Tag: Medicare for all

The Discourse is Toxic and Everyone Sucks

I’m no political expert, but Jimmy Dore telling Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez she can, er, go fly a kite over whether or not to force a vote on Medicare for All in the House doesn’t seem like a great way to build a movement. (Image Credit: Gage Skidmore/CC BY-SA 3.0)

Online chatter is frequently inhospitable, but ever since the presidential election, it has been especially egregious.

Lately, checking trending political topics on Twitter has been a test of one’s mettle or, perhaps more aptly, a measure of one’s masochism. Democrats sniping at Republicans. Republicans sniping at Democrats. Donald Trump is deranged! The election is rigged! Depending on who you listen to, we either need to save the integrity of America’s elections from collapse—but only in the states where Trump lost—or we need to save the integrity of America’s elections from collapse—not by running better candidates, but pointing reflexively to RUSSIA! RUSSIA! DID YOU HEAR ABOUT RUSSIA?!?

For leftists, this would at least appear to be an advantageous situation. The election is over and Joe Biden won, so they can’t be blamed for the Democrat losing this time, right? And because leftists don’t particularly like Biden, that means they should be cool with the right, or at least not nearly the subject of the ire that Democratic loyalists are, right? Let the “vote blue no matter who” and MAGA crowds fight among themselves and focus on the issues that matter. Easy peasy.

Not exactly. Liberals, freshly emboldened by a Biden win, are feeling free to chide naysaying progressives for anything they may have done—real or imagined—to cost Joe a bigger victory or to hurt congressional candidates vis-à-vis the losses incurred in the House and the failure to secure a firm majority in the Senate. They’re the ones at the top of the heap—and the “far left” would be wise to get in line. Stop killing our post-election buzz, man.

Trump’s faithful, meanwhile, in their feelings about an election that they don’t feel they lost—rather, they believe it was stolen from them—blindly are lashing out at anyone who doesn’t support Trump in his ludicrous bid to overturn the will of the American people. As far as they are probably concerned, those who accept the results as legitimate are no better than the Biden and Harris stans who unapologetically are wagging their tongues at the losing side. And this is before we even get to the matter of the Proud Boys tearing down BLM banners, shouting “F**k Antifa,” and claiming ownership of city streets while toting assault rifles. They certainly are not taking the results of the election lying down.

Simply put, if partisan rancor was bad before, it has only intensified since the election has come and gone. Things haven’t settled down. Moreover, in the face of increasingly dire need from everyday Americans and at a time when progressives, a group most attuned to this need, should be well positioned to cut through the discord, they have their own demons and divisions to sort through.

The kerfuffle of the moment for leftists is whether or not progressives in the House should use whatever leverage they have to force a vote on Medicare for All legislation. With a narrow Democratic majority, members of the Progressive Caucus could refuse to vote for Nancy Pelosi for Speaker of the House. Such a stance is not without its immediate risk; if Pelosi does not secure the speakership, that puts GOP minority leader Kevin McCarthy, a climate change denier, a staunch Trump defender, someone who has threatened “action” against Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib for their criticism of Israel, an opponent of legal status for DREAMers, and an all-around shithead, atop the House pecking order.

What this debate essentially boils down to is a matter of strategy and how forceful progressives should be on compelling the vote on a bill (H.R. 1384, proposed by Rep. Pramila Jayapal) that is presumably dead on arrival in the Senate. On one side of the discussion, there are people like comedian and political commentator Jimmy Dore who insist that Democrats need to be held accountable, esp. if they insist people should not have access to health care in a pandemic. The merits here would exist with respect to putting pressure on elected officials to elaborate on why they don’t support a position popular with Americans across the political spectrum, and in doing so, flex their might.

On the other side of the discussion, you have people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who insist the votes are not there for M4A to even make it past the House, let alone the Senate, and to instead put energy behind other progressive priorities, such as pushing for a $15 minimum wage and putting progressives in leadership positions within the Democratic Party. According to this view, all the demands made for a vote on H.R. 1384 which goes nowhere won’t speak to progressive power—and could make progressives look even weaker than some might suggest they already are.

To say that some participants in this debate have taken a contentious tack would be an understatement. Dore made waves when, on his show, he told AOC to—how should I put this in a more family-friendly context?—take a long walk off a short pier. From what some observed, this diatribe was less about politics and more about wanting to destroy Ocasio-Cortez for her perceived treachery. On top of the apparent ill will, there was also the matter of Dore’s factual inaccuracy: Jimmy insisted Ocasio-Cortez had voted in favor of the CARES Act, when it was reported that the representative from the state of New York had not.

The crux of the matter here is not so much what one side believes—you probably have your own opinion on the #ForceTheVote question—or whether the vote would garner the positive attention advocates for forcing the vote are hoping in the first place—some like Ryan Grim of The Intercept are pessimistic on this front, while others, like Briahna Joy Gray, the national press secretary for the 2020 Bernie Sanders presidential campaign, think “the Squad’s” ability to generate interest is understated—but how they express their beliefs.

For some, this is yet additional evidence that AOC is a sellout or traitor or shill for Nancy Pelosi and that anyone who defends her now is a neoliberal bootlicker/hack. For others, Dore and likeminded #ForceTheVoters are crybabies who don’t understand political realities. Over a matter of political tactics on a theoretical vote, contingents within the broadly-stated Left are ready to go scorched earth on present and future alliances. For a mainstream media landscape eager to paint leftists as a fractured bunch, this feeds the narrative all too easily.

Beyond the optics aimed at a general audience, however, the significance of individuals perceived as leading voices of the progressive movement butting heads in an acrimonious way (Gray herself became embroiled in a bit of controversy when fellow progressive podcaster Benjamin Dixon came for her publicly for her stance on forcing an M4A vote) shouldn’t be understated. What amounts to mere performative antics for some can be taken seriously by those devotees within earshot of that soapbox—and the resulting bile spilled jeopardizes the engagement of those for whom politics is an acquired taste or whose natural inclination is to tune out at the earliest sign of contentiousness. In other words, it’s difficult to have a unified front when your forces can’t agree on a target—or lose the will to fight altogether.

In the 24-hour news cycle and amid the real and present concerns of Americans just trying to meet their basic needs—and for some, the global pandemic didn’t create their situation, but has only exacerbated it—this debate over playing hardball with House Democratic leadership and the Speaker’s seat over Medicare for All is a relative blip on the radar. Who cares about an M4A vote when they have no job and they’re facing eviction or they have loved ones sick and dying? What does it matter to me if Jimmy Dore said some bad words to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez? The Lincoln Project crowd, for one, would be more apt to turn the lens on Donald Trump and all he hasn’t done for the country during a time of hardship for millions. Trump bad. Bad, bad man.

