‘It will be the end of democracy’: Bernie Sanders on what happens if Trump wins – and how to stop him
‘It will be the end of democracy’: Bernie Sanders on what happens if Trump wins – and how to stop him
Don't forget, Sanders is the only person Trump has ever admitted he's afraid of.
Dems really underestimate what life is like for normal Americans. trump doesn't get it either obviously, but at least he acknowledges shit is bad for them.
If Biden tries to run in the economy it's going to hurt him because all the money is going to the wealthy.
Bernie acknowledges and actually has a plan to fix shit. And unlike trump points the finger at whose fault it is.
trump can't compete with that.
But neoliberals don't want to really address wealth inequality either.
My favorite Gif of 2017. Thanks.
Take with a grain of salt, considering Putin says Biden is better for him than Trump. While I don't necessarily agree with the argument, Republicans (and centrist dems) certainly believe Sanders would've been an easy target for smear campaigns.
Trump was an easy target for smear campaigns. That's why Hillary's campaign helped Trump win the primary, and that sure worked out well.
Americans don't give two shits about what the neolibs think are devastating attacks. They are fed up with the out-of-touch wealthy and political classes.
Is there a real plan to shore up our "democracy" if the Democrats win this election? What is Biden going to do next term that he didn't do this term?
I feel like people are so fixated on Trump that they can't see past him. Trump is a giant, clown-shaped piece of shit-- absolutely. How does the opposing party fail at politics so hard that someone like Trump ever even had a shot?
I feel like people are so fixated on Trump that they can't see past him.
Well yeah, because if he wins there won't be anything past him for much of the country.
But what can you really do? Not voting is beneficial to the open christo fascists, and the only person who has any real world shot at winning an election, for some mind melting reason Joe Biden. The same Joe Biden, who despite his kinda actually not terrible first term, is currently funding a genocide as the wold watches. It's a shit choice, but this problem isnt going to be fixed this cycle. It's like punching the clock.
OK? What if Biden wins, is my question. Is the Democrat value-proposition nothing more than "periodic intervals of slightly slower slide into total fascism"?
I agree that it's frustrating that Democrats use shitty Republicans as an excuse to be just a tiny bit less shitty. However, it's getting really annoying that you can't criticize Trump without someone chiming in with "whadabout Biden?!" and you can't criticize Biden without getting a "whadabout Trump?!"
They're both fucking awful. It's a waste of time criticizing Trump because everybody knows who he is, and the people that like him don't give a fuck what he does. They aren't listening to your criticism. I'm don't think Dem leadership really wants to actually help working class people, but they definitely don't have much reason to start when people keep voting for the most "conservative" ones out of fear from the monsters which have mysteriously found a way to represent the other half of voters.
You know they don't . Their strategy was, is, and will continue to be: "The other side is worse".
Yep, and it is a shit strategy.
Just ask about DC statehood and the Dems' inability to enfranchise over a million US citizens.
As soon as you scratch this problem, you discover how shallow and unserious the party is in "protecting democracy".
The more he loses the less likely he'll be to win, plus he's old as hell and not aging gracefully. Rebuking Trumpism is shoring up democracy.
I don't think there really can be a plan. Like what would you want Biden to do to shore up democracy?
One of the inescapable, fundamental, bedrock concepts of democracy is that people will not vote for a corrupt, criminal, authoritarian, self serving demagogue.
If a society can't achieve that basic state then they can not be a democracy.
Honestly, I suspect that the best thing Biden can do is to "grey rock" the American people and hope that Trump self combusts, which seems to be what's happening.
That said, that's just the best Biden can do. The dems need an actual leader that can inspire the american people to see a better version of themselves.
Did you mean to have the word "not" in your second paragraph? Because people absolutely vote for leaders like that all the time lol.
Oh I think I see. I agree that we're not a real democracy.
Because Trump is great for me fundraising and keeping party bigwigs at the trough
Sometimes in life there is such a thing that is called: "Maybe there is no Good Vs. Bad just assholes all around". Good luck with that
MUST WATCH: Bernie Sanders - Why People Vote For Trump
He's 100% right on this.
.
Man, it’s crazy how similar that sounds to exactly what Biden has been saying all along:
I get your frustration, but this is a good thing. Bernie having the same message only strengthens it, and can convince people that won't listen to Biden.
We don't have the luxury of picking allies. If holding my tongue gets us a reluctant ally, I'll take it. None of us have to like each other. We just need to remember that fascism is the ultimate evil. We may bicker like dwarves and elves, but when the orcs appear, we need to fall lockstep shoulder to shoulder immediately.
