He chose instead to just not acknowledge Drek's Post, presumably because it's full of all those pesky facts and truths.
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Bernie Sanders: Barack Obama won 10% of the white vote in Mississippi. That speaks to very bad work done by Democrats there
- Thread starter GrapeApes
- Start date
He chose instead to just not acknowledge Drek's Post, presumably because it's full of all those pesky facts and truths.
The problem with your paraphrasing is MLK wasn't pivoting to "alright, we solved civil rights, now let's make the economy work for everyone." Here's what he said in full context:
Not exactly compatible with the "give white Southerners more money and they'll stop being racist" theory that Sanders seems to be endorsing.
I appreciate the shout-out, particularly as I find Drek's argument much more thorough!
Yep. Fun fact: MLK is closer to Bernie Sanders politically than anyone else running for president.
Are you like, actively trying to not understand the arguments being made here?
Must be paraphrasing the whitewashed version of MLK. Because I'm pretty sure, King and Civil Rights leaders needed shit like fundraising to get anywhere.
Civil Rights didn't just fall out of the sky.
His opinion would be unchanged.
:-/
i mean, i don't think it is that controversial to suggest that maybe only 75 or 80 percent of white people in mississippi are racist
I'm giving plenty of quotes, historical evidence, facts/figures, and experiences living in southern states, but you're simply giving shout-outs to the posts you agree with. There are plenty of people here making very good points on my end in these 20 pages, but because they run contrary to yours, you don't single them out with a shout-out. Drek's points are mostly without context or countering things that I'm not saying. That there are racists in Mississippi does not run contrary to winning more of the vote or having a platform that appeals to white voters across the country, and it's a little disturbing that you're OK with calling 90% of a group of voters racist, no matter the state they're in.
Why? It's simply true that the man was a socialist, something democrats (and Republicans, of course) have been pushing against for decades prior to 2016.
"Stop calling these people that are okay with racism racists and maybe they'll vote for Progressive White Man."
That's not what he's endorsing, and that's not how I'm paraphrasing MLK. Here is MLK talking of the plight not just of poor black Americans, but even the white Americans in "racist" states:
On the other hand, something like legacy admissions was created specifically for racist and anti-Semitic reasons. White people were caught in that as collateral damage even if they weren't the intended target. The War on Drugs has a racist past, to which someone like Biden and Buttigieg don't have as ambitious a plan as Sanders.
Combating poverty is a civil right since you have no power with no income.
MLK supported "radical" redistributive changes in the economy to combat income inequality and promoted a universal basic income. He was very likely closer to a Democratic socialist than a typical Democrat.
Fun fact: it's pissed off many Republican voters when I point this out as they try to claim MLK was a Republican. Pointing out his really left ideas is a fun way to hit them with a fact stick.
If only that's what the post said.
As a white Mississippian, this post is incredible. Thank you.
Edit: actually all of your posts. Good stuff
But Obama didn't run as an economic populist though. You can say he ran as a populist, but his core message was always just "change" he wasn't providing lots of big structural economic change policies. It's easy for a bunch of people to vote for change, however when that change becomes specific then that coalition isn't as together as it once was because people want different things. That's why, to me, this isn't a sound comparison.
We're also ignoring the fact that a lot of people who voted for Obama for super mad whenever Obama would ever display his racial identity (the trayvon Martin Incident). You call it writing off the people in Mississippi, I call it realising that our resources are better spent in other places where we can actually win instead of trying to get from 15 to 25 percent in Mississippi.
I never said MLK didn't believe poor whites were a problem, but in the speech I quoted he specifically acknowledges that implementing policies to specifically address the wealth inequality between black and white Americans would turn away white allies who had no problem participating in the Civil Rights movement because they didn't feel it would impact their bottom line.
Segregation, Jim Crow laws, slavery, etc. etc. created a wealth gap that wasn't just instantly solved when those things went away. For one thing, in many important regards, they didn't go away. Former slaves still worked on the plantations, Southern states kept up discriminatory laws as long as they could get away with it, segregation continued happening. But more importantly, a slave's freedom did not mean they were suddenly economically on the level with the average white person. Segregation ending did not mean black people suddenly had good-paying jobs and houses. Passing the Civil Rights Act in 1964 did not cause MLK to pivot to "alright, civil rights fixed, now let's pass single-payer healthcare to pass the poor whites too." Even if he believed in doing that anyway. He didn't even think the Civil Rights Act was sufficient, and for good reason! (That he outlines in the full speech!)