As minor as this episode which is still ongoing may be, that it is illustrative of a larger trend in political discourse gives scrutiny of it value. On an anecdotal note, I’ve observed numerous instances of paid pundits and armchair critics alike ready to cancel AOC for her take on bringing H.R. 1384 to a floor vote. One commenter I saw even opined that they thought Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is the most disappointing politician they’ve witnessed in the last several decades. The woman hasn’t even completed her first full term in the House of Representatives after a surprise primary win against a 10-time incumbent and she’s already a major disappointment? The notion would be infuriating if it weren’t so laughably absurd.

Of course, not every “hot take” we read on social media is going to be well considered. (Frequently, they are very poorly considered.) Still, the people uttering these lines are likely prospective voters in 2022 and beyond. Maybe it’s fatigue after a long and hard year and an even longer presidential campaign. Maybe progressives are starting to become impatient after two failed presidential campaigns for Bernie Sanders and a seemingly endless barrage of attacks from the right and center-right.

Whatever the case, that some leftists would be so apt to throw AOC, one of the most sympathetic figures to their cause in Congress, under the proverbial bus seems wrong-headed. As it stands, the pickings are slim with respect to congressional allies on core progressive issues. Besides, it’s not as if she, while remaining skeptical about forcing a vote on M4A, is devoid of ideas on how else to apply political pressure on the people who need to be pressed on universal health care. We might not agree with her stance completely, but at least there’s the possibility of negotiation. This is not Joe “I Beat the Socialist” Biden we’re talking about here.

I’ve never been super active on social media, but of late, I’ve largely distanced myself from it completely, especially as intersects with the political and social issues spheres. Do I feel less informed? Sometimes, yeah. But do I miss the drama that accompanies a lot of the day’s political discourse? No, not at all. The title of this piece is intended to be ironic, but only to an extent. The insistence of moderates on civility toward people who actively do and wish harm on others is certainly problematic in its presumption that the center is always best, but perhaps a balance should be struck when dealing with individuals who are outspoken defenders of progressive values. It could get lonely on the left otherwise.

The Democratic Party Platform Is an Insult

By refusing to include it in the party platform or even entertain the possibility of ratifying Medicare for All, Joe Biden and the Democrats are exhibiting poor political and practical sense. (Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore/Flickr/CC BY-SA 2.0)

“We don’t have red lines—we have values.”

So said veteran lawmaker Steny Hoyer recently in a CNN interview, echoing the sentiments of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi on whether $600 weekly payments to supplement unemployment insurance should be extended. Evidently, the Democrats are willing to negotiate—or capitulate, depending on your viewpoint—on the final figure.

This position of Democratic leadership comes amid gridlock in the Senate regarding an extension of federal unemployment benefits. Whereas House Democrats passed a bill in May that would have guaranteed the extension of $600 per week, Senate Republican leadership has balked at that figure, offering a counter-proposal of $200/wk. while states come up with a plan to satisfy their constituents’ needs with a mix of their own funds and federal dollars.

That Hoyer and other Dems have left the door open to compromise with the GOP is vaguely troubling, especially since Hoyer in that same interview parroted Republican talking points by expressing concern that people who receive a more robust stimulus check might not want to go back to work. It also renders Hoyer’s statement gobbledygook. “We don’t have red lines—we have values.” Right, but when “red lines” can be used to communicate one’s values, what is that even supposed to mean? It’s an illogical and unnecessary potshot at the Left.

In a similar vein, the recent reveal of the Democratic Party platform for the Democratic National Convention casts doubt on the party’s principles leading inexorably toward November. Upon its unveiling, the Democratic National Committee’s platform committee co-chair Denis McDonough referred to the Democratic 2020 party platform as the “boldest Democratic platform in American history.”

Progressives would beg to differ, meanwhile. John Nichols, national affairs correspondent for The Nation, underscores how without Medicare for All, McDonough’s assertion neither matches the substance of the platform as drafted nor matches this moment in history.

As an untold number of advertisements will tell you, we live in “extraordinary” or “challenging” times. It’s their way of saying we’re living in a global pandemic and people all over the world are getting sick and dying, but in a PR-speak kind of way where the actual problem isn’t mentioned as if refusing to utter the name of the disease either saps it of its power or prevents it from rearing its ugly head.

This is the moment in history to which I’m referring, and with it has come significant job loss and thus access to “affordable” health care. At a time when a safety net is needed (or three or four), being forced to worry about being plunged into medical debt is brutal, if not unconscionable.

As such, from a purely moral standpoint, the hour calls for single-payer healthcare. Beyond this, though, as Nichols explains, it’s not good political strategy to bar it from the party platform. For one, COVID-19 (gasp, he said it!) is disproportionately killing people of color, a reality about which patent refusal to entertain the mere possibility of M4A sends a bad message to a key portion of the Democrats’ base.

In addition, Medicare for All is popular with Democrats and non-Democrats alike. People, you know, generally like having healthcare and being able to afford it without having to mortgage property or sacrifice an internal organ. As Winnie Wong, former senior adviser to Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign, is cited in Nichols’ piece, the Dems are “making a fatal mistake by turning their backs on Medicare for All.”

To this effect, some 700 delegates have signed a pledge refusing to back the party platform without M4A on it. At the very least, this show of opposition is a bad look for a Democratic Party touting its supposed party unity and counting on turnout from progressives to help push Joe Biden over the top in the presidential election.

We would be remiss if we were to say that the entire platform as drafted is without merit, a notion Nichols explicitly highlights. There are a number of elements within the party platform which might appeal to progressive voters and almost certainly reflect the input of progressive activists, notably a call for a $15 minimum wage and clear goals for climate change remediation. That said, historically speaking, these tenets do not in them of themselves make the platform the boldest on record and certainly are not to be lauded as uniquely courageous.

In short, the Democratic party platform as it is presently constructed is a mixed bag. What seems significant, however, is that not only are some of its recommendations rather tepid, but other provisions appear to be specifically designed to alienate progressives. The party voted against including marijuana legalization in the platform, for one.

There’s also nothing about ending qualified immunity for police officers, nothing about expressly condemning Israeli expansion/occupation in the West Bank, and no commitment to a climate change plan as comprehensive as the Green New Deal. In a game of party platform Bingo, progressives are struggling to fill one row or column, let alone the entire board.

By now, the Democrats’ agenda in advance of the general election is no surprise. As is their custom, they’re playing it safe and trying not to offend any big donors or moneyed interests in the process. The unique set of circumstances at work in 2020 might yet be enough to propel Joe Biden to victory in spite of, well, Joe Biden.

