Web Only / Features » December 19, 2014

Why Bernie Sanders Needs to Run for President—As an Independent

The corporate capture of both parties, explosion of energy in grassroots movements, and popular disgust with politics as usual make this the perfect moment for Sanders to run outside the Democratic Party.

BY David Goodner

Source: In These Times

It’s time for a new course of action—and Bernie Sanders has the name recognition, the resume and the gravitas to be the face of a new national democratic socialist political party that has the potential to change the direction of U.S. politics.

Bernie Sanders, the fiery, independent, populist U.S. Senator from Vermont, has been mulling a presidential campaign in 2016. There is no question about it: He should absolutely run.

Mr. Sanders has the credentials, the charisma and the community support he needs to seize the populist moment we are in and help spark a grassroots insurgency against the billionaire class.

Somebody has to take on Hillary Clinton from the Left—otherwise the 2016 elections will be nothing more than two corporate politicians making hollow promises to the American people while selling their souls behind the scenes to war profiteers and Wall Street banksters. And while Elizabeth Warren is also a compelling candidate, chances are at least moderately high that she may not run, opting to play it safe in favor of maintaining good standing with the party’s leadership.

And even if Warren does run, her candidacy will not contribute to the building of a genuine third party movement—which is what the Left really needs to do to build long-term independent political power.

That’s why Bernie Sanders must run—and it’s why he should run on a third party ticket, not as a Democrat.

Merely impacting the 2016 presidential elections through the Democratic primaries is too small of a goal given the times we are in, and will not go far or fast enough to move the people and the planet away from the brink of corporate and climate catastrophe. The last thing we need is a firebrand like Mr. Sanders to spearhead a populist electoral charge and raise expectations, only to concede after a few weeks, endorse Hillary and urge his followers back into the folds of the establishment Democratic tent.

It would be disappointing, to say the least, to see a lifelong independent and self-described democratic socialist using the specter of a Republican boogey-man to scare millions of everyday people back into the two-party closet. The truth is, our country’s neoliberal turn advanced tremendously under the Carter, Clinton and Obama Administrations, and it was the Supreme Court that stole the 2000 election from Al Gore, not Ralph Nader.

Neither should Mr. Sanders run only as an independent without attempting to build the kind of organizational and party infrastructure that can live on after his campaign is over, as Nader failed to do in 2004. Mr. Sanders should instead aim higher and strive to change the course of U.S. history by making 2016 the year that an independent third party broke through the white noise and became a permanent fixture in American politics. This should not be done through the Green Party, but through the construction of a new, broad-based democratic socialist party.

Building a nationally viable third party in less than two years will be challenging, but Mr. Sanders has long enough coattails to pull it off. For one thing, the conditions in this country are ripe for this kind of move. Grassroots social movements, from Madison to Occupy Wall Street to #BlackLivesMatter, have been growing steadily since the economic crash in 2008, and have articulated a reform agenda that neither political party appears willing to embrace.

The 2014 midterm elections saw the lowest voter turnout of the modern era, after which the much ballyhooed left turn by President Obama and Senate Democrats turned out to be little more than liberal hype. (See, for example, the party’s capitulation to the corporate right without much of a fight during the recent “Crominbus” budget debate.) The incident serves as yet another example of a political culture that has become thoroughly corrupted by big corporate money.

Voters aren’t stupid. Their apathy in these elections comes from a lack of appealing choices. In a system where neither party is willing to address the bread-and-butter issues that impact us most like jobs, education, housing, health-care and debt, our only options are to stay home or to “vote the bums out,” replacing them with another set of bums we’ll want to vote out, ad infinitum.

That’s why the history of U.S. electoral politics is such a schizophrenic seesawing of power back and forth between two wings of the same corporate power structure. One party swoops into office using the voter backlash against the other’s broken promises as a wedge, and then once in power does very little (at best) to make everyday people’s lives better in material, tangible ways.

Such a system will never be able to solve the staggering number of social problems confronting us. A third party candidacy led by Bernie Sanders, perhaps with a strong running mate like Seattle council woman and fellow socialist Kshama Sawant as his running mate, can give voice to the aspirations of millions of working-class Americans who have been effectively shut out of the governing process by the corrosive influence of corporate power. Their goals should include winning at least a third of the popular vote, concrete victories in dozens of local, county, statewide, and federal down-ballot races, construction of permanent party infrastructure and close collaboration with social movement actors independent of the Democratic Party.