Sanders has long advocated a "rising tide lifts all boats" policy which is a fallacy in specifically dealing with the problems black America faces, problems that are not shared by white America. There are problems that are mutual to both communities. Those are the only problems Sanders (and indeed, some leftists in this very thread who suggested Democrats' focus on social equality was wrong) seems interested in solving.
No, it's literally what he said. If a black American doesn't have the right to vote, their power is reduced. We know that. If said American doesn't have money, then their power is also reduced. The two aren't mutually separated. The reason many of us talk about the top 1% so much is because they hold much more power than a supermajority of Americans, which includes poor minorities.
Also in regards to voting: that's why Sanders' idea that, short of treason, you shouldn't lose the right to vote is important for civil rights. A government such as the current one can say, "I don't like this person. Arrest him," and now said person cannot vote because they're technically a felon. His positions on the War on Drugs would be a much bigger positive for all communities and especially minority communities, who have been unfairly targeted.
Your idea of historical evidence is to say Democrats would do better among white Mississippians if they were more like Truman and LBJ, who respectively got 10% and 13% of the vote in Mississippi (breaking a long Democratic win steak and Republican losing streak respectively) despite winning each election.
Also, both people that in private weren't fond of non-whites. LBJ infamously referred to the CRA as "that n****r bill" while negotiating it behind the scenes. Yes, LBJ signed the CRA/VRA, but he didn't care much for the black community or the cause.
What's disturbing is you tone policing a black man who is calling out white racists. There's nothing surprising about 90% of white people in a racist state being racist. At least not to the people who have lived that experience. Tone policing a black man who has those lived experiences is condescending at best.
It's unclear to me what those slamming Bernie as a narcissistic moron (ridiculous characterization, fwiw) think the current Dem strategy is achieving, or will achieve, on the issue of race that is superior to what a more class-conscious orientation of the party would accomplish. It's very easy to say that Bernie is naive, that he's underestimating how baked-in racism is to these people's voting patterns, but if you are basically nihilistic about any possibility of further Dem inroads in these regions, it's unclear to me what is functionally being lost by trying a gambit of making "the haves vs the have-nots" the primary message of the national party. Maybe it won't work, but if the current strategy is NOT working, why continue to pursue it?
Or, let me put it another way: if Bernie's strategy DID work, to some kind of electorally significant extent, and the Dems got, say, 15-20% of white voters in Mississippi running a class-focused campaign, would it be worth it? Or does the presence of people in a coalition who might vote for the outright reprehensible Republican Party under a different rhetorical framing, or just stay home, poison it irrevocably?
Or, let me put it another way: if Bernie's strategy DID work, to some kind of electorally significant extent, and the Dems got, say, 15-20% of white voters in Mississippi running a class-focused campaign, would it be worth it? Or does the presence of people in a coalition who might vote for the outright reprehensible Republican Party under a different rhetorical framing, or just stay home, poison it irrevocably?
So which minorities will you ignore and throw aside to get the racist white vote of Mississippi?
Well there was this just recently; https://www.bet.com/news/national/2...s-there-will-be-1000-years-of-darkness-i.html
I'm sure race plays no part in that statement.
He absolutely didn't think the CRA and VRA were sufficient; that's why he talked so much about combating poverty. He didn't simply pivot; it was part of his civil rights platform.
There are absolutely many racist reasons why black Americans have less power. White flight away from middle class black neighborhoods is one. Linking heroin use to black Americans is one. Targeting black precincts and making it harder to vote is one. Requiring poor Americans to pay fines they can't afford to get their right to vote back is one. That's not the same argument as appealing to more white people. In the video, again paraphrasing, he says along the lines of, "We got 10%, but we could get 20% or 25%."
MLK was not afraid to talk about the poor white American because they're getting screwed by our economic system as well. One thing MLK talked about after the CRA/VRA was our fellow black Americans being promised land, not receiving it, other groups getting it, and then those same groups telling black Americans to pick themselves up by their own bootstraps. Giving them the right to vote didn't fix the economic issues that they faced in the 1960s and now in the 2020s because little income means little power.
Jesus the amount of bad faith questioning and straw-men in this thread is unreal.
Oh, so racist whites are just going to NOW believe in social services and helping the poor with Bernie, and not with literally any Democrat since the Civil Rights act?
What changed?
