What exactly would Bernie Sanders accomplish by running for President? Aside from a replay of Bush-Gore-Nader?
Go ahead and work to elect Romney if you think he’d be better for the country than Obama. But don’t pretend that’s not what you’d be doing if you run as a left-wing third party candidate.
Your problem isn’t that Obama isn’t left-wing enough. Your problem is that the Republicans have a majority in the House, and according to our Constitution, the House controls spending. If you want left-wing legislation, then elect a majority of left-wingers to the House. Except, that isn’t going to happen, and the reason you didn’t see left-wing legislation when the Democrats controlled the House is that most Democrats aren’t left-wing.
Obama is not a left-wing politician. You know it. I know it. The American people know it. Pretending to be disappointed because Obama isn’t a left-wing politician is supremely disingenous.
Once again: Sanders just floated the idea, for the Democrats, which he is not. He is not offering to run. Not as a Democrat, not as a Socialist, not as a NPA candidate.
Well, he could provide an object lesson on the actual difference between a real, live, card carrying socialist and whatever it is that reasonable people would describe Obama as.
No, they don’t or I wouldn’t constantly see Obama described as ultra left-wing, Communist, Marxist, Nazi, etc, etc, etc.
CMC fnord!
YMMV, depending on what level of craziness you’re willing to expose yourself to. (There are places that make Free Republic look quite sane . . . as hard as that is to actually believe.)
This is what bothers me most about the Democratic Party. They have great talking points. Actual mass appeal on most issues and yet they seem genetically programmed to piss their pants and fall apart in the face of the usual baseless and in my opinion openly false ranting from the right. Christ can’t these people all go to a self esteem seminar or at least get common talking points.
The Democratic party is not a left wing party. The reason they “cave” to the Republicans is that lots of Democrats vote for the same things as Republicans. It ain’t like Democrats are all aching to raise taxes through the roof and start handing out welfare to gay pandas and ban guns. The reason the Democrats didn’t do these things when they controlled the House is because most Democrats didn’t want to do those things.
I know the right-wing media industrial complex yammers incessently about the socialists in Congress, but that doesn’t make it true. If you want a left-wing party in Congress you better start electing one, because the Democratic party isn’t it.
There was a time in the 70s, after the southern conservatives had abandoned the Democrats for the Republicans, that the Democratic caucus was overwhelmingly liberal. That was a long time ago.
If the Democratic Party is not the party of the American left who is? Please do not insult me by naming some off-the-wall group that got less than 1% in the last election.
I’m a republican that voted for Barack, thinking that just maybe he would do something great. Sadly no, he didn’t. However, if instead of every President that gets in office getting bashed by everyone and their toddlers, we all form a line behind the Chief and actually assist (or at least not bash), then maybe we’d get somewhere. As soon as the poor guy steps in the door, it seems like everyone just wants to pick up stones and take aim, like it’s his fault for everything thats gone wrong, and any mistakes the previous one made are now piled on. It seemed like the day after he got ellected, everybody expected to walk outside and have the sky be purple, and a brand new BMW in the driveway. Plus, I remember Obama saying specifically that the ‘change’ wouldn’t necessarily happen during his term, and the road to ‘change’ would be rough and very bumpy.
There are left-wingers in the Democratic party, that doesn’t make the Democratic party a left-wing party. The left-wingers are a marginalized minority wing of a centrist party. There are tiny marginal wingnut left-wing parties, but neither major party is a left-wing party.
Aw shit. I forgot. Okay, moonbats. Thanks for the correction.
Traitor to the United States of America. And in particular, the United States of America that HE espouses. Any primary of President Obama weakens his chances of winning the Presidency. And when the Supreme Court is on the line, especially if you’re a socialist like Sanders, you don’t even think about fucking with that. That’s what.
No, he campaigned as the candidate who would take the Left/Right, Red/Blue blinders off and try to heal the damage such divisive behavior has caused this nation. He’s been saying that since two-thousand-fucking-FOUR! Where the hell were you during the campaign?
Tell me, what kind of “pussy” gets over 500 pieces of legislation passed in just 2 years? Are you fucking serious? Do you know how many pieces of legislation Boehner has managed to have become law in the 7 months he’s been Speaker of the House?
TWELVE
Yeah, twelve whole laws.
So Obama’s a Republican, huh? Strange how that doesn’t make any fucking sense.
Oh yeah, I forgot, you didn’t get your public option. Guess what? If you held out for that, we’d still be here listening to some hateful Republican Senator filibustering it, you dumbass.
OH, that’s right, he “caved” and extended the Bush tax cuts. I’m sure all the 99-week-unemployed who got their benefits extended wish he’d have held firm on that one, oh yes they do!
