In Chicago for the weekend. pic.twitter.com/q6KEmFK1J4
— E McMorris-Santoro (@EvanMcSan) June 17, 2016
“No, sir, th’ dimmycratic party ain’t on speakin’ terms with itsilf. Whin ye see two men with white neckties go into a sthreet car an’ set in opposite corners while wan mutthers Thraiter an’ th’ other hisses Miscreent ye can bet they’re two dimmycratic leaders thryin’ to reunite th’ gran’ ol’ party.” — Finley Peter Dunne, Mr. Dooley’s Opinions (1901)
“Dems in disarray” is an honorable tradition, one of the oldest in modern politics; so is Will Rogers’ comment that “You’ve got to be an optimist to be a Democrat, and you’ve got to be a humorist to stay one.” Last weekend the progressive/leftist wing of the party convened in Chicago, to prepare for the convention and rally their troops…
Democracy Now’s Juan Gonzalez warns activists not to repeat the New Left's mistake of 1968 by sitting out the election.
— daveweigel (@daveweigel) June 18, 2016
D.D. Guttenplan, in the Nation, “There Was No Clear Agenda at the People’s Summit—and That’s a Good Thing“:
…[C]oming from London—where a political argument about what kind of world we want to live in and what kind of relationship we want to have with Europe turned murderous and took a young woman’s life—what I saw in Chicago was a warm, lively, hopeful, well-organized gathering of 3,000 people whose biggest discovery in the past year has been not that the system is rigged (we already knew that) but our own astonishing strength. And who have no intention of giving up that strength and falling quietly in line behind Hillary Clinton or anyone else.
“Once you know something you can’t un-know it,” the activist and actor Rosario Dawson told the crowd. “Now we know how powerful we are.”
The task now is to figure out how to preserve and grow that power, and how to use it most effectively in a time of great danger, and when the stakes for our country, and our movements, couldn’t be higher. And what may have seemed frustrating to those in search of a quick sound bite—namely the lack of a unified, coherent agenda going forward—actually struck me as a sign that no one was being stampeded, or shepherded, or rounded up to be delivered to Clinton or anyone else. Which is a tribute to the National Nurses United, who tacked this “gathering of the tribes” onto the end of their annual convention here, and proof that when Winnie Wong, the Occupy Wall Street veteran who co-founded People for Bernie, the group which co-sponsored the summit, told me that, instead of a list of demands, “I want to see a thousand lovely parasols,” she meant it…
For some, that means going to Philadelphia, where Sanders backers will be both inside the hall—like Mike Fox, Florida state coordinator of Progressive Democrats of America, or Waleed Shahid of the Working Families Party, who will be among the nearly 1,900 Sanders delegates—and outside on the streets. If you believe—as Sanders and his supporters do—that pushing the party away from corporate accommodation and towards a more populist, more “democratic” direction is actually crucial to defeating Donald Trump in November, then both are necessary. Because while those inside the hall are able to communicate demands, and negotiate, their power to do so stems from those outside—not just on the strength of their numbers but also on their willingness to obstruct or disrupt if those inside are ignored or muscled out of the way…
Frances Fox Piven, the veteran activist who has been mentoring movements for a half-century, did tell the group that, faced with the real risk of a Trump presidency rolling back decades of social progress, “we have to elect Hilary Clinton to defeat Donald Trump. You may not like it, but we do.” However, Piven also reminded us that “movements flourish when there are politicians in office who have reasons to be afraid of them.” …
Notable: There’s a Green Party booth but zero interest in making this event look like it’s teeing up a spoiler. https://t.co/MsSaFUofrC
— daveweigel (@daveweigel) June 18, 2016
Dave Weigel, in the Washington Post,
… The first plans for a post-primary summit were hatched in September 2015, when hopes for Sanders’s presidential bid were still relatively modest. National Nurses United, the first union to endorse the campaign, saw the summit as a way to gather Sanders supporters and other elements of the left after what looked likely to be an easy Hillary Clinton victory.
“Back then we just assumed we’d end up with a nominee who’d have to be pushed significantly to the left,” said Roseann DeMoro, NNU’s executive director. “One of the lessons from Obama years is there was a movement growing, and after it elected a president, the movement went away. Wall Street had free rein, and we didn’t push back. People assumed Obama would do their bidding – which is just crazy, when you look back.”
