Turning up the Bern

The media is against Bernie Sanders and supports Hillary Clinton. Isn’t the media supposed to be impartial? Of course, but it isn’t, and that’s a reality we’re living with.

Hillary is a damaged candidate of declining popularity, regardless of her excellent acting performance in the first DNC debate. There’s still no place to go but down, and with so many democrats soured by Clinton and her obvious corruption, its possible the republicans may win against a Hillary ticket. Big corruption is what Americans detest, even if they can’t agree on the actual problems or how to fix them. Hillary is a face of corruption to both republicans and about 1/3 of democrats according to polls.

Bernie rallied to his base during the debate, probably too much. There are things he could have done differently, and still can, to woo voters from outside his white college-educated northeastern base.

Foreign policy and war: It was frustrating to see Bernie not give an authoritative answer on whether he would go to war if necessary. A large number of Americans are hawks on foreign policy, and I suspect a lot of voters soured with Bernie’s answer. Bernie should have come straight out and said “I will do anything to protect this nation and absolutely yes I will go to war to protect America.” After this he could have added his comments on coalitions and war being the last option, people would have understood.. I mean, if the US was invaded tomorrow, would Bernie go to war? I have no doubt the answer is yes, but he didn’t say that. He lost an opportunity and turned off some voters.

Denmark and other Scandinavian countries. Bernie is right, these countries have smarter social policy, the people live longer and are happier, living with more stability than robber-baron casino capitalism provides, yet capitalism still thrives in these countries. Bernie could have been more sensitive to the landscape of American views on this subject and put things a little differently. He should have presented himself as the next FDR, not the next president of Denmark. Bernie’s message was hurt by not communicating this in the best possible way.

Capitalism: Bernie waffled when he was confronted for not being a capitalist, he ranted about not being for casino capitalism and then left it alone. He never clearly stated that capitalism, as its called and implemented in modern America, isn’t really capitalism. There are no free markets when a few big players control too much, we’re living with corporate socialism, our system is rigged and doesn’t support true free markets and competition. Our government has been a corruptive benefactor to these groups and has stifled free enterprise through cronyism.

Bernie should have come right out and said “Yes I’m a capitalist, I believe strongly in the great things capitalism has done for America and the world.” Americans are distrustful of any candidate that isn’t a capitalist, and in truth, Bernie really is a capitalist. After this declarative statement, Bernie could have continued to talk about how unregulated capitalism needs to be saved from itself, and how a hybrid system of capitalism and socialism was the direction of the 20^th century – it worked, and its why we have social security and medicare in the first place. Unfortunately Bernie allowed himself to be painted as a non-capitalist, and this likely hurt. A lot of people just don’t get the whole “big banks” thing or Citizens United, they don’t have the political education and can’t understand why these are important issues, it sounds like a bunch of hippie college stuff to them.

Which leads to talking about tuition free college education, one of the first things mentioned and repeated. This is a great thing and would result in a smarter public, and graduates less saddled with debt would be more able to put that education to good use. There are a lot of people listening to this and thinking their tax money will pay for rich kids to laze around in colleges – its something they can’t relate to. It would have been better if Bernie put more time into talking about universal healthcare, which more people would rally behind than free tuition.

Did Bernie “win” the debate? Yes, because he’s clearly on the side of the people against corporate power. He mopped the floor with Hillary over Wall Street and the decline of America’s middle class, the most pressing issue to many Americans. Thankfully O’Malley attacked Hillary for the same thing.

Hillary made it clear in the debate to those who listened, she will not help the middle class or do anything truly effective against corporate domination of government, and will stand against the fundamental changes needed to bring representation back to the public interest. Hillary stands for corruption and she should lose for this reason alone, because its the most important issue of our time. There are several more debates, and time is on the side of Bernie, but he needs to connect more effectively to the unconverted and focus less on his base.