You’re nuts. Calling people traitors to the U.S. because they disagree with you politically? You should be ashamed of yourself.
You’re still nuts. You’re taking it as a given that Socialists, etc., should support Obama because he’s lefter than whatever dingbat the Republicans nominate. Why? He’s not a Socialist or an etc. Perhaps a period of reactionary government would be good for the cause in the long run.
Well, there you are, that was his mistake. The American Right does not need to be accommodated to, it needs to be screamed at and bullied and humiliated and shamed and out-demonized and pounded and battered into jelly and finally, permanently marginalized. Haven’t we all learned that by now? We need a divider, not a uniter. This is not an age for healing divisions, this is an age for fighting the good fight to the finish.
You may be right, I won’t dispute that. That doesn’t change the fact that that isn’t what he campaigned as, and anyone who expected him to be that, and who are angry that he hasn’t been, had their expectations out-of-whack and absolutely no justification for their anger based on the realities. It’s misplaced.
That anger needs to be directed at the party who has put their craven goal of destroying this president above the good of this nation. They need to be goddamn furious that Republicans are responsible for the watering-down of health care reform, because of their campaign of lies and their threat of filibuster. And they need to blame their own damn selves for allowing their [waah waah] disappointment to keep them home during the mid-terms, destroying what little power the president even had to get things done.
The only way President Obama is ever going to be able to fully institute some of the programs he campaigned on (single payer, for instance), is if he has not only the majority returned to Congress, but a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. This fucking temper tantrum crap not only isn’t helping, it’s hurting.
And pals and gals, brethren and sistren, its going to get a lot harder. Corporate money is going to flood over the landscape, with fake grassroots groups showing up everywhere. Americans for Sound Policy, Americans for Freedom and Goodness, Citizens United to Beat the Dutch…
Add to that the full-court press to destroy even the remnant of the union movement, and the voter suppression drive.
And finally, the apathy and hopelessness, the most loyal allies of the Forces of Darkness. Sharpen your swords, and griddle your loins, its going to get rough. Rougher. A lot.
My name is Mr Sunshine, and I am appalled at this message…
The Democrats had a majority in the House and Senate. (Who cares about a filibuster threat? If they want to filibuster, make them do it.)
What came out of it? Proof that Congressional Democrats are a bunch of fucking wimps without backbones. Shivering in their boots, “Oh Noes! If I vote for this, I might not get re-elected!” Then they get beat in the election anyway because, well, nobody wants a spineless toad representing them in Congress.
Yet we’re supposed to continue to support this bunch of corrupt, syphillitic hyenas because a government led by the bunch of corrupt, syphillitic jackals across the aisle might be microscopically measurably worse? Fuck that.
This group of cowardly, vacuous, and interminably useless jerkoffs has proved that they are incapable of standing up and fighting for what they claim to believe in. You go ahead and support them. I’m certain that they’re delighted to have support from someone who requires nothing from them, who demands nothing from them, who expects nothing of them, who only asks that they have a D after their names.
Well, like I said, perhaps we need a good deep fucking to wake the fuck up. Perhaps we need 4 years of President Bachmann with speaker Cantor and majority leader DeMint. Get this insanity out of our system so that we can return to a more rational center of gravity and we can go back to ignoring the the modern incarnation of the John Birch Society.
And the last time I checked, challenging your president isn’t supposed to be considered treason, but it says a lot about you that you think it does.
I saw the 2004 speech and I supported him for President in 2008. I wanted to reach a middle ground back then but the Republican party hadn’t sprinted to the right yet. Obama has chased the Republican party to the right bent over, running backwards and with grease on his ass.
The one we have in the white house.
Deadly. I am willing to see a supreme court full of Scalias and Thomases if that is what it takes for people to wake the fuck up.
Why do you think that passing highway bills and shit like that is any indication of leadership?
I said he might as well be a Republican. In trying to find a middle ground he is chasing the Tea party to the right.
I’d rather if he didn’t bring up health care at all until the economy was in better shape. WTF was so important about health care that he was willing to spend all his political capital for the worst version of health are reform I could have imagined. Oh yeah, I forgot, his legacy.
Read that again. These people have been unemployed for 99 weeks. TWO FUCKING YEARS!!! Why shouldn’t they go apply for welfare? Why should we continue to give the wealthy a free ride so that folks who couldn’t find a job in two fucking years can continue to collect government benefits and call it unemployment instead of welfare?
Plus, I remember Obama saying specifically that the ‘change’ wouldn’t necessarily happen during his term, and the road to ‘change’ would be rough and very bumpy.