“It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them,” Sanders said.
“First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they’re right.”
“Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign?” Sanders asked.
“Will they understand the pain and political alienation that tens of millions of Americans are experiencing? Do they have any ideas as to how we can take on the increasingly powerful Oligarchy which has so much economic and political power? Probably not.”
Yeah. The Democrats really screwed the pooch on that one. He's a solid candidate, and has stood on his moral stance from before the Democrats recognized the issues that are now popular.
They keep giving us candidates nobody fucking wants and keep being surprised when they lose
And then it creates all this infighting where we're all blaming each other for being Bernie bros or third party protest voters when in reality it's the regular joes on the street who need to be convinced to give a fuck about their candidate, not terminally online hyperpolitical dweebs
The democrats are just gonna keep losing and our climate is going to slip deeper and deeper past the point of no return. Earths climate, our political climate, our social fabric, all of it. Slowly but surely being pissed down the drain because Joe Biden thought he should run despite middling approval ratings and massive health concerns, leaving us with literally zero choice but to back Harris once he inevitably stepped down. Because we had so called "superdelegates" choosing our candidates for us in the 2016 election when we were actually able to finally build a massive grassroots movement spearheaded by the Sanders campaign.
We're gonna keep losing, and we're gonna keep blaming each other, and the ruling class are just gonna keep sinking their claws deeper into what used to be ours.
I'll see you all again in four years, same time, same place, same fucking rigamarole
It's why I stopped voting altogether. Last time I voted in general elections was 2008. Last time I primaried was for Bernie in 16. Only time I ever donated money, too.
Fuck the Democrats. They made it clear they want Republican voters more than than they want me
Not saying that you have to vote when you dislike the options given. But you do have other options. Like spoiling your ballot, or nullify your ballot.
Yes the results are the same, but by voting this way, you are actively participating in your democratic process. While not voting at all you are not. And if you do not participate, in my view, you cannot complain about the results.
Oh and if you don’t know how, on election day just ask the poll workers. They should’ve been trained on how to handle it.
Liberals seem to get real uppity when you remind them how actual holders of leftist beliefs in the general US population are almost nonexistent and all third party votes added together wouldn’t have saved Harris.
Although if liberals were capable of using logic, they wouldn’t be liberals. You even see it in their hilarious Lemmy tantrums, they are genuinely so confused and lost.
If only leftists were there saying exactly what they were doing wrong and exactly what would happen for literally the last four years.
Oh wait. We were. Weird how Marx and Lenin continue to be proven right by history again and again.
Help me parse this logic. I'm having trouble figuring out how "Leftists are much too small and insignificant a demographic to make a meaningful difference in elections, therefore Democrats should implement leftist political strategy" makes any sense.
“It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them,” Sanders said in a statement Wednesday. “First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they’re right.”
Dems 100% sold them out and assumed they'd still vote D as long as a handful of issues were different.
The worse the Republicans got, the worse Dems got. Because they could get away with it and it increased donations.
The thing is it just energizes republicans and depresses Dem turnout.
If the goal is winning elections is a terrible strategy.
If you only care about money and the election is just a grift to you tho, it's a win/win. The result of the election doesn't really matter.
"See? The people WANT the republicans. That's why they keep electing republicans. Therefore, if we want to be competitive, we must become more like republicans."
That is the only lesson they are ever capable of winning. If they win, it's because they were like the Republicans so they should be more like the Republicans. If they lose, ti's because they weren't like the Republicans enough.
The Democratic base, and i say this as someone who willingly voted straight D ticket and has for a long time, keeps trying to kick the football and the Democratic Party keeps yanking it back at the last second. Every time.
There was never really that much risk of Dems losing voters to the Repubs (at least as long as Trump was the R candidate). The real damage came from Dems losing enthusiasm.
This. I just had a very long argument with someone else that completely and utterly failed to grasp this simple concept. Trump ran as the most conservative conservative ever and his base loved him for it. Harris ran as the most conservative liberal ever and her base gritted their teeth and grudgingly trudged to the polls. And then the DNC is shocked and flabbergasted that they didn't get a better turnout.
The thing that has driven me crazy for so long is this is the situation in America.