The epic length of the primaries has changed the tone of the summit. While NNU is not among the Sanders endorsers calling on him to officially end his campaign, the focus of the conference is not on winning him the nomination…
Morning from the @pplsummit in Chicago. pic.twitter.com/dhxAGqEyK0
— Yamiche Alcindor (@Yamiche) June 18, 2016
Former Illinois state Rep. Nina Turner preaches at #PPLSummit "We need doers of the deed." pic.twitter.com/iSwNzcfFF0
— Isaiah J. Poole (@ijpoole) June 18, 2016
Evan McMorris-Santoro, at Buzzfeed:
The big question this weekend in Chicago is how to turn the Bernie Sanders movement into a lasting element of Democratic politics.
For some of the Sanders faithful on Saturday afternoon, the answer was locking arms on a civic center floor and struggling as “police officers” pulled them apart and “arrested” them…
In the basement of the Lakeside Center, where the Summit was held, some of those younger Sanders supporters prepared for what they called “direct action” — loud, consistent, and perhaps disruptive protest outside the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. Several dozen of them attended a training on how to march, how to follow a chant, how to defy police orders to disperse by sitting and locking arms in what’s called a “human chain,” and how to conduct themselves when the police stepped in and physically removed them.
Trainers wearing fake badges waded among the chanting and human-chained “protesters,” pulling them apart, putting their hands behind their backs, and leading them away.
The simulation was for what training leaders called “a blockade,” but they stressed blocking busy intersections or other disruptions may not be what the final protest plan looks like. “Direct action,” said participants in the training, is non-violent and peaceful.
Thousands of Sanders supporters have already signed a Facebook petition promising to protest the Democratic convention. Many of those gathered at The People’s Summit expected those protests to include police stepping in. Rumors of police efforts to push protests back from the convention site or other efforts by the authorities to quiet the Sanders uprising abounded in the training session…
Update:
Philly mayor's office says Bernie supporters protesting at DNC will meet police not out to arrest them.https://t.co/Y6BBFSU2Bl
— E McMorris-Santoro (@EvanMcSan) June 19, 2016
There are maybe 1,000 campground spots within 25 miles of Philly, all on the Jersey side. A mini "Berning Man!"https://t.co/Y9K76skN5Y
— Al Giordano (@AlGiordano) June 19, 2016
Gregory Krieg, at CNN:
… “We think Trump is going to implode,” RoseAnn DeMoro, executive director of the Bernie Sanders-backing National Nurses United, told CNN. “He’s his worst enemy. So I think all the hype around the choice right now, Hillary or Trump, it’s a false narrative. She’s going to beat Trump. Most people could beat Trump, because he’s going to take himself out.”
Trump is viewed by many of the 3,000 leftists here as a potentially dangerous drain on the energy rallied by the success of Sanders’ own insurgent bid — and an escape hatch for Clinton, who they fear will seek to channel anxiety over his ascent to muffle the movement’s cri de coeur against the presumptive Democratic nominee.
“What we’re offering is an affirmative program to really address the basic human needs in our society and to overcome this inequality,” Michael Lighty, Nurses United’s public policy director, told CNN before the event. “And that is more challenging if everyone is just focused on defeating Trump.”…
But some other influential voices at the summit said they found it more difficult to look beyond November. Brooklyn-born Palestinian-American activist Linda Sarsour said dismissing the Trump candidacy was a matter of privilege — the kind she did not possess.
“Being a Muslim in America, I don’t have the luxury of saying, ‘Let’s see what happens when Trump gets in the White House,'” said Sarsour, who will be a Sanders delegate and platform committee member at next month’s Democratic National Convention. “So I think that for people who are directly impacted, we look at things a lot differently. I don’t see working against Trump as a distraction. I see working against Trump as one piece of the larger movement to build a political revolution.”
That piece, she added, had helped fuel her work — and would likely lead her to vote for Clinton in the general election.Frances Fox Piven, the revered octogenarian political scientist whose Saturday morning testament to the power of movement politics went viral — she received the news that her name was trending on Twitter with graceful puzzlement — also became one of the few high-profile speakers to announce she plans to back Clinton.
In an interview later, Piven argued that Trump’s proximity to power demanded a more pragmatic response and that his election could not be separated from the left’s fortunes.
“I, like a lot of people, am afraid of Donald Trump,” she said. “I’m especially afraid of a coalition between Donald Trump and some of the big money people on the right, like the Koch brothers.”Four or eight years of a Clinton administration, she added, “will give us time to build democratic, popular movements that will make a difference in American politics. Hillary is a politician through and through and she will be responsive to the pressures that can be created by the movements.”
