Can the FBI Save Bernie?

The current gyrations of #BernieOrBust and Green Party activists begging Bernie to please leave the Democrats are painful to watch.  It emphasizes how out of touch with political reality and weak many of these third party activists can be.

Yes, Bernie had an incredible opportunity to change his mind, bolt the party, and run outside it.  Perhaps if he had any idea how successful his appeal for votes and money and crowds would be, he would have done exactly that last year when he announced and threw in his lot with the Dems.  But he chose his strategy then: to be a Progressive Champion and influence the Party, and to not fall into the abyss of being 2016’s Nader, forever wrongly tarred and loathed by liberals for causing that millionaire hall monitor Al Gore to lose so grandly.

Bernie made it clear at the first debate that he would handle Clinton gently, mocking those who were raising absolutely serious concerns over her brash and outrageous behavior of ToxicSludgeIsGoodForYouprivatizing her emails as Secretary of State, and then getting cute about it.  No, Bernie, we are not sick and tired of hearing about Hillary’s email abuse, and ironically this scandal is now your best hope for winning the nomination, given the Theft-By-SuperDelegates and the alignment of the establishment Dems against you.  But Obama has behaved like Bill and Hillary’s houseboy ever since he beat her in 2008, and he has made it clear that her abuse of government secrets and privilege is no big deal, so she can count on him to pull her butt out of that fire.

Perhaps Bernie is having some second thoughts about his decision to play it safe and support Hillary, but that is late at night and in the privacy of his home and bathroom.  No frigging way does he have the gonads now to bolt the Dems.

Trump of course, as polls show, will have a much better chance of beating Hillary than Bernie as the Democratic nominee.  The corporate media and liberal pundits refuse to believe it, and keep underestimating his support, but Trump could be president given the deep, deep loathing that most Americans have for a political establishment owned by the richest and managed by their hired pols, hacks, PR flacks and apparatchiks in Washington, DC.  Yes, Hillary and Trump are loathed, but the two Wall Street parties and the process that bore these candidates are despised even more deeply by most people.

So it is just sad to see all the starry-eyed dreaming that Bernie will join Jill Stein on a Green ticket, or that Bernie will suddenly wake up and bolt the Dems and try to run as Independent.  Ain’t gonna happen.  The massive lava dome of 2016 politics is headed for bursting in early November, and it will be Hillary vs Trump.  Now, if Hillary were smart and not the embodiment of hubris, she would put Bernie on the ticket.  He would accept and he would campaign his ass off for her.  He will campaign hard for her anyway, but on the ticket he would haul along many disaffected Feel The Bern voters.

Bernie had his chances, he could have hit Clinton hard from the start of the campaign. He could have reversed course and left the party.  But now he finds himself in league with the Neocons, the Kochs and the Bush family oligarchs, ready for Hillary.  Whether he ends up on the ticket or just a pied piper, the Feel The Bern Movement is as good as dead and buried as a force for  change, just as the Democrat establishment always intended.

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John Stauber is an independent writer, activist and author.  His books include Toxic Sludge Is Good for YouMad Cow USA and Weapons of Mass Deception.  In 1993 he founded the Center for Media and Democracy to exposed corporate, political and media propaganda campaigns.  He retired from the Center in 2008.  http://www.linkedin.com/in/johnstauber.