Possible short-term electoral success and fundraising goals achieved notwithstanding, encouraging antipathy from the party’s burgeoning leftist wing is quite a price to pay in service of these objectives. It’s one thing to enjoy winning or to be able to breathe a sigh of relief in avoiding four more years of President Donald Trump. It’s another to poke progressives in the eye and expect them to show their loyalty while you do it.

As it should be emphasized, for progressives critical of the 2020 party platform, while Medicare of All is a glaring omission, there is ample room for commentary. Patrisse Cullors, activist and Black Lives Matter co-founder, reportedly proposed about 10 amendments on various issues primarily impacting the black community and other communities of color which were rejected without a vote. If Cullors feels like less of an ally or a member of a party with principles, can you blame her? We’ve seen ordinary people protesting en masse IN THE MIDST OF A PANDEMIC to bring attention to and demand change to combat systemic racism in our society. How can this platform possibly be construed to meet this historic moment?

Another criticism of the platform is that it underestimates both the durability and magnitude of COVID-19’s impact. In a separate article for The Nation by Emma Galbraith and James K. Galbraith, the authors outline how the Democratic party platform falls short in several areas related to coronavirus.

In addition to, as mentioned, not embracing single-payer healthcare at a time when this pandemic has exacerbated a healthcare crisis, the platform insufficiently addresses our oil surplus, it undersells the blow dealt to the services and construction industries (among others), it offers minimal relief to renters and others facing homelessness, and it doesn’t fully comprehend the lack of trust America’s disastrous response to COVID-19 has engendered in its inhabitants. After all, faith in our political institutions was relatively low even before we started seeing cases in the States. Now? Memes about guillotines are on the rise, and while we’re yet on the level of dark humor, I feel like today’s politicians and others more removed from the struggles of everyday Americans shouldn’t push it.

I’ve heard it said that the DNC has effectively taken a victory lap with its elaboration of the party platform, an analogy I consider to be apt in how it reflects the dynamic between centrist establishment forces and progressives trying to reform the Democratic Party from the inside. What’s especially on the nose about this comparison, meanwhile, is that it resembles the attitude Democratic supporters had in 2016, which we all know was an ill-fated confidence. 2020 is already different in any number of ways and at this writing, things look good for Joe Biden. Very good. Just the same, the Dems would be well served not to press their luck. If anyone knows about losing winnable elections, it’s them.

Not everything is bad about the Democratic Party’s platform this election cycle. That said, it could be dramatically better, and furthermore, even if Biden wins, the U.S. will face huge structural issues that the policy positions enumerated within the platform won’t begin to fully address. Progressives will be holding Biden’s feet to the fire in that case. Democratic leadership better be ready for it.

I Voted for Bernie and All I Got Was This Stupid Task Force

Bruh, I know how you feel. (Photo Credit: Steven Pisano/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)

I will always feel indebted to Bernie Sanders for how he inspired me to become involved with politics. But damn if I’m not disappointed with the way the Democratic Party presidential primaries turned out—and super disappointed now that all progressives have to show for their efforts in 2020 at the highest level is the Joe Biden-Bernie Sanders task force.

At this writing, Biden has well surpassed the requisite tally to clinch the nomination, garnering 2,575 pledged delegates, 584 more than the minimum needed. Bernie stands at 1,047 after dropping out in April. All other candidates who won delegates amassed but 142 delegates. What’s the significance, beyond Joe running up the score?

By now, nothing. Had Bernie reached 1,200 delegates, there might’ve been a discussion to be had, albeit a relatively short one given that the nomination has long since been locked up. At this juncture, however, that is essentially impossible, if not mathematically certain to be so. Moreover, it comes on the heels of a drive by the Sanders campaign and supporting organizations that by most accounts would be described as tepid—at best.

In an article for The Intercept from April, Rachel M. Cohen detailed how while Bernie was staying on the ballot in an effort to earn more delegates, the investment to get him to 1,200 pledged delegates—the necessary number by which he and his campaign would be able to influence the Democratic National Convention/party platform—hasn’t been much of an investment.

As a function of exiting the presidential race, the Sanders campaign stopped advertising and the man himself got behind his onetime rival, endorsing Biden and vowing to campaign for him against the wishes of Larry Cohen, chair of Our Revolution. And while OR still prioritized getting out the vote for Bernie, other Bernie-sympathetic organizations shifted their focus to down-ballot races (which, to be fair, need(ed) their share of attention) or simply lack the bandwidth to make a dent in Biden grabbing the lion’s share of the delegate haul.

So, yes, we can forget about that drive, which leaves us now with the aforementioned join task force. In fairness, this “show of unity” between the two campaigns is not altogether discouraging when considering some of the dramatis personae, esp. on the Sanders side. Among the high-profile names representing Bernie’s faction are Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (Climate Change), Rep. Pramila Jayapal (Health Care), and former Michigan gubernatorial candidate Dr. Abdul El-Sayed (Health Care).

As to what they’ve come up with a month and change before the convention, though? From a progressive perspective, it’s not all that and a bag of chips (note: please excuse my use of ultra-modern sayings).

To be clear, and as with the roster for the task force itself, the recommendations for the party platform are not completely devoid of encouragement, as reports Ella Nilsen for Vox, citing a 100+-page report on the Biden campaign official website.

Elements of the set of recommended directives include the creation of a postal banking system to expand banking access for low-income families; a net-zero greenhouse gas emissions national goal for all new buildings in 2030; universal pre-K for three- and four-year olds; a ban on for-profit charter schools; decriminalization of marijuana at the state level and legalization at the federal; ending the use of private prisons and detention centers; and terminating the Trump administration travel ban.

What these recommendations don’t do, meanwhile, is advocate for Medicare for All (instead, the bid is for a “public option” administered by Medicare), nor do they even mention the Green New Deal. There is no appeal for a cancellation of all student debt. These progressive priorities are largely side-stepped for the sake of this nebulous concept of party “unity.”

On the subject of Medicare, too, the task force calls for a lowering of the enrollment age from 65 to 60. For younger voters in particular, that’s small potatoes, especially when Hillary Clinton, on several counts a better candidate than Biden, was offering enrollment at the age of 55. On such a critical issue as healthcare in a time of political upheaval and amid a global health crisis, that we’re moving backwards, not forwards is frustrating—and that may be putting it mildly.

Similarly, there’s no mandate to defund the police. Sure, this is a “charged” issue, with some fearful voters equating defunding police forces with abolishing them outright and not even Bernie supporting the defunding movement; if anything he wants to give police departments more money, albeit with strings attached (still not a great take, by the by). That said, for young adults from communities of color that have been disproportionately and negatively impacted by increasingly militaristic policing, to not take a firmer stand on defunding is less likely to draw their attention and generate excitement for the Biden campaign.

