Tonight's Debate

This election is about hope.

I am utterly astounded that the media and most of those running, never mind the consultants, just don't get this. They believe this is a game, a known quantity, and he or she with the most experience and expertise wins.

But they are wrong. A tsunami has already wiped out that game, but the people with the most money and the most power are somehow unaware of this.

The people have been left out. Of not only the decisions, but the spoils.

Elizabeth Warren K.O.'ed Mike Bloomberg early, when she said he supported Lindsay Graham in his Senate run. Is there anything else you need to hear? Isn't Graham public enemy #2? A weasel with no backbone who does what is expedient? No amount of support for good causes makes up for that and the other heinous candidates Bloomberg has supported over the years. As for stop and frisk...he said it was 95% wrong. Can you enlighten me as to the 5% where it was good? The guy's been hammered over this policy for months but he still doesn't get it, or maybe this is a wink to the racist who will sacrifice anything for law and order. The same people who are worried about online privacy, who pay lip service to people of color, but don't want them living in their neighborhood, who are afraid whenever they're out of their element.

But it's too late for Warren. She displayed fight too late.

As for Mayor Pete...the more he talks, the less you like him. He's a young 'un who's a traitor to his class. He keeps talking about gradual change, a return to what once was, while his brethren are paying off student debt and can't afford to buy a house, never mind get a job at McKinsey.

Klobuchar has the same problem. I did it before, give me your trust. But that's not what we want. We don't want incremental change, we want revolution. Yup, despite Pete sneering at the concept as a relic of the sixties. This is what Trump delivered to his acolytes, a revolution. And all the left can do is say his supporters are wealthy or white supremacists. When the truth is blue collar voters pulled the lever for Trump because they wanted change. Forget that he's a phony, forget that he's not as rich as he says, forget that he got all that exposure on TV, Trump promised a right wing revolution, a return to what once was, and it may not be that great but he is certainly pulling the country there, what part of this does the media and the left not understand?

Trump promised to shake it all up. Don't dig into the details of the tax cut for corporations and billionaires, look to him giving the middle finger to said media and the left. Meanwhile, those he scorns just laugh, and believe they're better than his supporters, never mind those less fortunate who are still members of the Democratic Party.

Biden doesn't get it. We're not concerned with what you did, but what you're gonna do! Barack Obama's tenure was more a failure than a victory in the eyes of Bernie's supporters. They believe Obama did not do enough to press their case, that he tried to negotiate with the right while it stonewalled him, that he just did not exercise his leverage. Trump's credo was hope by jetting us to the past. That's the Republican ethos. The Democratic ethos is just the opposite, we want to be jetted into the future!

Let's forget Tom Steyer, everybody else has. It's like a bad movie, no one from nowhere gets accidentally placed somewhere. Steyer comes across like Gomer Pyle in Mayberry, lacking sophistication and experience. Get off the stage, now!

So that leaves us with Bernie.

Even when the moderators teed it up the other candidates couldn't deliver. Bloomberg couldn't come up with an aphorism describing him, he just quoted himself!

Bernie quoted Nelson Mandela.

"It always seems impossible until it's done."

A black man elected President?

Check!

Gay marriage?

Check!

Legal marijuana?

Check!

But Medicare for all no. Why?

Oh yeah, the insurance companies and the medical establishment don't want it, and they own D.C. Most people want it, it's doable, it's been done not only in Denmark, but Canada and the U.K.

But it can't happen here because of fear.

That's what all the candidates other than Bernie were selling, fear. And we don't need any more more fear, it's bad enough for us already, how much worse can it get?

We don't want business as usual! We don't want a return to what once was!

And it's not only the lower classes and the millennials, it's the boomers too.

Let me see...

You go to a good college and get a graduate degree but you find out you're at the end of the line, the billionaires and the rest of the rich have bought up all the tickets and have got all the reservations at the restaurants. They employ not only their money, but their connections to make this happen. People kowtow to the ultra-rich, that's the way it goes. Whether you're an individual hankering for a ride on the private plane or Emily's List. The playing field is not level for nearly everybody!

But those who are advantaged by this system are too blind to see this.

Credit the rich Republicans, they vote their pocketbooks, they do what's right for them, they make no bones about it.

But only on the left do you get rich and powerful people saying they're doing it for everybody else when in truth they're just doing it for themselves. It's even worse, they've got no idea how the rest of us live!

We want opportunity.

