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Tag Archives: progressive movement

9/25-26 Weekend Open Thread

The Progressive Wing Posted on September 25, 2021 by BennySeptember 25, 2021

Bernie spoke to The World Transformed conference via Zoom today. Here’s a clip from it.

"We are now taking on everybody:

The billionaire class
The healthcare industry
The fossil fuel industry
The drug companies

These people are very religious. Their religion is greed, and they're prepared to destroy the planet in order to make a few $ more." @BernieSanders #twt21 pic.twitter.com/ypebtNp0lh

— People for Bernie (@People4Bernie) September 25, 2021

This is from the Mirror UK. There is a little bit of reporting but not much.

Bernie Sanders urged Keir Starmer to follow Joe Biden’s example of embracing the left of his party.

The US Senator spoke to former Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell via video link at The World Transformed festival, on the fringe of Labour Party Conference in Brighton.

Mr McDonnell asked Senator Sanders, a prominent socialist on the left of the Democratic Party, how he’d managed to build a relationship with a “centrist leader” and convince the President to adopt a “radical programme”.

“I want to let you into a secret,” Mr McDonnell said. “We have a centrist leader as well, but we’re having problems in ensuring that we have a working relationship from the left with that relationship.”

Senator Sanders, who campaigned against President Biden for the Democratic Presidential Nomination, said Mr Biden had embraced the passionate youth movement the left had energised in the US.

“You’re quite right,” Senator Sanders said.

“[Biden’s] history is one of being a moderate centrist, but he is a very decent human being.

“I know him quite well and I say that without hesitation. He does not like to see suffering, racism or sexism around him.”

He said: “To his credit, and I think he deserves enormous credit, he looked around him and he saw the kind of movement that we helped develop … and the excitement of young people in wanting transformative change.”

He added: “We still have differences, but to his credit he was prepared to think big not small – and he understood that the only way that we bring people into the political process is by talking about the pain that they are now experiencing.”

The World Transformed is a festival organised by the Jeremy Corbyn-backing Momentum campaign group to coincide with Labour Party Conference.

Speaking at the end of the session, Mr McDonnell told the audience that when Mr Starmer was elected, he and Mr Corbyn “took the view that we wouldn’t support doing to him what they did to us – which was every day the personal attacks and abuse.”

He said the pair had been “providing a critique of the mistakes and errors that have been going on at the moment – but we’ve not done that through personal attacks…we’ve done it through political analysis.”

“It’s not the left that are undermining Starmer,” he said.

“It’s Starmer that is undermining Starmer.”

More news, tweets, etc in the comments. Weekend open thread.

Posted in Bernie Sanders | Tagged Labour Party, open thread news, progressive movement

11/3 Benny’s Bar 1600 Pennsylvania is Open for Election 2020 Night Part 1

The Progressive Wing Posted on November 3, 2020 by BennyNovember 3, 2020

Polls are just about closed in western IN and KY; eastern parts of those states closed at 6pm.

(image attribution: NYT)

Music videos are encouraged, along with tweets, news, jibber-jabber.

Budtenders are available as well!

Bar Wait Person with Mask 2020-07-24 170727.png

Bar Wait Person with Mask 2020-07-24 170727.png

Posted in News, Video | Tagged 2020, Bernie Sanders, Dems, DNC, Donald Trump, General Election, GOP, Joseph Biden, Paula Jean Swearengin, progressive movement, RNC

7/15 Progressives Have a Window in TX; AOC Punks Ivanka’s Goya Ad; News Roundup & OT

The Progressive Wing Posted on July 15, 2020 by BennyJuly 15, 2020

Si es Trump, tiene que ser corrupto 💸 https://t.co/Ti3oxFO6oY

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) July 15, 2020

Leave it to AOC to tee up for someone to jab the Trumps. Spoken in Spanish…nonetheless.

Texas gained some progressives wins for the GE this fall. Grim and Chavez at The Intercept write:

The recent wave of progressive primary victories rolled into Texas on Tuesday evening, with Candace Valenzuela and Mike Siegel pulling into strong leads against centrist opponents for the chance to flip Republican-held suburban districts. In the Travis County district attorney race, José Garza, an immigrant rights activist and former public defender backed by the Democratic Socialists of America, ousted incumbent Margaret Moore. The Democratic national party’s pick for Senate, M.J. Hegar, meanwhile, found herself locked in a much closer fight than expected with Royce West, though by the end of the night, she appeared headed for a general election race against Republican Sen. John Cornyn.