In all, Biden and Co. appear to be banking on the suburban “swing mom” vote, all but ignoring the youth vote, the Latinx vote, Black Lives Matter’s larger aims, and every intersection betwixt and between. Generally speaking, and with a nod to the “insurgent” wing of the Democratic Party desperately hungry for substantive change, it’s a rather disheartening collection of platform priorities, notably because it is yet one more instance of establishment Democrats playing it safe with a critical election on the line.

Did Bernie Sanders betray progressives by dropping out so early with few to no concessions from Joe Biden and his camp re the party platform? It depends on who you ask, but as far as I’m concerned, no, Bernie hasn’t betrayed progressives. As a member of the Senate, Sanders has continued and will continue to champion progressive causes like M4A and the GND. Concerning the former, lest we forget and as Bernie growled in a memorable debate exchange, he wrote the damn bill. Thus, while he may have laid it down to Biden, he didn’t abandon his principles like other so-called progressives in the race (cough, Elizabeth Warren, cough).

Nevertheless, lay it down Bernie did, and this notion is still something I wrestle with as one of his supporters. I get that Bernie pledged he would support the eventual winner of the Democratic Party nomination as he did in 2016. He may be a rabble-rouser, but he’s not a complete asshole and he understands the threat that a second(!) term of President Donald Trump presents.

This aside, when it came to the lone heads-up debate with Joe Biden, where was the killer instinct his supporters were looking for? I know, I know, Bernie—Joe is your “friend.” He’s not my friend, though, not with his litany of bad policy positions and votes. With that, I don’t know if he rescued you from a burning building or what, but the way you threw in the towel, it felt less like a strategic maneuver and more like something done out of obligation or duress. Watching Bernie’s endorsement of Biden, I felt like shouting at the screen for him to tug on his right ear if he were being held hostage. Three months removed from that moment, that this theory remains among my top explanations for what happened is vaguely alarming.

We may never know what was discussed behind closed doors between Biden and Sanders, or for that matter, Sanders and Barack Obama. Maybe Bernie is just too nice or too much of an optimist. (By proxy, I might be a cold-hearted cynic and a jerk.) In terms of leverage, however, any pull Bernie and his backers had died when his bid for at least a quarter of the delegate share did. If nothing else, it’s aggravating to have Biden backers and dyed-in-the-wool Democrats popping off and telling progressives to “kiss the ring” or “bend the knee.” This is supposed to be American democracy, not a g-d Game of Thrones situation.

Even the act of withholding one’s vote or not committing to Biden until the general election nears has been undermined in part by—you guessed it—Bernie Sanders, taking a more scolding tone this election cycle and suggesting it would be “irresponsible” for his adherents to sit this election out. As is always the case with vote shaming, however, the directionality is warped. In all but a handful of “swing” states, “rogue” Bernie supporters are unlikely to make a significant impact on the outcome. Either way, it’s ultimately Joe Biden’s job to make the case for Joe Biden, not Bernie or Briahna Joy Gray or David Sirota or anyone else affiliated with the Sanders campaign. As I feel it should be stressed, Bernie backers are not a cult. They have real concerns about real issues and should be talked to, not talked at accordingly.

As Bernie himself recently put forward, Joe Biden has a chance to be “the most progressive president since FDR” if he commits to the recommendations outlined by the joint task force. Meanwhile, these are purely recommendations and from what we know of Biden and his profile as a lawmaker, a more centrist and less inspiring outcome is more probable. I hope the Biden campaign ultimately surprises progressives en route to a decisive victory over Donald Trump, I really do. At the same time, I’m not exactly holding my breath either.

2020 Has Been a Disaster for National Progressive Politics (and Pretty Much Everything Else)

Joe Biden is the Democratic Party presidential nominee, Bernie Sanders gave up the fight and endorsed him, and Elizabeth Warren has evidently abandoned her principles to try to become Biden’s VP pick. So yeah, a great time for progressives on the national stage. (Photo Credit: Phil Roeder/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)

Speaking as a progressive, the fight for economic, political, and social justice is such that, despite any setbacks, there are always more battles to fight. In other words, there is always work to be done and voices to be amplified. But damn if it doesn’t get disheartening sometimes.

Of course, as the death count related to COVID-19 in the United States makes its inexorable climb toward 100,000-plus, the immediate health and safety of all Americans is of paramount importance. Still, taking a snapshot of progressive politics at this moment in time, it’s worth noting that, at the national level, progressive leadership and power doesn’t seem all that it’s cracked up to be or could be.

Let’s start with the Senate. Who are your progressive leaders and how do you feel about them lately? Bernie Sanders, who has missed at least one key vote in recent memory, is reportedly asking some delegates to sign agreements barring them from attacking other candidates or leaders, getting involved in social media confrontations, or doing interviews with reporters without approval. If true, it’s a disappointing development from a man who suspended his presidential bid with a whimper and gave up the fight with so much at stake and with so little conceded from Joe Biden’s camp.

Elizabeth Warren? After a disappointing campaign that ultimately saw her fail to catch on with progressives and party loyalists alike and only manage a third-place finish in her home state, her progressive credentials are in question now more than ever. Her attacks on Bernie, her reversal on super PAC funding, and her self-identification alongside Amy Klobuchar from primary season notwithstanding, her apparent abandonment of Medicare for All, a central tenet of the progressive movement in the U.S., invites charges of selling out for a chance to be Biden’s vice president—an unlikely eventuality to begin with given Joe’s ties to the banking industry.

Kamala Harris? Kirsten Gillibrand? Cory Booker? Like Sanders and Warren, they’re all carrying water for Biden despite a credible sexual assault allegation against him and other claims of unwanted touching or close physical proximity. Poor Ed Markey might not survive a primary challenge from Joe Kennedy III, the Pete Buttigieg of the Senate Democratic races—and no, that “Mayo Pete” comparison is not a compliment. Jeff Merkley. Mazie Hirono. Sherrod Brown. They’re not exactly household names outside of progressive circles and none are younger than 60.

In the House of Representatives, meanwhile, we thankfully have members who are making a name for themselves as progressives on the national stage—and younger ones at that. The problem here is that these reps are seemingly having their influence circumscribed at every possible turn (or at least the attempt is there) by Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other dyed-in-the-wool establishment Democrats.

Faced with an unprecedented economic and health crisis, Pelosi and Co. have largely capitulated to moneyed interests, offering little in the way of substantive relief to everyday Americans beyond the minimum standards Republicans have proposed. All the while, Pelosi, like her other moderate colleagues, has endorsed Biden’s presidential bid and has allowed herself to get dragged down in the mud with Donald Trump, making references to his weight and other performative gestures which neither do anything to help people in need nor do they help rally support for the party cause outside of loyalists (and also risk alienating people who don’t take kindly to body shaming regardless of the source).

