https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/21/bernie-sanders-democrats-2018-599331
Sure it's is by undermined his supporters and inspirers did won few to several seats and elections since 2016.
I mean...we still got 2 years to get this shit sorted out. It took less than a year for Bernie Sander's primary campaign to become an actual contender against Clinton.
No offense to this writer but I get the sense he doesn't really have a clue what's going on with the Sanders coalition. Many of us never really cared one way or the other about Our Revolution, especially since the Democratic leadership made a concerted effort early on to grab the helm from more ideologically-driven (and vastly more popular) progressive figures like Weaver. The story of Our Revolution mirrors the Democratic Party: chaotic, full of wasted potential, and defined by internal struggle between moderate and progressive blocs.
Our Revolution was conceived for the purpose of promoting progressive change. You can't blame them for refusing to endorse center-right candidates like Conor Lamb and Doug Jones. The writer of this piece may interpret this as party disloyalty, but it's pretty damned entitled to expect unwavering loyalty when your party acts against its own principles. Our Revolution is not the DNC's lapdog; it's a progressive tool, and a powerful one at that, hence why the party leadership has gone to such lengths to co-opt it. Seems they've now moved on to Plan B, i.e. smear and discredit the organization and (by extension) the Sanders coalition. Just goes to show how little they've learned from the 2016 election if you ask me.
Your Revolution isn't for Center Democrats, they have the core democratic party functions for that, they're for far left candidates.
Well more for anti-establishment populist based center-left to left-wing candidates.
One can maybe quibble with the headline, but the article itself doesn't make any attempts to say that it speaks to Sander's base, only that of the internal difficulties of Our Revolution. Difficulties that, if one actually reads the article, one realizes are mostly matters of internal management, and not political problems. Hell, most of the direct quotes in the article criticizing Our Revolution are from former Sanders delegates, or other state operatives who sympathized or worked for him, or even people who formerly worked there. These aren't criticisms from the DNC, but genuine Sanders supporters.
Particularly odd was the part where they mentioned that Nina Turner, the current President of Our Revolution, tried to make chief of staff of the PAC a person who worked for her as a personal political consultant, who had no experience in political organizing, and who had done a number of Fox News hits defending Trump and slamming immigrants. While I suppose one can argue that a chief of staff is more an operational role, and not a political one, it's still more than a little odd to try to install a Trump defending xenophobe with no experience in political organizing at a central role in a progressive organization.
There's also concerns with their endorsement process being biased towards personal friends of Turner's, as opposed to it being an unbiased contest. They particular cite an instance for the Ohio Democratic primary, where one candidate who was running for it, and was attempting to secure Our Revolution's endorsement. He attended meeting, filled out their questionnaires, all the steps as a part of their evaluation process. And then, suddenly, Dennis Kucinich jumped into the race towards the end, and quickly got their endorsement, seeming to bypass their lengthy formal process entirely. And in the process, leaving the one candidate going through the formal process out in the cold. It would turn out that Kucinich's running mate was a longtime personal friend of Turner's, both being Ohio politicans, which naturally makes one suspect Turner is using the organization to help her own circle.
One can counter the arguments that they should've endorsed and intervened in Alabama or PA-18 with the argument that they don't have to endorse lukewarm moderate Democrats--and that's fine. They're not the DNC, it's not their job to try to push each and every Democratic candidate, independent of that candidates values. They're a progressive organization, with progressive values, and that's fine. But the notion that Turner is trying to use Our Revolution not as a fair progressive advocacy organization, but one to be used to her own ends is significantly more concerning.
The part about the sudden endorsement of Kucinich in particular, bypassing their formal endorsement process, I found especially disheartening. Because if Our Revolution's endorsements can be unilaterally given out based on what the head of the organization wants, and used to pursue her own personal interest, then how is it any better than Debbiw Wasserman Schultz at the DNC? Maybe it's no worse than the DNC, but the problem with the DNC and larger Democratic party establishment wasn't that they just favored Clinton, as opposed to Sanders. It was that their personal relationship with Clinton effectively made them bought out, closed out the way for any outsider candidates to come in and make a real run for the Presidential nomination, and ordained her as the nominee long before as much as the Iowa caucus. A further leftwing copy of that isn't any less corrupt.
I would been true and would've used "Bernie's Our Revolution have Identity crisis made by Nina Tuner" as article title, But guy instead purportedly used clickbait title to lure Anti-Bernie folk.
And like Orpheus pointed out the flaws with article like guy think this organization would be an generic Pro-Democrat PAC because why for?
I think the parts about OR not endorsing Jones and Lamb were part of a point about how OR's endorsed candidates haven't had much success, while many of the real Dem upsets had nothing to do with OR - they've been largely irrelevant and haven't even come close to sustaining the Sanders campaign's momentum
He posted other article yesterday claiming they have anti-immigrant consultant with reliable links this time.
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/22/our-revolution-sanders-turner-figaro-603410
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