With well more than half of the precincts reporting, Siegel was leading physician Pritesh Gandhi by 9 percentage points and declared victory around 10 p.m., Texas time. Valenzuela was up nearly 20 points over veteran Kim Olson, and also declared victory.

Computer engineer Donna Imam was leading Christine Mann, a physician who backed single-payer health care, by almost 14 percentage points in a race where the ideological lines were less clearly drawn.

snip

The wins would be well-timed. Simply winning a handful of House races each cycle is nowhere near enough to change the structure of Congress fast enough to stave off cataclysmic climate change tipping points, to rescue the economy from a tailspin, or to address the unfolding health care crisis. But if the window for big legislative maneuvering opens in 2021, and House Democrats feel that their seats are in jeopardy if they don’t go big, the consensus within the party of what the most strategic move is could shift left.

SIEGEL, A CIVIL rights attorney who supports a Green New Deal and Medicare for All, first ran in 2018, when Democrats considered the district out of range, but surprised officials back in Washington by winning 47 percent of the vote. That blood in the water drew new candidates, notably corporate attorney Shannon Hutcheson, who was backed by EMILY’s List and was clearly the establishment favorite, even though she did not have the official backing of the DCCC.

But a super PAC backing Gandhi, 314 Action, spent heavily pounding away at Hutcheson, and she failed to make the runoff. The super PAC has continued to spend big — dropping close to $600,000 on the race — in the runoff. The PAC presents itself as pro-science, but endorsed John Hickenlooper, a champion of fracking, in Colorado, and Gandhi has called the Green New Deal and Medicare for All “fool’s gold.” 314’s main line of attack against Siegel is that his loss last cycle proves he is unable to win the general election. Ironically, of course, it was his surprisingly narrow defeat that coaxed Gandhi and Hutcheson into the race. The parallels with Levin’s 2018 race are notable, as Applegate, like Siegel, helped make the district competitive the cycle prior, and 314 Action helped power Levin over Applegate.

Sen. Kamala Harris had endorsed Gandhi, while Siegel had the backing of Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Siegel’s outspoken civil rights record was a boon throughout June, as protests erupted after the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers.

In his victory speech Tuesday night, Siegel noted that the district is more than just a stretch of suburbs, zeroing in on the closure of three rural hospitals in the district over the past 10 years. “We are in a district where the legacy of Jim Crow racism hangs heavy,” he said, noting the recent five-year anniversary of the death of Sandra Bland in the district.

The wave of protests also helped Valenzuela, who surged significantly following the March 3 primary. Last week, a survey, which was commissioned by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and conducted in July by Data for Progress, revealed a significant shift in the race, showing that Valenzuela was climbing, leading Olson by an 11-point margin. Early voting data from her campaign suggests that the surge was fueled by higher turnout among voters of color. If elected, Valenzuela would be the first Afro-Latina in Congress. And as someone who grew up homeless, at one point “sleeping in a kiddie pool outside a gas station,” Valenzuela would also be bringing this economic perspective to Congress, where many of the lawmakers are millionaires. She noted in her victory speech that, thanks to a newborn and another young child, “the majority of our campaign was run out of our master bathroom.”

Leading up to the March primary, Olson led the rest of the field in fundraising and as a retired Air Force colonel, fit the mold of the party’s preferred candidate. But her record, specifically that Olson was charged with war profiteering in Iraq, had the potential to be too big of a political liability in the general election, so the House Democrats’ campaign arm stayed out of the race. EMILY’s List, which doesn’t typically weigh in on races between two pro-choice women, backed Valenzuela.

Valenzuela also won endorsements from the Congressional Hispanic, Black, Asian, and Progressive Caucuses, and lawmakers like Warren and Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga. In the most recent fundraising quarter, The Intercept reported last week, Valenzuela outraised Olson, $465,000 to $438,000, with a smaller average campaign contribution.

