Editorial: Time for Sanders to be honest
Publisher’s note: This editorial is from the May 18, 2016, Washington Post.
Tension in the Democratic presidential race exploded in Nevada last weekend. Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. shouted, cursed and threw chairs during a state party convention in which they failed to force rules changes they wanted.
Even though they were attempting to get more delegates than the caucus results in the state suggested they deserved, they attacked the process as unfair. The state party chair subsequently received death threats against her and her family.
Mr. Sanders responded with self-righteousness and hypocrisy. He released a statement in which he listed a series of procedural complaints about the Nevada convention, attacked the Democratic Party for not being inclusive enough and warned that “millions of Americans are outraged” and that “the political world is changing.” He offered a throwaway line, three paragraphs down, condemning his supporters’ hooliganism in a statement that mostly justified it.
Interesting article. According to Bernie Sanders’ biography at http://www.biography.com/people/bernie-sanders, in the 1960s he participated in sit-ins and other marches and during the Vietnam War he applied for conscientious objector status which was eventually rejected, but by then he was too old to be drafted since he was born in 1941.
It appears that Mr. Sanders is encouraging the same militant techniques in which he and many others engaged during the 1960s, and Donald Trump’s supporters have demonstrated their fair share of belligerence also. I think the political landscape is undergoing real change and that a lot of people in this country are just not satisfied with the status quo, otherwise Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump would never have gained so much traction. There are a lot of angry people who no longer want everything to remain as it’s been and when people think that their needs are being discounted, ignored, and generally not respected they can get angry. Times change and circumstances change, and trying to keep everything as it’s “always been” isn’t looking forward and it’s obviously not working.