Especially when in Mississippi they literally campaign against increasing social services by saying "X County (which is majority black) will also get YOUR money". And guess what? It works, they all get voted down, including Medicaid expansion.
So what changed? Because they sure aren't going to vote for you when you are providing services to EVERYONE, when that is precisely what they don't want.
They'd still lose by about 10 points, and in the process possibly lose support for black community leaders and organizers in the state.
To answer your absolutely terrible-faith question with a good-faith one: What racial justice policies that other candidates are pursuing or would pursue is Sanders not pursuing?
Why would bringing up issues of healthcare, education and income inequality to people in Mississippi alienate minorities exactly?
Ill take what is a non-sequitur for 1000 Alex.
You want to get the White Vote in Mississippi, the same white vote that adamantly does not want money spent on services for Black people, no matter that the white voters would also get the same services. There is no sercret hidden pocket of not-racist but not-voting white progressives in Mississippi.
So either you write legislation to exclude the people they hate, or you abandon the people that they hate, that support you right now.
Because Democrats have campagined on those issues and they all lost because GOP reminded their white voters that black people would benefit from them.
No because if you win 15-20% of white voters in Mississippi you still fucking lose!
As has been explained, many times in this very thread - even Kerry won 14% of the white vote in MS in 2004, while losing the state overall by twenty points. Jim Hood and Mike Espy ran very class-conscious campaigns in Mississippi in strong Democratic years while taking race-specific issues off the table, got their share of the white vote into the mid-teens and still lost.
Sanders is trying to argue that he can do what Obama failed to do (flip the state of Mississippi) by appealing to white voters while dismissing the fundamental truth that makes Mississippi practically unwinnable for any Democrat, conservative or liberal, white or black, male or female, that yes, about ~90% of the state's white electorate is very likely too racist to vote for a Democratic presidential candidate. Not only that, but he suggests he can do this while holding Obama's unprecedented level of black support (98% in 2008!) that made the state as close as it was in his elections, doing the exact same thing (taking the black vote for granted by assuming it's static and will support any Democrat in those numbers because hey, who else would they vote for, Trump?) he accuses the Democratic establishment of doing (writing off white working class support as unwinnable due to racism).
You don't think the compromises you'd need to make as a Democrat to meaningfully win 25-30% of the white vote (which would be, at best, enough to win the state) would turn away any black voters? Black voters aren't dumb, they know when they're being hustled. There's a reason Sanders has abysmal support among African-Americans, and the fact that this thread even exists is only one piece of the puzzle.
Jim Hood literally ran for Governor on a platform of expanding Medicaid, reversing corporate tax cuts and making college free. I don't know how people keep missing this.
This is very cute except where is the evidence it works? Biden is literally polling better than Sanders in a state like West Virginia with a fairly similar profile of terrible WWC voters.
Don't mind me, I'm just quoting this for the people who need to see it.
If you win 15-20% of the white vote in Mississippi, you're probably doing very well nationwide.
He also did better than previous Democrats who ran in the 2010s. That's the point so many of us keep making -- we can try to zero in on how hard it is in Mississippi, but if you're even winning 15% there, you're probably doing very well in a ton of areas across the country. At a minimum, being more competitive helps down-ballot. He's just using the state to talk about a broad coalition Democrats can build state by state.
He's also been pretty vocal about fair voting. Expanding the coalition helps us be more competitive as voting rights groups continue their fight across the country in places like Pennsylvania and North Carolina. Because while we wait to try to win the fights on gerrymandering, we need to be as competitive as possible elsewhere and force Republicans to use money in places that should be safe.
The way people talk about appealing to White voters in Mississippi is like Democrats have just been sitting there saying "VOTE FOR US BECAUSE WE ARE DEMOCRATS"
And not actually talking about issues with medicaid expansion, social services and education, no, Bernie is literally the first time since the Civil Rights act that Dems are talking about those issues now.
And not actually talking about issues with medicaid expansion, social services and education, no, Bernie is literally the first time since the Civil Rights act that Dems are talking about those issues now.
I am unable to take anything away from this other than utter political nihilism.
If you're stumping in Tupelo with this as well as "you guys definitely aren't racist, that's nuts," you're signaling that the people who think they are racist are wrong and that they're being ridiculous. Who in Mississippi does that describe?
My points are directly following the relevant quotes from what you've said. I'm not the one who started randomly talking Florida politics in a Mississippi thread.
Also, I'm not saying "there are racists in Mississippi". I'm saying "Mississippi is a state ran by racists, to the approval of the white majority".
