2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Why didn't Bernie get Vermont to pass single payer? [View all]Armstead
(47,803 posts)And I'm sure you don't want to open up my Hoover Dam of possible verbiage -- and luckily I haven't got time to go into it anyway.
I will simply say that the perennial litany "reasons" why Democrats are unable/unwilling to articulate a clear liberal vision anymore on some basic core principles is as much a part of the decline of the last 35 years as the GOP's inverse relentlessness in pursuit of a clear conservative vision.
Hence, without a strong counterbalance to the GOP Corporate CONservative message, the country has moved so far to the right that even relatively modest versions of the positive liberal advances of the past are made to seem impossible.
That is at the base of much of the movement that Sanders represents. It's not radicalism. It's simply attempting to revive -(and I know it's a cliche, but I don't care) a contemporary version of FDR can-do liberalism (or progressive populism or whatever you want to call it).