Summary
Sen. Bernie Sanders is touring Iowa and Nebraska to rally against “the oligarchy,” aiming to energize progressives rather than launch a 2028 presidential bid.
At 83, he seeks to shape the Democratic Party’s future, arguing it lost in 2024 by neglecting working-class voters.
He hopes to influence budget battles and the 2026 midterms, targeting GOP lawmakers in battleground districts.
With Democrats lacking clear leadership, Sanders’ prominence and focus on economic inequality could define the party’s direction in the Trump-Musk era.
So they’re making a progressive party?
He should be pushing to replace First past the post voting so these 3rd parties can compete with the democrats on who can smash the republicans the best.
Defeating the Republicans is more important then the Democratic party. Democrats have lost their unearned privilege to go it alone against the republicans. Pass the reforms in blue states and we will work on the red states together
That would mean gathering enough support to do it from people that got where they are because of it. It seems impossible.
Oh cool another wannabe gerontocrat
Cultivate an ideological successor please Bernie.
It’s not AOC, she’s a sell out.
I think usually Bernie means well, but I think Democratic party is far beyond saving. We will have no significant progress no less opposition to fascism, until they are gone.
Electoralism is largely a dead end under the duopoly.
“If the Democrats listened to Bernie, we wouldn’t be in this mess. I assume he feels a deep level of disgust.”
Unfortunately he’ll probably end up the first to go in front of the firing squad
Right time. Wrong guy.
What does this even mean?
Bernie is trying to pull attention away from the Green Party - Jill Stein and Kshama Sawant - who has already been doing this for months with Workers Strike Back and the Fight the Rich and their two parties conference.
Bernie is the lullaby singer. He is there to take the power away from the people.
Remember that the candidate in 2020 who got the largest amount of grassroot small donations - aka the person everyday people donated to the most - promptly folded when he was told that Biden would be the nominee.
Bernie is not our friend and democrats are not going to win another election again. The time to go green is here.
And then promptly gave those mailing lists to the DNC.
Not with Butch word salad Ware. while Stein is relatively good compared to the corporate D/R ghouls it’s far from what it should be. You should all vote socialist.
Not the person you responded to but, Bernie is great and we really need this kind of stuff right now. Unfortunately, he’s 83 years old. We could really use some new blood on the left.
I think that’s the point of this tour. He isn’t running for president. He’s trying to build a support base for a real alternative.
That’s presumably AOC but it’s still too early.
The democratic party is dead. Go green.
The Democratic party, as it stands, is dead and the Greens are stillborn.
There’s nothing but hopes and prayers to support the idea that the Greens will ever get anywhere in the US. They have neither a policy platform nor any individuals who inspire broad support.
It is absolutely possible to take over parties from within though. We’ve seen it happen twice with the Republicans. They tried, and failed, to keep the Tea Party from taking over. Then they tried, and failed, to keep Trump from taking over.
History suggests we have a better chance getting AOC to take over and clean house with the Democrats than we do waiting for the Greens to make any headway.
Do note that the only reason the GOP was taken over was because they allowed themselves to be taken over. They run competitive primaries and take their results seriously even if it’ll result in the current party leadership losing power. The DNC is the exact opposite on that front, so just because it worked in the GOP doesn’t mean it’ll work in the DNC.
Maybe. “Allowed” suggested that they wanted or welcomed it.
A bunch of formerly powerful people in the Republican party are now much less powerful. Many of them have been sidelined in the Republican party and replaced. Several prominent former Republicans have effectively switched to the Democrats.
The Republicans and Democrats have differences in how they structure their organizations but neither one wants to intentionally allow outsiders to take over.
Jill Stein is a grifter
The Green Party is tiny and has tinier primaries. It doesn’t have to be Stein.
And owned by Putin.
Good point, to maintain our clear winning strategy, we need an old centrist. How about Schumer or Pelosi, right? Electing Pelosi would be good for the stock market, and her appointees (whoever donors want) could just run the place, just like Biden’s did.
And the 83 year old deceiver of his supporters is the person you want to throw you energy behind?
Crazy shit bro.
They will never get it.