There are 70M Americans that will vote Republican and nothing will ever change their minds
There are 70M Americans that will vote Democrat and nothing will ever change their minds
There are a couple million independent undecided voters that everyone goes after
Then there are 100M+ people that sit out the election and no one seems to try to understand what would make them vote. It’s so crazy that we have just decided that there are red states and blue states and that’s how it is. A party that could retain some of either party while activating half the people that sit out would be a force to reckon with.
As the Democratic Party has tried to find some way to win again they have gone after which group? The handful of independents and the 70M republicans that aren’t going to vote for them ever. And the people sitting it out probably aren’t looking for them to shift right, if so they would be republicans.
You're right. Lot of people sat out because of inflation, which was driven by corporate greed, which of course a Republican is not going to address. The electorate needs a fucking education. Prices have stopped climbing aggressively. They're not going to go back down. Wage growth is the next step, which is another thing a Republican will not address. Americans cutting off their nose to spite their face.
None of that stuff is going to happen, unfortunately, not while the Rs control everything. And it's not official but it looks like they're going to win the house too. So they're going to run buckshot on this country with no one to stop them. They'll control all 3 branches.
None of it happened while Ds had any modicum of control either. Bernie represents what the democratic party should be, not what it is and has been. They pivoted hard to the status quo and we are footing the bill.
I think ranked choice voting and the popular vote interstate compact can happen at the state level. Just needs more local campaigning.
Then people would feel more empowered to vote for who they really want. I think that would be a big push towards nominating an actual progressive candidate.
I don't think I agree with you about deficit spending because actually it's not clear that some degree of a deficit is bad. The country does print its own money, so what you have written down in a spreadsheet might look scary but actually be less so.
In other words, what's true for a business or for an individual is often not true for a country that has its own mint.
Considering multiple blue states just voted against RCV, and the majority of the country voted to put even more ultra-conservative SCOTUS judges on the court, I'm not sure he is on the right side of history.
History is being written right now, soon to be dictated by Donald Trump, and recorded through the lens of Donald Trump. What will the fascist schoolbooks written by the Texas board of education say to remember the people who stood up against Trump?
At this point I'd be in favor of him just starting a podcast and enjoying retirement. The left has to go around the DNC to effectively deliver their message, it's foolish to think otherwise.
The dnc should all fall on their sword politically and admit that it would been better today had they given being their blessing and support when it would have mattered.
Then give Bernie power in the dnc to craft the future of the party. Find a new direction while there's still time
In June 2016, a class action lawsuit was filed against the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and former DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz for violating the DNC Charter by rigging the Democratic presidential primaries for Hillary Clinton against Bernie Sanders. Even former Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid admitted in July 2016, “I knew—everybody knew—that this was not a fair deal.”
They need to swing for the fences more. Don't just bring forward the items that might pass, bring up the bills that really matter, again and again, and put that in an ad. I'm probably more politically in-tuned than most voters (clearly) and I only know of ONE vote to raise the minimum wage during Bidens term. It should've been a dozen votes and then Dems get to say they were fighting for the working class while the GOP gets paid to show up and say "No" to everything.
Yeah I forget who said it but I remember a commentator in 2016 complaining that Democrats seemed afraid to get out their and really be Democrats. But TBH I felt like Kamala was doing that.
That party of the Roosevelt is gone since the Clintons showed up. It's market-based solutions organization nothing. If you don't like it, you can forfeit your tax rebate
Are you referring to the upcoming lame duck session? Because Dems have a couple of months to try that, and then it looks like the openly fascist GOP is going to control all three branches of our federal government.
If it meant my testicle for un-gerrymandering the voting districts, ranked-choice voting, and abolishing "first-past-the-post", you can call me the one nut wonder, brother.
I don’t buy this. In Nebraska there was an election between an independent union leader and a career politician. The union leader lost.
The consensus seems to be that people that voted democrat in 2020 voted republican this time because they experienced inflation under Biden that think it was his fault.
If the problem was that democrats did not support the working class enough then why didn’t the union leader win? This isn’t magic or rocket science. Many people thought democrats were responsible for the high inflation because they don’t know macro economics.