There is already an emerging electoral precedent that suggests such a strategy is not outside of our ambitious reach. Ms. Sawant’s successful campaign in Seattle in 2013 not only elevated a card-carrying socialist to office, it helped catapult (alongside tenacious street demonstrations) the national Fight for $15 movement that has seen several major American cities pass significant minimum wage increases.

The success of Howie Hawkins and Brian Jones on the Green Party ticket in November’s New York gubernatorial race is also strong evidence that the appetite for third-party movement-building is there—if organizers and activists are willing to seize the initiative and take some risks.

The liberal establishment will cry “spoiler,” but their strategy has long proven to be bankrupt. It’s time for a new course of action—and Bernie Sanders has the name recognition, the resume and the gravitas to be the face of a new national democratic socialist political party that has the potential to change the direction of U.S. politics.

David Goodner

David Goodner is union organizer in La Crosse, Wisconsin. Originally from Iowa, he worked in Des Moines as a community organizer and Catholic Worker between 2009-2014. He may be reached at david.a.goodner [at] gmail.com or @davidgoodner.

by James Thompson

In the article previously posted on this website from the Huffington Post, Igor Bobic writes:

“Rubio, who is the son of Cuban immigrants, loudly protested the shift in policy all week. He chided the president on Wednesday for “coddling dictators and tyrants” and for dealing with a regime that has “harassed, imprisoned and even killed” its own people.” He is writing about Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).

It appears there may be some weaknesses in the esteemed Senator’s argument. The rhetoric has been intense among congresspeople from both the Republican and Democratic party on the President’s admirable actions towards Cuba. The president is to be commended for his brave new policies towards Cuba. With the actions he took last week, President Obama has earned his Nobel Peace Prize.

Now the hypocrites are coming out of the woodwork. Sen. Rubio’s remarks stink of hypocrisy. The USA has a long history of “coddling dictators and tyrants.” Prior to the Cuban revolution, the US fully supported Batista. Batista was one of the most terroristic dictator/tyrants in human history. He terrorized the Cuban people, harassed them, imprisoned them and murdered them mercilessly with full US support. Similar terrorists receive full financial and propagandistic support from the US government around the world today.

The Zionist regime in Israel receives full US support for its terroristic activities towards the Palestinians. Dictators throughout Africa continue to terrorize their populations with full US support. The right wing regime in Colombia receives full US support for its terroristic activities towards its own citizens and towards the people of Venezuela. The US imposed fascist government in the Ukraine receives full support from the US as it advocates the extermination of Jews and Russian speaking people in the Ukraine. Saddam Hussein received full US support when he used gas purchased from the US on the Kurdish people. However, when he refused orders from the US, shock and awe was unleashed on him. The US supported the terrorist regime of Diem in Vietnam and slaughtered innocent people in Vietnam who opposed this nasty dictator.

Not only has the US supported petty dictators around the world who do the bidding of the wealthiest elite, agents of the US state (including CIA, NSA, etc.) have carried out terroristic operations directly. The US now has a reputation for violating international law and previous US heads of state cannot travel to many parts of the world since they risk arrest for war crimes. The US has a reputation for torture, drone attacks and the list goes on and on.

Rubio’s application of the phrase “‘harassed, imprisoned and even killed’ its own people” to Cuba is particularly egregious. The USA leads the world in the number of incarcerated people and in the application of capital punishment.

We must also remember the spectacular police killings of African-American males in the USA. These murders are on a par with the terroristic activities of the vicious Nazi regime in Germany. It should be remembered that the Nazi regime in Germany was partly financed by the Bush family, Henry Ford and many other wealthy people of the US.

Of course, it should be remembered that the only military use of nuclear weapons in the history of the world against a foreign country, i.e. Hiroshima and Nagasaki, occurred as a result of the direction of a President of the United States who was a member of the Democratic Party. The US also participated in the firebombing of Dresden at the same time in history.

No one has accused Cuba of using nuclear weapons  against a sovereign nation. No one has  accused Cuba of waging terroristic, imperialistic wars against sovereign nations.

 

So, perhaps Sen. Rubio should also criticize President Obama for attempting to normalize relations with a country, i.e. Cuba, that wants to normalize relations with its northern neighbor, i.e. the USA, that has a history of “coddling dictators and tyrants” and has “harassed, imprisoned and even killed its own people.”

