{"id":234146,"date":"2016-03-26T16:11:44","date_gmt":"2016-03-26T16:11:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/should-progressives-back-sanders\/"},"modified":"2016-03-26T16:11:44","modified_gmt":"2016-03-26T16:11:44","slug":"should-progressives-back-sanders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/should-progressives-back-sanders\/","title":{"rendered":"Should Progressives Back Sanders?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div readability=\"180.54763877382\">\n<p>Though Bernie Sanders \u2013 as a \u201cdemocratic socialist\u201d \u2013 is the most progressive presidential candidate in years, some\u00a0progressives are rejecting his campaign because he doesn\u2019t go far enough, a stance that Rick Sterling rejects.<\/p>\n<p><span id=\"more-18660\"\/>By Rick Sterling<\/p>\n<p>In the past year, some progressives have explained why they are not supporting Bernie Sanders. Last summer, Bruce Dixon from Black Agenda Report <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blackagendareport.com\/bernie-sanders-sheepdog-4-hillary\"><u>presented<\/u><\/a> a \u201csheepdog\u201d theory suggesting that people who join the Bernie Sanders campaign will eventually be herded into supporting Hillary Clinton. More recently, Chris Hedges <a href=\"http:\/\/www.truthdig.com\/report\/item\/why_i_support_dr_jill_stein_for_president_20160221\"><u>wrote<\/u><\/a> \u201cWe must focus exclusively on revolt\u201d and break with the establishment parties. Steven Salaita <a href=\"http:\/\/www.salon.com\/2016\/02\/13\/i_wont_vote_for_bernie_sanders_his_feeble_position_on_israel_is_a_serious_progressive_problem\/\"><u>criticized<\/u><\/a> Sanders\u2019s lack of a radically different foreign policy, especially regarding Israel and Palestine.<\/p>\n<p>While there is some truth in all these criticisms, I personally think it\u2019s important to support Bernie Sanders. In my view, here is why:<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_17501\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" readability=\"33\"><a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Democratic-Debate-Sanders-Clinton-Emails.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-17501\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-17501\" src=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/lazy-load\/images\/1x1.trans.gif\" data-lazy-src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Democratic-Debate-Sanders-Clinton-Emails-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at a Democratic presidential debate sponsored by CNN.\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" srcset=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Democratic-Debate-Sanders-Clinton-Emails.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Democratic-Debate-Sanders-Clinton-Emails-160x90.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-17501\" src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Democratic-Debate-Sanders-Clinton-Emails-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at a Democratic presidential debate sponsored by CNN.\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" srcset=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Democratic-Debate-Sanders-Clinton-Emails.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Democratic-Debate-Sanders-Clinton-Emails-160x90.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at a Democratic presidential debate sponsored by CNN.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Sanders is not just a \u201clesser evil.\u201d His proposals and policies are good on some key issues such as economic inequality, health-care, education, and the judicial\/criminal system. His ideas on foreign policy suggest a substantial shift away from interventionism and militarism.<\/p>\n<p>In addition, Sanders seeks to change the current electoral process based on money coming from corporations, political action committees and wealthy individuals. Changing this system is the first step toward breaking the strangle-hold of the military-industrial complex, Wall Street and reactionary lobbies such as AIPAC and the NRA.<\/p>\n<p>While some people will be led from supporting Sanders to supporting Clinton, this is not a given. Many people pushing for Bernie now will not vote Hillary if she is the Democratic Party nominee. Why? Because there is a huge difference in policies and because campaigning for Bernie significantly involves criticizing and exposing Hillary\u2019s history and policies.<\/p>\n<p>The Democratic Party establishment has not been encouraging Sanders, as suggested by the \u201csheepdog\u201d theory. On the contrary, it seems they have been&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2016\/03\/24\/should-progressives-back-sanders\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Though Bernie Sanders \u2013 as a \u201cdemocratic socialist\u201d \u2013 is the most progressive presidential candidate in years, some\u00a0progressives are rejecting his campaign because he doesn\u2019t go far enough, a stance that Rick Sterling rejects. By Rick Sterling In the past year, some progressives have explained why they are not supporting Bernie Sanders. Last summer, Bruce [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-234146","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234146\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}