Jim Hightower's closing speech to #PPLSummit suggests progressives can make "a second run at the WH" in 2020. cc @HillaryClinton
— daveweigel (@daveweigel) June 19, 2016
maya
“Dems in disarray”. And here I thought they went dataway.
Emma
Part of me is envious (for some level of envious) of their enthusiastic fervor; the experienced rest of me wonders if that same enthusiastic fervor will survive their encounter with the sausage factory is that is American lawmaking. And the snarky part (yes, I contain multitudes, why do you ask) wants them to end with everyone singing Kumbayah as they salsa out of the hall.
Keith G
Good to see the positive energy out there at the Democratic Party’s left-ward frontier. I have always liked that I am part of a disruptive (even at times, brawling) coalition.
JPL
A little bird is telling me that Hillary is going to give a speech at 11:30. Surely, the cable channels will carry it. For those without cable, let us assume that CBSN will stream it.
maya
@emma The difficulty with Kumbayah is remembering the second line. Which is why the first line is looped.
Matt McIrvin
I find this news mostly encouraging. I voted for Clinton for a variety of reasons, but I don’t really want the Sanders movement to vanish; I just don’t want them to turn into nihilist worse-is-better types either. And most won’t.
Iowa Old Lady
@JPL: That’s an economics speech, right? I’ll be at B&N writing when it happens, so I won’t have to face the disappointment of seeing it ignored in real time.
Calouste
Apparently Gabbie Giffords has already been forgotten, as has the Charleston church shooting.
Keith G
@Iowa Old Lady: It’s not going to be ignored. This is catnip.
dmsilev
@JPL:
Even the bird has deserted Sanders now? That’s sad.
(sorry, couldn’t resist)
Elizabelle
@JPL: Thank you. Would love a thread about Hillarys econ speech. And live link.
gwangung
Typical top down, short term thinking approach. I think a more fruitful approach is to cultivate more progressive politicians that WIN at the local level. Move the legislation leftward; the president is more likely to move with it.
JPL
@Elizabelle: Adam answered, by putting up a thread.
Matt McIrvin
@gwangung: Primarying incumbent Presidents doesn’t have a great track record of success–it only goes anywhere when the incumbent party is probably doomed anyway.
nonynony
@Matt McIrvin:
I find this encouraging, because it sounds like they might have actually reviewed history and learned the lessons of 1968 (i.e. dropping out of politics isn’t going to get your agenda enacted, so dropping out after a setback is incredibly unproductive). I’m worried that they haven’t learned the lessons of 1980 though and are seriously planning to primary Clinton regardless of what she does over the next 4 years (which would be dishearteningly stupid). And I’m worried that they STILL refuse to learn the lesson as given in the classic Grimm’s Fairy Tale “How the John Birch Society Took Control Of the Republican Party And What They Did With It” – I’m not hearing a lot about plans to work at the state and local level, which is where the bulk of progressive reforms get strangled in their crib.
So good things overall, tempered with a bit of hope for something better I guess.
Elizabelle
@JPL: indeed. FSA. Full Service Adam. Do appreciate his attention to the blog.
gwangung
@Matt McIrvin: That, too, but I don’t get the idea that these folks are any fans of history.
gwangung
@nonynony:
Yes, exactly. Whatever happened to “think globally, act locally”?
Loviatar
I laughed out loud when I read this. First, I believe most of the bridges are Toll bridges, so there is the cost, most of them are two lane commuter bridges, so there will be congestion. If they stay anywhere on the NJ side of the Delaware river, they will get into Philly sometime in the afternoon, broke and hungry.
Poopyman
@Emma: And (the weary old) part of me knows that movements like this are prime targets for ratfvckery. Pick your poison, Republican operatives or anarchists. (Maybe that should be “anarchists”, because I don’t know if there are any more real anarchists these days.)