To recap then, we have a promising group of younger progressives in the House amid Democratic Party control, but old-guard leadership is evidently determined to thwart them as part of a last-gasp effort to flex its might. In the Senate, Mitch McConnell is majority leader, Chuck Schumer is the party’s face, and even the members with the best voting records have made questionable alliances/decisions of late. In addition, as alluded to, the most progressive options of the 2020 presidential campaign saw their hopes dashed in dramatic fashion following Super Tuesday.

All of this on top of a coronavirus crisis that has seen tens of thousands of Americans die, millions of people file for unemployment and/or lose health insurance, and the world’s richest individuals get even richer as a direct result of the global pandemic has made the first half of 2020 so far a little frustrating, to put it mildly. What’s more, it doesn’t appear things will improve over the rest of the year or anytime soon for that matter.

Small businesses will continue struggling to survive in the absence of needed aid from the federal government. Another wave of COVID-19 infections is probable if not certain. And while Biden is enjoying a national polling lead in some cases of eight or more percentage points, that he’s not doing better given the depths of Trump’s inadequacies and that he continues to lag behind in the enthusiasm department is deeply troubling with November fast approaching. In short, 2020 has sucked royally—and for progressives in particular, there is every reason to worry the worst is yet to come.

Lest I relegate myself purely to the realms of doom and gloom, it’s not all bad for the progressive movement in the United States of America. If the popularity of figures like Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez is any indication, it’s that there is a real appetite for new leadership within a growing subset of the left-leaning electorate. As ignominious as the end to Bernie Sanders’s 2020 campaign was, too, exit poll after exit poll showed that despite primary voters’ preference for Joe Biden to take on Donald Trump, on issues like Medicare for All, they favored the progressive position over the standard alternative. So many voters are desperate for real change.

As the late great philosopher Tom Petty once said, however, the waiting is the hardest part. Whilst progressives helped organize a campaign for Bernie that was poised to go the distance—and there’s much to discuss in the postmortem period of analysis about why it didn’t but there’s not enough space in this article or perhaps one article in it of itself to do that—the Biden campaign struggled to raise finances, limped out of the gates in early contests, and didn’t even have a presence in a number of bygone primary states.

And yet he still romped in the South and managed numerous upset wins following his dominant showing in South Carolina. Whether Elizabeth Warren’s presence in the race long after it was clear her electoral chances were dead on arrival hurt Bernie is yet a subject of debate in leftist circles (among Sanders supporters, I feel like this may be overblown), but regardless, the two best candidates to ever be in striking distance of the overall polling lead came up well short of winning the nomination despite being better-funded and better-organized than the campaign that actually has Biden on a path to win the Democratic Party nomination and maybe even defeat Trump in November. That’s a tough pill to swallow, and increasingly so as real life proves candidates like Sanders, Warren, and even Andrew Yang on the topic of universal basic income right.

The news is better further down ballots, where there are real electoral successes to be found. AOC’s meteoric rise to prominence aside, though, primary challenges ending in progressive wins are fewer and farther between than eager leftists sifting through voting results would obviously like to see. The Democratic Party establishment has been more than hostile toward primary challenges from the left. (If you’re Ed Markey and facing a challenge from the right in the form of a corporate-funded candidate with the Kennedy name, that’s apparently fine.) Though this doesn’t mean that challengers’ efforts aren’t worthy if not necessary to compel Democratic incumbents to actually try to earn their votes, it’s nonetheless deflating when effort and good intent alone can’t overcome voter aversion to change and a party apparatus specifically constructed to quell dissent.

Inherently, these circumstances promote tension, for while progressives ideally would like to think about how to organize over the long term, the realities of the short term compel action even at the expense of immediate political capital. Regardless of the “color” of one’s district, someone should be running to represent policy goals like Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, a $15 minimum wage, cancellation of student debt, universal basic income, and other progressive priorities. No one wants to be running without a genuine chance at winning when the optics surrounding a landslide loss loom large. The need for involvement at the lower levels of government because of the magnitude of suffering for millions of Americans creates urgency, and progressive groups across key voting blocs are often fighting one another for relevance when cooperation should be the order of the day.

For me, what is especially challenging about all of this is how, despite progressives’ collective efforts since the 2016 election, we yet find ourselves in a precarious position. After Hillary Clinton’s defeat, Democrats haven’t learned their lesson, that much more determined to return to the days before President Trump no matter what in coalescing behind a candidate in Biden who generates even less enthusiasm than the woman who just lost.

Regarding COVID-19, America lags behind the rest of the world in curbing the spread of infection despite its wealth of resources, and at a time when we should be rethinking the role of capitalism in how our society functions (or doesn’t), some people seem only that much more willing to sacrifice others on capitalism’s altar so they can get a haircut or prevent a decline in stock prices. If there is a lesson to be learned herein, it’s sadly that 90,000 deaths is not enough to spur a movement of sufficient size toward fundamental change. A few months into widespread quarantines across the country, many of us are restless to the point of advocating for armed rebellion. What happens when the ravages of climate changes really start hitting home? If current developments are any indication, it, um, won’t go well.

In belaboring progressives’ struggles within the Democratic Party, I don’t mean to paper over the differences between the Dems and the death cult that is the Republican Party. For example, Joe Biden deserves your vote more than Donald Trump—full stop. I also don’t mean to insist that leaving the Democratic Party altogether is necessarily the correct tactic. The #DemExit movement is fraught with its own difficulties and potential shortcomings, though I also don’t blame progressives for wanting to move on after the litany of abuses they’ve suffered in such a short time, only wanting to do their part to make the Democratic Party better.

Though I think progressives might do well to place a greater emphasis on winning and grassroots organizing at the lower levels of government and though I have reservations about watching the Democratic Party burn to the ground, politics is ultimately a two-way street. Democratic leadership would do well not to take progressive votes for granted and offer at least some meaningful concessions to the left rather than mere table scraps. 2020 has been a disaster for progressive politics on the national stage thus far, but it doesn’t have to end that way—and the Democrats would be all the stronger by recognizing it.

It’s Not Too Late to Vote for Bernie Sanders

As it turns out, Bernie Sanders has been right about pretty much everything. Maybe Democratic Party voters should be voting for him. Just a thought. (Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore/Flickr/CC BY-SA 2.0)

Down by about 300 delegates, Bernie Sanders has an admittedly narrow path to victory in the race for the Democratic Party presidential nomination. An essential element of the argument against Bernie and thus for Joe Biden is that Bernie is simply “not electable,” while Biden, who had never won a state primary in three campaigns until this year, will beat an overall unpopular incumbent in Donald Trump.

