Bay Ridge Dems Endorsed a Socialist
Wow! I am shocked to see the Bay Ridge Democrats endorsed Bernie Sanders, a Socialist. Kadia Goba broke the story here and then they tweeted what’s above. Goba doesn’t live in NY anymore, but knows more about politics here than other reporters!
It’s very disappointing. What happened to the Bay Ridge Dems? It appears El-Yateem’s supporters must have infiltrated the Bay Ridge Democrats. See Facebook comments.
Bernie doesn’t have a shot and wouldn’t be able to win against Trump. #SMH (SMH = Shaking my head folks)
Bay Ridge – you need to know that this is Justin Brannan and Andrew Gounardes’ club. It’s also District Leader, Ralph Perfetto’s Club.
Hugs,
marlene
Topics: Bay Ridge | 2 Comments »
December 19th, 2019 at 3:04 pm
Marlene,
Four out of ten eligible voters did not vote in 2016, and dissatisfaction with both parties was a main animating feature of the electorate. Not only that, but the Democrats’ loss of rust belt states decimated by both parties’ trade agreements was not only what tilted the scales in this election, but was also a primary reason why the Labour Leave voters stayed home due to Labour acquiescing to the pro-EU remainers, and it has helped fan the flames of the far right’s rise throughout most of the industrialized world. Bernie Sanders in many ways breaks that spell, by being ideologically opposed throughout his entire life to much of the policies that hurt the working class including the decline in unionization, stagnating wages, and the crippling costs of housing and health care, while also eschewing the mega fundraisers, bundlers, and Super PACs that make people instinctively tune out politicians because of. Because he is the only one that is building a multi-racial, working class movement (https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/11/12/bernie-sanders-has-more-diverse-support-you-think), he is the only candidate that can even begin to roll back those policies to any semblance of normalcy. People in Bay Ridge and South Brooklyn are being absolutely crushed under those same costs which are amplified for the NYC area, and we are situated in an area with poor public transportation and exposure to future climate change catastrophes that only the mobilization of a Green New Deal could tackle even in the slightest.
I very much implore you, especially with a good platform such as yours, to introspect as to why the media and populous would like to see Sanders on a right-left dyad where turning the dial “too far left” could cause for bad results; the simple reason is that they have a class interest in opposing them, and not on their own terms but through the meta-conversation of electability that really should have been shattered by a reality TV host being elected President, or total buffoons like Boris Johnson and Jair Bolsonaro being elected as well.
If politics is a zero-sum game, and no net-new voters can be generated by a candidate, then maybe there’s an argument to the “too far left,” in that every voter you lose automatically switches sides. But the four voters who don’t, if mobilized with policies that would actually put substantial coin in their pockets when literally no politician over the last 50 years has done such a thing, would actually create an overwhelming political majority that the Democratic Party hasn’t seen since the 1930s. That majority didn’t spawn out of FDR’s brain, but it was because the 1920s and 1930s had strike after strike (organized by which political ideology, I wonder) that racked the country to the point of forcing their hand. Coincidentally, the purging of the spooky socialists, who by the way no one under the age of 40 even cares about the spookiness of, in the 1950s almost directly presaged the slow demise of the New Deal, and the beginning of the ridiculous and cruel political era we’re trying to break free from.
December 20th, 2019 at 5:44 am
Matt,
Socialism has failed.
There are enough people in the US who know this so I don’t think Bernie is electable. NYC is not a thermometer for the US.
And then there’s the candidate, Bernie Sanders the millionaire. IF that doesn’t make people under 40 question something, then people under 40 aren’t thinking.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2019/04/12/how-bernie-sanders-the-socialist-senator-amassed-a-25-million-fortune/#7102630236bf