What Makes Bernie Run?

[Uncle Joe]

(snip)

Traditional candidates withdraw hoping to gain favor with the nominee, perhaps secure an appointment, while retaining the respect of deep-pocket donors and the party establishment. The calculus of a movement candidate is totally different.

Sanders is building that movement. His vision and agenda have begun to drag the Democratic Party his way. He has inspired a growing following—notably the young in 2016 and Latinos this year. He has demonstrated that small donors can make a movement candidacy financially competitive, upending the Big Money politics that so corrupts our elections. He has inspired community organizers, grassroots networks, and movement activists to bring their energy into electoral politics and into the Democratic Party.

(snip)

Sanders can use his pulpit—as he did Tuesday night after suffering primary defeats in Illinois, Florida, and Arizona—to lay out a bold agenda for responding to the crisis. The risibly inadequate early responses of the Trump administration, the House, and the Senate demonstrate the need for that. And while both Trump and Biden focus on the immediate future, suggesting that any public provision is temporary and targeted for the emergency, Sanders has a unique opportunity to show how the crisis reveals the imperative of fundamental structural reforms.

Moreover, as Naomi Klein warns, the coronavirus will provide a classic opening for disaster profiteering and for shock doctrine politics, using the crisis to pass a wish list of unpopular policies—from subsidies for big banks and oil and gas companies to hitting working people with the bill for the bailout afterward, including cuts to Social Security and Medicare. Already, companies are lobbying hard for subsidies without conditions or a requirement that any bailout include long-needed corporate reforms. With a live campaign, Sanders has greater opportunity to expose the rip-offs, to lay out the alternatives in the midst of the crisis, and push Biden to a bolder position.

(snip)


https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/bernie-sanders-assess-campaign/