Actions speak louder than words. Biden locked in Trump’s $2T tax cuts for the rich and corporations, bringing the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%. Never mind the open loopholes they exploit to pay virtually nothing anyway. Then, Biden claims he wants to bump up the corporate tax rate to 28%, but can’t, for “reasons.”
What is this halfway corpo-fascist stance? How are we going to pay for that?! By cutting social programs meant to support the working class. Biden is full of shit on this issue, open your eyes.
Fuck it. I’ll write in Bernie. /s
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If trump wins and America can't defeat his senile version of fascism, then it's already on the death bed waiting for the next republican to take power...
trump is the best authoritarian we're going to get, he's easy mode, the republicans will get someone worse, someone who has the ability to think beyond his next shit.
It's not going to get better only worse...
I was proud to vote for Bernie in the 2016 and 2020 primaries, but I bit the bullet and phone banked for Biden even though he was far from my first choice. There's way too much at stake here.
Yes. Better Biden than Trump but Bernie would have been better.
I volunteered for Sanders campaign but didn't do anything for Biden. He didn't earn my vote. Democracy at work.
I honestly get where you are coming from. I protest voted green party in 2016 thinking Hillary had the election in the bag - and felt terrible afterwards. Voted for Biden in 2020 even though he was low on my list. Without seriously overhauling our voting process to ranked choice or STAR voting, not voting for one of the major party candidates just helps the other.
Who did you vote for? Or did you just not vote?
Citizens United needs to be removed.
The massive polarisation in the media needs to be addressed and the outright blatant lies told by the Rightwing goons needs to be legally stopped. ‘Free Speech’ my ass. They need to be labelled ‘opinion’ or ‘entertainment’ or something other than pretending to be ‘fair’ or ‘news’.
I think an "equal air time" law that requires that corrections to misinformation and disinformation be provided at the same scope, scale and duration as the offending material. Since Fox news backed down on their dominion case, they ought to reprint every article, rehost every show and re-run every ribbon and banner on all of their platforms for next 3 years, admitting that they lied, linking sources to proof of their lies, and advising everyone that 2020 had no meaningful amounts of voter fraud on either side. Failure to do so should be fined at a rate of 1000 dollars per second of missed remediation time.
Unfortunately the law would've never applied to fox news, as it was broadcast only and cable was exempt. But even so nowadays so much of the information sphere is online, through Facebook, Twitter and the thousand different right wing blog news sites that you aren't really going to be able to stop anything. The American system very dependent on the two parties having a bipartisan consensus. But after a few decades of the right wing media sphere whipping the base into frenzy after frenzy the 'true believers' are the ones in government now and the idea of compromise is done for.
The massive polarisation in the media needs to be addressed and the outright blatant lies told by the Rightwing goons needs to be legally stopped. ‘Free Speech’ my ass. They need to be labelled ‘opinion’ or ‘entertainment’ or something other than pretending to be ‘fair’ or ‘news’.
Replace "rightwing goons" with "leftwing commies" and this is exactly Trump's plan lmao. Do you not see how that is a problem?
Sanders is one of the only politicians unworthy of the guillotine.
Bernie is a Genocide defender and wants to keep funding israel even now.
We don't have much of a democracy as things stand considering the average person doesn't influence policy lol. If all hope is on Biden clutching it out then we better brace for the end. Dems had 4 years to plan ahead.
What sort of plan do you think an incumbent president who has actually been doing policy should adopt?
We did plan ahead, I'm sorry you don't like what we planned but you were also fully welcome to participate in the process the entire time.
The same process that locked Bernie out?
The same one where biden literally promised he would be a one term president but now has turned around and is running again and there is no democratic challenger?
If becoming less popular than when you beat Trump and enabling genocide is planning ahead, then I guess it is over.
Damn you suck at planning lmao
"Republicans are going to end democracy"
"Why would Joe Biden do this to us??"
This.
Funny how many comments just went poof! Gone! So this place is basically /r/politics now? Mods smoking out every opinion they don't like?
Funny thing is, the deleted comments were from liberals, not raging conservatives spewing bile and lies. Must not have passed the purity test.
Funny how many comments just went poof!
Are they in the mod log? The link is at the bottom of each page.
Or maybe the mods are actually moderating by cutting out the off-topic arguments and BS threads that don't contribute anything to the overall discourse of the discussion.
I can imagine most of the comments were 14yo's and trolls saying GeNoCiDe JoE hUrRrR
So this place is basically /r/politics now?
👨🚀🔫👨🚀
So what do you think that means for mod bias if they're deleting "liberal" comments on a platform that is largely home to leftists?
