Let me stipulate that Bernie is a true leader of the progressive movement. There is growing inequality in the world and those of us who defend capitalism have much to answer for in terms of how we got to where we are now and how we need to fix things. And of course, we need to increase access to healthcare and quality education. He is absolutely right on that and has been a prophet in the wilderness for a very long time.
But too many people assume that if you don’t like Sanders, you don’t like his aspirations. Not true! My issue is not with his objectives or his critiques of crony capitalism. My issue is with the hypocrisy, the fanaticism, the arrogance. Let me explain:
First, the hypocrisy. It’s an open secret that Sanders does not have a high opinion of Barack Obama. He faulted Obama for what he considered a milquetoast presidency that catered too much to corporate interests. He even tried to mount a primary challenge in 2012 (no matter how much he lies about it now, he did). His whole campaign is an explicit rebuke of Obama’s tenure. But he doesn’t have the cojones to say it explicitly, so he attacks Biden as a surrogate. I was okay with that. But now that Biden has all but foreclosed his path to the nomination, what do we see? It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s ObamaMan™ to the rescue! Bernie’s ads tout his closeness to Obama in a transparent, desperate, and cynical play for the African American vote. It’s straight up nauseating. And it won’t work. I keep hearing about how candid and fearless Sanders is. Okay, then, stop lying and say what we know you really think about Obama. I feel like Andy Garcia in Godfather 3: “Say it to his face, just one time!” But you know he won’t. Courageous and candid, my you know what.
As if that were not bad enough, there’s the fanaticism. These Bernie folks straight up scare me. Just look at the video from Biden’s rally in Detroit last night. The Bernie Sanders folk repeatedly interrupted and even knocked Symone Sanders to the ground. Do you see anyone else’s supporters acting that way??? Of course not, it’s all from one campaign. And even Elizabeth Warren, his political soulmate, has excoriated him for it. Have we not had enough of true believers who dismiss every inconvenient fact as “fake news”? Bernie gets his behind handed to him on Super Tuesday and it’s the “establishment” and the “corporate media” working against him??? No, bruh, it’s the good people of America who aren’t buying what you’re selling. The zaftig lady is singing, and it’s Lizzo. Truth hurts!
Which brings me to my last point, the arrogance. The sheer, unmitigated arrogance of people of privilege presuming to tell us how to think, how to vote, and what’s good for us (even if – or especially since – the rest of us are too dumb to see it). These are authoritarians in socialists’ clothing. The arrogance, hypocrisy, and fanaticism blend together in especially noxious ways. A few examples:
• Sanders keeps complaining about the “corporate media.” He’s THIS close to calling the press the enemy of the people. But the media has been camping for Sanders this entire election cycle. And not just the usual folks on the left like The Nation, The Intercept etc.; the Grey Lady herself, the New York Times, is chock-full of Sanders advocates, some of whom are connected to the Sanders campaign. I read a recent Op-Ed by one Elizabeth Bruenig and was so taken aback by its vitriol that I googled her. Turns out she’s married to one Matt Bruenig, who is a die-hard Sanders stan. Here’s a March 5 tweet of his (since deleted), talking about Biden’s opposition to M4A: “By the same logic, what’s so bad about Sandy Hook? It just accelerated the inevitable. Moderates are some of the sickest people in the country.” Both Bruenigs routinely retweets David Sirota, Sanders’ comms guy, who is just THE WORST. You can check out his Twitter feed, but you will need coronavirus level decontamination afterwards. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. These are the folks in Bernie’s orbit, openly and ever more aggressively making the case for him in the pages of the NY Times, the 800-pound gorilla of “corporate media.” We are told that the “corporate media” is against him, when in truth they are in the tank for him. That’s Trump-level gaslighting.
• Have you heard of Cenk Uygur? Founder of the Young Turks, founding member of the Justice Democrats (the pro-Sanders organization that got AOC elected). His whole shtick is, like Sanders, to rail against corporate interests and all the nefarious ways in which they take advantage of the downtrodden. Except, not so much when it comes to his own company – his staff tried to unionize, and Cenk ain’t having THAT. He’s opposed it, fired people in retaliation for organizing union drives, according to news reports, and otherwise acted just like the people he purports to deride. The world looks real different when you move from bomb thrower to media mogul, huh, Cenk?
• Saikat Chakrabarti is another beauty. He’s the former Chief of Staff for AOC. Former, because he was the chief antagonist in the fight between AOC’s crew and Pelosi and had to go once the warring parties reached a détente. He poured gasoline on the fire by, among other things, tweeting out that the new House members elected from moderate districts in 2018 were “hell bent to do to black and brown people today what the old Southern Democrats did in the 40s.” That incendiary tweet prompted a clapback from Hakeem Jeffries’ Twitter account. After which it was over for dude. And who is he exactly? A millionaire who worked on Wall Street and in Silicon Valley but really, really wants to lead a transformational movement on behalf of “black and brown people.” One percenters railing against the one percent.🙄.
• Finally, there’s Bernie Sanders’ rank and file fans themselves. Somebody needs to sit them down and tell them some hard truths. Like, YOU’RE the reason Obamacare is not driving costs down as much as you’d like. The whole point of Obamacare is to get the so-called “Young Invincibles” into insurance pools in large enough numbers that premiums come down on a risk-adjusted basis. But these folks are young and invincible and, therefore, don’t want to sign up in the required numbers. So you have pools full of middle-aged and elderly folks, and the premiums reflect that. Same with voting. The whole premise of the Sanders candidacy is that he would drive turnout among the young. It turns out these Sanders fans will do anything BUT show up and vote. They’ll interrupt your own rallies, they’ll take to social media and post the most disgusting things about people they oppose, but vote? – oh my god, that’s, like, hard and stuff. Like Drake said, “Trigger fingers turned to Twitter fingers.”
So no. In fact, hell no. Bernie Sanders and his crew have to go. The intolerance, the do as I say not as I do attitude, the presumptuousness – it’s all too much for me. If there is any justice in the world, today is the day he shuffles off the stage to enjoy his millions and his three dachas and leaves the rest of us the hell alone.
Authored By: Jude Chidi Ogene, Legal Influencer