As a counterpoint to this prevailing narrative of electability perpetuated by professional pundits and corporate hacks, everyone is electable if you vote for them. Moreover, with roughly half of states yet to vote, it’s not too late to vote for Bernie Sanders. Amid a global pandemic which has seen over a million cases worldwide, has killed more than 50,000 people, and is responsible for sickness, death, and surging unemployment claims here in the United States, he is unquestionably the leader for this moment.

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, assistant professor of African-American studies at Princeton University and author, expresses this sentiment beautifully in a recent piece for The New Yorker titled “Reality Has Endorsed Bernie Sanders”. As she finds, Sanders’s “policy proposals are especially apt now, when the coronavirus crisis is revealing an economy organized around production for the sake of profit, not need.”

In meditating on the alacrity with which the U.S. and the world at large has found itself in an existential crisis, Taylor underscores the reality that the state of America’s welfare state, precarious to begin with, has been steadily worsened by the marginalization of the individuals and families who rely on it. The poor, despite numbering in the tens of millions, are mostly ignored except to be demonized as fundamentally lacking in effort, intelligence, and social graces. All the while, rent goes up and salaries/wages don’t, leading to a national housing crisis, and as a function of racial injustice, black and brown Americans feel the pinch worst of all, including having reduced access to affordable, high-quality healthcare.

Throw in a highly infectious and deadly novel coronavirus and the byproduct is brutal, if unsurprising. People of color, particularly those who live in poverty, are at greater risk for contracting and for suffering severe complications from COVID-19 because they are unable to afford the kind of social isolation “flattening the curve” merits, whether as a function of their living arrangements, jobs/professions which pay little and expose them to the public (e.g. home healthcare, retail, service industry), or both. The greater the economic and racial inequality, the more pronounced the racial disparities are liable to be.

As Taylor makes the connection, looking back at U.S. politics of recent decades, it is no wonder why both major political parties’ responses to the spread of coronavirus have been lacking. During Richard Nixon’s presidency, conservatives did their part to undermine the welfare state by depicting entitlement programs as rewards for laziness or a form of privilege, while at the same time pushing for corporate tax cuts and profits. In response, Democrats followed suit, echoing concerns about Americans “taking advantage” of welfare and advocating for criminal justice “reform” in the form of harsher attitudes and penalties for violators, predominantly those from communities of color. Today, Democrats and Republicans alike elevate profligate spending on the military and the perpetuation of a cruel and unjust criminal justice system above investment in and protection of an adequate social safety net. They have done little to change course since the start of the crisis in the United States because they don’t know how, a slave to the ideologies they have elaborated for more than a generation.

This is where Bernie Sanders and his campaign come in. Previously derided by his political rivals, their supporters, and armchair political theorists, Sanders and his policy goals sound more than plausible in the current climate, political or otherwise. It is this global crisis which has brought clarity to the notion that Bernie’s active bid for the White House isn’t just the one that best elaborates the antidote to what’s happening now, but to the underlying conditions that preceded it too. In theory, the idealized “free market” should have an answer to the present economic crunch and health care emergency. Instead, free testing and treatment for COVID-19 is a “debate;” PPE, tests, and ventilators (not to mention the essential personnel to tend to the sick and dying) are in dire supply, overpriced or overtaxed; the cruise industry is asking for a bailout despite not paying U.S. income tax; and others are actively seeking ways to profit from this disaster. Does that sound acceptable to you?

Consequently, any set of solutions going forward must rethink our paradigm, embracing collectivity, connectivity, and personal responsibility over illusory top-down solutions. It is in this sense in which Bernie’s emphasis on big-picture thinking and grassroots organizing is thankfully distinct from that of Joe Biden’s and Donald Trump’s hyperpartisan rhetoric. Taylor closes her column thusly:

The class-driven hierarchy of our society will encourage the spread of this virus unless dramatic and previously unthinkable solutions are immediately put on the table. As Sanders has counselled, we must think in unprecedented ways. This includes universal health care, an indefinite moratorium on evictions and foreclosures, the cancellation of student-loan debt, a universal basic income, and the reversal of all cuts to food stamps. These are the basic measures that can staunch the immediate crisis of deprivation—of millions of layoffs and millions more to come.

The Sanders campaign was an entry point to this discussion. It has shown public appetite, even desire, for vast spending and new programs. These desires did not translate into votes because they seemed like a risky endeavor when the consequence was four more years of Trump. But the mushrooming crisis of COVID-19 is changing the calculus. As federal officials announce new trillion-dollar aid packages daily, we can never go back to banal discussions of “How will we pay for it?” How can we not? Now is a moment to remake our society anew.

A mere two election cycles after Barack Obama’s tenure in the White House, the promise of “Yes, we can!” has given way to the notion we not only can work together for a better future, but must do so if we’re to have a future at all. Bernie Sanders’s movement, of which the slogan is “Not Me. Us,” is the human-powered political force that best articulates the paramount importance of putting people and the planet over profit. The rest is just noise at this point.

Touching again upon the insufficiency of both parties’ responses to the coronavirus pandemic gripping the nation, unless you are a steadfast party supporter or backer of the president, you probably don’t need an explanation as to how poorly the Trump administration has handled this situation. I mean, Jared Kushner has a functional role in the response. That’s a red flag right there.

Reports of Donald Trump showing favoritism to red states in the availability of supplies. Press conferences that are more likely to feature the creator of MyPillow than usable information. Considering 200,000 deaths due to COVID-19 a “very good” result of the virus’s spread. The Trump White House is showing its lack of preparedness for an emergency of this magnitude atop its standard incapacity for empathy for people unlike the president. That Mitch McConnell and his ilk would try to blame the “distraction” of impeachment for Trump not doing his job or to create their own distraction by pivoting to talk of Hunter Biden merely adds insult to injury. We’ve seen him at his rallies. We know about the golf. This isn’t fooling anyone except the gullible members of his base.

Unfortunately, establishment Democrats haven’t really seized the advantage. As usual, rather than offering a substantive vision for how to move forward in this time of crisis, they’re hoping and waiting for Trump to self-destruct, all the while coalescing behind a man in Joe Biden who seems patently incapable of making a media appearance without glitching or lying. In the face of millions of Americans losing health insurance as a result of being newly unemployed or having to pay through the nose for testing/treatment for COVID-19, Biden appears unmoved on the subject of single-payer healthcare. When appearing in an MSNBC interview with Yasmin Vossoughian on the matter, here was his response:

Single-payer will not solve that at all. The thing that is needed is, for example, we have a whole number of hospitals that are being stretched, including rural hospitals, they are going to need more financing. That doesn’t come from a single-payer system. That comes from the federal government stepping up and dealing with concerns that they have. The reimbursement they are going to get, how they’re going to be able to move forward.

