Puttin' on the Mitts!

Bernie Needs to Toughen Up His Debate Performances

I watched part of the Democratic debate before the Nevada caucuses.  It was clear that Bernie was a target, both for the ‘moderators’ and certain other candidates.  Socialists watching might have shaken their head over Bernie’s glancing defense of ‘democratic socialism’ and the attacks of other candidates.  Bernie is like a bulldozer, but he's not the most subtle or supple of debaters.  Nor is he a hard-core Marxist.  So let’s give him some advice:

Time to play hardball with MSNBC / MSDNC

Chuck Todd

Getting the debate off to a rousing red-baiting start, Chuckie announces Sanders as “democratic-socialist senator Bernie Sanders.”  No other candidate gets a description before his name.  So here is what Bernie should have said:

“Chuck, Chuck, I notice that you singled me out for my politics, but no one else.  Let me help you in that regard.  Like this, ok?

“We have raving capitalist billionaire and former Republican mayor Mike Bloomberg!”

“We have consistent neo-liberal former prosecutor Amy Klobuchar!”

“We have gay Christian mayor of a very small town, Pete Buttigieg!”

“We have shy capitalist and former Republican Elizabeth Warren!”

“We have the former vice president and the senator from MBNA bank, Joe Biden!”

And you Chuckie, who is MSNBC owned by?  Comcast, the most beloved corporation in America! (wait for audience laughter…)  If I was on RT, you’d call me a Russian agent.  So you should be introduced as ‘pro-capitalist journalist and Comcast tool, Chuck Todd!’”

Hallie Jackson (moderator)

“Hallie, I noticed you compared my so-called ‘lack of transparency’ to Donald Trump because you can’t remember that I released my heart-attack records.  Quite a comparison. Really?  I expect you to ask Bloomberg about his stent too.  Why is it that the ‘rap’ against me is I’m old when 4 candidates up here are in their 70s?  No one tells 78 year old Bloomberg he’s too old to run ...  because he has money!”

Bloomberg

Responding to Bloomberg’s poke about his ‘3 houses’:  “Well, Mike, if I tried to self-finance my election, I’d have run out of money before Iowa!  But I got my staff to research you and in 2011 you had 11 houses.   What do you need 11 houses for?! My question is, how many do you have now? 20?”

Buttigieg

“Listen up, kid.  You call me ‘divisive.’  Where have you been the last 40 years?  Oh yeah, partly in diapers.  Well let me remind you that there has been an intensified class war against workers in the last 40 years.  Some young people know this, which is why they are voting for me, not you!  If there is ‘dividing’ being done, it is by the billionaires and the rich.  Now you want to sling empty platitudes and sing Kumbaya like some Boy Scout leada?  The only bi-partisan deal you will get will be one the Republican Party likes!  Oh, by the way Platitude Pete, wanting to get rid of "Citizens United" and still accepting corporate PAC money is called hypocrisy.  As to ‘socialism’ – youse a smart guy, went to Oxford and Harvard and all.  Your dad was even an academic interested in Gramsci and socialism. You know very well the many types of socialism there are, so don’t play stupid with me.  As to ‘my way or the highway,’ the highway has been owned for the last 40 years in the Democratic Party by people like you – lightweight neo-liberals.  How can I 'burn' that down? You’re real beef is that I’m on what you think is your highway.  Well, as they say, the middle of the road is a dangerous place to be.”

Klobuchar

“Amy, I liked what you did with the snowstorm, I really did.  But yore just confusin’ the field running for a cabinet position, you know?  And hey, the USMCA you’re so proud of supporting?  Republican Chuck Grassley said it was 95% the same as NAFTA, so congrats on making the same mistake twice!”

Biden

“Joe, Joe.  Really?  We’re buds but being the male Hillary Clinton isn’t doing you any favas, you know?  Iraq, the banks, the crime bill, Anita Hill, NAFTA, the drug war, the bankruptcy bill, opposing busing, trying to cut Social Security and Medicare, all your billionaire donors – Jesus!  You have so many skeletons and even fresh bodies in your closet, I can hear the rattling from here!  Give it up already.  That boat has flown.”

Warren

“Look, Elizabeth, you’re the best debater on stage.  You know I offered you VP and Treasury.  Think about it.”

“Democratic Socialism”

When Todd called him a democratic socialist in the introduction, Bernie’s head went down like a turtle, as if someone had taken a shot at him.  Yesterday the CIA virtually called him a Russian stooge right before the Nevada caucuses with no facts listed.  The CIA is getting its untraceable heart attack medications ready in case that stratagem doesn’t work.  

As to 'waging war' on the Culinary Workers union, here is what he could have said:  "You know, the Culinary Workers have an excellent health plan.  Like the farmers from Saskatchewan did in Canada, who self-financed their own health care and spread it to all of Canada, I just want to spread good health care to everyone in the U.S.  But if you want to leave a job at the casinos and the union?  What happens to your health care then?"

As to socialism, here is what Bernie could say about his kind of socialism:

“Let me explain my socialism to you, since you’re so ignorant it hurts. I even have to stand next to a multi-billionaire let in by the DNC.  You know that ‘share the wealth’ thing in Alaska with the oil money?  A socialist plot!  How about the North Dakota state bank?  Goldman Sachs won’t like that.  Cooperatives and worker-owned companies all over the country?  More socialist plots!  Eisenhower’s interstate system?   Part of a planned economy!  That internet thing before the profiteers ruined it?  Government instigated.  The post office?  No wonder the Republicans want to destroy it.  Medicare and Medicaid?  Sponsored by a known socialist, LBJ.  Unemployment insurance and social security?  Another socialist plot by FDR!  The TVA?  The GI Bill?  The VA?  Get real. Or what about public schools?  You know, 'public,' which is like socialist?  Which is why conservatives are pushing charter schools to privatize education!  Hey, even fire departments and trash pickup – though they are trying to privatize those now too.  Or municipal liquor stores?  Socialist drunks!  Muni power plants?  Collectivized energy!  There used to be real ‘non-profit’ hospitals, but those have been changed into something else.  Thank you capitalists!  It's called a 'mixed economy' frankly and that is what I'm for.  Finally the Green Bay Packers.  Yes... no billionaire is going to run away from Green Bay, Wisconsin because it is their team.  Which is why the NFL’s billionaires banned any more municipal ownership.

That is just in this country.  Canada just north of us, Iceland, England’s NHS, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Italy – all have more aspects of socialism.  The ‘Nordic model’ is to try to have universal health care, universal education, universal housing, universal employment – what’s not to like?  Denmark is the happiest country in the world.  Know why?  Yes, they dabbled in democratic socialism.  Denmark! Damn them, right?   

This country is not happy though, no matter the stupid jingoism.  For a so-called advanced country it has the most suicides, the most murders, the most mass shootings, the most use of anti-depressants, the worst labor laws, the longest working hours, the worst treatment of children and mothers, the most poverty, the most racism, the most heavy drug use, the biggest prison population, the most police shootings, the biggest military budget, the most invasions by one country – I could go on.  Listen, Trump called the Democratic Party ‘radical socialists’ a week ago.  Obama was baited as a socialist too.   Anything that helps people is baited as socialist, including here in the Democratic Party and by the DNC.  Grow the fuck up.”

Now whether the U.S. can actually become a ‘democratic socialist’ paradise and do this through the Democratic Party is another matter.  Nor is Sanders pledge to endorse any Democrat.  But that is a debate for another day.

Other prior reviews on this subject, use blog search box, upper left:  Use the word "Sanders."

Red Frog

February 22, 2020