I’m commenting but also experimenting wether the /s is needed. I see I have +4 -1 with no /s right now with no /s. I think I’ll just watch to see how it unfolds.
Remember, this is for posterity, so be honest
edit: ok by not using a /s on your obvious snark, you will lose ~ 25% of readers.
Are there videos of these rallies that can be shared so more people know about this?
Unless the democratic party’s platform becomes deny the oligarchy access to the levers of power, defend the working and middle class against the billionaires, and depose those who would enact political violence via law or pen, I’m not interested.
So just let the republicans rule forever nice choice.
It’s hard to tell the difference between Democrats and Republicans. They both seem to embrace the same ideology.
No it isn’t.
Republicans are fascist, eugenicist, lead-addled dementia patients with no regard for human life outside their immediate families and even then only to the degree that they can be exploited. Their core values are narcissism and personal greed.
Democrats are performatively-compassionate cowards who are terrified of change and value avoiding conflict above anything else. Their core values are looking outwardly like they give a damn and not being yelled at by anybody.
The two are incredibly distinct from one another.
Fascism cannot rise on its own. Fascism is only possible with a weak, complicit liberal party. Their continual ratchet effect has enabled Our current level of fascism in this country.
Good News:
He’s not a Democrat
If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it must be a mother fucking duck. He talks one thing while asking us to support his good friends, the oligarchy.
right, the only person in washington trying to get money out of politics is for the oligarchy. the one person who brow beats against the oligarchy, is actually for the oligarchy. you’re a straight up moron, my dude.
Someone who talks about oligarchy and then tells us that we need to support his good oligarchy buddies is a tool.
I love Bernie and I admire his tenacity even at 83. But it is not nearly enough by a mile and we should not be relying on 83 year old to generate paradigm shifts. Please, for the love of God, other decent people with influence. Step up.
The Democrats succession planning was/is terrible, which is why an 83 year old independent is one of the few that can rally a crowd. I wish they had done better.
In German class, in Arizona, my German teacher taught us teenage edgelords about Hitler. About his speeches. About his Charisma. He was a cult of personality. He could rally a crowd. If there aren’t videos comparing trump rallies to Hitler, I suggest you make you’re own comparison, and use your own judgment. There’s a reason fascism wins. Hate doesn’t prosper under progressives.
I have a friend who’s really into serial killers and cults, like, he’s listened to the recordings of the final moments of the Jamestown Massacre where you can hear them forcing the Flavor-Aid down people’s throats as the rest gasp and choke and die in the background, and he says that Trump sounds just like Jim Jones. From his speech patterns to the tone of his voice, it gives him chills just how alike they sound.
I have a friend who’s really into serial killers and cults
Yeah, uhhhh, keep an eye on that guy.
Jonestown, or as I just learned it was also called, the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project
the democratic peoples republic of temple
Thanks, I have no idea why my phone auto corrected to James.
Yeah, it’s not bad planning.
They continue actively keeping the progressives and the younger leaders out of power.
(This is about AOC, not Bernie, but we all know they did him dirty at least twice already.)
Which is why he’s recruiting.
He’s not recruiting, he wants to drive working people and our movements back into the graveyard of the Democratic Party.
Removed by mod
Please
Ok, good opener, I’m listening
for the love of God
Eh. Fuck that asshole sideways.
other decent people
We’re back on, yeah!
with influence.
Ah. That’s a no-go, sorry. Especially not in this fascist-breeding-pit climate…
Step up.
Hunh. Might be why the only guy stepping up is Bernie. He’s so old, he’s in Death’s phone contacts under “guy @ work”. 🙃
Democratic Socialists had a pretty serious recruiting campaign for the 2018 midterms. Cold-called potential candidates, offered training for both speechifying and organizing. Put up actual progressive candidates against incumbent dems in carefully chosen districts. That’s where “The Squad” came from.
Then they just kind of disappeared.
My point is that there are people out there willing to step up, but probably not thinking that they could be a “real” candidate and win, put up with the hassle and harrasment. People who would answer if called, but aren’t ready to jump in unasked. Bernie’s asking.