Combine that with Sanders' comment about needing to court the 90% of white people who didn't vote for Obama, i.e. the white majority ok with their state being ran by racists, while ignoring their still active today economic segregation and oppression of the large black minority in their state.
Thats a pretty fucking bad look, no? He's ignoring the suffering of the people who already got his back to court segment of the oppressors who have similar economic struggles.
So following that your defense is to argue that 90% of the people in MS aren't racist, and its real unfair for people to take offense to what Sanders said via pointing out that a lot of MS white folk are racist.
Yet that same 90% keeps voting for fucking racists. So maybe not all of them are racist, but fucking lot sure are and the rest are pretty ok with it.
Here is this concept in proof form:
Statement A - Trump won MS by a larger margin than Romney or McCain (the results via Wikipedia).
Statement B - 90% of white people in MS voted for Romney in 2012 (Sanders numbers).
Given A and B are both true we can make:
Statement C - A larger portion of the white population voted for Trump than Romney. Pretty obvious math here.
Now lets introduce:
Statement D - If someone voted for Trump they're either racist, or super ok with racists.
Assuming D is true how can you claim that less than 90% of MS' population isn't either racist or super ok with racists when this same ratio continually pops up in election after election?
So this boils this whole defense of white Mississippians down to this: Do you think Statement D is true or false? If false please provide reasoning to that effect.
Here's the secret you're apparently missing bud: most white people are racist or super ok with racism. Want to know an easy way to tell? Ask them if most white people are racist. If the answer is "no" you're talking to a racist or someone so ok with racism they don't know what it looks like.
Elizabeth Warren.
I'm not her biggest fan by any means but the woman swung by the delta damn near a year ago, talking about a federal housing assistance package that would directly help the delta, to the point where the black state reps fighting that fight actually gave a shit.
But nah, she's no true progressive, not like the Bern.
Bernie is the only one with a theory of change that has even the tiniest iota of a possibility of making the kind of serious structural changes that are necessary to avert climate catastrophe and a slide into fortress politics as liberal institutions around the world collapse with the biome. It will likely not succeed in the way he'd like, but what the Dems are currently doing we KNOW doesn't work. Making a calculated gamble in the face of catastrophe is not any more fantastical than continuing to fiddle as the ship sinks.
"What if Bernie could win 15-20% of the white vote in Mississippi?"
"Other Democrats have done that and they lost"
"NIHILISM"
While you are pulling for Bernie Saviordom.
I will listen to the people that have lived there and experienced the racism to know what the political realities are.
This thread just shows us all once again that when black women tell you who someone like Bernie is, you should believe them. I did.
And that all the pearl-clutching about how leftists Totally Aren't Overwhelmingly White that I've experienced here, from staff members no less, is bullshit.
But go ahead and keep stanning him, era. Keep denying what's right in front of you. Show us all how thin the veneer of "progressive" ideals here really is.
Just don't go crying to me when they start passing out the Kool-aid.
And that all the pearl-clutching about how leftists Totally Aren't Overwhelmingly White that I've experienced here, from staff members no less, is bullshit.
But go ahead and keep stanning him, era. Keep denying what's right in front of you. Show us all how thin the veneer of "progressive" ideals here really is.
Just don't go crying to me when they start passing out the Kool-aid.
This also isn't some over night fix. If you want to deprogram Mississippi, you're doing things like addressing the brain drain situation (this is very important as more liberal and educated people 'escape Mississippi') which goes hand in hand with the economy. You're adding teeth to regulations for news broadcasting, you're addressing the for profit 24 hour cable news systems. You're getting money out of politics and Dems in the state are no longer being out fundraisers 2:1. You're Fixing Gerrymandering so that the 40% African American share of the population can be better represented to engage and have a voice. A lot of these things are possible and can be done. Sanders attached no timetable to flipping Mississippi, and even I agree that he is underestimating the degree of the problem, but that doesn't mean you simply stop trying. Change IS possible.
"Doctor, my arm is stricken with gangrene. Good news however! I have a novel remedy that will take up none of your time. I'm going to close my eyes and pretend you've amputated it."
Yep, Mississippi is harsh. In love Bernie and all, but it seems unfair imo for him to blast the democratic party of the state for not presenting messages of fighting economic injustices when you have politicians like Jim Hood who ran campaigns doing just that and still get btfo when Republicans ring the racism bell. Winning higher margins in the state is not that simple.