Garza, executive director of the Workers Defense Project, ran on a progressive platform that focused on transforming the criminal justice system to decriminalize poverty. He was endorsed by Sanders, Warren, Julián and Joaquin Castro, the Austin DSA chapter, the Center for Popular Democracy Action, and the Working Families Party. One of the major highlights of Garza’s platform was a vow to treat substance abuse as a public health crisis and end the prosecution of low-level drug offenses, which he defined as the sale and possession of a gram or less of narcotics.

More news, tweets, videos, etc in the comments. This also serves as an open thread.

Posted in 2020 Elections, Activism, Bernie Sanders, Democrats, grassroots, News, Open Thread | Tagged AOC, Latino vote, progressive movement, Trump, TX

7/10 News Roundup and OT: Bar is Open

The Progressive Wing Posted on July 10, 2020 by BennyJuly 10, 2020

Has Biden Really Embraced the Left?

Dave Weigel at WaPo writes:

The last time Joe Biden appeared on a presidential ticket, the Democratic Party’s platform contained no mention of marijuana. Its health-care language focused on the Affordable Care Act, suggesting that the fight for universal coverage was pretty much won. It promised to “fight inequalities in our criminal justice system,” without spelling out how, and urged that when the death penalty is used, it should “not be arbitrary.”

Biden is happily inheriting a party that has moved to the left, without interruption, since he left the vice presidency. The report this week from his Unity Task Force, the product of a deal between the nominee and primary runner-up Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), found Biden’s team inching a little further in that direction — cautious, careful with its wording, but dramatically different from the politics that defined much of Biden’s career.

“I think the compromise that they came up with, if implemented, will make Biden the most progressive president since FDR,” Sanders said in a Wednesday night interview with MSNBC’s Chris Hayes.

Republicans quickly repurposed Sanders’s answer to describe Biden as a catspaw for the country’s resurgent socialist movements. “This is surrendering to the socialists,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said in a Thursday interview on Fox News. The Republican National Committee highlighted sentences taken directly from some of Sanders’s campaign white papers to accuse Biden of “plagiarism,” a charge that evoked his botched 1988 presidential campaign, if not quite describing a task force designed to merge platforms.

But the basic Republican critique was right. Biden, seen by voters as the most moderate of their two dozen or so options in the primary, has welcomed a shift away from the careful politics Democrats deployed, for decades, to mollify suburban voters. Under his proposals, millions of voters are offered a new government health-care plan, and millions more are offered federal housing and housing assistance. Tax cuts, emphasized for years to convince swing voters, aren’t prioritized.

“In 2008, one of the things we had to constantly fight in places like the I-4 corridor was taxes,” said Steve Schale, an Obama-Biden campaign veteran who’s now a strategist for the pro-Biden super PAC Unite the Country, referring to a vote-rich stretch of Florida cities and suburbs. “I bet you we ran more ads about Barack Obama cutting middle-class taxes than anything. We had to win that fight. Our ad strategy was built around keeping that fight neutral.”

Tough-on-crime politicking has been de-emphasized, too. The party’s 2012 platform did not mention the “war on drugs.” The 2016 platform, reshaped by Sanders delegates, condemned the drug war for the “imprisonment of millions of Americans, disproportionately people of color.” The task force’s paper, with Biden’s name at the top, pledges to “end the failed ‘War on Drugs’ ” entirely.

Weigel is right about FNC though. They are crafting the narrative reporting that AOC and Bernie, the socialists, are taking over Democratic Establishment, and it is showing up in other Red State.com outlets. I guess the new norm is the “Progressive Establishment.” I wish that were true. I’m not fooled by any of this and neither are most progressives.

Every single day for the past 21 years… https://t.co/tFw6Jla0vw

— Warren Gunnels (@GunnelsWarren) July 10, 2020

More news, tweets, videos in the comments. TGIF….

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i-am-drinking-until-this-election-is-over-republican-democrat-bar-sign.jpg

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Mocktails Image.JPG

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Double Vodka.JPG

Posted in 2020 Elections, Activism, Bernie Sanders, Democrats, grassroots, News, Open Thread | Tagged Bernie Sanders Joe Biden, cannabis, Joe Biden, Progressive Establishment, progressive movement

May 4 Kent State and OT

The Progressive Wing Posted on May 4, 2020 by polarbear4May 4, 2020

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/04/kent-state-massacre-marked-start-of-americas-polarization

i’m not sure how the news came in that day, probably on the radio since my new husband and I didn’t have a TV. I turned 20 in Houston, he at 27 in April. we had both marched against the war, but this was a new realization, a shock to so many.

