The Democratic Primary Continues. The Sanders people are angry.
The triumph of Trump has not brought Democratic unity. It has exacerbated the divide within Democratic thinking at the grass roots of activists writing in Facebook and at Indivisible rallies. Facebook is a gold mine of primary research data.
One school of thought is that Democrats need to be incremental and win little battles by choosing battles carefully. (For example, ok Gorsuch but oppose deporting students.) The other is your oppose everything Trump so that--they hope--Trump is perceived as utterly outside the mainstream. There is a problem with the latter tactic: he won the election and a great many people do not consider him crazy. They think he is courageous and a straight-talking right-thinking patriot.
The Democratic fight shows up in the Gorsuch battle. Pick the battles or resist is played outby Democratic activists as a continuation of the unresolved fight between Hillary Democrats and Sanders progressives--like the Cold War that followed WW2, the former allies becoming enemies. Hillary voters tend to see the choice as one between a good liberal (Hillary) and a very liberal Sanders--two politicians on the same scale. The Sanders progressive/Socialists think it is a choice between a sold-out accomodator-collaborator with the dark side of American corporate power versus an idealistic and positive visionary. Sanders' supporters do not see Hillary and Sanders as being on the same team, while Hillary's supporters do.
Hillary Democrats urge Sanders Democrats to "get with the team" and it irritates Sanders people who perceive it as an invitation to betrayal and heresy.
Some of the friction between the two sides comes from midunderstanding those two different viewspoints. Hillary supporters are impatient with Sanders people: aren't we on the same side? Why didn't you help Hillary more? Sanders people are impatient with being asked to support exactly what they reject: that willingness to work with the enemy, and that enemy isn't Trump. It is the whole bipartisan array of powerful elites. The see Hillary as a collaborator with the enemy.
Trump may be the solution for repairing the divide, and it is not simply the unity of disliking and fearing Trump. Rather it is the fact that Trump is a disruptor. He revels in high drama. Trump likes a crisis.
World events will create a crisis soon enough and if not Trump will elicit it. It will be the crisis thst creates the opportunity Sanders supporters want. Sanders wants revolution. A geopolitical, constitutional, or economic crisis will create a kind of "reset" opportunity and Sanders supporters may seize on it to create a lurch in the political order. Sanders wanted a political revolution. Real revolutions come after events so significant that the old regime has been thoroughly destroyed or discredited. (Russia 1917, Germany 1945, China 1949.) Theoretically the Financial Crisis of 2008 was enough to discredit Wall Street and the powerful corporate elites, but to the chagrin of the Tea Party and progressives both Bush and zobama propped them up rather than destroyed them. They repaired the damaged system and did not push reset on it.
Trump was the revolution from the right in protest. Sanders represents the revolution from the left. Sanders people want to carry out and complete the resetting revolution and Hillary does not.
So the Democratic constituencies are split and the battle is being fought in skirmishes over how to deal with the Gorsuch nomination. Hillary-type Democrats are open to accommodating Trump and accepting some of his nominations because they seek incremental change for the better, picking battles, keeping the system intact.
Not Sanders. Remember, Sanders refused to be a Democratic until he filed for the Democratic nomination. He was a Socislist before and now again. His supporters don't want collaboration and incremental change. That is what they oppose.
Sanders gave progressive Democrats hope for something more. Sanders called it a revolution.
The triumph of Trump has not brought Democratic unity. It has exacerbated the divide within Democratic thinking at the grass roots of activists writing in Facebook and at Indivisible rallies. Facebook is a gold mine of primary research data.
One school of thought is that Democrats need to be incremental and win little battles by choosing battles carefully. (For example, ok Gorsuch but oppose deporting students.) The other is your oppose everything Trump so that--they hope--Trump is perceived as utterly outside the mainstream. There is a problem with the latter tactic: he won the election and a great many people do not consider him crazy. They think he is courageous and a straight-talking right-thinking patriot.
The Democratic fight shows up in the Gorsuch battle. Pick the battles or resist is played outby Democratic activists as a continuation of the unresolved fight between Hillary Democrats and Sanders progressives--like the Cold War that followed WW2, the former allies becoming enemies. Hillary voters tend to see the choice as one between a good liberal (Hillary) and a very liberal Sanders--two politicians on the same scale. The Sanders progressive/Socialists think it is a choice between a sold-out accomodator-collaborator with the dark side of American corporate power versus an idealistic and positive visionary. Sanders' supporters do not see Hillary and Sanders as being on the same team, while Hillary's supporters do.
Hillary Democrats urge Sanders Democrats to "get with the team" and it irritates Sanders people who perceive it as an invitation to betrayal and heresy.
Some of the friction between the two sides comes from midunderstanding those two different viewspoints. Hillary supporters are impatient with Sanders people: aren't we on the same side? Why didn't you help Hillary more? Sanders people are impatient with being asked to support exactly what they reject: that willingness to work with the enemy, and that enemy isn't Trump. It is the whole bipartisan array of powerful elites. The see Hillary as a collaborator with the enemy.
Trump may be the solution for repairing the divide, and it is not simply the unity of disliking and fearing Trump. Rather it is the fact that Trump is a disruptor. He revels in high drama. Trump likes a crisis.
World events will create a crisis soon enough and if not Trump will elicit it. It will be the crisis thst creates the opportunity Sanders supporters want. Sanders wants revolution. A geopolitical, constitutional, or economic crisis will create a kind of "reset" opportunity and Sanders supporters may seize on it to create a lurch in the political order. Sanders wanted a political revolution. Real revolutions come after events so significant that the old regime has been thoroughly destroyed or discredited. (Russia 1917, Germany 1945, China 1949.) Theoretically the Financial Crisis of 2008 was enough to discredit Wall Street and the powerful corporate elites, but to the chagrin of the Tea Party and progressives both Bush and zobama propped them up rather than destroyed them. They repaired the damaged system and did not push reset on it.
Trump was the revolution from the right in protest. Sanders represents the revolution from the left. Sanders people want to carry out and complete the resetting revolution and Hillary does not.
So the Democratic constituencies are split and the battle is being fought in skirmishes over how to deal with the Gorsuch nomination. Hillary-type Democrats are open to accommodating Trump and accepting some of his nominations because they seek incremental change for the better, picking battles, keeping the system intact.
Not Sanders. Remember, Sanders refused to be a Democratic until he filed for the Democratic nomination. He was a Socislist before and now again. His supporters don't want collaboration and incremental change. That is what they oppose.
Sanders gave progressive Democrats hope for something more. Sanders called it a revolution.
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