To all my friends who are Bernie supporters —
Bernie Sanders has been running an important campaign. He has raised important issues. He has raised awareness of certain issues that need to be talked about. He has activated a base of voters who are getting involved and getting angry. All of that is great. All of that is important. All of that needs to keep up. This is my biggest worry: the base of people who have been activated, all of you at rallies in the Park and marching for what you believe in, my biggest worry is that you will lose your passion and anger once he doesn’t get the nomination.
Are you passionate? Are you angry? Good. Don’t lose that. Use it. Use it constructively. Use it proactively. There’s a lot more work that needs to be done and being a moody, sobby, teenager upset that Mommy didn’t let you go to the party isn’t going to do anyone any good. I don’t wanna hear your angst. I don’t wanna see your passive aggressive complacency. I don’t wanna read your unworthy and daily beast articles. I don’t care about your conspiracy theories.
I want you to get on busses and travel to Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina. I want you to phone bank. To hand out flyers. To open honest and intelligent conversations.
Here are some notes via Ballotopedia.org:
The big story of the 2016 congressional election cycle is whether or not the Democratic Party will be able to regain control of the Senate. In order to take the chamber back, Democrats will need to gain five seats in 2016, a difficult but not impossible task. The majority of vulnerable seats are held by Republican incumbents, many of whom are freshmen who were swept into office in the Republican wave of 2010. Additionally, Democrats only have 10 seats to defend in 2016, while 24 Republican incumbents are up for re-election.[2]
There’s a lot of work that needs to get done. The Presidential race is only the tip of the iceberg. One could even make the argument that it isn’t even the most important race to worry about. The House is up for grabs. There’s an empty Supreme Court seat, and if the House is Red, it doesn’t matter who’s in the Oval Office. So get out and do work on what you really think matters.
I get it. You like Bernie’s rhetoric, his issues, his lofty views of how government can and should operate. They speak to you. I get it. You think Hillary is status quo and stale and rigid. You trust Bernie, you don’t trust Hillary. I get it. But whether or not you agree with Hillary’s views on foreign policy and immigration policy and campaign finance, you have to look ahead a few months and realize that there’s a real target you should be setting your eyes on. It’s not Hillary. It’s a scary, real, fear-mongering presence. Whether it’s Cruz or Trump, they are both real and threaten your life way more than Hillary.
The House is up for grabs. The White House is up for grabs. This is not the time to take a pouty stance on the sideline. You’re already in the game, don’t take yourself out.
If you’ve been a staunch Bernie fan, attended rallies, handed out buttons, then don’t back down. If you do, if you become complacent, if you ignore your Congressional and Senatorial races, if you don’t get on a bus and put time in a swing state, if you disregard your rights and shun your desire to be a part of a movement, then you’re no better than a Trump supporter.
In fact, you’re worse.
Designing Solutions, One Problem at a Time 