<blockquote>To Lou Capecci, the crack of the national guard’s guns sounded like more of the same.

“It was pretty common to have demonstrations every day. The national guard had been on campus for a few days. They would shoot tear gas into the middle of the crowd and people would throw it back at them. Then we heard the shots and at first everybody kind of shrugged their shoulders and thought more tear gas,” he said.

But the young student at Kent State University in Ohio was mistaken.

Fifty years ago today, 28 soldiers opened fire on anti-Vietnam war demonstrators, letting loose 67 bullets in just 13 seconds. Four students were killed, nine wounded, and a fissure exposed in American society that shaped politics into the Trump era.

To large parts of the country, the Kent State massacre was a shocking and seminal event – American soldiers gunning down white students was unthinkable until it happened.

Part of the shock for Capecci, who walked away from the demonstration minutes before the national guard fired, was that he thought the soldiers’ weapons were just for show.

“No one knew the national guard had real bullets. We were completely shocked. It just never occurred to anyone that they would actually have bullets to shoot people. It may sound naive but we talked about that for years afterwards,” he said.

If there’s an era when the tribalisation of the Trump era began, it’s this time

David Paul Kuhn, author

It was naive. In other parts of the country, the police were killing African Americans protesting for equal rights, including on college campuses before and immediately after Kent State with little attention from the television cameras that gave saturation coverage to the deaths of the white students.</blockquote>

Read more at the link.

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Bernie Sanders, COVID-19, Joe Biden, Kent State, National Guard, Ohio, Open Thread, progressive movement, Richard Nixon, Vietnam War

4/17 TGIF- Next Gen for the Progressive Movement: Nina Turner; Evening OT

The Progressive Wing Posted on April 17, 2020 by BennyApril 17, 2020

Nina is doing the internet media circuit today. She spoke with Niko House earlier today:

Great interview. Just love @ninaturner ❤️https://t.co/KWK9Yx4Dxt

— #CaliBernication (@brooklynnygirl) April 17, 2020

At 9:oo ET, Nina and her campaign sister, Dr. Victoria Dooley will be on Instagram to talk about the campaign and beyond Bernie.

TONITE!! 9pm ET @DrDooleyMD @ninaturner ✊ #HELLOsomebody 🙌 pic.twitter.com/Q0kfmdxCBy

— Ԍεοϝϝ 🌹 (@SpittingBack) April 17, 2020

Meantime, bar is open. Enjoy a little music from the video jukebox. This serves as an open thread.

i-am-drinking-until-this-election-is-over-republican-democrat-bar-sign.jpg

i-am-drinking-until-this-election-is-over-republican-democrat-bar-sign.jpg

(credit:@w61)

Here’s a song to start our TGIF.

Nina and Victoria, you’re always welcome to drop by our Nest.

Posted in Activism, grassroots, Justice Democrats | Tagged Nina Turner, progressive movement, Victoria Dooley

4/10 TGIF : TYT Viewers’ Poll on GE Indicates Biden has Work to Do to Earn Progressive Votes & OT

The Progressive Wing Posted on April 10, 2020 by BennyApril 10, 2020

Cenk Ugyur said the poll, while unscientific, indicates that most progressives aren’t voting for Trump. As you see from the graphic, Biden didn’t get 50%. Over half were voting for someone else or not voting for the top of the ticket. Now, this is strictly a snapshot. No cross tabs.

If TYT or Democracy Now were watched more than just progressives, this contest could have been different. But it is what it is.

Bloomberg set to bid for campaign management (perhaps ads) for Team Biden. I don’t recall open bids like this before, but maybe this is just new to me.

Ryan Grim at The Intercept writes:

Hawkfish, which ran the presidential campaign of Mike Bloomberg, is in serious talks to serve the presidential campaign of Joe Biden, according to sources with knowledge of the ongoing negotiations. Along with Biden’s campaign, the firm is courting a wide swath of other progressive and Democratic organizations, opening up the possibility of Bloomberg gaining significant control over the party’s technology and data infrastructure.