“Disappeared”? The Squad was literally targeted by the same fascists dismantling our nation this very moment (and those other cowards fired before them) until The Squad’s efforts were off the first few pages… and relegated to those who actually read (the Venn of that group and fans of The Squad is almost a single circle). FWIW, “disappeared” is exactly what the opposition prefers us to believe. Don’t.
Of the 5 current US reps with DSA history, DSA only endorsed 1 in 2024. They don’t even support AOC anymore. Maybe they’ve just refocused their efforts on state level races - which are definitely more ‘winnable’ and definitely an important part of building a pipeline to national office - but far less visible to people who don’t live in any targeted districts. To my view, they’re not the national joke that the Green party is, but they’re much harder to see than they were six years ago.
Fuck the Democrats™, in office or otherwise; they’re not your friends or neighbors, and have shown they’re capable of nothing more than jerking the ripcord when the Turd Reich yells “Pull!”
How many clays get launched before we legit recognize this isn’t just for practice? Sub-question: how many rounds would you guess before your “turn” down the slide, into the sky and their iron sights, fellow pigeon(s)?
✊🏼 The revolution may not be televised, but if anyone out there is waiting to catch the reaction vids first before forming an opinion? You’re not in traffic, you are the traffic. Pick a lane.
WE are those other decent people with influence.
If you have any ability, run for office and start your campaign now. If not, find a progressive running and join their campaign.
If the democratic party won’t do their jobs, we need to fucking do it for them.
AoC has been highly visible in news and media so she’s also giving it a go. I think one of our real issues is that leadership wise Jefferies is alright but Shumer is downright depressing.
Over the next two years we’ll see a constant push by establishment dems to push out the progressives because centrist politicians on both sides want to keep a pro-corporate status quo.
She looks great, but is it worth risking more MAGA on America voting for a woman? A third time? They think they were radical voting for “the black man”. Voting a woman seams beyond America even if the other choice is Trump or not voting. God know what the state the world is going to be in by the time another US election is due, let alone if it’s allowed to happen and be remotely free and fair.
Around the world, countries voted for change last year, not just America. Not necessarily good change, but people were unhappy and didn’t like the way things were. When Biden dropped out, there was massive excitement that maybe Kamala would offer good change, but eventually she promised more of the same.
I’m not saying sexism wasn’t a factor, it was. But it wasn’t the only factor. And Trump’s margin of victory wasn’t so large that we should just write off all women because Trump won against two women who allowed him to be the “change” candidate.
See from here in the UK, both women seams good enough and miles better than Trump. I think it says a lot about the US that both times they choose Trump over these clearly competent woman. The US just isn’t as socially progressive as Democratic leadership seam to think. I agree there was more than just misogynism going on, but it seams like it was a solid chunk of it.
See from here in the UK
Sorry UK, you’re very much in the same boat with us americans. Nothing an American or Brit says about politics will be taken seriously by anyone. A literal clown with a painted face would be taken more seriously than either of us.
Yer, Brexit is our Trump. It hurt us badly and continues to hurt us. We have a more grown up party in power now, but they dare not question Brexit as the popularists will jump on them if they do.
Kamala’s biggest weakness was trying herself with Joe Biden. She should have taken a more radical approach and sweeping changes.
I would argue the biggest factor is the lack of a primary. Kamela didn’t get to prove her 2024 chops, along with not having nearly enough time to organize a campaign. Biden and his handlers really screwed the pooch.
What it really comes down to, though, is corporate donors. Never forget that most of the high democratic leadership are a feckless and dependent lot. Kamela, like the rest, listened to the demons.
I mean, not having a real platform beyond business as usual, ignoring the cost of living crisis, and expressing a commitment to continued genocide were particularly large factors.
Harris raised 50% more than Trump. It’s hard to pin this one solely on big money influence.
Harris raised 50% more than Trump.
That just tells me she was paid to take a dive.
Her messaging changed midway through her campaign, to one that was friendlier to a center-right disposition. She lost a good deal of her mojo because of that, since she became Biden v2.0. While obviously better than Trump, she was rejected for being more of the same. Many politicians across the globe felt a backlash in 2024 for not trying to rock the boat.
And Trump’s margin of victory wasn’t so large that we should just write off all women because Trump won against two women who allowed him to be the “change” candidate.
“Women can’t win” is an excuse to shut out AOC and nothing else.
She looks great, but is it worth risking more MAGA on America voting for a woman? A third time?
Questions no one would be asking if she were a corporate ghoul.
I honestly don’t think it matters how great or not she is. I just don’t think America will vote for a woman yet. They prefer a rapist fashist narcissist.
I honestly don’t think it matters how great or not she is.
I honestly think that all the handwringing about a woman not being able to win is because the party hates AOC and everyone she stands for and will happily hold all women back to prevent her from being able to run.
You don’t think it’s that too big a chunk of US voters are backwards misogynists? Wish I didn’t, but I do. I’m not going to get my hopes up a third time.
Jeffries is horribly corrupt and a total stooge for monied interests. Don’t let his PR team fool you.
But but but he rhymes at times like johnnie cochran when he’s on and rockin!
Surely, that makes up for being a corporate drone that helps keep status quo fascism in place.
I was higher on Jeffries until I heard him interviewed by John Stewart. He said a bunch of nothing just like the rest of the party.
AOC’s interview was significantly better.
From Jon’s podcast? Wasn’t that a horrible interview? Jon starts put saying “what’s the plan instead of just saying you have to get the message out” and Jeffries doubles down on “branding”.
Its really disheartening to see that bullshit gaslighting is still the MO of the Democrats going forward. Every word of that interview was more of the same old shit, and unfortunately Jon didn’t push back on him at all.
Yes it was a bad interview hence me saying he said a bunch of nothing.
AOC is now old enough to run for president. I can see her running in 2028 and getting the grassroots support that Bernie enjoyed.
If anyone can get the youth out to vote she can. they need to focus hard on getting people registered though.
I also really REALLY hope she doesn’t campaign with a fucking Cheney
AOC is now old enough to run for president.
She was old enough during the last election as well.
aye, but there were no Democratic primaries in the last election
How about that.
She’s another dnc sheepdog like Bernie.
I personally would prefer a Bernie/AOC ticket, with Bernie giving a public contract that allows her to have him resigned if his mind starts going. IMO, it would be ideal if we could get 16 years of Bernie/AOC, and more if they can raise worthy successors.
Bernie will be 87 in 2028. Unfortunately i think Bernies chance at the presidency has been and gone. AOC/Walz would be nice. Walz proved him self to be likable in the Harris campaign but he doesn’t have the profile that AOC does despite arguably having more experience
Walz is the “Israel has the right to expand its borders” guy so you’d have to make him keep his mouth shut over Israel, but fair enough.
He ticks the old white guy box so the racists and sexists can feel okay voting for them while still being left enough to not be too much of a drag on the resulting administration
They’ll never allow AOC to win, just like they didn’t allow Bernie.
With enough support they won’t have the power to choose. It’s an uphill battle but one that we can win.
Granted the DNC “changed the rules” but are you forgetting the super-delegates overruling the majority votes in the primaries in 2016?
With enough support they won’t have the power to choose.
If there’s no primaries, no amount of support matters.
And if frogs had wings they wouldn’t bump their ass when they jumped.
We do have the technology to grow wings on frogs now.
As far as I can tell there is no legal requirement for a party to run a primary. If I am missing something I am more than willing to amend my opinion.
In today’s political climate, I think that’s unfortunately true. It would take some drastic outreach, Obama levels of outreach and more, plus a ton of money to change peoples biases and opinions (again, as of today).
Looking at how shitty the democrats are now, they don’t have the ability to stop her.
She just needs to win the working class. There are far, far more of us than the elitist snobs currently running the show on both sides of the aisle.
The biggest hurdle for AOC is she’s a woman. She is an attractive woman, so that’s beneficial, but I think America has made it abundantly clear that we are happy being misogynistic assholes that can’t trust women with important decisions.
Gender has absolutely nothing to do with it. She is neoliberal garbage like the rest of the party
Can we pleas stop repeating this narrative? Hillary lost because she is an evil ghoul. Harris lost because she kept saying how she will continue the work of Biden who equally is an evil ghoul. And Harris invited Cheney to campaign with her, who is the father of evil ghouls in the 21. Century US politics.
There is countries more conservative than the US, where women have been Presidents, Prime Ministers and Chancellors.
Far right and Nazis also dont have an issue with women leaders any more when it comes to elections. Look at Le Pen in France, Meloni in Italy and Weidel in Germany. Ffs Weidel is the nazi candidate in Germany and she is in a lesbian marriage with an Asian immigrant and raises two adopted children.
Gender has nothing to do with Harris loss and this narrative is kept being peddled to not face why people are alienated by her political program, character and donors.
They are more ok with women when those women are on their side.
Notice how none of those are America? Evil ghouls but somehow evil men get voted in no problem? America well never vote in a Woman sorry.
You’re correct that Hilary was awful and Kamala was uninspiring, but that’s still glossing over the fact that they both lost to Donald Fucking Trump, and Kamala did so with the benefit of hindsight.
Then maybe they shouldn’t have run awful people.
The party pilloried Sanders in 2020 because he allegedly said the same thing to Warren. Now, since the party doesn’t want to run AOC because they hate anyone to the left of Dick Goddamned Cheney now, suddenly the electorate isn’t ready for a woman? Fuck that. Democratic voters no longer want yet another status quo military industrial corpodem.
Repeat yourself.
And she took that hindsight and ignored it
We told her how to win. She needed the working class. Instead she tried to win suburban wine moms and “sane” republicans.
America will vote for a woman if that woman doesn’t look down on them. Harris lost at that rally where she shouted down protesters with “I’m speaking”. She told us all she wasn’t listening.
I think this ignores just how uninspiring Hillary and Kamala were.
Neither really spoke to the working class
You’re correct that Hilary was awful and Kamala was uninspiring, but that’s still glossing over the fact that they both lost to Donald Fucking Trump, and Kamala did so with the benefit of hindsight.
Really just ctr+c/v’d your own comment, huh?
Yes?
You’re making me feel like I need to punch more sexists that I find. I’m really liking the idea of identifying as a fucking problem these days.
So watch them run a pair of old white men, or find another member of the Clinton family that hasn’t had a go yet.
Kerry/Manchin.
Well if we cant get Chelsea Clintin we can tap Hunter Biden right.
On a more serious note though, I would be comfortable with Michelle Obama from the getgo if she ran. I dont think she’d be easily controlled by the party. She had no time for their bullshit even when Obama was leading the party.
She might be a popular option but she doesn’t want the job.
I also really REALLY hope she doesn’t campaign with a fucking Cheney
I thought I saw AOC calling out how bad an idea that was, back when Harris did it, so I don’t expect her to make the same mistake
“I think there’s plenty of people that aren’t happy about that, and I think that is part of the nature of putting together a coalition,” Ocasio-Cortez, who clashed with Cheney when they were both in the House, said.
“I don’t love it, but that doesn’t mean that we aren’t on the same team, and we aren’t on the same page when it comes to who is unequivocally the better candidate in order to win the presidential election.”
https://www.newsweek.com/aoc-liz-cheney-harris-campaign-trump-1976031
Aw shit, I hadn’t seen that.
My read on that statement is “I think this is a bad idea but in-fighting is the last thing we need right now if we want to avoid a Trump presidency.”
That’s my take as well
Afraid of competition on who can beat the republicans perhaps?
Calling it out harder publicly during the election would have just made a Trump presidency more likely. It’s similar to how Sanders shut up after Hillary stole the primary and threw his full weight behind her train wreck or a campaign.
People who actually give a shit don’t want Trump to win and will do whatever they can to keep that from happening.
Yeah that played out great in 2016 and 2024…
Of course infighting is bad if it escalates. But candidates who are completely detached from reality, need a reality check.
If the Democrats hadn’t waited until Summer to acknowledge what everyone saw with their own eyes, Biden being mentally declined well past the point of doing another 4 years, they could have built a proper campaign with a properly primaried candidate. But the oligarchy doesnt want that, because then topics like cost of living, housing health care and US funded genocide become topics for the Democratic base too.
And after Biden came the trainwreck of the Harris campaign. No Charisma, no political character, embracing the oligarchs coming out in support of her and finally closing the coffin with fucking war criminals Cheneys.
Bahaha you cant rally progressives.
because liberals/the left are not a unified party.
Its 33 different parties in a trenchcoat, unified only by their opposition to the insanity coming out of the right wing.
The left and liberals are not even close to each other on the political scale. Liberals share more ideology with Republicans than they do leftists.
This one is fun because Republicans told us this and now liberals vote Republican. I love the new world. We do their work for them. They’ve weaponized our autism
Cool, so we’re fucked then. It applies to the right as well but they make it work. But the left just comes up with excuses why we don’t even like each other
Yes, thats literally what I said, and totally not a projection of your own defeatism which is the actual problem.
We gotta take Capitalism down before it takes us down
But is capitalism really the issue here? As far as I can tell, you can put in place any economic agenda, if people just vote against themselves and if laws are actively ignored, the economic policy doesn’t really matter?
You are right that you can have authoritarian policies in any economic system, but capitalism in America has led to our authoritarianism. Capitalism does this as it relies on single ownership of the means of production, so it inherently centralized power and wealth.Think about the oligarchs, they control how wealth is distributed through their companies. If their workers had a say in the sharing of the profits, there is no way people would vote to give people enough wealth to control the globe while screwing over the rest of us. Also, if people are more individualized, like in America, they vote less on their group benefit, and what they see as their own benefit. This leads to fascism’s easy rise to power, but putting the blame on others.
Laws are often ignored in history through periods of change; I’d say it’s a matter of people agreeing or disagreeing with them.
In this case, it’s about a very strong push by very wealthy people to trick masses of followers into thinking their billionaire daddy’s are fighting for them.
Ostensibly, that push would be harder if there was not such a uniform path to wealth disparity where one idiot owns so much.
I’m at my states Capitol protesting and it’s kind of scary how many Trump supporters have driven by. But make no mistake, most are not for him. Call your representatives and demand action today. Don’t wait.
I think the only way the Democrat party meets the current moment is if an AOC or Bernie or similar wins the next presidential primary and aggressively replaces the current leadership.
agreed, but of the 448 votes for electing dnc party leadership, 248 were dnc insiders, and 200 were handpicked by the dnc to vote, from the pool of state leislators. Theres no way at all to take control of the dnc in any hostile manner. Its just not possible.
First they’ll need to fight to even have a fair election in 2026 and 2028. (Hell, even to have an election).
“elections” are a cornerstone of autocracies. There will definitely be an election event.
Whether your vote is even counted is another question entirely. Same for whether you will be allowed to cast a ballot.
I’m not even talking about saving democracy yet, I’m just talking about whether or not the democrats earn a “You tried” sticker.
Going to be hard for a progressive to win a primary when the corporate dems flood those campaigns with DNC money for the opposition, or worse just steal the nomination flat-out.
So, in the USA, the current presidential candidate of a party is also automatically the head of the party? How do they expect any human to fulfill both roles competently at once?
Current leadership will never let that happen. They will ride the wreckage of our nation into the ground rather than let the party move left or allow substantial power in the hands of non-boomers. We just have to wait for them to die of old age.
Pelosi Won. The Democratic Party Lost.
(Pelosi is silent generation ffs! She should have had her hands removed from the levers of power decades ago.)
Also:
Bernie wants to drive working people and our movements back into the graveyard of the Democratic Party.
What movements? As an outsider watching the US, are there any notable workers’ movements over there at the moment?
Refusing to support warhawk neoliberals like Biden and Harris seems to be a hell of a movement.
I mean, sure, but what else? I wouldn’t call ‘not voting for a candidate you don’t like’ a movement
It seems to me that Bernie is doing his best to create and energize a movement of working-class people in support of a better world. It isn’t trying to hijack an existing movement; because no cohesive movement currently exists. The lack of cohesion is exactly what Bernie is trying to address.
There is no movement outside the Democrats party… Unless you can post any proof?
