END TO END BERNERS: The Official Bernie Sanders 2020 Crew thread

We're still keeping it weird down here. Bernie is in town and got the one endorsement that truly matters.

“Surprise guest” and native Texan Marianne Williamson endorses Bernie Sanders for president at his rally in Austin, TX pic.twitter.com/wpBb2MK4iM

— Emma Kinery (@EmmaKinery) February 23, 2020

One with the Orb

Now this is an endorsement lol.

To be honest, a Sanders administration would probably leave center-left policy wonks like me out in the cold, at least initially. But this is no time for self-indulgence and ego trips. Freedom is on the line 5/

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) February 23, 2020

the replies are really something

I just finished my first shift of canvassing for Tío Bernie!!

good 4u cg

it's always time for self-indulgence and ego trips

exactly! I’ll be patting my back to a peaceful slumber tonight

Toody approved! Stickers, 3 for $5 delivered, and all the cash goes to the Bernie campaign. #BernieSanders2020 #DeadMoon

By Dan Cronin with lettering by Shelby Menzel.https://t.co/DmdMABqfrX pic.twitter.com/JlV6HT7Bxh

— Backroad to Nowhere (@thumphreypdx) February 4, 2020

bernie stickders

Exposed by Anderson Cooper and trending on Twitter. Bernie is done:

Bernie Sanders defends his 1980s comments about Fidel Castro in an interview on 60 Minutes. https://t.co/ySqvQKoiBU pic.twitter.com/lTwuXWp9sA

— 60 Minutes (@60Minutes) February 24, 2020

this stuff hurts sanders in florida, but who gives a shit beyond that.

lol love how this would-be gotcha moment becomes a classic bernie pivot into attack on trump

He probably will lose Florida, but Hillary also lost Florida, so did Kerry, and we know what happened with Gore.

He is literally making excuses for a communist murderer, Twitter will have you know. xps

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/fl/florida_trump_vs_sanders-6842.html

i mean maybe but the sanders v trump polls rn in fl are competitive

xp

But yeah, m bison OTM.xp

i think what most impresses me abt bern as a candidate is his ability to stay on message. its frustrating at times when ppl ask for something more granular or detailed, but it makes it where people who dont pay much attention to politics can understand his platform in a relatively short pd of time. and he can draw contrasts b/w him and his opponents while doing so.

My parents and relatives weren't voting for a Democrat anyway.

I did confront several squeamish Dems anticipating comments from their parents and relatives.

I reminded them we'd been called Commies and fellow travelers most of our lives anyway.

Fidel Castro is dead. Raul is nearly so. The world moves on. Any comments made 35 year ago should be considered mummified and studied as dead artifacts. If someone wants to know what Bernie thinks is appropriate policy toward Cuba, they should ask him. He'll tell you.

Someone should have stepped in before this headline went up on the Washington Post site. https://t.co/h5bBoMiNgH pic.twitter.com/pChEjB3hIG

— Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu) February 24, 2020

Democracy Dies In Darkness is more of a goal than a warning.

I reminded them we'd been called Commies and fellow travelers most of our lives anyway.

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 February 2020 03:34 (one hour ago) link

One of my theories about why the "commie" stuff isn't getting more traction is that the GOP has really boy-who-cried-wolfed that one by now, not least with Obama (all his ties to "radicals" and the like). Another is just that there's a growing part of the electorate who was either born after the cold war or doesn't really remember any of it, let alone the scary parts, and a shrinking part of the electorate who does.

wapo's about to go beast mode this is just the beginning

Can we do a poll to determine what percentage of ILX (in 2019) really remembers the Cold War firsthand? Because I don’t - I was born in late 1982 and I literally have no memory of the Berlin Wall falling or the collapse of the Soviet Union. The first international news story I can recall, for some reason, was the capture of Manuel Noriega. I have absolutely no memory of the fall of the Berlin Wall (a month before Noriega’s capture) and the dissolution of the USSR (two full years later) - none.

11 years ago, but...

The ILX user age average Poll

It was definitely talked about in my Grade 6 class. Iirc, a kid who always sat quietly at the back of the room whispered "the wall is falling now but you will all live to one day see socialism come to America".

I was born in '81 but I was a giant nerd so I remember some of the '89-'90 Cold War stuff on TV and then I got hooked on news about the '91 Soviet coup and dissolution.

I was born in 79 and I vaguely remember the wall falling, "perestroika" etc. I also absorbed a lot through pop culture stuff like Spies Like Us

78 and I remember all of those things but I didn't feel the anxiety at all. You're a kid, you don't understand the stakes. Scorpions! Wind of Change!