The consensus seems to be that people that voted democrat in 2020 voted republican this time because they experienced inflation under Biden that think it was his fault.
What consensus is saying this? Outside of Latino men and first time voters shifting to Trump, most analysis (so far) is that the Democrats lost around 10-15 million votes from 2020, compared to Trump losing only 2 million. If all the Dems/Undecideds moved to Trump, he would have not lost voters.
What was the Red vs Blue turnout in Nebraska in 2020 vs 2024, I bet that would go a long way to explain why the union leader lost.
because they experienced inflation under Biden that think it was his fault.
yeah, that's problem all around the world, people are too dumb to understand how two years of covid and ongoing war in europe affects our lives and demand that someone just takes care of it.
so in a year we will get populist pro-russian billionaire prime minister who will just start dropping more inflation money around and tells people "see? i will take care of you!" (while stealing some of these money for himself, of course)
And Harris was too stupid to just come out and say that she'd do that. Not Trump though. See that huge sign behind him at rallies? "Trump will fix it".
The dem strategy should have been to bombast like Trump, but more. Make America greatER. Would have really taken the wind or of his sails, IMO.
First of all, it is hard to beat career politicians. They have a track record, experience. Second, you're in Nebraska. Third, and most importantly, the goal is not for a single person to win, but to build a strong organization that will make people's lives better, and that would over time get more people to vote, because they would understand that it matters.
In other words, big corporate Democrats are mediocre at best, and often much worse than that, so of course people stay home. But if you think they're the wave of the future, hey, do whatever you like.
First of all, it is hard to beat career politicians.
This counters what Bernie said.
Second, you're in Nebraska.
I’m not in Nebraska. Just giving one of many examples of politicians that support the working class losing because of the billionaire class.
Third, and most importantly, the goal is not for a single person to win, but to build a strong organization that will make people's lives better, and that would over time get more people to vote, because they would understand that it matters.
Scapegoating the democrats that tried to tax the billionaire class prevents this from happening.
But if you think they're the wave of the future, hey, do whatever you like.
I don’t think they’re the wave of the future. I think the billionaire class countered Harris because they didn’t want to be taxed like she laid out in her plans and now people are trying to scapegoat them, ensuring it will be less likely that the next person will try it again. Just like the billionaire class wants.
She should start a Democratic Socialist party as a leader, with Bernie as the spiritual leader/Grandpa. Start convincing sitting Democrats to switch parties. Now is the time
We have a nascent left-wing movement in the local governments of many cities. It's loose and relatively unorganized but it's more than we've had in decades. Bernie's run in 2016 has a lot to do with that.
Our primary election turnout is abysmal, and Americans need to realize that the primaries are how the parties get reformed. Maybe the Democratic Party will have its Tea Party moment in 2026.
I don't know about MAGA, but the Democratic party definitely needs to go hard into the same kind of obstructionism that the Republicans have been doing. No validation of insane policies, no negotiating with terrorists.
And when everyone accuses the Democrats of not cooperating, they need to just stay quiet and stay the course. For the next four years, the legislature is closed.
Republicans can be evil and Democrats work with them an compromise on killing half of them.
Democrats consider maybe paying postal workers and Republicans stop it and cry how it's unconstitutional to have people paid for their labor.
If the Democrats got a spine and told Republicans "Just shut up, you complained about breaking segregation." And get things done, we'd be a fucking utopia.
I saw on one of the newscasts on election night that the overturning of Chevron deference is going to come back to kneecap the whole GOP agenda because they'll have to pass all their (de)regulatory changes through Congress which will be, as you say, closed.
Nah, I'm good. Been punk rock long enough to know it's just gonna be the thing to hate. Just planning in my head how the subversion works this time. I just hope they tear it ALL down this time and stop f'ing around.
While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they’re right.
Goddamn this hits the exact thing that Democrats really need to learn.
There's a ton of emotion in this nation. Given:
The opioid crisis where the people responsible are in perpetual litigation.
The wars we fought that costed us deaths of young people who had lives ahead of them, and scarred millions more. All so that a few rich asshats could profit.
