I'm a lifelong democrat. And a pretty far left person in my values. But I hate Bernie. Why? Because he is. not. a. democrat. I spent years going door to door registering voters, phone banking to drum up support for candidates, running online campaigns, driving voters to polls, etc. And I did that because it was in support of a political party I believed in. Meanwhile what has Bernie done for the democratic party? For democratic candidates? Even for his recent senate election he was officially independent. And yet he wonders why the rules that govern the democratic primary are the way they are? If he doesn't like it, maybe he should join the god d$&%*d party and work to change them1?!?!?!?!?!??!
All that aside, the reason I think that he is a terrible candidate is that none of his ideas will get anywhere. Even if he wins, the senate likely isn't going to be in democratic hands. And just look at Obamacare. It ended up a watered down, republican influenced bill, and yet republicans have still spent the last 10 years dismantling it. If you want something to last, you have to build consensus from everyone. His policies alienate and infuriate a large portion of the country. That is not the way for lasting change.
As I have aged, I have become much more pragmatic in my thinking. While I would love to see policies like Bernies implemented and at least tried, we are not there yet. Sure we probably need to do more than the incremental change we get, but the risk is we just keep devolving into this team sports stuff where the party in power just spends their time undoing whatever the other party previously did.
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