At one point, Biden also referenced the way Italy has been impacted by the pandemic, saying that single-payer couldn’t prevent coronavirus from spreading. Right, Mr. Biden, but you’re missing the point. Meagan Day, staff writer at Jacobin, details what the former vice president either doesn’t get about single-payer or doesn’t want to admit owing to his fealty to the health insurance industry.

Addressing Biden’s comments re Italy, Day points out, citing responses from Italians across the political spectrum, that the death toll would’ve been much worse had it not been for universal healthcare. Here in the United States, the number of tragic stories grows seemingly day by day of individuals who are dying because they can’t afford treatment/testing or are otherwise reluctant to seek it out because of the cost. A system like Medicare for All would ensure nobody is denied the care they need because they can’t afford insurance. Bernie’s critics have lashed out at him for continuing to champion M4A amid this catastrophe, but this isn’t just politics as usual for millions of Americans. It quite literally could mean the difference between life and death.

In fairness to Biden, he isn’t the only Dem offering weak sauce to a divided electorate desperately seeking a direction forward. Days after the passage of coronavirus stimulus legislation that saw, among other things, Senate Democrats largely capitulate to the GOP on a one-time $1,200 payment and give Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin largely unchecked powers over a $500 billion bailout “slush fund,” Nancy Pelosi’s big idea evidently is to…revisit a repeal of the SALT deduction cap that would largely benefit wealthy earners? What?

As un-presidential as Trump proves with every briefing, he’s speaking directly to the public, controlling the narrative on COVID-19 in the United States. What’s worse, it seems to be working for his popularity, which is on the rise as of this writing. He’s also gaining nationally in polling on Biden, the presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee who has been invisible at times during this crisis and even when making remarks is a gaffe machine. That Democrats would even casually float New York governor Andrew Cuomo’s name as someone they might rather support in the lead-up to November (another leader who has a sizable audience these days) should be deeply concerning to party leadership. Biden’s campaign doesn’t inspire nearly as much confidence or excitement among Democratic supporters as Trump’s does for his base, which could spell disaster close to six months from now.

Meanwhile, Bernie Sanders has been front and center during this crisis, doing regular livestreams answering questions about our coronavirus response and featuring legislators and experts in various fields as part of the broadcasts. He also memorably stood up to Senate Republicans in the stimulus bill negotiations, threatening to hold up its passage unless a handful of them backtracked on stripping unemployment insurance expansion for millions of workers. That’s the kind of real leadership hiding in plain sight that the Dems have been looking for.

Alas, down by about 300 delegates, Bernie Sanders has an admittedly narrow path to victory in the race for the Democratic Party presidential nomination. Win or lose, though, his candidacy matters. For those who have yet to cast their ballots in 2020, it’s not too late to vote for Bernie Sanders. He’s the only candidate left who has the mindset and the wherewithal to steer the country as it should be steered in these perilous waters.

Of Course the Coronavirus Pandemic is Political

SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, is affecting people regardless of country or origin and political affiliation. If you think our response to it shouldn’t be politicized, though, you don’t realize how politicized it already is. (Image Credit: NAIAD/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)

I’m not sure if you realized, but there’s some sort of virus going around.

By now, unless you’re living under a rock, you understand that COVID-19, a disease caused by the SARS/coronavirus 2 virus strain, is a global pandemic (and even if you do live under a rock, you might want to get tested if you can afford it). According to the Center for Disease Control, fever, cough, and shortness of breath are common symptoms.

As of March 12, the World Health Organization has confirmed over 125,000 cases of coronavirus disease, with upwards of 4,500 deaths across more than 100 countries, regions, and territories worldwide. What’s worse, as numerous authorities on the subject matter have emphasized, these numbers represent only what is known.

Depending on the availability of testing, those showing symptoms or suspecting they might have the disease after being in contact with people who have tested positive might not be able to confirm they’ve contracted it. Plus, there are those who may be asymptomatic but are still carriers of the disease. Regardless, the tallies stand to get much higher and the scope of the problem much worse.

In no uncertain terms, then, this is serious business and not, as some have suggested, a “hoax” or some elaborate conspiracy designed to bring down President Donald Trump. On that note, if anyone or anything can make Trump’s legitimacy as a leader seem questionable, it’s Trump himself.

It is painfully apparent that Trump and his administration are woefully unprepared for a health emergency of this magnitude. The president has repeatedly undercut his own advisers and medical professionals on the facts surrounding COVID-19, suggesting that a vaccine is nearing availability when the actual timeline points to such an intervention being a year or more away. Trump also has downplayed the gravity of the moment, opining that this coronavirus threat will be gone by April in concert with a rise in temperatures, despite having no evidence that the virus will be susceptible to warmer weather and otherwise failing to appreciate the notion that this strain could return in full force when the weather gets colder again.

Clearly, the United States’s response thus far is indicative of the disorganization and flippant self-servingness of its highest officeholder. For one, the Trump administration disbanded its global health security team after the sudden departure of Timothy Ziemer, the official designated as the country’s leader in the event of a pandemic. Trump has also authorized cuts to the CDC, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Homeland Security, and the National Security Council, organizations which all play a role in helping the government respond to a major health crisis. If this weren’t bad enough, in its proposed budget for the coming fiscal year, the White House has outlined further cuts to the CDC and, at this juncture, is sticking to its guns. You know, because we’re not having enough fun as it is.

Given every chance to seem remotely presidential, Trump has severely botched this aspect. From the first mention of COVID-19 as a “foreign virus” that “started in China” in his Oval Office address on the coronavirus disease, the xenophobic overtones and influence of Stephen “Richard Spencer Is My Homeboy” Miller were unmistakable. The haphazard announcement of a 30-day travel ban on most trips from Europe to the United States, aided by Trump’s inability to read a teleprompter because the man won’t admit he needs glasses, is also of questionable utility given that there are already so many cases here.

Speaking of confirmed cases, America faces a shortfall of available testing for the coronavirus, in large part because the Trump administration sought to drag its feet on its response so as to fudge the numbers and not make the president look bad. Instead of using the lag in the proliferation of the virus following its earliest reports from China, whose own initial response to the outbreak deserves admonishment, the Trump administration squandered that time, blaming, of all people, Barack Obama for this mess. Seriously, is there nothing Trump won’t blame Obama for?

In sum and to put it mildly, there’s a lot of noise and disinformation surrounding COVID-19 in America right now. I certainly don’t wish to add to it. More narrowly, though, I’d like to highlight the attitudes of Americans across the political spectrum in relation to coronavirus right now.

As one might expect, there are umpteen refrains from armchair political analysts and professional pundits alike that this health emergency isn’t political. We’re all affected by it. It doesn’t matter whether you’re from China or the United States or Italy or the United Kingdom or South Korea or Iran or what-have-you. COVID-19 doesn’t discriminate and the loss of life and livelihood as a byproduct of this crisis are regrettable independent of where you live, what you look like, or how much money you have or make.