My thoughts exactly. Why is it that these "politics" sites just end up going completely Left? Is this "politics" or "Democrat Politics?" I get confused... apparently, the Right isn't allowed to have an opinion any where anymore..
You're allowed to have an opinion and we're allowed to tell you that your opinion sucks
Does the right still have anything left to say that isn't hate speech? The entire conservative economic schtick has failed the reality test so badly that most conservatives don't even want to talk about it anymore. It's all border wall nonsense, election denial, and reactionary isolationism now, and that's the saner half of conservatism.
Pray tell, these opinions of yours that you're afraid of sharing publicly?
Democrats are not left.
By supporting a different Republican, how hard is it? In many states you can even vote in the primary of a party you're not part of, people think it's beneath them to pick a candidate of the party they dislike whose agenda is least-unlikable. There's no law preventing you from switching parties on a whim.
I like the insinuation that the US is an actual "democracy" lmao
If we do an election and the wrong candidate wins, the democracy goes away.
So you can't vote for the wrong candidate.
And also, you can't vote for a third-party candidate.
And also, you can't abstain from voting.
So, really, you have exactly one choice that you're allowed to make.
Democracy!
It is for anything besides president. That's the sad part.
i’d say it’s largely, tho not completely, a de facto oligarchy now.
It never was, or was ever meant to be, an actual "democracy". Imperial core countries' political systems only serve to protect capital and imperialism, with a thin veneer of "democracy" to discourage uprising and two parties to divide the working class.
I know you mrrrkns absolutely hate it when furriners' talk about your politics, but it saddens me to see a fellow democracy in such a state. Both these guys are demented old f&@ks! These are the best candidates your democratic system can give you? Really? I know we Aussies have plenty to cringe about, but jeez!
Trump is a result of the systems failure to address underlying problems. The underlying problems can all be associated with a single common source: Inflation.
Governments printing money at a rate greater than value is created in the economy, nets you inflation - and that has been going on since around the mid 90's in a very real way, and even before that. We can more or less call this the "NeoLiberal Era" if you like. Around the 90's is when things get bad - and to more or less cover it up, the CPI was manipulated (read: Fixed like you would fix a wrestling match) to make inflation look acceptable - in reality: Replace Steak for Ground beef in the CPI shopping cart and tell people it's still relevant.
End of the 90's you get the ,Com bubble and crash. 2008 Market Crash - and you get "Quantitative Easing" being sold as a fix - when all it is is, PRINTING MONEY. Then during the pandemic a huge push to shut down the economy (largely impacting the lowest wage earners the hardest just FYI) requiring the government to provide stimulus, coupled with grands, loans, and such to businesses in hopes they would keep people employed (hint: They didn't). And so we have had a series of the most NeoLiberal thing possible: Publicize the risk, privatize the profits, and screw the poor over in the process.
The fix: Reduce the Money Supply. Drive to a negative inflation number. But the kicker is? The wealthiest hedge funds, realestate investors, and what not would basically go belly up from that type of move. And why? Because if inflation lowers - the debts accrued cost more to maintain the interest on, than they can gain with inflation flipping for real profit over time. Once you reduce the money supply by at this point about 2/3eds - we can move to aiming for a 0% inflation number. The government should at that point be focused on reducing debt one way or another.
The real problem for the US Economy is, if any action is taken to reduce the debt - it will be a clear signal that the US economy is not gaining value, and that the Dollar Value is currently overvalued. And that could in a very real way cause a spiral. And a fear of the Spiral is making the long term problem worse as it's kicked down the road.
By the way: You can take the US out of this and replace just about any western nation into the mix and find the same problem. Actually, China really fits in here. And oh boy a correction is coming and it's going to be ugly.
Cue*: “this is the most important election of our lifetime”
*Cue
He meant, queue up to cast your vote!
Sanders looks like Noam Chomsky in this picture.
... which, if you really feel that way, is exactly why we need to implement more democratic and efficient voting systems, like ranked choice (instant runoff),, STAR, approval, etc.
As American political systems are today, the only viable candidates to win the presidency in 2024 are Joe Biden (a well-meaning, old white man) and Donald Trump (old white narcissistic Putin-loving vindictive criminal rapist who doesn't care for democracy and can't remember his wife's name).
I'll be voting for Biden because even if you really believe he's "evil", he's certainly the far lesser evil than Trump (for the reasons listed above and then some).
I'm not going to hold it against Biden for being old and white. All for moving toward equality but I'd be willing to give anyone a chance if they have some ideas (like an actual platform) and some drive to make some positive change. It's more the fact that Biden seems slightly demented and acts like a prototypical old white man stereotype that worries me. Of course I'm not even going to talk about the alternative though, the choice should be simple here given the options but it's a depressing choice either way.