Sen. Rubio and many others are fighting hard to make the world safe for hypocrisy.

By Igor Bobic

Huffington Port, Dec. 19, 2014

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/19/rand-paul-marco-rubio-cuba-2016_n_6355646.html

A dispute between two possible presidential candidates escalated on Friday around the topic of newly opened diplomatic relations with Cuba, and the latest jabs took place on — where else — the Internet.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) took to Twitter and Facebook to lambaste Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who claimed Thursday on Fox News that his fellow Senate Foreign Relations Committee member “has no idea what he’s talking about” on Cuba. Paul came out in support of the Obama administration, which reached a historic accord with the communist island that included the release of U.S. Agency for International Development worker Alan Gross.

“The United States trades and engages with other communist nations, such as China and Vietnam. Why not Cuba?” the Kentucky Republican wrote on Facebook. “I am a proponent of peace through commerce, and I believe engaging Cuba can lead to positive change.”

“Seems to me,” Paul continued, “Senator Rubio is acting like an isolationist who wants to retreat to our borders and perhaps build a moat. I reject this isolationism. Finally, let’s be clear that Senator Rubio does not speak for the majority of Cuban-Americans. A recent poll demonstrates that a large majority of Cuban-Americans actually support normalizing relations between our countries.”

Rubio, who is the son of Cuban immigrants, loudly protested the shift in policy all week. He chided the president on Wednesday for “coddling dictators and tyrants” and for dealing with a regime that has “harassed, imprisoned and even killed” its own people.

The spat highlights a fissure in the Republican party, and is a sign of things to come should both senators decide to run for the White House. But it’s not the first time the two have tangled over foreign policy. Last year, Rubio delivered a speech in Paul’s home state in which he passionately made the case against isolationism — a philosophy the libertarian senator from Kentucky has flirted with in the past.

At this rate, we may as well just cancel the debates.

Travis Gettys 16 Dec 2014 at 13:40 ET

SOURCE: Raw Story

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) plans a legislative push for the breakup of Wall Street’s largest banks and lifting the cap on contributions to Social Security.

“If Congress cannot regulate Wall Street, there is just one alternative,” said Sanders in a speech Saturday. “It is time to break these too-big-to-fail banks up so that they can never again destroy the jobs, homes, and life savings of the American people.”

Sanders, who has signaled he may run for president in 2016 to offer a true progressive alternative, said he would introduce legislation at the start of next congressional session to break up the largest investment banks.

“If a financial institution is too big to fail, it is too big to exist,” he said.

He made the remarks during a debate on a controversial spending bill that contains provisions written by Citigroup lobbyists to weaken Dodd-Frank oversight of banking.

“If Wall Street lobbyists can literally write a provision into law that will allow too-big-to-fail banks to make the same risky bets that nearly destroyed our economy just a few years ago, it should be obvious to all that their incredible economic and political power is a huge danger to our economy and our way of life,” Sanders said.

Sanders also said he would introduce legislation intended to strengthen Social Security to lift a growing number of American seniors above the poverty level.

“The best way to expand Social Security is to ask the wealthiest people in our country to pay more into the system by scrapping the cap on income that is subject to the Social Security payroll tax,” he said.

Sanders said current rules allow a billionaire to pay the same amount into Social Security as a person who earns $117,000 a year.

“This is regressive, this is unfair, this is absurd,” the senator said. “If we lifted this cap and applied the Social Security payroll tax to income above $250,000 — not $117,000, but $250,000 a year, we could not only extend the solvency of Social Security for decades to come, which is what we want to do, but we could also provide the resources necessary to expand Social Security benefits. That is exactly what we should be doing, and that in fact is what the American people want us to do.”

A poll conducted in August found that 90 percent of Democratic voters supported lifting the cap, the senator said, along with 73 percent of independent voters and 73 percent of Republican voters.

“Sadly, despite this overwhelming support for expanding Social Security, the CEOs at the Business Roundtable — the organization representing the largest corporations in America — came out with a plan last year which does exactly what the American people do not want to do,” Sanders said. “The American people want to expand Social Security and the Business Roundtable came out with a plan that would increase the Social Security retirement age from 67 to 70 and severely cut the COLA of senior citizens and disabled veterans.”

Watch his speech before the U.S. Senate posted online by Bernie Sanders: