Bernie Sanders Simply Was not in It to Win It!

By Rohullah Naderi

Bernie Sanders’s campaign resonated with me for multiple reasons. His brilliant grass-roots, multi-racial, and multi-generational campaign connected with ordinary folks, particularly, with the working-class and youth which had been left out of the electoral politics by the corporate candidates for a long time. Bernie’s platform was the only one that highlighted the plight of the working-class, and young voters. Sanders put their interests at the forefront. These policy proposals include:

• Raising the minimum wage to 15 dollars an hour living wage
• Making public colleges tuition-free to help the working-class with economic upward mobility
• Providing a single-payer healthcare to all, especially to those uninsured and underinsured, to guarantee quality treatment, and crucially, eliminate premiums, copayments, and deductibles
• Expanding Social Security aimed at protecting pensions, and vulnerable seniors
• Providing free child care to help parents earn more and spend less on child care
• Forgiving medical debt for 79 million Americans, and more importantly reforming bankruptcy laws to prevent Americans from incurring further medical debts.

All these programs address the issues faced by middle, working-class, and underprivileged Americans, and therefore move the country toward a little more economically equal and socially just society. As a millennial who is living in an era of gross economic inequality, mounting student debt, lack of good-paying jobs, irresponsible financial institutes, and unresponsive representative politics, Bernie’s campaign attracted me significantly. On an economic level, the campaign proposed creating 20 million jobs through the Green New Deal — a deal desperately needed when the economy is turning into a full-fledged “gig economy,” and awarding more benefits to the wealthy “One Percent.” The Green New Deal also addresses the ever-pressing issue of climate change — a serious challenge that threatens the future of humanity and the planet. This, perhaps, was the other major reason that Bernie had the millennials’ backing as climate change impacts them and the future generation more than anybody else.

This article aims to shed light on some of the reasons that Bernie’s campaign failed to procure the Presidential nomination twice in a row.

“Joe Biden is My Friend,” Was Counterproductive

In almost every media appearance where Bernie faced questions about Joe Biden, he kept referring to him as a “friend.” I strongly believe that Bernie saying “Joe Biden is My Friend,” cost him the Democratic nomination. Considering Biden’s horrible political track record and the strong backing from corporate America, he can never be a friend of a progressive candidate who is campaigning against the very corrupt political culture that Biden stands for. Joe Biden’s political career has left many disasters that prevent any individual — let alone a progressive who believes in social justice from befriending him. Here is a mere sampling of some of the things Biden did that preclude him the title of a progressive:

• He wrote the Patriot Act — an Act that has seriously curtailed the civil liberties of Americans and left in place a mass surveillance apparatus.
• Biden not only voted for the Iraq war but also helped give weapons manufacturers a windfall profit. Such a war-monger can never be a “friend.” Today, Iraq stands destroyed and has to grapple with widespread corruption and terrorism — a direct result of the American invasion.
• Biden helped author the racially-motivated Crime Bill that led to the mass incarceration of African-Americans. Today America has the highest number of people in prison providing free labor to corporations and manufacturing firms.
• Biden treated Anita Hill horribly. He allowed the Republican members of the panel to discredit the credibility of Hill’s testimony and deliberately avoided taking the testimony of three other women who offered their stories about Clarence Thomas. Such a misogynist who does not believe in a fair-play can never be a friend.
• One of the worst legacies of Biden is his support to repeal the Glass-Steagall Act which set the groundwork for the great recession of 2008. Since 1933, the Act had maintained a separation between commercial and investment banking. The repeal allowed Wall Street to act recklessly and greedily, and resulted in the collapse of the American economy. It left many Americans to lose their jobs and houses. Anyone behind such an irresponsible and catastrophic legislation can never be a friend of a progressive who has been fighting his entire political career to rein in the recklessness of Wall Street and hold it accountable.
• In 2005, Biden voted to end bankruptcy protections for students. One of the reasons that Bernie is popular among youth and millennials is his proposal to make public colleges tuition-free and canceling student debt — currently standing at $1.6 trillion affecting 45 million Americans.

Politicians like Biden are the obstacles to progressive legislation, moreover, they help corporations to entrench their grip on the legislative process even more. Biden’s priority has always been to enrich himself and his family by representing the interests of corporations and interest groups — the money machines that keep the likes of Biden in Congress by funding their reelection campaigns. He has never truly represented the people of Delaware. He has always fought for the interests of credit card companies and other corporations. Politically and ideologically, he has been way closer to the Republicans than to the liberals or progressives. To him, Dick Cheney — the architect of the Iraq invasion in 2003 — is a decent guy. The invasion killed many innocent Iraqis, destabilized the region forever, and created a monster called the Islamic State. In 2008, Barack Obama chose Biden as his running mate not because of his political experience but due to his right-wing politics to appeal to right-wing voters. He is what is wrong with American politics and the political system he perpetuates. If you are a true progressive, Biden can never ever be your friend. If you are still calling him your friend, your judgment may be called into question.

American elections are cutthroat competitions. Every candidate is your rival — whether you like it or not. You treat other candidates as rivals and they treat you as such. There is no bromance. There is no personal chemistry. There is no political agreement. And there is no friendship. It is the platform and the policy proposals that matter. Voters judge candidates on their platforms (or ideally should). Instead of calling Biden a friend, Sanders should have focused more on explaining his platforms and distinguishing it from that of Biden’s centrist, and corporate-friendly ones. In contrast, Biden constantly attacked Bernie’s proposals, calling them radical, unrealistic, and casting doubt on how they can be funded. He never returned the favor by calling Sanders a friend. When one of Sanders’ surrogates published an article in The Guardian attacking Biden’s political track record and proposals, Bernie disowned the piece and apologized to Biden. Throughout the campaign, I was wondering if Sanders was campaigning for Biden or the working-class that he claimed he spoke for. Throughout his political career, Biden has undermined the working-class by supporting deregulation of the financial industry, supporting free trade deals that led to the de-industrialization of the Midwest, supporting cruel privatization, giving tax benefits to corporations, and supporting the military-industrial complex by pursuing military interventions. In addition, Biden’s support for neoliberal policies that benefit the millionaire and the billionaire class has accelerated privatization, militarization, and corporatization. Such a hardcore neoliberal with a strong neo-conservative leaning cannot be a friend.

Bernie’s Uninspiring Debate style

Bernie Sanders enjoyed a considerable name recognition during the 2020 campaign — a stark difference from his 2016 campaign. This time around, he was more popular, widely connected, had a strong presence in media circles, advised by policy experts, supported by a more organized campaign, and had an energized pool of volunteers. In 2016, Bernie Sanders’ campaign was not as robust and politically targeted. My theory is that he entered the race just to influence the DNC and the Clinton campaign to incorporate some of his progressive policy proposals. One clearly felt that Sanders was not in the race to win the nomination. However, Sanders’ debating style was strong and sharp. Sanders was good at putting across his message and touched upon the fundamental issues facing the working class and the country — economic inequality, Medicare for All, climate change, the influence of money on electoral politics, and progressive taxation. Up until that time, those issues were considered relatively taboo in the mainstream media. Even though Sanders did not deliver any knockouts to Hillary Clinton — which he should have — he was nonetheless successful in cultivating a core political base and showed a high level of energy.

However, in 2020 Bernie Sanders’s energy level was unimpressive. It was evident in Sanders’ uninspiring debating style. One can understand the fatigue and failure carried on from the 2016 campaign and the bitterness it left among progressives. That failure and bitterness made Sanders exhausted. The exhaustion was even more palpable and overwhelming when the liberal media, the corporate wing of the party, and the Clinton political machine put all the blame on Bernie Sanders for Hillary’s 2016 defeat. Unrelenting attacks are draining, particularly, when it comes from all corners. Sanders’s low energy level and exhaustion were visible on the debate stage. In addition, the frustration point was the lack of consistent counter-attacks by Bernie Sanders. He never countered Pete Buttigieg fiercely and Biden was almost always left unharmed.

The uninspiring debating style of Bernie Sanders left very little room to focus on the funding aspects of his programs despite it being the central point of attacks by his opponents, corporate media, and policy circles. Bernie Sanders could have emphasized the funding aspects of his programs in the same way he emphasized the importance of Medicare for All. The funding details of Sanders’ programs were present on his campaign website. Considering today’s election campaigning style which is limited to sound bites and catchy phrases — Sanders should have prepared a few of those to cover the funding aspects of his programs.

In the primary debates, the one debate that stood out and could have been emulated by Bernie Sanders was Elizabeth Warren’s strong debating style against Michael Bloomberg. Bernie should have been that strong and sharp in all the debates — bashing the racism of Pete Buttigieg repeatedly and exposing his corporate backers regularly. He should have attacked the centrist and anti-working-class policies of Joe Biden. He could have drawn attention to Biden’s strong leaning towards right-wing politics. Strategically, Bernie Sanders failed to pinpoint a significant drawback in Joe Biden’s horrible track record despite there being many. This strategy was used masterfully by Barack Obama in 2008. He equated John McCain’s campaign as the continuation of George W. Bush’s third term. It stuck with McCain firmly and he could never get rid of the label.

In the primary election of that year, Obama focused on the political judgment of Hillary Clinton as she had voted for the disastrous invasion of Iraq in 2003. Obama attacked Clinton on it consistently, swaying potential voters that he has a better political judgement. Obama proved that the strategy was effective and voters’ attention was kept on Clinton’s poor political judgment longer. By repeating a catchy message or phrase constantly, voters will be persuaded to follow your campaign and eventually vote for you. Strangely enough, Donald Trump used that strategy, too. He focused on the foreign policy blunders of Hillary Clinton. I am amazed that this tried and true strategy was not utilized by Bernie Sanders’ campaign. While in Congress, Joe Biden tried to cut social security four consecutive times. One of Bernie’s major policy planks has been protecting the working class and the vulnerable. He could have focused on this affront consistently and attacked Biden on the issue at every debate and campaign ads.

The corporate media have been anti-Sanders since 2016 the moment Sanders took on the political might of Hillary Clinton and the DNC. As an anti-establishment candidate, Sanders criticized the role of the corporate media in overlooking the major issues faced by the working class. In most cases, the corporate media perpetuated and distorted Sanders’ policy proposals. For example, there was a consistent spotlight on Medicare for All program being unrealistic and impractical. Sanders himself was called a “socialist”, and a “radical” by the mainstream media. The programs he has championed are New Deal-oriented — similar to the programs advocated by the FDR. In sum, the corporate media shut Sanders down by giving negative coverage and undermine his programs as much they could. What was so hypocritical was the amount of praise Sanders received by the same corporate media when he ended his campaign. And Joe Biden was given a free pass by the corporate media. His horrible and anti-working class political and legislative track records were never scrutinized by the corporate media.

Some of the American voters do not vote at all as they do not consider electoral politics as a path to bring about real change. The power and influence of corporations and their Super PACs have made real reforms almost impossible. However, Bernie’s people-backed small donation campaign proved that a people-oriented and grass-roots movement without the corporate influence and direction was possible. The hope generated by Sanders’ campaign electrified many voters — particularly young voters — to become politically active and attend Sanders’ rallies, town halls, and campaign events in great numbers. The campaign turned into a successful movement that reached every corner of the country and inspired people from all walks of life, and it considerably helped shift the base of the Democratic party to progressive politics. Issues such as healthcare for all, economic equality, affordable education, housing for all, holding corporate America accountable, and taxing the super-rich, considered radical policies a few years ago, are now mainstream. This is perhaps the most significant political legacy of Bernie Sanders that will last for generations to come.

Another positive of Bernie’s campaign is that it helped elect a handful of progressives into the House. One of them — Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez aka AOC — defeated a long-time serving Congressperson with influential political connections in the Democratic Party. However, following the defeat of 2016, the campaign failed again to secure the nomination and Bernie ended up supporting the politics that he and his campaign were fighting against for two consecutive electoral campaigns. This was the painful part of the campaign. Sanders gave his political base hope but did not fight wholeheartedly to deliver that hope. Sanders never took the gloves off to go after his political opponents’ policies and their corporate-backed platforms and expose their detrimental policies in relation to the working class. Sanders is a nice guy, no doubt about that. But niceness, political compromise, weak or lack of counterattacks do not win elections. They give false hope and create opportunities for the opponents to tear you down.

I do not see any difference between the platforms of Joe Biden and Donald Trump. Both are anti-working class leaving the public policy in the hands of corporations and special interest groups. The argument of the “lesser of two evils’’ — a recurring pattern almost in every election — can’t help the working-class folks pay their bills. It has been a long time that both parties have forgotten that the working-class even exist. I am sure once in the White House, none of the parties will remember their fake promises made to the working-class that struggle daily to make ends meet. It will be business as usual. Building on the strengths of a third party or candidate with progressive credentials and voting for progressive Congressional candidates are the way forward. The movement built by Bernie Sanders has the potential to continue to make a difference, and that potential will increase exponentially if Bernie Sanders treats his pro-corporate opponents as enemies not friends.

Rohullah Naderi is an Afghan political observer. A former Fulbright Scholar, he has a graduate degree in political science from Lehigh University. He can be reached at roohullah.naderi@gmail.com