18.7.15

Look, Bernie Sanders' run is plenty fun to watch; good on the crazy old socialist uncle for building some steam and reminding the Democratic Party about its ostensible roots in challenging the sheer absurdity of our caste system in America that only seems to be clamping down on working class families. But isn't it kind of frustrating that America is *finally* starting to make some progress on (re)developing a racial consciousness and that's in spite of the Democratic Party missing a candidate running on a #blacklivesmatter platform? Bernie's rise in attention is undoubtedly due at least in part to the remnants of the Occupy movement, which definitely recalibrated how we nationally talk about class inequality, and that's awesome, because hey, that shows that everyday citizens can, in fact, shift the paradigm in spite of seemingly insurmountable odds. But damn! it'd sure be great if the Democratic Party outside candidate shooting spitballs was doing so on the basis of challenging prisons, police brutality, and the like. Obama's totally coming around now (a privilege of not running again, and also undoubtedly empowered by the citizen uprising in Ferguson and Baltimore and Charleston), and that's super important. But, like, Bernie's politics feel like they're out of the 1930s. He seems genuinely sympathetic to racial injustice in America, but not exactly willing to acknowledge that changes in the tax structure will not exactly solve the systemic racism that Ta-Nehisi and Bree have suddenly found a megaphone to shout about. Warren and Sanders are doing a great job giving Hillary the instigation for her to move on socioeconomic inequality, and that's super important, but damn, i wish we had a candidate doing the same on issues of racial justice.





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