I was also really into the movie White Nights because it was played on cable over and over and over.

I remember the wall falling but didnt understand it (I was 4/5 at the time). I remember also thinking that the Soviet union was a nautical state because I thought the hammer and sickle was an anchor and in the news and popular culture youd often see their submarines and battleships pictured

^ lock thread

I learned from seeing The Hunt For Red October with my dad that they had a way better national anthem.

I went to the Soviet Union in '88 when I was in high school.

I was born in ‘82 and I definitely remember the Berlin Wall coming down. I’m sure this is mostly due to being an army brat—we had lived in what was then West Germany just a few years before.

My dad has some interesting Cold War stories. He was stationed with NATO in Italy (where I was born) in the midst of the Nuclear Able Archer ‘83 exercise and the Soviet Nuclear False Alarm Incident. He also survived a Baader-Meinhof bombing in Germany during the mid-70s.

If the wall hadn't fallen in '89 chances are I'd still be stuck behind the Iron Curtain right now.

itshappening.gif

MSNBC - 2/23/2020

Word art by @AnandWrites... pic.twitter.com/eVcSGZJJA6

— J̶O̸N̶ (@Bern4Bern) February 23, 2020

I also went in high school as a sophmore, 1986

In Miami the Cold War never ended.

xp sophOmore

bg twitter video there saying a lot

The day the Berlin wall fell is the very first day I remember. I don't remember anything about the news, but it was my last day of daycare and we built a snowman. So that

Glasnost the Snowman

wow @ that video

Ottepel the Snowman

FTFY

Born in 1975, remember the Cold War, as such, but recall it loosely peaking with "The Day After" and never thought (or was made to think) anything of nuclear annihilation or the like beyond references in music and other movies. I remember the wall coming down and all the coverage, but in my mind it felt inevitable (propaganda worked?). My wife, on the other hand, grew up partly in West Germany and had experience with/in East Germany, Checkpoint Charlie, etc., so had slightly different experiences.

I'm sure Communist/Socialist still works as a demonic derogatory term in some circles and for some audiences, and maybe those terms should for those who experienced, say, the Soviet Union first hand and had to get out. But I suspect for a lot of people they're just vague meaningless derogatory words, like hippie or pothead or poopy-pants. I assume the term "socialist" will nonetheless be successfully weaponized, but I also assume that was going to happen no matter who gets the nomination. "Socialist" can also pretty be easily countered, but I wouldn't bet on the Dems doing that well. They're going to get caught up in the same defensive loop bullshit that kneecapped them last time.

I feel like most of the ppl for whom "socialist / commie" is a demonic derogatory term are already in Trump's main demo anyway (older, more affluent voters, mainly though not exclusively white). The challenge for the Sanders campaign will be fighting the perception that he's too big a risk in a time of a "healthy economic climate"; it's up to him and the campaign to show that those measures don't mean squat for most people.

i went through my whole childhood hearing my dad call innocuous midwestern university towns havens for 'communists', so, thanks for debasing that one, pops

That video triggered an unironic rendition of 'America, Fuck Yeah!' in my head. Although it's probably more than a little utopian to hope that the broader establishment will follow that one dude's lead re: curiosity and self-reflection.

xxpost I don't have anything more than anecdotal data points, but my mom (for example), went hard Democrat post-Trump - she used to consider herself an "independent" - and now she is firmly "blue no matter who." Still, talking to her she does seem to have some misgivings with the term "socialist," which ... yeah, she's borne the brunt of propaganda for *decades,* it takes a bit to get past that, despite being very smart and very educated. She told me she has friends who are anti-Trump but *also* anti-Sanders, threatening to stay home and not vote if he gets the nomination, and she apparently pushed back at them, reminding them that getting rid of Trump remains the top priority. Hopefully she doesn't let them get away with inaction.

I have another friend who is a financial advisor, and she has been telling clients, per the guidance of managers above her, that Sanders *or* Warren getting elected is predicted to knock 30% off the stock market. For what that's worth (literally and figuratively). So, yeah,

The challenge for the Sanders campaign will be fighting the perception that he's too big a risk in a time of a "healthy economic climate"; it's up to him and the campaign to show that those measures don't mean squat for most people.

That Vox piece above did an OK job explaining that Sanders is ultimately just another politician who behaves like normal politicians, but that's a double edged sword. Sanders generates a lot of energy from his occasional bomb throwing rhetoric, so it's a risk to amplify the more mundane aspects of his political record. If he makes himself appear *less* radical, does it cost him support? If he gets the nom, will he attempt at all to mainstream? Does he need to? I have no idea. As always it all comes down to turnout, and that, historically, has been erratic.