It's extraordinary the extent to which "news" personalities are trying to bait Bernie Sanders to abandon the issues and engage in personal attacks or horse-race politics. This recent interview with Andrea Mitchell is a good example of this approach by a interviewer and Bernie Sanders' approach to bringing the discussion back to concrete issues.
Bernie Sanders characterizes himself as a Democratic Socialist. What does that mean? Here's a well-phrased graphic I found on Facebook.
Noam Chomsky has it down to four simple steps:
Here's the bottom line of a Princeton study, "Does the Government Represent the People?":
Gilens & Page found that the number of Americans for or against any idea has no impact on the likelihood that Congress will make it law.The study found that nearly every issue we face as a nation is caught in the grip of corruption. Industries given special attention are those who provide the most funding to politicians: Energy, Telecommunications, Pharmaceuticals, Defense, Agribusiness and Finance.“The preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”One thing that does have an influence? Money. While the opinions of the bottom 90% of income earners in America have a “statistically non-significant impact,” Economic elites, business interests, and people who can afford lobbyists still carry major influence.
Earlier this week, I attended an organizational meeting for those seeking to do volunteer work for the presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders. The meeting was held at the office of the Communications Workers of America in west St. Louis County (there were 8 other simultaneous meetings in St. Louis along, and thousands of these meetings nationwide. As you can see, more than 100 people showed up to volunteer at my location. Sanders spoke via video to all of those gathered together tonight. There are reports that 100,000 people attended Sanders' House Parties across the U.S. this week.
Anyone else interested in working for Sanders' campaign can do so by visiting his website.
