I got to tell you. We saw it in Seattle with BLM, and now that we are on the verge of voting in SC, I have to chuckle to myself.
White Sanders supporters just do not get it. Honestly, I don’t think a lot of White Clinton supporters get it either, but they’ll take it.
The frustration in the Sanders campaign is erupting in racist invective just like it did 7 months ago in Seattle. ‘They’re poor, uneducated, uninformed, conditioned, looking for someone who is going to give them something’.
I never put much stock in the whole firewall concept, but after dealing with Bernie supporters for months now, as a Black person I can tell you that’s exactly what it is.
Bernie supporters point to Clinton’s flaws and say ‘don’t you see? How can you trust her? Look at her history of racism!’
I have to tell you, to me and I think to a lot of Blacks this is hilarious. We think to ourselves ‘maybe she is racist. But then Bernie is certainly racist too. They’re both White.’ And Blacks have been choosing the lesser of two evils our entire history in this country.
A couple of weeks ago, Keli Goff wrote a great article in the Daily Beast called “You’re Damn Right Electability Matters to Black Voters”. She made the great point that Blacks take our votes seriously. Just like bad public policy has a disproportionate impact on our communities, so do bad electoral outcomes.
I have people say to me ‘the parties are the same’ and ‘I can’t trust Clinton, I don’t believe in her’. And I think, trust? Believe? What does that have to do with anything?
History. A track record, even if flawed. An agenda. Engagement. These are what matters.
We want someone we know, and who knows us. Someone who will come to the table and listen, and have the flexibility to change, to make accommodations.
Not someone like Bernie, who is so rigid that he attempted to stop an Obama budget because of compromise with Republicans, calling it absurd and accusing the President of ‘caving’ to the GOP. He tried to block that budget, even though it would have meant extending the worst recession since the Great Depression. He stood on principle. He stood on the backs of the poor.
Black people don’t do protest votes. Our issues are already too low on the totem pole to walk away from the game. And here we have some Whites with the arrogant, racist audacity to suggest that we should risk a Trump or Cruz presidency by voting third party or not voting at all.
Trump and Cruz. Openly racist, and openly promising racist policies while openly meeting with bigoted and racist supporters and organizations. Bernie supporters want us to turn away from a decades long relationship with Hillary Clinton to risk it all on a White stranger and his racist supporters, a socialist, calling for some of the biggest changes in government in U.S. history, who could easily lose to some of the worst political actors in generations.
Now that I think about it, I’m not chuckling anymore. I’m pissed.