D58826
@Emma: Kind of reminds me of the student radicals in 1968 who were going to change the world. Where did they go. Oh yea we are now the corrupt old establishment. What goes round comes around. (sigh)
MattF
@Matt McIrvin: Just as long as they don’t get all sniffy about the sublime Mysteries of the Dialectic. I wasted some of my youth on that, when I could have been having a good time.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
I just can’t help but keep wondering how much these “lefties” understand how government even works – their focus on the presidency, and consequently their quickness to label anyone with actual governing experience as a sell out and Establishment, makes me automatically dismissive of them. They completely misunderstood the obstacles to Obama’s agenda wasn’t that he became a corporatist sellout, but that the GOP was determined to thwart his every move. Too many of Bernie’s bots weren’t able to survive contact with reality without creating an alternate (delusional) reality. They want a progressive George Bush, but the first time President Stein had to sign a bill, they’d all run away to their safe space.
Mnemosyne
@gwangung:
Thirded. My (now late) father-in-law became a precinct captain at 19 and stayed in Democratic politics on and off his whole life, though he never ran for office himself. I would much, much rather see all of these enthusiastic young people show up at their county Democratic meetings than protest outside the DNC.
I will also say, for anyone planning to attend the protests, that you need to watch out for assorted Black Bloc anarchists and other assholes who will do their best to convince you to throw garbage cans through the Starbucks window so they can slip away while you get hauled off to jail. They recently caused some mayhem in San Jose at a Trump rally, and I’m sure they’re looking forward to doing the same thing at the DNC. Don’t let them.
Emma
@Poopyman: Yes. The ideologically pure are often easily manipulated.
D58826
@Loviatar: Well for any Bernie folks on the thread or if you know of any. Yes the bridges are toll bridges. From S. Jersey the best mass transit option would be the Lindenwold line into center city and then connect to the Broadstreet subway to get to the Wells Fargo arena. There are a number of buslines (NJTRANSIT) into center city as well. Links to Septa and Lindenwold high-speed line will provide details.
KS in MA
@gwangung: “Typical top down, short term thinking approach. I think a more fruitful approach is to cultivate more progressive politicians that WIN at the local level.”
THIS.
Chris
Well fucking said.
Matt McIrvin
@nonynony:
I think the lessons of 1980 (and of 1968, and maybe even Buchanan ’92) are a bit ambiguous, actually; the causality mostly goes the other way. When you have a strong primary movement against an incumbent President running for reelection, it’s probably a sign that that President is in serious trouble to begin with. Otherwise, it fizzles out immediately.
danielx
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
Now, I’ve heard something similar…..what was that phrase again? Oh yes, epistemic closure. Yes, it operates on lefties in precisely the same way it does for wingnuts.
Mnemosyne
If we haven’t heard from rikyrah yet this morning, she’s probably trying to get “Hamilton” tickets — they went on sale in Chicago this morning. ??
magurakurin
I don’t understand what they are protesting. Their candidate lost and in truth two candidates mostly differred on methods rather than actual goals. 68 was about Vietnam. What is this about really? The “she is beholden to Wall Street” is bullshit. Single payer isnt the only way and the ACA has had a pretty good couple of months. It seems like they are better off getting out the vote for Clinton right now and then regroup and retool after November.
tastytone
Couldn’t make it down to McCormick Place for this (1/3 schedule, 1/3 didn’t want to pay for parking, 1/3 still angrily disillusioned by the leftier-than-thous, and still too willing to fight about it).
Good on ’em for training the protesters. My strongest recollections on trained, non-violent protest are with the sit-ins, marches, and protests of the Civil Rights Movement. They were focused on de-segregation and voting rights…what will these folks be focused on?
I’ve seen a Grateful Dead logo co-opted into a Bernie Sanders shirt, and I’ve seen a Black Flag logo co-opted into a Bernie Sanders shirt. I’ve watched footage of a Sanders rally in CA with people co-opting “We Shall Overcome”.
Having a hard time getting over the notion that this is all–still–just about screaming “fuck the man” en masse.
Tom Q
@Matt McIrvin: You’re correct about the history, but the fact HIghtower is talking about this as a strategy for 2020 suggests he doesn’t understand it very well. If Hillary has a successful administration, primary voters will want to keep on with her; if she doesn’t, she might be vulnerable to an intra-party challenge, but what the Dems will most be vulnerable to is a general election defeat. There’s no example in the post-Civil War two-party era of a successful intra-party challenger being elected president. For True Progressives to be rooting/planning for such a thing indicates to me a myopia: such love for their own ideology that they’re willing to endure/hope for an electoral loss in the service of it.