Ah both sides BS again.
Also correct.
What fuckin crazypants logic is this
"Well what I have is way far away from what I want, so what's the point in choosing the clearly better alternative"
As applied to this particular election, this is like saying "I want to climb this mountain, but the hill in front of me isn't where I want to get to, it's like thousands of feet lower than the summit, so what's the difference if I jump into this ravine filled with lava instead"
Also what happened to that video call where you offered to prove that you were who you say you are? Not a right-wing shill posting anti-Biden things to discourage Democrats from voting?
Here's the reality - it's been 171 years since we've last seen a third party take presidency.
I repeat - 171 years! If you're still foolish to think that this year is the year or foolish then to think that 2020 and 2016 were the years for the Independent Party. All that you're doing is just wasting effort and time going out in the voter's booth and voting Independent just for a self-pat on the back.
Who's arguing about the viability of third-party candidates? Your comment is a non sequitur.
I'll add that the only, and i'll say it again, ONLY, viable path to 3rd party success in this country is through more democratic voting system reforms. (ranked-choice, STAR, approval, etc.)
Anyone who doesn't understand this is either ignorant, stupid, or playing dumb for sophistry and manipulation's sake.
As his position on the Israel-Gaza war threatens to upset his support
In the bi-line. I don't think these people know who Bernies supporters are.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
There are posters from different stages in his political life, including an inevitable “Feel the Bern” placard and a photograph from Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua, which mayor Sanders twinned Burlington with during Ronald Reagan’s Contra war against the leftwing Sandinistas.
He also dedicates the book to his brother, Larry Sanders, who lives in Oxford, England, and is a former Green party councillor, and to his four children – one by his first wife, Deborah Shiling Messing, and three stepchildren, who are Jane’s but whom he considers his own – as well as to those seven grandchildren.
With his index finger jabbing as though pointing to an invisible crowd, he tells me that before the pandemic three multibillionaires (Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett) owned more between them than the combined wealth of the 160 million Americans who make up the bottom half of society.
More than 400 of his former staffers signed an open letter imploring him to shift his position; one of them, his 2020 campaign spokesperson, Briahna Joy Gray, tweeted “biggest political disappointment of our generation” in response to an interview in which Sanders explained his view.
For all his talk of revolution, for all his tax-the-rich bills and declarations of radical populism, a large part of the Sanders creed is nothing more nor less than an appeal for the basic fundamentals of life – health, housing, a living wage, education – that are taken for granted by all other developed nations.
Is there a danger many young Americans and voters of colour who formed a critical part of the coalition that elected Biden – and defeated Trump – in 2020 will look at the rematch of the same two candidates in November, decide they aren’t inspired by either, and stay at home?
The original article contains 3,677 words, the summary contains 295 words. Saved 92%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
Bernie is right about why people vote for Trump, he's wrong that it will be the end of democracy. America has never had a democracy, it's had an electoral college with gerrymandering and 2 senators per state.
Well whatever we have is still better than a dictatorship.
So, which country with 300 Million people is doing it the right way? China? India? Do tell...do tell!
They've been saying this every election. This line is the norm now. There never was much of a democracy.
I don't think it's a coincidence that "this line" became normal at the same time the GOP has been enacting antidemocratic legislation and putting forward antidemocratic candidates.
at the same time the GOP has been enacting antidemocratic legislation
1940: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnice_P._Clement
1964: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Eagle_Eye_(United_States)
1981: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballot_Security_Task_Force
From 1838 to Present: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felony_disenfranchisement_in_Florida
Were you alive in 2000? Bush & Gore were often parodied as too similar
Also, The End of History
It hasn't been forever. It's been since Trump started running, and the Republcan party pulled the Southern Stratgy Part 2.
Did climate change stop being real when we started breaking the record temp every year?
VOTE DEMOCRAT OR WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!!!
It will be the end of democracy. Just like last time. Remember when democracy died?
Most presidential elections have had some kind of doomsayers. This particular election has a candidate that supported (supposedly indirectly) an insurrection, stated it's ok to execute political opponents, and has openly said some very nazi like things. This election is a bit different than the others.
Then the left puts up a weak candidate, again, and says eat that shit sandwich, so I get the frustration.
What left?
All i see is fascist capitalism vs narcist capitalism. Neither cares what the people actually want. But yeah one is significantly worse… which means reasonable people have only one option to vote. Freedom be damned.
Don't worry, the democrats will yet again cheat enough to make sure they win and in doing so, save democracy. Cause god forbid people would decide who they want for president. That's not how you save democracy !
