Just finished listening to Hillary Clinton on MSNBC with Chris Matthews. They were talking about how millennials don’t know how politics works, and that Bernie Sanders can’t get anything done in the White House. Clinton said this phrase, “We can't have ideologues hurling rhetoric,” when talking about how to get things done. She thinks we’re stupid. She thinks we’re stupid for wanting to change the status quo. She thinks it’s not worth it to call us to action, or to use her bully pulpit in the White House to push for big changes. Hillary Clinton is perfectly fine with the status quo. Problem is millennials (and I’m counting myself among them) don’t want the status quo anymore. It’s untenable. We’re looking at lots of student debt, high interest rates on that debt, college being much more unaffordable these days, paying high premiums for insurance plans that have high deductibles, and it feels like the American dream is falling out of reach for us. We’re being choked financially, and our wages are stagnant. No one in the Democratic Party other than Bernie Sanders is calling for the status quo to change, only tiny incrementalist changes that doesn’t excite us or get us out to vote. It’s the same old, same old. And it’s why Bernie Sanders’ message is resonating with millennials. We desperately need things to change, and we’re willing to work for that to happen when we have leadership that believes in the big goals, and strives to make them possible. Do I think single payer will happen? No. Do I think that free college will happen? No. Neither does Bernie Sanders. He has said time and time again that it won’t happen until we get much more involved in voting and in politics, and that it is up to us to push for the change we want. If we aim for the big ideas, get people inspired, and ready to push members of Congress, then we can end up with much more progressive change, and even get one of the big ideas accomplished, than the incrementalist steps (er, breadcrumbs) that Hillary Clinton is in favor of. What Hillary Clinton also fails to mention is that it won’t just be Bernie who faces gridlock in the White House. She’ll face that EXACT same gridlock from Republicans who hates her guts. Can she use the bully pulpit to get people to push their lawmakers to vote for policies they want, and to encourage them to get out in the midterms and vote out bad Members of Congress? I don’t see that happening with Clinton at all. I see it happening with Bernie Sanders. I believe in the America that we want, and I still believe it is possible. We deserve much more as an American people, and I for one am not satisfied with the status quo. I’m with Bernie all the way.
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