial board noted this, and so did Hillary, saying Bernie "hadn't done his homework."  She went on to say voters needed "to decide who of us can do the job the country needs, who can do all aspects of the job, both on the economic domestic issues and on national security and foreign policy."

This is polite stuff, gloves on, respectful.  He wants to break up the banks--great.   How?   But the Post blog headline writer decided to pep it up:    "Clinton questions whether Sanders is qualified to be president."

Yikes!

In political poker, Bernie heard the bet, called it, and raised:   "She has been saying lately that I am not quote unquote qualified to be president.    Let me just say in response to Secretary Clinton: I don't believe that she is qualified if she is, through her super-PAC, taking millions of dollars in special interests' funds."

and,

"I don't think you are qualified if you supported the Panama free trade agreement, something I very strongly opposed and which all of you know has allowed corporations and wealthy people all over the world to avoid paying their taxes."

He goes on and on with a list.

Fox News could not be happier

Maybe it will not matter.  I have little doubt that we will see Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton on the stage in Philadelphia clasping hands and saying that the Democrats are united.   I am not worried about them.   I am worried about Bernie's supporters.

Bernie's critique of American politics isn't mostly about right wing extremism.  It is a critique of the American political system in which powerful special interests push against each other: banks against brokerages against insurance companies.  And coal producers against oil drillers against pipeline companies against natural gas producers against renewable energy people.   And labor unions against the Chambers of Commerce.   AARP against groups who would privatize or reduce Social Security.     Bernie Sanders says the money these groups throw around are fundamentally corrupting of our politics.  

Bernie says a politician like Hillary Clinton can not be a "good guy" politician in a corrupting environment (which is her argument), because the whole system is corrupt and anyone who is experienced and good at it (as Hillary most certainly is) is corrupt and under the influence of bad people.

If Bernie's supporters listen closely to Bernie they will stay home on election day, or more tempting perhaps, they will end up casting a vote of conscience for an Green or some other Third Party candidate, one underwritten by GOP super-PACs.   

That would be the smart GOP play: create a 3rd Party candidate who voices Bernie Sanders' positions, funded by independent money, lots and lots of independent money.  And in a Citizens United world the name of the Super-PAC would not be "Koch Brothers Fooling Stupid Democrats Committee."   It would be "Citizens for Honest Government Committee" or "Cast a Vote of Conscience Committee", or "Your Vote Ends Special Interest Influence Committee".  They would not urge a vote for Cruz.  They would urge one for the Bernie Stand-In candidate, possibly Ralph Nader.   

We have seen this movie before and it ends badly for Democrats.