The digital consulting firm has had little political experience outside of the Bloomberg campaign, a trial by fire in which the former New York City mayor burned through nearly $1 billion in less than four months. Hawkfish, which Bloomberg founded in 2019 to be the operational backbone of his campaign, is not yet able to sell its track record or quality of service, since it has no other major clients and few, if any, minor ones.

But instead it comes with other enticements to clients. Democratic operatives who’ve been pitched by Hawkfish say that the firm is able to offer extraordinarily low prices by operating at a loss subsidized by Bloomberg, whose wealth dangles as an added benefit that could come with signing the firm. A Hawkfish insider, who spoke on the condition of anonymity so as not to jeopardize employment, confirmed that the company is willing to operate at a loss in order to grab control of the party infrastructure, explaining that the firm hopes to offer a fee that would be small enough to entice the Biden campaign while passing muster with federal regulators. (If a firm offers services for less than fair market value, the discount is considered under campaign finance laws to be an in-kind contribution, and thus subject to legal limits depending on the entity collecting the contribution. A presidential campaign can’t accept more than $2,800 from a single individual per election, or any contributions at all from a company.)

“When the objective isn’t money but control, $18 million is incredibly cheap to become the center of gravity for all Democratic political information, which we would be if both Biden and [House Democrats] have to come through us,” the source said, referring to the amount of money the Bloomberg campaign transferred to the Democratic Party last month, in a reversal of his earlier pledge to create a Super PAC in support of the party’s nominee. “And in the current environment, the public sees this as generosity.”

Downsides: Bloomberg will gain even more access to contracts etc in a Biden administration, and I suspect Liz is no longer on the VP short list.

The upside is that perhaps Team Biden knows now the clock is being reset.

Bernie made an appearance this evening on PBS Newshour:

"For all intents and purposes, … I think we have won the ideological battle," @BernieSanders tells @JudyWoodruff. pic.twitter.com/xKi8MLNV5g

— PBS NewsHour (@NewsHour) April 10, 2020

When the full interview is available on YT, that will be posted. Other snippets from twitter will be in the comments. Update: here’s the transcript of the interview.

Judy Woodruff:

This week, the Democratic primary election took a momentous turn, as Senator Bernie Sanders announced he is suspending his presidential campaign.

The senator from Vermont joins me now.

Welcome to the “NewsHour.”

Senator, you said on Wednesday, when you made the announcement, you were doing this in part because of the pandemic, and, as you said, it would be difficult to continue under the circumstances.

Today, you announced a proposal to guarantee health care during this period. Who is this aimed at?

Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.:

Well, it’s aimed at the tens of millions of workers who are losing their jobs, Judy.

And when you lose your job, you lose your health care. So, on top of 87 million people who were uninsured and underinsured before the crisis, you got tens of millions more who are not going to have any health insurance.

And it’s my view that, in the midst of this terrible, terrible crisis, when people have so much to worry about, the least we can do is to say to all of those people, you know what? You go to the doctor when you’re sick. Don’t worry about the health care bills. Medicare will fill in all the gaps and cover those people who are uninsured or underinsured today.

Judy Woodruff:

And do you have support for this among Democratic colleagues?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Yes, we do.

There’s support in the House, and I think you’re going to see growing support in the Senate. And I think that the cost is reasonable. It will be about $150 billion over four months, which, given everything that we’re dealing with, is not a lot of money.

But to say to every American that, don’t worry about the costs of health care, you’re not going to have to pay it out of your own pocket, you’re not going to have to pay for prescription drugs, I think that will take a huge burden off the shoulders of so many of our people, and that is the very least that we should be doing right now.

Judy Woodruff:

Senator, let’s talk about this election.

What, after 15 months of pour-your-heart-out campaigning, and this after you spent, what, years campaigning in 2016, you had to make this announcement that you didn’t want to make. This is not where you wanted this to end up.

But, as you look back, what went right and what went wrong?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Well, look, I think that what went right is that, for all intents and purposes, Judy, I think we have won the ideological battle.

I think ideas that I fought for four or five years ago which everybody considered to be radical and extreme are now part of the mainstream discussion. And, in fact, many of them are being implemented across the country, raising the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour, making public colleges and universities tuition-free, forgiving student debt, guaranteeing health care to all people as a human right, focusing on climate change as an existential threat, immigration reform, criminal justice reform.