The corruption of large companies as they swindle the working class, only to watch legislators continue to profit off of insider trading.
And that's just to name a few. There's a ton of emotion in this nation. And Trump, for better or worse, taps into that emotion. The cut and dry democrats, they keep telling us, "The system will work, this time" and you have a public that just screams "well how soon is now then?"
Democrats cannot just keep tapping on the system as it currently stands when the system so obviously doesn't deliver. There are hungry democrats looking for change to the system to form a more better system that will serve them, and the party just keeps dressing the bones of the long gone bird from days long pass.
Sanders fucking sinks the nail in a single stroke of the hammer on this. And Republicans are using that emotion, that pent up distrust of the system as it is, to move people in their direction. The entire point of this living government is to have a government, to have a system, that matches the people who are alive and having to deal with it. Sanders sees that and cut and dry Democrats keep going "but Trump will ruin the system that doesn't work for you!!"
Goddamn, one day, they will learn. Democrats will pick up on what Sanders is saying one day. But holy shit, they are going to clearly take an incredibly long and winding road to get there. I don't agree with where Republicans want to take us. I don't agree with how Republicans want to get there. But goddamn, we've got to hand it to them that they're actively pointing out the exact same thing the Sanders is pointing out. "Status Quo ain't going to fucking work anymore." The sooner the traditional Democrats learn that, the faster they can come back to being relevant.
The single best thing the Dems can do now is take a chapter out of the Republican playbook and obstruct everything, full tilt, no good barred. Inject themselves into everything, all committees, panels, investigations, reviews, etc, and block. See how much Trump can accomplish when the shoe's on the other foot.
Tbh, unless Wasserman-Schultz and the other imbecilic DNC royalty step down or are made to fuck all the way off somehow, I don’t think the Democratic Party is going to recover from this. And in that case, frankly, they shouldn’t recover. This result is absolutely, unambiguously damning.
Goddamn, one day, they will learn. Democrats will pick up on what Sanders is saying one day.
In the next government, we're not having elections thanks to Harris botching it for everyone. The RBG of presidential candidates. Thinking you know best until it's too late and now we need to plan for the fact you made things worse.
If holding on too long is RBG's legacy, then wouldn't Biden be the RBG of presidential candidates? He held on until after the primaries before dropping out.
Had Trump won in 2020, he’d have taken the fall for the Recession and Hyperinflation and it would have caused a 2008 effect. Populist Wave haulted, strangled in it’s crib by Coronachan.
Had Trump won in 2020, he’d be done now and his VP would still be the democracy respecting Pence.
Trump when elected in 2016 had no major plan and mostly left the employees of the state intact, and in 2020 the change was minimal. Now there’s a full blown scheme to control the government
In 2020 they didn’t know how much they could get away with. They’ve seen the limits now.
Winning in 2020 means no January 6th shattering the overton window and leading SCOTUS to some interesting choices about power.
2020-2024 had one Supreme Court Justice to appoint. Now there’s another 2 if not 3
In 2020 it would have been close. Now Democrats will have to regain ground, New Jersey New Hampshire and Minnesota are now Swing States.
2016 Trump had his populist wave weakened by Gary Johnson and Evan McMulin who blocked the popular vote and kept states like Colorado and New Mexico out of his hands. 2016 Trump sucked with Hispanics. That initial wave would have burnt out with the COVID fuckery. Instead Democrats slotted in, took the 4 worst possible years, and are handing it back having effectively both given them another shot in the arm and crippled themselves. There goes the court. This isn’t John Kerry, it’s Carter.
I’ve heard of 2020 hindsight, but this is ridiculous
The "shut up and fall in line while we do nothing for you" bullshit is what got them. Add a full support for a genocide and doing nothing to stop it. A lot of people voted for Trump out of spite to the Dems. They know Trump is worse, but they got burnt by the Dems so many times and they're done with them. I personally voted Harris, but in the back of my mind this is the very last time I'm voting for the " lesser of two evils". I'm just fucking done.