Matt McIrvin
@magurakurin: It seems to me that the strongest and most passionate arguments Sanders supporters have are concerns about Clinton having an interventionist/militarist/pro-Likud foreign policy. I think these can be exaggerated–sometimes it sounds as if they think we’re reelecting George W. Bush–but I share these concerns to some degree, and it’ll be useful to have voices against that continuing under a Hillary Clinton administration.
magurakurin
@Matt McIrvin: It is delusional. Sanders differs only on the margins. They have made Sanders into a pacifist isolationist, but that is not who he is. It is silly to me and not reality based.
Persia
@Loviatar: Yeah, I’m fine with that.
Calouste
@magurakurin: Funny that a guy who is in the pocket of the arms industry is thought of as a pacifist.
The Lodger
@MattF: Hah, I read that as Mysteries of the Diabetic.
goblue72
@D58826:They got out-voted by their Boomer peers, who would up being more reactionary and Republican than the Boomer hagiography would like to tell itself. Thankfully, the Millenials are turning out to be more liberal (and less selfish) than their parent’s generation.
daryljfontaine
@Mnemosyne: Annoyed by Ticketmaster; was in a 45-minute electronic line to get “Verified Tickets” in October, when the “your wait time is” overlay disappeared with no change to the screen — I could not complete the transaction. Did get tix for a backup date in March, but I’m still feeling out October days.
D
Tripod
So… basically Netroots without kos. That’ll show ’em!
In Rahmland and at McCormick Place to boot – bit of a mixed message there kids….
Netroots I made the same mistake of booking space McCormick Place. There’s millions of us… It’s a great space for fire apparatus trade shows, but isn’t a place for being human.
A thank you party -slash- political rally by Bernie for his volunteers and supporters would be the right thing to do, be positive, and move them in the right direction going forward – but he’s an asshole.
Persia
I guess they think those fighter jets are just for pretty.
laura
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: with all due respect, it was both. Yes, the Republicans had the January 2009 meeting and committed to opposing every damn thing for the Obama administration and make him a one term president. We know that they haven’t moved off that dime in the second term. And yes, the sheer audacity in denying the very legitimacy of this black President shouldn’t be over looked -and his Supreme Court nominee is a perfect example of the high level rat-fckery.
However, appointing Rahm Emmanuel sent a clear signal that this administration was not interested in the people’s interests. OFA was dismantled. The results can be seen in the midterm turnout and results. We thankfully barely missed a grand bargain-thanks to opposition by the right. TTP is still planned for post-election passage.
Just saying, it’s not one or the other, but more complex.
I was happy to vote for Bernie and will happily vote for Hillary. But I’m none too happy with the primary. California hasn’t completed its vote count and the outcome is yet to be certified. I don’t consider myself a bernie-bot, but I’m down with big, juicy, robust state local and federal government. So maybe I’m a Neo-New Dealer.
Tripod
@magurakurin:
Hillary also has to own Bill’s allegedly aggressive foreign policy, which is weird (and tots sexist to boot), because his biggest FP failings were slow walking intervention in Bosnia and Rwanda to the point of genocide.
gwangung
@laura:
This wording irks me. More than a little self aggrandizement there and over-estimation of interests, as well as, once again, putting faith in a top down approach to politics, instead of a true grass roots approach. With much of the country definitely not down with progressive policies, this viewpoint rather cavalierly ignores that the Democratic party is a coalition of interests—and ignores that the real work is to persuade groups close to you to come along further to your orbit.
Matt McIrvin
@magurakurin:
Whether or not that’s so, I think Sanders’ actual positions on foreign policy are immaterial at this point–the whole question is where the movement goes after him.
Matt McIrvin
@goblue72:
Don’t forget us GenXers–on the whole we’re more right-wing and jerk-libertarian than either group, and will cause more trouble as we age into the prime voting years (though our relative lack of numbers will mitigate the damage).
Matt McIrvin
@Tripod:
I think those concerns have more to do with her Iraq vote, and her role in Obama’s military interventions (or in advocating things that Obama didn’t do). Those are genuinely on her, though I’ve heard speculation that to some extent she’s reacting to Bill’s perceived failures born of excess caution.
slag
No. YOU assumed that. The rest of us assumed that it would take continual work from everyone to move this country out of the Bush leagues.
What kind of dumbass elects a President and assumes progressive utopia will just follow along? And are a team of smiling bluebirds and collaborative woodland creatures involved?
ruemara
As most the agenda was whining, street theater tactics and pining for a President Chomsky, I find this hope that somehow an organized, coherent lefty political powerbase is being develop to be strange. You can’t say what you wish it to be, you have to acknowledge that the people in charge have a proven track record of stupid, short sighted and flaky. If we get 5% out of this applying some real organizing skills to real races, we’d be lucky.