Many of the ideas that we brought forth which were initially rejected are now moving forward. And I think that is the best thing that we have accomplished.

Furthermore, we have won the generational struggle. We did very poorly — and I don’t know why, to tell you the truth — with older people, but we have done phenomenally well with younger people. And by that, I mean people 45, 50 or younger.

And the truth is, that is the future of America. So, the ideas that we have fought for are gaining momentum among younger people and will be the policies that guide America in the future.

Judy Woodruff:

Senator, I think that — I was just going to say, I think the numbers show you didn’t do as well with young people as you had in 2016.

But what I want to ask you about is, you are supporting — at least you acknowledge Joe Biden will be the nominee, and yet you’re going to compete against him in the primaries to come. What is the value of that?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

No, we’re not competing against — we don’t — there’s no active campaigning. There’s nothing to compete about. Joe Biden will, everything being equal, be the nominee.

But I think our — my name will be on the ballot. That’s the way it is in all of the remaining states that hold primaries. We would like to get as many delegates as we can, so that we have a stronger position at the Democratic Convention to help us shape the new platform of the Democratic Party and the other issues that the DNC deals with.

Judy Woodruff:

You say you want to shape the platform, and yet, I think, it appears, from the many last conventions, it’s what the nominee wants that ultimately matters.

And, right now, Joe Biden has moved in your direction. He’s talked about lowering the age for Medicare eligibility to 60. He’s talked about making free college tuition more available.

But, at the same time, he has not endorsed Medicare for all. Senator Sherrod Brown, liberal Democrat, was on the show two nights ago, said he doesn’t think that Joe Biden is going to do that. Is that sufficient for you?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Well, look, Judy, what I said on the very first day that I began my campaign, I said that, if I lose, I will be there to support the Democratic winner, the nominee, the person who wins the nomination, because I think that Donald Trump is the most dangerous president in the modern history of this country.

And we all have got to rally around the winner to defeat Trump. And that’s certainly what I will do. But I hope, in the coming weeks and months, I will be working and my staff will be working with Joe Biden and his team in making the point that, if Joe is going to do well against Trump and is going to defeat Trump, then he is going to have to reach out effectively to a whole lot of people where he has not had the kind of support that he needs.

And that’s lower-income people. That is younger people. And he’s going to have to give those people the understanding that he hears them and he’s moving to respond to their concerns. And that deals with climate change. It deals with making public colleges and universities tuition-free.

In my view, it deals with — you’re right. He is not going to support Medicare for all, but I think there is a significant path forward for him to make sure that, when so many people are losing their private insurance, that the federal government will be there for them to cover their health care needs.

Judy Woodruff:

You have said that you campaigned enthusiastically for Hillary Clinton four years ago. Will you do exactly the same for Joe Biden? Will you be more enthusiastic?

Because, as you know, many Democrats look back and say they wished you had done more.

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Well, many Democrats opposed me from the Democratic establishment from day one.

All I can tell you is, in 2016, I worked as hard as I could to see that Trump was defeated and Clinton was elected.

(CROSSTALK)

Judy Woodruff:

And will this year be different?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Well, this year, I will work as hard as I can to make that sure Donald Trump is not reelected and that Joe Biden becomes president.

But I hope, in the interval here, what we have got to do is to — is — and I think Joe Biden is a — not only is he a decent guy. He is a good politician. And he understands that, for him to win, to get the votes that he needs, he’s going to have to listen to and respond to the needs of a whole lot of people who have not been overly enthusiastic about his campaign up to now.

Judy Woodruff:

But you are saying you will be enthusiastically supporting him.

A key decision that he’s going to have to make, of course, is for vice president. He has said he will choose a woman. Let me ask you how your supporters would view it if he chose Elizabeth Warren?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Well, I think — I can’t speak for all of my supporters.

All I can say is that I think the more progressive the vice presidential candidate that he nominated, the better it would be in terms of the kind of response that our supporters would provide him.


Judy Woodruff:

So, if it were Amy Klobuchar?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

I can’t speculate on that.

Judy Woodruff:

Or Kamala…

Senator Bernie Sanders:

You know, Joe is going to have to make that decision himself. I have not been involved in that discussion. We will see what he does.