By the same token, as with calls for civility in a political climate marked by dramatic polarization and online interactions that often veer into the realm of personal attacks, abuse, death threats, and doxxing, these pleas are only as good as the intent of the person making them. Notions of “we’re all in this together,” made in good faith, are valuable and inspiring because they evidence a recognition that this pandemic is one we have the ability to address, particularly by working with one another and rejecting the distinctions and principles that might normally divide us. As the saying goes, desperate times call for desperate measures.

Pledges of unity are therefore double-edged swords, and when wielded in bad faith, serve only to silence conversations we need to be having, especially on behalf of members of marginalized groups. Defenders of President Trump are quick to hide behind the sentiment that in this time of communal suffering, we should put aside our criticisms of one another in service of a common goal in fighting COVID-19.

Discourse restricted in this way, though, deflects blame where blame should be assigned. The Trump administration’s actions and verbiage heretofore have been shameful. We are behind the curve on coronavirus testing and COVID-19 amelioration as a direct result of the president’s deliberate inaction and counterproductive rhetoric designed not to negatively impact the stock market and not make him look weak by proxy. As recent market plunges the likes of which haven’t been seen in decades manifest, meanwhile, we obviously have already crossed that bridge. With every new cancellation or shutdown and with the market gains accrued during Trump’s tenure effectively erased, now is the right time to scrutinize his job performance. It is in the crucible of an event like a global pandemic that we arguably can best judge a leader’s ability and temperament. Trump is failing this test miserably.

The fact of the matter is we’ve heard this kind of politically-motivated inertia before and it’s no less depressing. In the wake of innumerable mass shootings, America has yet to make substantive progress regarding gun control, even as far as the most basic reforms which most Americans agree on (e.g. universal background checks) go. To dismiss desires of Americans on the left, on the right, and everywhere in between to hold Trump accountable for his poor handling of the COVID-19 threat is to make eerily similar arguments against progress merely to cling to an ideology and to ignore the reality of the circumstances at hand.

Bringing former president Barack Obama back into this to illustrate a point, if he were primarily responsible for the systemic failure of our government to address coronavirus, he would be roundly criticized on FOX News and elsewhere in conservative circles for the quality of his administration’s response. Hell, the man once caught flak for using Dijon mustard on his burger. If the roles were reversed, do you have any doubt Obama would be lambasted by Americans from coast to coast? Trump seemingly gets a pass from some because he, under normal circumstances, screws things up and lies about it. It’s not that funny normally, however, and it’s certainly not a laughing matter now. It’s quite literally life or death.

Accordingly, it’s fair to make discourse about America’s response to the spread of COVID-19 political in nature because it already is inextricably linked to politics. Most of our world is, whether we choose to acknowledge it or not. In our own daily lives, we wouldn’t (or shouldn’t) expect to get away with things because of our political affiliation or a particular agenda. The same applies to Donald Trump and exceedingly so given that he willingly signed up for the task of leading the country.

In their own addresses on coronavirus after President Trump’s debacle, Democratic Party presidential candidates Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders drew a marked contrast to their potential general election opponent by treating the occasion with the solemnity and measure it deserves.

On his campaign website and in his public remarks, Biden has emphasized the need for “decisive” public health and economic responses to the COVID-19 crisis, highlighting the importance of “trust, credibility, and common purpose” as well as “leadership grounded in science.” He has advocated for free and available testing; the creation of mobile and drive-thru testing sites and temporary hospitals; activating the Medical Reserve Corps; accelerating the production of medicines, tests, and vaccines; allocating resources for health and emergency services workers, including overtime reimbursements; ensuring paid leave for workers and reimbursements to employers; expanding unemployment insurance, employment relief, food relief, medical assistance, loans to small- and medium-sized businesses, child care, mortgage and student loan relief/forbearance, and union health funds; and other forms of mediation. It’s a rather detailed plan.

As for Sanders, he also was highly critical of the Trump administration in his address, stressing the urgency for declaring a national emergency (which Trump has since declared); convening a bipartisan coalition of experts to lead the coronavirus response; and caring for communities most vulnerable to COVID-19, notably nursing home residents/rehabilitation patients, immigration center detainees, and the incarcerated. Like Biden, he supports free testing for coronavirus as well as free vaccines when available.

Sanders too examined the need for funding for paid family and medical leave; expanding community health centers; facilitating private- and public-sector cooperation to ensure the availability of ICU units, medical professionals, and ventilators; establishing safeguards against price gouging, especially with respect to the pharmaceutical industry; augmenting unemployment insurance for employees and independent contractors alike, food assistance programs, and emergency loans to businesses; and placing a moratorium on evictions, foreclosures, and utility shut-offs, among other things. As with Biden, there are policy specifics aplenty to be appreciated herein.

For both candidates, the proposed coronavirus response is much more developed than anything the Trump administration has or likely can come up with. As always, “better than Trump” is a low bar to clear. An important distinction to be found between the two, meanwhile, is in the call for structural reforms, the importance of which is magnified by the severity of the problems the United States and the world currently face. Regarding access to high-quality health care for all Americans, the expansion of public programs to meet the need at this juncture is evocative of Medicare for All, an idea certainly not lost on Bernie’s supporters.

The Federal Reserve’s move to inject $1.5 trillion into the markets to fight “highly unusual disruptions” related to coronavirus also eats away at the professed concerns about cost that Sanders’s opponents have used to try to discredit him. What is evidently lacking is not the ability to meet these costs, but rather the political will. As Sen. Sanders tweeted in response to the Fed’s decision, “When we say it’s time to provide health care to all our people, we’re told we can’t afford it. But if the stock market is in trouble, no problem! The government can just hand out $1.5 trillion to calm bankers on Wall Street.” Critics of the backlash to this intervention say it is unfair to call this a “bailout,” but it’s hard to view this as anything but socialism for the rich and for Wall Street speculators.

Following a string of disappointing primary losses on consecutive Tuesdays, Bernie faces an uphill battle in capturing the Democratic Party presidential nomination. While I wouldn’t wish COVID-19 on anyone, though, it draws attention to the necessity of providing health care to everyone as a right as well as the sheer absurdity of saying we can’t pay for things like the cancellation of student debt when we can provide the markets over a trillion dollars in cash infusions with a snap of our fingers.

So, electoral prospects be damned: Bernie Sanders is right on these issues and deserves to continue his campaign as long as he can shine a light on the problems we face as a nation and will face even when we can reasonably say coronavirus has been contained. Here’s hoping he hammers this point home in this weekend’s debate with Joe Biden.

Sorry to get political there.