Democracy is more of a sliding scale than a true or false. The US has had significant democratic decline during the last decade or two, and it was definitely not helped by Trump.
Slide far enough and well, that’s the end of democracy.
lmao schizophrenic
That’s what they said last time.
It was true last time. It's true this time. That's the funny thing about fascism - it is usually a one-way choice. You only need to let fascists win once to forever lose your right to choose your leaders.
And?
Good needs to win each time. Evil only needs to win once.
Bernie wants to continue to support israel.
And Bernie refuses to acknowledge israel commits Genocide.
His words ring hollow.
Watch this pathetic man dance around the subject of a Genocide on two million people
Oh brother... they say the same thing every time a Republican becomes President....if Trump becomes President, he'll be exactly like he was before. This is just more fearmongering from the Left.
Well Trump did actively support an insurrection, I don't know how you can't see this as a threat to democracy in the US...
How did you get to this conclusion? What in the article makes you think that?
If Trump wins what? An election?
It's a good thing no one who was ever democratically elected dismantled democracy so they could never lose the power they gained.
1, he's been elected before, yet we've still got our election system. 2, democrats are actually trying to dismantle democracy by denying a huge number of voters the ability to vote for their choice for president. Dont by hypocritical, flip the roles around and imagine Trump or republican states are the ones barring Biden from running. It's not gonna sit well with you is it?
Democracies mean the people decide, even if that goes against who you want to win.
Like Hitler, who was democratically elected before ending democracy in Germany?
Yes, exactly.
Hitler wasn't directly elected. Hindenburg won the election vs Hitler for president in 1932, then later Hindenburg appointed Hitler as chancellor after nazis became the largest party in the Reichstag. Hitler got to work using nazis and other right wing parties in parliament to pass laws to give more powers to himself (using excuses like the Reichstag fire), and then later usurped presidential powers as well after Hindenburg's death.
But your point still stands, democracies have failed before and America isn't immune to that. It could happen in America too. And some of Trump's plans in 2020 and his plans for 2024 are very similar to the nazi playbook. They kind of tried to pull a Reichstag fire on January 6th by blaming antifa or the deep state or whatever crazy conspiracy theory they cooked up to try and distract from their failed coup.
no he wasnt
Trump doesn't seem to really care whether he wins or not, just in case you haven't noticed...
Just like last time, he'll claim that he's won if he's ever even slightly ahead, and he and his cult will harass people to "stop the count".
Just like last time, he and his cult will resort to violence and insurrection to overthrow democracy even if he loses.
You have to remember that a large swath of (generally) younger people are wildly misinformed/uninformed on the actual power of the presidency. They have the idea that the president can universally override all powers of the other branches at any given time and/or that both other branches will be captured (conveniently while a given dictator-to-be is in office) in a significant enough way that whatever piece of legislation the president outrightly wants, they will receive.
A lot of people act like the president has unilateral power, not just younger people.
He doesn’t, there’s checks and balances in Congress and the courts.
But the courts are stacked and Congress is pretty closely split by which side of history their members have historically been on.
Easier said than done I know but if Trump wins my wife and I would strongly consider emigrating to another country. There's only so much insanity one can take before needlessly going down with the ship. And if the calculus is that that my kids will have better prospects elsewhere, then so be it.
You're assuming that 1st world countries will have us.
Fascism is on the rise globally. If enough decent people leave the US, we will fall into a fascist regime, and it will be the beginning of World War Three, with the US leading the equivalent of the Axis powers. No place in the world will be safe for you or your children. That's the hard, honest truth.
The problem is that without good people to stop them, evil people taking charge of the USA would radically change the entire world.
It's not easy, but most of us have to stay. Maybe all of us...
I'll be in my 3rdW country eating popcorn
Yes. That's the end game of our type of voting system. You get two options and both suck.
We will get no progress until we get something like ranked choice voting.
Obligatory CGP Grey video about the inevitability of a 2-party system
https://youtu.be/s7tWHJfhiyo
It always has been.
I wonder if Haley is staying in the race betting that Trump won't be able to run in November
That has been my assumption as well.
I think she would help Biden if she stayed in the race as an independent
Betting on Trump's last hamburder
We need to focus on smaller winnable races. Unfortunately we can't shortcut our way into the presidential candidates we want, we need to replace the establishment and build a foundation of allies to support it. I know a lot of us are in conservative areas where you can't realistically get new candidates elected locally, but you can still volunteer for races in other parts of the country. If we can shift politics in the house and Senate the presidency will follow. It's hard work but it's possible.
When's the last time that hasn't been the case? 1964?
Always has been that way