Memo: Why and How to Stop Bernie Sanders
Motivation
This is regarding an extremely concerning development. Many of us knew Bernie Sanders would run for President again in 2020 after his 2016 campaign. In his words, he and his followers started a political revolution in 2016, and it is now time to complete this revolution. I do not have to expand on the threats posed by a growing number of people entering the democratic process and taking control of their own lives, increasing labor power through strengthening unions, and a general population that asks elementary moral questions to our esteemed corporations.
I do not have to expand on the threats, but I will do so anyway.
The effects on our prized way of life are profound. Passive capital gains made off the labor of others must be, in part, returned for public services through higher taxes. Our relentless and passionate drive for profits by extracting and selling fossil fuels, and price-gouging drugs at premiums would be forcefully curbed. Our prestigious banks would be broken up. There will be a general rise in awareness of power dynamics in the country. Employees will begin asking too many questions to their employers. Students will challenge university deans. Women and minorities, who view Sanders more favorably than white men do, will be emboldened and liberated through ideological and policy shifts. Labor will challenge capital.
Allow Juan Bravo Murillo, Spanish minister in the 19th century, to articulate our goals with crystal clarity:
“We need no men who can think among the workers; what we need are beasts of toil.”
Challenges mounted against our precious economic and political monopolies directly threaten the sanctity of Milton Friedman’s economics. Our worldview, constructed by our schools and propagated by our media, will begin to crumble in the face of even slightly expanding democracy.
Do I have your attention now?
It is time that centrist Democrats like Joe Biden and proto-fascists like most of the Republican Party cast their superficial and petty differences aside. We must unite together against this force that broadens democratic engagement, wrestles control away from us and squanders it by returning it to the unwashed masses. Allow me to quote Walter Lippmann, a leading American political commentator in the 20th century, so as to stir your spirits for the battles to come.
“The public must be put in its place, so that the responsible men may live free of the trampling and roar of a bewildered herd, ignorant and meddlesome outsiders whose function is to be interested spectators of action, not participants, lending their weight periodically to one or another of the leadership class (elections), then returning to their private concerns.” (Year 501, Chomsky)
Make no mistake, while Sanders’ policy platform is broadly a New Deal-type social contract program, it is a precursor to expanding economic, political, social and environmental justice. This is an unacceptable outcome. The Senator has already affected blasphemous changes, such as forcing Amazon to raise its minimum wage along with activists, and passing a War Powers resolution to end U.S involvement in the Saudi-led war in Yemen.
As Anarchist Rudolf Rocker described the potential trajectories of such movements,
“From their daily battles against the employers and their allies, the workers gradually learn the deeper meaning of this struggle. At first, they pursue only the immediate purpose of improving the status of the producers within the existing social order, but gradually they lay bare the root of the evil — monopoly economy and its political and social accompaniments. For the attainment of such an understanding, the everyday struggles are better educative material than the finest theoretical discussions. Nothing can so impress the mind and soul of the worker as this enduring battle for daily bread, nothing makes him so receptive to the teachings of socialism as the incessant struggle for the necessities of life.”
Against such a rising tide of solidarity, communal empathy, and civic awareness, I fear that the full might of our education and media systems to generate obedience and consent may prove to be insufficient. By definition, we have nothing to offer to the people. We side with capital and all forms of authoritarian power to coerce the public into obedience. Hence, we must utilize alternative forms of ideological combat to counter Sanders. Below are a few recommended approaches.
Combatting the Sanders Scourge
He is old
Notwithstanding the fact that we have supported 78-year old Nancy Pelosi through the years, including her present-day House Speaker term, and that we continue to prop up 76-year old Joe Biden for president, we shall taint political discussions amongst the masses by propagating ageist concerns about 77-year old Sanders. We shall be careful not to mention that Sanders won more millennial votes during the 2016 primaries than Clinton and Trump combined.
He is a white male
Per a December 2018 CNN poll, Sanders is less popular amongst whites and males than racial minorities and women. Empirically, his policy proposals challenge a white-male dominated establishment — a nexus of state and global institutions, and corporations. This unfortunately diversifies the electorate by pushing for beneficial policies for all of the public, regardless of demographics. In our effort to protect this nexus of our power, we must utilize his identity against him. We assume the masses will be unable to make this elementary systemic distinction.
He is Radical
Medicare for All is supported by 70% of Americans, including 52% of Republicans. The Green New Deal proposal is supported by a majority of both parties. A majority of voters support a $15 minimum wage. Most Americans support increasing taxes on the wealthy. A majority supports infrastructure spending, and oppose border wall funding. These are just some of Sanders’ policies that are supported by a majority of Americans. It clearly makes him a fringe radical whose ideas exist in the shadowy corners of American life. The really popular ideas are those that support wealth and power; and uphold existing class and racial dominance.
While these extremely astute and potent arguments should prove to be sufficient to combat Sanders’ movement, we shall send routine memos for other lines of attack.
Long live the nobility.
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