Senator Sanders: We ARE Smart

[Haveadream]

Last edited Sun Feb 28, 2016, 08:35 PM - Edit history (1)

You would think that Senator Sander's experience of outspending Hillary in South Carolina and being thoroughly trounced would give him reason to pause and recalibrate his message. That he would realize that all the money and staffers in the world cannot make a difference if you simply don't understand the voters or the issues important to them. If you aren't listening, your message is going to be wrong. And having more staffers around to repeat it and yelling, insulting or wagging your finger is actually going to make it worse. That reality was born out by his deplorable results in SC. But rather than using that failure as an opportunity to learn, he has doubled down and is now saying that going forward, "smart" people will vote for him. What?!

What he doesn't seem to understand is that we ARE smart. Bedsides being incredibly insulting, telling us otherwise is not going to get our votes. Which makes him not so smart if he wants not just to win but to solve our problems. We have an excellent understanding of the day-to-day challenges we face. And it is a candidate's job to understand US and them before laying out solutions.

Senator Sanders sincerely (and I do believe he is sincere) does not understand that all our social justice problems cannot be solved with the solutions he goes on and on and on and on and ON about. He's starting to sound like the not-always-so-beloved Uncle Bernie at the Thanksgiving dinner table who shouts about his pet peeve every time someone shares something about anything. Some quick examples involving crime-- which is a massive problem for women and many minorities who just happen to comprise a huge chunk of the Democratic Party-- show his alarming tone deafness: "Becuz socialism!" just. isn't. working. And for large swaths of the American people, worrying about Wall Street is a luxury problem. Being 'splained that it is all interrelated is not dissimilar to listening to how trickle down economics is going to pay the rent.

That is the reason that he and some of his supporters can actually unashamedly accuse Jim Clyburn, John Lewis and Planned Parenthood of being part of the "establishment" and not realize that they are part of the problem. That is the reason he can address victims of crime and respond with his knee jerk boiler plate solution of "free school". Talk about blaming the victim. It takes a stunning amount of privilege and condescension to denigrate the lived experiences of others as "low information". President Obama has started a conversation about how all men (and women) are not equal in our society and the more Senator Sanders talks, the more I realize Hillary Clinton is the best person to continue it.

[SunSeeker]

1. We're smart enough not to waste our time on Internet polls and attacking Facebook pages.

[DemonGoddess]

2. K&R!

[displacedtexan]

3. And we're smart enough to recognize his insulting "Northern AA's will vote for me" crap, too.

That was truly smarmy.

[George II]

16. Insinuating that "southern" blacks (i.e., South Carolinians) aren't smart enough. Disgusting.

[Control-Z]

4. I can't believe he said that.

Now THAT seems like desperation.

[Lucinda]

5. Sanders and team seem to have forgotten that this is a job interview, and WE are the employers

Excellent post Haveadream! Welcome to DU!

[Haveadream]

13. Thanks

so much, Lucinda!

[yallerdawg]

6. After we have elections...

we are always told how smart and wise the American electorate is.

We have to remember how much contempt they have for us during the elections.

I guess how smart we are depends on who wins. And of course the winners think we're smart (or is it real stoopid?).

[lunamagica]

7. K&R. Excellent post!

[lamp_shade]

8. "I can handle things. I'm SMART"

[Ellen Forradalom]

9. Great post

Bernie understands well the progressives' Achilles heel: their conviction that they are smarter, better, purer. That is the very foundation for their manipulation. Flattery works every time.

[Treant]

10. Thanks, Sanders.

Calling me stupid by implication really doesn't improve my view of you or my comfort level (currently quite low) with you in the White House.

And it's certainly not going to convince me to vote for you.

[Cha]

11. You would think.. you'd be wrong. I am so glad you wrote this, Haveadream.. that

has been bothering me a lot since I read it.

How can he be so insulting to South Carolina and the Black Voters?

sanders has also accused all the members of Congress who endorsed Hillary of being #soestablishment. And, the HRC .. he demands purity of everybody but himself.. as with his supporters.

"What he doesn't seem to understand is that we ARE smart. Bedsides being incredibly insulting, telling us otherwise is not going to get our votes. Which makes him not so smart if he wants not just to win but to solve our problems. We have an excellent understanding of the day-to-day challenges we face."

Thank you!

[fleabiscuit]

12. Wow.

His ignorance is only a bliss if he keeps it to himself.
K&R

[HillareeeHillaraah]

14. Maybe that's the whole difference...

"If you aren't listening, your message is going to be wrong."


Hillary's campaign is about listening to the voters.

Bernie's campaign is about getting the voters to listen to him.


People don't want to be told, they want to be heard.

Just my two cents..

[KitSileya]

21. Some Sanders supporters are claiming that he says it in every speech.

That it is part of his stump speech. If that is true, isn't it just another example of how out of touch he really is? He is incapable of changing his speech when parts of it no longer fit, or when events make his usual way of saying things ill-advised.

In other words, you are right. He is not responding to the voters, and their concerns. He is not listening, he is not changing his message as he is told by ordinary folks that their lived experiences contradict his theory. Hillary does that. She goes around talking to people, and what's more, listen to them, and then change her stances if it's appropriate. Because of it, her detractors call her a weather-wane, but I would much rather have a President who is willing to hear and take into account what ordinary Americans have to say, than one who hasn't changed his message since 1958. The world is a much different place in 2016 than it was in the '60s.

[SharonClark]

15. The condescending and ageism is bad

Only the 'smart' and the 'young' should be able to vote in the world of Bernie's supporters on DU. The rest of the voters are not good enough to think for themselves and should just take orders from the enlightened ones. It doesn't seem to be working for them.

[Starry Messenger]

17. k&r

This is beautiful.

[Cha]

18. Just Kicking it!

Thank you!

[UtahLib]

19. K&R very well said, Thank you. nt

[Cha]

20. Just amazing that this would have to be written to a candidate in the Dem primary but

here it is .. and so eloquently done.