I think one way the party screwed up was by not cultivating younger Democrats to contend for the nomination this year. It's not like 2024 or Biden's age snuck up on anybody - they should have had a slate of viable options ready besides him. The Harris campaign was brilliantly run, especially on such short notice, and I don't blame her or the campaign one bit for failing. But as many analysts have pointed out, the public didn't feel like they knew her - the VP is surprisingly not super visible. One thing Trump had in his favor was that he was "the devil you know". He had already been President and we're still here, whereas they didn't feel they knew Harris. I thought that changed radically as the summer went on. She really seemed to grab everybody. It was electric and exhilarating. But apparently not enough.
They royally fucked up three elections by pushing shitty unpopular candidates to the point where we ended up with a little fascist whiny bitch in office with unchecked power. We cannot rehabilitate the Democratic party, the damage is complete there is nothing there left to save. The democrats lost worse in 2024 than republicams did in 2020, we judge Republicans for hanging on to their party after it got commandeered by Trump, but when are democrats going to turn around and look in the mirror because our party fucked up worse than we could have possibly imagined and here we are sitting thinking it will be different next time, after twelve fucking years of this shit. Disaffected Republicans and Democrats must build a coalition to form a new party and kick out the old and stale guard that is holding on to our body of government like a tick with Lyme disease
I think the time has arrived for party diversification. If the DNC wants my vote back they’ll need to earn it back. I have thrice voted for them to avoid a Trump Presidency, and 2/3 of those attempts were unsuccessful.
No longer will my vote be held hostage by the people that will squander it. From now on I vote for who I want, not against who I don’t, since it apparently doesn’t matter anyway. At least this way I vote on my own terms.
Bernie is too good for us, we need someone like him with a shot at gaining popularity for policy stances not backed by one of the large establishment parties.
It really says something when the media browbeated minorities actively harmed by neoliberal policies into voting Democrat and never third party, and third party didn't even sway anything in any state.
I voted Green in 2016 in California and I regretted it. I voted Democrat in 2020 (knowing it doesn't matter, I live California), despite Sanders getting shafted a second time. I voted Harris in 2024, and I swallowed my morals to do it.
And I got nothing but Trump rolling out his plans his oligarchs planned since 1980.
The way to affect change in elections apparently is to unite the larger population around a single person/cause/issue. We just need to find ours and convince enough people.
Personally, I just want a country where we actually let people different than us live and prosper. Why the fuck is that such a hard thing to have???
I have family and friends that are POC, gay, trans, and/or physically/mentally disabled. Why should they have to put up with policies and leaders that vilify them for simply being who they are?
Why do we accept normalized medical debt?
Why do we accept a constantly eroding education system?
Why do we not scale minimum wage consistent to inflation?
I know the real answers, but I think more of the population needs to vote based on the results of them asking themselves why this is the norm and find the candidate willing to fix that shit.
I have a feeling it won’t be an establishment Democrat.
What is says is that the Green Party has always been a joke that exists solely to trick idealists like yourself into throwing away your vote every 4 years.
The reason they didn't vote third party is because it's always been a joke.
Democrats have definitely become the elitist party. They parade their rich celebrity friends around to inspire your vote. Can it become more ridiculous?
Yea but with the republicans you already sorta expect it. Harris pivoted from a really sensible campaign that honestly I think would've won, to "look at all these rich people, celebrities and even right-wing warmongers who support me!" - and while I get the point - a dirtbag like Cheney supporting Harris is a sign of how fucked up Trump REALLY is - the message might not have been as clear to everyone.
I will always blame DWS, Clinton, and to a slightly lesser extent Brazile for the ruin of the party. Until there is proportional representation (i.e. never), there will never be a party that represents a great many of us.
lmmfao, Bernie Sanders hasn't achieved anything in his entire useless life, he isn't going to start now. Don't believe me? Look up his legislative record. The man only talks, he doesn't do the work. He hasn't actually done anything. He's like the rest of The Squad that way. They don't work with a coalition to pass law, they chirp from the cheap seats, and target Jews for votes.
In 2005, Rolling Stone called Sanders the "amendment king" for his ability to get more roll call amendments passed than any other congressman during the period since 1995, when Congress was entirely under Republican control. Being an independent allowed him to form coalitions across party lines
They can control the narratives. Democrats haven't done enough to break the "both sides are the same" narrative, this is a 32 year problem. It breeds apathy and apathy helps autocrats.