Judy Woodruff:

Republicans, Senator, this week in Wisconsin, as you know, took steps to prevent measures that would have made it easier for people to vote, to either delay the election or to make it — mail-in ballots possible.

That view is also held by Republicans at the national level. How concerned are you right now about November and access to ballots, access to voting for Americans across the board?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Judy, I will tell you I don’t know that I have ever, within a political context, seen anything as ugly as the role that the Republicans in the legislature in Wisconsin and their Supreme Court played in terms of this primary.

What they essentially said to people is, you’re going to have to put your life on the line in order to cast a ballot.

And that is just unbelievably disgraceful. And that is not what we can allow to happen in future elections. So, it is a very, very high priority for me, and I think for many other Democrats, as we go forward on the new piece of legislation — and I have got a lot of ideas on that one — but certainly one of the highest priorities must be to make sure that every American in this country is able to vote through a paper ballot in November.

And the Republicans, I must say, have been pretty clear. They understand that, if there is a large voter turnout, they are not going to do so well. And they’re fighting us. But I hope their respect for our Constitution, for our democracy will prevail.

And they will understand that people shouldn’t have to die or get sick in order to cast a ballot.

Judy Woodruff:

Very quickly…

Senator Bernie Sanders:

I should also tell you — I should also tell you that, in terms of the new legislation, we’re working very hard, not only to make sure all people have health care, but that people will continue to get their paychecks.

I think that is the easiest, most efficient way to get us out of this economic disaster that we’re in right now. Just making sure that every American continues to receive his or her paycheck will go a long way to allowing Americans to have a decent standard of living, so long as we’re in this crisis.

Judy Woodruff:

Final question.

And quickly, Senator, who leads the progressive movement that Bernie Sanders started next? Who are the next leaders of your movement?

Senator Bernie Sanders:

You’re asking me to speculate. I’m not much into speculation.

But what I will say is, right now, literally, as we speak, I have been on the phone with progressives all across this country figuring out the best way that we can keep our kind of unprecedented grassroots movement strong and growing.

So, we are a strong movement. And history will determine what happens in the future. But, right now, we are working hard to build that movement.

Judy Woodruff:

Senator Bernie Sanders, joining us tonight from Vermont, Senator, thank you very much.

Senator Bernie Sanders:

Thank you, Judy.

We miss Bernie not rallying us on weekends. Here is a precious moment captured by Shaun King.

Bar is open and budtenders are available for cocktails. This serves as an Open Thread.

Chicago Fizz.JPG

Chicago Fizz.JPG

I think this song, listened to broadly, is a good way to start our weekend.

Posted in 2020 Elections, grassroots | Tagged Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, Loser DNC, PBS Newshour, progressive movement, Shaun King, TYT

2/23 Bernie Rally in Austin; Also to Appear on CBS 60 Min & Evening OT

The Progressive Wing Posted on February 23, 2020 by BennyFebruary 23, 2020

Bernie Sanders Hits the Jackpot

the Nevada caucus votes that would give Bernie Sanders a sweeping victory, and newfound momentum for his antiestablishment bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, were beginning to be counted, the rival campaign of Michael Bloomberg growled out another objection to the anticipated results of a contest in which the billionaire candidate had chosen not to participate.

“The Nevada results reinforce the reality that this fragmented field is putting Bernie Sanders on pace to amass an insurmountable delegate lead,” complained Bloomberg campaign manager Kevin Sheekey. “This is a candidate who just declared war on the so-called ‘Democratic Establishment.’ We are going to need Independents AND Republicans to defeat Trump—attacking your own party is no way to get started. As Mike says, if we choose a candidate who appeals to a small base—like Senator Sanders—it will be a fatal error.”

Sheekey would have been wise to wait for the full picture of what the Sanders campaign accomplished in the battleground state where the senator and his backers put a heavy emphasis on grassroots organizing and mobilization.

The tabulation of Saturday’s caucus votes and polls of caucus-goers refuted the false premise of Bloomberg’s campaign that Sanders has a narrow appeal. The senator clinched a “huge win,” in CNN’s words. That win, coming on the heels of popular-vote victories in Iowa and New Hampshire, positions Sanders to counter the naysayers who keep questioning whether the democratic socialist is electable. That’s a rare opening for any candidate—and one that he now must seize by making a savvy argument for why he can not just win the Democratic nomination but also defeat President Trump in November.

