So, he’s running.
Bernie Sanders, who will be 79 years old when the 2020 election takes place, has announced his decision to run for President of the United States again. To say I am extremely conflicted about this announcement would be an understatement on the level of saying I have mixed feelings about Billy Joel. On the one hand, I have very little confidence or interest in electoral politics, my faith in the ability of the President to effect truly positive change in a political sense is shaky at best, and I have a deep and nagging suspicion that Bernie’s time has come and gone. On the other hand, there has never been a candidate in my lifetime whose values and ideology are as in line with mine, and there may never be again; while he still represents a compromise candidate at best and has significant flaws as both a politician and a person, he’s leagues beyond anyone else who might run, and his best beliefs are ones that he has consistently championed for half a century, in stark contrast to the poll-driven spinelessness of most candidates from the Democratic Party.
There is something about Sanders that drives liberals and centrists completely mad. The modern Democratic Party is more of a corporate brand than a political party, and most of its adherents treat politics like a football game that they aren’t especially interested in winning than a life-or-death struggle over the fates of real human beings; but nothing, up to and including the behavior of Donald Trump, seems to rile them like the mere existence of Bernie Sanders. He’s not a real Democrat, they hiss, as if that was something to be ashamed rather than proud of; he’s a racist widely despised by minorities, they boo, despite that being disproven by one poll after another; he’s wildly unpopular, they insist, despite the fact that he amassed a staggering $4 million in donations in a single day without taking a penny from PACs or corporate donors. That they would rather swallow concrete than see a man with the most progressive policies since FDR take office is evident everywhere, from the complete ratfucking their party gave Sanders in his 2016 run to the open claim by idea-deficient coffee billionaire Howard Schultz that he will run as a centrist spoiler, in hopes of throwing the election to Trump, instead of leaving open the possibility of a Sanders win.
This sort of mania, hugely exacerbated by social media and pure nectar to comfortable full-time losers drunk on Russian conspiracy theories, is perplexing enough, especially when it is claimed that Sanders is actually a reactionary wolf in sheep’s clothing who would presumably take office and start to do Communist racisms if we don’t vote for the real progressives like, say, Kamala Harris or Joe Biden. Given how much these people seem to think that Trump is the anti-Christ come to collect America’s soul, you’d think they’d be more interested in supporting the one candidate who perpetually drubs him in one poll after another — but then, polls mean nothing unless they support what you already believe. The whole democratic process seems to offend this breed of liberal: it’s bad enough that Sanders has the audacity to run for President in the first place (an act of lunacy that surely speaks to the presence of malignant narcissistic personality disorder in Bernie and no other candidate), but at a time like this! That Bernie needs to step aside and throw his followers’ support to some other candidate is without question, but strangely, why no other Democrat needs to do the same for him goes unanswered.
Still, even in light of all the numbers (which mean nothing, because polls are outdated, inaccurate, and subject to confirmation bias), even in light of all the senseless hatred on Twitter (which means nothing, because the internet isn’t real except when it is), even in light of my own preference for his policies and positions (which mean nothing, because anyone can say anything but not anyone can do what they say), I can only get so excited at the prospect of Bernie Sanders running again. Age ain’t nothin’ but a number, but 77 is a pretty high number. His positions have serious flaws (his universal health care plan could use a lot of finessing, his foreign policy notions are often ill-considered, and he has some outdated notions of how the economy works). He’s not especially charismatic or convincing. The entirety of the Washington establishment is arrayed against him — conservatives hate him for being a socialist, and liberals hate him because he’s not someone who can affirm their admirable essentialism — which means even if he wins, his chances of pushing through the most needed items on his agenda are slim to none. And, of course, he might not win, since the establishment is even more determined to crush him now than they were four years ago.
Beyond that, electoral politics is a snake pit. The president’s powers are (thankfully) limited; governing in a country whose political system is as intentionally corrupted and broken as our own demands compromise and sacrifice; and running for high office, even with the best intentions, is little more than a long, drawn-out way of setting vast amounts of money on fire. While the symbolic and practical significance of America — America! — electing an openly socialist leader would be enormous, particularly when many other countries with strong leftist traditions are either being lost to neoliberalism or succumbing to creeping authoritarianism, Sanders wouldn’t be able to change the course of the country overnight, or perhaps at all. (This speaks to the dire state of the country more than it does Sanders’ politics or personality, but the end result is the same.)
Agreeing as I do with both Bob Black, who said you can’t want what that state wants and not want the state, and Lucy Parsons, who warned that the rich will never allow us to vote away their wealth, I am a lifelong skeptic of the efficacy of electoralism; I find it to be expensive, resource-draining, a huge time-suck that never ends and corrupts or exhausts even the finest people, and largely ineffective at anything but a small local level thanks to the poisonous influence of money on politics. Next week, the socialist organization to which I belong will discuss whether or not to endorse Sanders’ 2020 run; I tentatively plan on voting in the affirmative, but in the most nominal way possible, supporting it in a general sense but devoting no resources or finances to it that could otherwise be used for more important local organizing work.
But here, again, I find myself at odds with myself. Liberals like to claim that for all his years in politics, Bernie Sanders has nothing in the way of successful legislation to show for all his high ideals and lofty principles. This isn’t entirely true, and even if it was, it seems more proper to blame all the compromised politicians who voted against his progressive ideas than to blame Sanders himself. Martin Luther King didn’t end racism, either, but surely that was the fault of the racists, not the fault of King for not trying hard enough. But there’s even more to it than that. I’ve always believed, and will continue to believe, that the key to wielding power is through large mass movements, who alone, through the force of their actions, can hold politicians accountable to their demands. And Sanders’ strength may not be in masterful politicking or the skillful crafting of legislation; but his consistency and moral clarity make him very good at galvanizing and supporting just the kind of mass movements that can truly transform our shattered society. He might not be a polished speaker or an accomplished policymaker, but he has a knack for getting committed people to organize around him. Those people, and the millions who stand beside them in solidarity, are the ones who can effect true change, on the level that no senator or president could do.
That’s leadership. And that’s why I’ll vote for Bernie Sanders.