So the economy is roaring. How's that gonna help me get a well-paying job? Sure, I can work at McDonald's, but I can't feed my family on that.

The rich and powerful have hoovered up not only concert tickets and restaurant reservations but college admissions too. That's right, they've removed the ladder those on the bottom used to climb to the top. Instead of ask what you can do for your country, it's all about asking what you can do for yourself!

It didn't used to be this way.

Tax rates were sky high under Eisenhower, a Republican.

FDR instituted social security.

Income inequality hasn't been this bad since the Gilded Age, we survived that but we can't survive, can't get rid of income inequality today?

And all this anti-government, anti-tax stuff.

If you've got a business, you're nothing without customers, no one makes it on their own, you've got to cough up your share.

And the government provides roads and schools and...

Yup, the Republicans have relabeled public schools "government schools," this is a wedge they're employing to get public funding for parochial and private schools. The Republicans have renamed the Democratic Party...they keep saying it's the "Democrat" Party. What do the Democrats do about this? Ignore it and fight amongst themselves. Just like the Republicans labeled Hillary and she lost, the same way they define the debate.

So we need a leader. And it's certainly not the DNC, the gang that can't shoot straight.

As for centrists... Turns out there are not that many. As there are not that many independents. We hear this blabbering...from Bloomberg tonight that we can't alienate those who voted for Trump who might come back. Reminds me of my phone call with a manager after his household name act left him. He was telling me what he was gonna say when the act wanted to come back. I told him the act was never coming back, and it never has!

For a minute there, it looked like Warren was gonna get traction. She skewered Bloomberg, but then got gun-shy, she didn't talk that much thereafter, instead we got Klobuchar bloviating that we should trust her.

We don't trust anybody.

And all of the candidates went after Sanders, hard. But he always escaped. By taking a moment and then explaining his position. He's the only one who can go up against Trump. Certainly not Bloomberg, with his lame jokes. Also, if that guy mails me one more time...Bloomberg has crossed the line from marketing to spam.

And when Bernie said that our enemies can sometimes do something right...

This is anathema to the yahoos. It's all America all the time. And the Democrats are afraid of alienating anyone, so they buy into it, whereas Bernie admitted the world was chiaroscuro, which every thinking person knows, especially millennials. Bernie was speaking English when everybody else was speaking gobbledygook.

It's over. The other candidates just didn't play their cards right. They dismissed Bernie and then fell back into their usual raps, I did this, trust me here, I'm thinking about you...but that hasn't worked here since 1969!

This election is about emotions, not facts.

Come on, if it was about facts, Trump would have no chance, no President has ever lied so much.

How do you feel about somebody?

And in a world where there's a rainbow of color on television, where "Black Panther" is a hit, our country is not open only to the tall and good-looking. That's another thing the media has wrong. Sure, looks matter. Bernie looks like a guy more interested in his ideas than his appearance, he looks like a guy who's trying to get stuff done.

As for all the criticism about what he's achieved in Congress...

We believe he's been thwarted.

As for being thwarted as President?

Trump hasn't been too thwarted, the chief executive has a lot of power these days.

As for coattails...

How about Obama, who had some of the worst coattails of all time, losing both houses of Congress and many statehouses...yup, that's what we want.

We are at an inflection point. Either recognize this and make change or get out of the way.

The old tropes don't work anymore. Bezos pledges $10 billion to the environment and he gets crap. Amazon pays no taxes and why should Bezos control the disbursement of these funds rather than we, the people?

All of the above may seem like hogwash to you.

But it doesn't matter.

Bernie's winning.

And he's gonna beat Trump handily.

Trump just doesn't work for most people. And returning to the Obama years is not that appealing to most. Stop citing his name, it's a disadvantage. It all went sour under his watch. This is another thing the media and the candidates have wrong.

The polls say Sanders is the best candidate to run against Trump and most of them say Bernie will beat the Donald.

But the left wing elite, the cognoscenti, are selective in their use of facts, just like the right.

I'm worn out with the process. There's nothing new here. The election should be June or July 1st, so we're not subjected to inanities for nine more months.

But we all can't take our eyes off the race because it's the only thing that matters.

We cannot retreat into our lives. Music may soothe, but it's out of touch with what's happening. Movies too. Occasionally TV gets it right.

But the truth is life in these United States is a train-wreck. We know it, we feel it, there's nothing you can say to change our minds. We're sick and tired of it, we're not gonna take it anymore. We're all in on Bernie because he's the only one speaking directly to us.

You're just on the wrong side.


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