In Nevada, Sanders showed genuine signs of strength. The senator swept the first round of caucus voting, securing a 2-1 margin over his closest rival and the erstwhile front-runner, former vice president Joe Biden. Sanders substantially increased his lead in the second round, where backers of contenders who fell short of viability realigned with a unity candidate.

By Sunday morning, with a majority of the precincts reporting, Sanders was winning 46 percent of county delegates from across the state and looked to be on track to secure as many as 10 pledged delegates to next summer’s Democratic National Convention. The closest contender, Biden, was picking up almost 20 percent of county delegates. Former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg, was at 15 percent. Three other candidates—Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, and billionaire Tom Steyer—finished with 10 percent or less.

Entrance polls of Nevada caucus-goers showed Sanders winning among men and women, running a solid second (behind Biden) in the race for the African American vote, carrying the Latino vote with 51 percent of the total, grabbing 65 percent of the vote of Nevadans under age 29 and 50 percent of those aged 29 to 44. Sanders swept the union vote in a state where a key labor organization had raised concerns about his support for single-payer Medicare for All health care reform. He finished up with a 2-1 advantage over the next-strongest candidate, Warren, among the 64 percent of voters that identified as liberal. And he tied Biden among the 34 percent who identified as moderate or conservative.

Sanders now finds himself in a complex position. He is the front-runner in the Democratic race. Yet his is still a dissenting and challenging voice within the party. On the eve of the caucuses, the senator declared, “I’ve got news for the Republican establishment. I’ve got news for the Democratic establishment. They can’t stop us.”

That line set off Bloomberg, party insiders, and a lot of pundits, who ripped into Sanders and his anti-establishment campaign. What Bloomberg and his apologists fail to understand is that challenging political power brokers has significant appeal among grassroots Democrats and independents. Notably, in Nevada, of the 17 percent of caucus-goers who identified as independents, Sanders won 50 percent. The next-closest contender, Buttigieg, was at 13 percent, and no one else was in double digits.

With his front-runner status confirmed after the first three contests of 2020, Sanders needs to engage with the electability debate in a more serious way. He really does have to make the “Bernie Beats Trump” message of his campaign posters central to his message going forward. Democrats know where he stands on the issues, and they agree with him—62 percent of those polled in Nevada said they favor responding to health care concerns with “a government plan for all instead of private insurance.” But Democrats and independents who lean toward the party are desperately determined to defeat Trump; in Nevada, two-thirds of those surveyed said it was more important to have a candidate who can upend the president than a candidate they agree with on issues.

For Sanders, the next opportunity will come in Tuesday’s debate in South Carolina, for which he, Bloomberg, Biden, Warren, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, and Steyer have qualified. There’s pressure on several of them to drop out, but none are likely to do so before Saturday’s primary in South Carolina, where Biden still leads in most polls but Sanders and Steyer have surged.

Bernie has been a busy bee in Texas! Yesterday, he held rallies in El Paso and San Antonio; today, he was in Houston, and soon to arrive in Austin, the heart of the grassroots.

Ahead of his campaign rally in Austin later today, Sen. Sanders remains optimistic about winning Texas https://t.co/AOlxxW8soF

— Austin Statesman (@statesman) February 23, 2020


From KXAN News:

Following Senator Bernie Sanders’ victory in the Nevada caucus this weekend, the presidential hopeful will be holding a rally in Austin at 5 p.m. Sunday.

The rally will be held at Vic Matthias Shores, the same site where Senator Elizabeth Warren held a campaign rally in September and where then-Texas Senatorial candidate Beto O’Rourke held a rally a year prior.

Sanders’ success in Nevada has had some including FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver suggesting that “Sanders is easily the most likely Democrat to win the nomination.”

But there is still more political work to be done before that determination can be made. Fourteen states including Texas will vote on Super Tuesday, March 3, offering a chance for the candidates to add to their delegate totals.

Williamson is a native Texan, so it makes sense to announce it in Austin.

Livestream:

More gibber jabber in the comments. This also serves an open thread.

Posted in 2020 Elections, grassroots | Tagged Austin, Bernie Sanders, Houston, Marianne Williamson, progressive movement, Texas

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