Curley: Bernie Sanders compromised with ‘the devil’
Jul 25, 2016, 11:29 AM | Updated: Jul 26, 2016, 5:18 am
Despite a load of leaked emails showing the Democratic National Committee’s favoritism to Hillary Clinton’s campaign, Bernie Sanders appears to be less upset than many of his supporters.
KIRO Radio’s John Curley believes that is because Sanders appears to be rolling over in the same way as politicians that the socialist typically rails against would. He’s looking for more power in the future, Curley says.
“If I were a Bernie guy, I would want him to be angry and say, ‘This is what I’m telling you. Don’t vote for her. She is part of the problem, DNC is part of the problem. This is the corruption in Washington I’ve been telling you about,’” Curley said. “But he’s not doing that because, my theory, is he thinks he will have more strength when she becomes president.”
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Co-host Tom Tangney agreed that Sanders is doing some political maneuvering in this issue, but notes that he is looking at the short game, as opposed to the long game proposed by Socialist Seattle City Council member Kshama Sawant. Tangney believes Sanders sees the possibility of a strong progressive Senatorial force with him along with Sharon Brown, of Ohio, and Elizabeth Warren, from Massachusetts. Sawant, meanwhile, wants to blow up the system my voting for the Green Party’s Jill Stein, taking votes from Clinton even if that means Trump is president, Tangney says.
“Sawant wants the entire system to collapse and allow a socialist point of view to rise from the ashes,” Tangney said. “It’s a long game versus the short game. I just don’t see the American public is where the extremes are. Btu the extremes can have an effect on the mainstream Republican, Democratic battle.”
Be that as it may, Curley says Sanders has sold out.
John Curley: He’s in the bag. He’s made a compromise. He’s compromised with the devil. He realizes he can get more done from the inside than the outside.
Tom Tangney: What do you mean by the devil? Why the devil? Donald Trump is the devil. He’s fighting the devil.
Curley: For 13 months, he railed against Hillary, he railed against big money. He could barely endorse her. Now all of a sudden you’re on the same team. It’s always the weirdest thing. You run against the opponent, bash away, and the all of a sudden, you know what’ she’s not so bad. Well, she’s not so bad because now she’s going to put me on her team.
Tangney: Exactly, it’s like the Seahawks rail against everyone in the NFC and AFC, and then you end up rooting for the team in your own division to win.
Curley: That’s about X’s and O’s, not about ideas. That’s a difference.
Tangney: No it’s not. The idea is if the Democrats run against the Democrats, they want to make sure they are No. 1. But if they’re not, the Democrats rally behind one another because they realize they have more in common than they do with the Republicans. That’s all it is.
Curley: Right, but that’s why if he really was an outsider, he would have been better off. But they realized if you don’t bring along the socialist to join Hillary, Donald Trump is going to be president.
Tangney: He already compromised himself by running as a Democrat. If he really wanted to, he could run for another Party like Jill Stein.
Curley: Well, apparently he was the outsider if you see the way the DNC treated him. I just feel bad for Bernie.
Tangney: What are you talking about? He has 40 percent of the delegates in that building in a Party that he didn’t even belong to. He chose to join the system to use the system. And he has a lot more favorability now than he did before he jumped it. It’s a smart move.