Ian
@Poopyman:
We call them Liberterians these days. I just wish we could get the FBI to keep investigating their behavior.
ruemara
@laura: no you’re very unaware. OFA is still around and kept working on policy promotion issues such as ACA. The CA race was both clearly a massive lead by HRC to call it and distinct demographics based on early voters vs same day voters to say Bernie lost. It also was clear prior to the primary that Bernie had no route to the delegate count needed. Progressives abandoned Obama prior to the fricking inauguration, based on the number I saw crying about Rick Warren and Rahm back in 12/08. So you guys were primed to be disappointed before anything happened band it didn’t let up his whole presidency because armchair presidentin’ is a fucking major hobby while reading about how government works is just too much.
Sorry you’re so disappointed, next time then.
nutella
Maybe it’s the selection of quotes in the OP that is giving a distorted impression but nobody mentioned ANY issue, so what is it these people will be protesting in favor of? Will they just shout “Leftier! We want leftier!” I was expecting something about banks or even campaign finance but maybe we have now transcended issues and are just pushing a vague direction.
Ian
@Tom Q:
This may not count as it was done by party insiders, not voters, but I believe Herbert Hoover over Calvin Cooledge is an example of this.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
yes, the Stimulus, Health Care Reform, the auto bail-out…. all signs that Obama cared nothing about “The People”. Because RAHM!
The comment about Obama not doing the people’s bidding and many others I saw this weekend confirmed that Weigel summed up a lot of this weekend in one tweet
Miss Bianca
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yeah. Weigel nails it.
@nutella:
Yup. Getting to the point where I dont even identify as a leftist anymore – seems that liberal” is going to become a smear from the left as well as the right. As in, “yeah…a liberal is a leftist who actually *knows* how government works – and thinks that thats somehow, yknow, IMPORTANT or something.”
Matt McIrvin
@Miss Bianca: “Liberal” has been a smear from the left for at least 50 years–see Phil Ochs, “Love Me, I’m A Liberal”. A song I’ve seen conservative Republicans cite without irony (anything accusing liberals of hypocrisy and racism is all right by them, even if it’s from a POV that is utterly anathema to them).
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@laura:
Where does this OFA disbanded nonsense come from???? OMG, if I hear that one more time my head will actually explode. They’re still around! After Obama’s first election, they sent me so many emails, and so many appeals to get involved with local and state politicians, and other organizations, including letting me know what Obama’s policy agenda was coming up and how to get involved, that I asked them to unsubscribe me. I really don’t know what reality you’re talking about, but it’s not connected to the one I saw close up and personal.
The thing that frosts me like nothing else about the Berniebots and Bernie himself, is what seems to me like a deliberate erasure of the last 8 years, and in particular Obama’s first campaign/election where Obama did what Bernie did, except better and more impactful. IOW, the progressives got a president they liked, then immediately started whining when he wasn’t George Bush of the left. Useless!
Celebrity Bowling
@Ian:
You’d have more success with the IRS and Treasury … Follow the money, and all that rot
Soylent Green
@goblue72:
Yep, that’s us boomers, Republicans all. Go Trump!
Too bad all those liberal millennials can’t be bothered to vote in midterms.
Tom Q
@Ian: Coolidge chose not to run for re-election — not because of any unpopularity or opposition from within the party (which was the case with Truman in ’52 and LBJ in ’68); simply because he didn’t want to. Hoover thus didn’t challenge him; he simply replaced him, not unlike HW Bush succeeding Reagan.
Miss Bianca
@Matt McIrvin: you’d think I’d have remembered that song…which I actually quite like!
I am really, really fed up with the Bernie Brigade, and maybe it’s souring me on “leftists” in general. I’m also getting sick of this “all the awful things HRC has done” bit of burp-up I’m seeing on other sites (looking at you, LGM!). Oh, and she’s going to get us into a war in Syria, did you know that? I wonder how many of these supergeniuses have the slightest fucking clue what’s actually going on in Syria, and what the geopolitical realities are – I sure as hell don’t, and thanks to some well-informed people around this here joint I’ve actually been doing a fair amount of reading on the subject.
laura
@gwangung: the Democratic party didn’t appoint Rahm, the President did. And there’s plenty of reasons to criticize the Mayor if one bothers to check.