Bernie’s New Message isn’t so New
Last night I went to a neighbor’s house with about 30 others to listen to Bernie and others introduce the next phase of OurRevolution.com. I was disappointed.
My point in writing this is to extend an invitation to Bernie, Shannon Jackson and Jeff Weaver to do something radically new, democratic and truly revolutionary. Connect all Americans with a new form of political communication.
There were good people and good speeches last night. The overview of past movements was inspiring. So was the recap of progress that has been made over the last few months. Bernie’s campaign has changed political conversation in America. Things that were off the table, even impossible, such as debt-free education, are now possible.
But there’s nothing new in the shape of OurRevolution.com. It’s a top-down “movement” about raising money to fight political battles. That’s fine, and for progressives, it’s good. And if they win lots and lots of battles, they promise changes that’ll be good for democracy.
Interestingly, they gave Arab Spring as an example. It started out very promising. “The People” gained power! But without an effective way of communicating, the best they could do was form some top-down groups to lead, and they could neither decide well nor lead well. So they couldn’t keep the power they claimed, and it was returned to the old guard. We saw this with Obama’s campaign, too. Is this what’s in store for OurRevolution?
After the meeting, the 20-or-so people who stayed introduced ourselves. We wondered if we wanted to meet again, and how. And what would we do if we met? These are all the usual questions when people get together. Again, there was no new plan. No new vision for how we’d actually work together.
In the meantime, Bernie, Jeff and Shannon offer hope, another website on which to make a donation, and lots of traditional political fights. None of which is new.
OurRevolution.com is a top-down political organization. They want your contact information, but offer none of their own- not even the usual “info@…” email address that you can count on to receive your email and either send you no reply or just an empty acknowledgement. It’s about we, the people, empowering them. Hopefully this time “they” will be aligned with “us” better, but there’s no system to ensure this. Nothing new.
Politics is made up of people acting according to mostly-internalized rules. It’s infinitely variable. Much more is possible. We can actually fix democracy. Bernie, Jeff or Shannon, please contact me and let’s set up a time to talk. You can’t do much better, but WE can. Your resources are much, much, much more than is needed to transform democracy. But only if you use them to empower The People.
For instance, we can set up an inexpensive political communication system so that your numerous new candidates don’t need to raise much money! Remember all those conservatives who were interested in some of your positions? We can get their support for those changes without even requiring them to vote for liberals. We can empower them to actually hold their own members of Congress accountable for it.
Please choose. Do you want a revolution that rejuvenates democracy? Or do you want money and power so you can support your side of the current system? Currently you’re just doing the latter. It’s possible to do the former, too, or both.