My guy, Biden blocked a railroad workers strike because it endangered corporate interests, and he didn't give them a key piece they were asking for: paid sick leave.
That's some nonsense from Bernie. Unions have fared better under Biden than any President for decades, and Bernie knows it. This is posturing image-burnishing for the naive; you think Bernie doesn't market himself to all the young progressives? Then, when the cameras are off, he turns into a garden-variety Democrat, voting solidly with this elitist-run party every time, without pouting and making protest votes or anything like that.
That’s a pretty dishonest description of Bernie. I don’t dare to say if your statement about unions is true, and it might as well be, but what Bernie is saying here is that it’s not enough. He’s arguing the democrats need to be more progressive. Feel free to disagree with his suggestion though.
I do think that the bigger problem is that the average person lacks the general understanding of how policies affect their lives. They want simple answers and Trump is giving them that. People are shortsighted and have a hard time grasping the bigger picture, and rather vote based on a gut feeling.
We can disagree about Bernie. I think it's deeply cynical of him to point the finger he's pointing.
You are very right about simple answers vs annoying complexity, and this is a systemic problem the Democrats will always face. Being based in reality and choosing to try to solve actual issues instead of simplified strawmen means the Democrats never will have an appealing story to tell, for most folks.
Clinton fucked the party over with NAFTA, and sided with big business. Biden did not: Biden did more for workers and the working class than any other President since FDR.
But he doesn't get credit for it, because people don't pay attention. They remember he ordered the railroad workers back to work, and say it proves he's anti-labor. They didn't really follow up on the fact that a few weeks later, his administration helped get them the new contract that gave them more paid sick days than they had originally asked for. But the story was long out of the news by then.
I can't stand idiot liberals who don't read past headlines and drift with the news wind.
It wouldn't have changed the outcome. After 4 years of Biden, people were over it. The millions of extra votes that showed up to stop trump in 2020 wouldn't have showed up for Biden, if they didn't show up for Harris.
People want change. Unfortunately this result is what happens when 1 candidate stays status quo and 1 candidate is for change.
Yes Draedron, you can. But you've already established your genocidal credentials. The rest of us will continue to mop up the mess you, harris/biden, and the dnc made as usual.
You are the one who picked the fascist by not voting. You are the one who gave power to someone who will worseb the genocide against Palestinians, Ukrainians and enables the coming genocide against Taiwanese people.
Like I give a fuck about whatever Bernie says at a time like this. Shut up and stop acting like you know what's best for us, this is some fine Monday morning QB that's completely unhelpful. Come at me Bernie bros.
Edit: Looks like the Bernie Bros do know how to vote after all! Just not where it matters. Shame on those who sat out the election in 2016 and 2024 to enable the slide towards fascism. Shame on those who didn't vote because of Gaza. Gaza and Ukraine are fucked now because of people like you. You do not have the moral high ground. Keep the downvotes coming, it means I struck a nerve. Shame on you. I sincerely hope the leopards come for you first.
I mean, yeah, I think that's unironically who they want to listen to. They're waiting for someone to tell them why the choices the party made were actually good and smart and how all the left punching they did was actually justified. I'm not sure they're going to get it, though; even the Pod Save America guys sounded on the verge of some self-reflection. But who knows, maybe they'll blame Russian disinformation campaigns again and put their heads back in the sand.
Shut the fuck up Bernie, you've spent 8 years corralling the working class into the undemocratic party controlled by the rich. Fuck you, you could have actually tried to start a new party but no, you did your job as a tool of the capitalists to keep people voting against their interests.
Saying that Bernie is garbage because he didn't dismantle the two party system seems a bit extreme. He actually has joined third parties but they didn't take off. He's also definitely anti-capitalist.
He actually has joined third parties but they didn’t take off.
Absolute bullshit. He had the ear of the country in recent years, and could have told everyone to support a third party. Instead he funneled them into the undemocratic party.
I agree that I didn't agree with him towing the line. But you can't argue that's he's been nothing but a source of good at least at the Senate level and inspiring new progressives