In this race, it’s Bernie vs. Anyone But Bernie
As Sanders breaks away, rest of field battles to counter his momentum
MANCHESTER, N. H.— The Bernie Sanders road show offers some variety: there’s some comedy from filmmaker Michael Moore, can-I-get-a-witness testimony from Ohio Sen. Nina Turner, a speech in American Sign Language, sometimes music (The Strokes, for example) and Hollywood glamour (“Sex and the City” star Cynthia Nixon).
On Saturday afternoon at the Rochester Opera House, 1,100 people packed the floor and balconies to take it in.
When Sanders took the stage, the 78-year-old Vermont senator who is suddenly the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for president heading into Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary, he noted he’d already been to Concord and Dover that morning.
Then Sanders said what he’s been saying more or less since 2016. “We have to end the international embarrassment of being the only major country not to guarantee health care as a human right.”
Look at Canada, he said: “We have to ask ourselves, what it is that our neighbours to the north have figured out.” A Canadian can have surgery for major heart disease and come home without getting a bill, Sanders said. “You should not go bankrupt because you’re dealing with cancer or heart disease. That is an outrage.” There was thunderous applause.
Canadian-style health care. In the United States of America, this is the message that heralds a “political revolution.”
Or did: portrayed as radical during his 2016 run for the nomination against Hillary Clinton, much of Sanders’ agenda has become the mainstream of the party’s thought. Like Tommy Douglas who dragged Canadian politics toward socialized medicine without ever winning. Though now Sanders has a real shot at winning.
You hear often from Sanders supporters that he’s called a radical here for suggesting what is mainstream in Canada or in Europe. But when you listen to him talk about his health-care program, you see it goes beyond what exists in Canada. Dental coverage. Prescription drug coverage.
And then he pitches universal child care, a $15 minimum wage, cancelling all student debt and offering free tuition at all public universities, rules to make it easier to unionize, an overhaul of the “broken and racist” criminal justice system …
This is not a case of someone who only appears left-wing standing next to U.S. President Donald Trump. His is a legitimately progressive agenda, even by Canadian standards.
And alone among Democratic candidates, that agenda has inspired a movement, drawing massive support among youth and an army of small donors that have made him a fundraising powerhouse.
Which has made him the leader of the race to take on Trump. He won the popular vote in Iowa and essentially tied there with Pete Buttigieg for the most convention delegates. He has been leading polls here in New Hampshire. And he shows a solid lead in many of the most important states coming up on the calendar. The race is shaping up to be Bernie versus Anyone But Bernie. And it hasn’t yet become clear who the Anyone But will be.
Saturday evening, at the allcandidates 100 Club Dinner at an arena in Manchester, the crowds in the bleachers were organized like sports fans, too: pink-shirted Elizabeth Warren supporters with letters spelling out “CHOOSE COURAGE” over here, Buttigieg supporters in yellow shirts chanting “BOOT EDGE EDGE” over there, a big section of Sanders boosters holding up signs with his name spelled out in pink lights.
Sanders, onstage, managed to get a sustained cross-partisan cheer going: “I know there are differences of opinion in the room,” he said with a laugh. “Despite the differences of opinion, I know that no matter who wins the Democratic nomination we are going to come together and defeat Donald Trump!”
It’s a unity plea he made at Friday’s debate, and one he needs to make now, perhaps, because the other candidates and some party establishment avatars such as Clinton have been attacking him. And because Sanders’ own supporters have sometimes told the press they may not vote for a candidate like Joe Biden or Buttigieg in the general election.
Everyone in the Democratic party seems to agree that beating Trump is the main item on their agenda. Almost all the other candidates besides Sanders and Warren have decided to largely make the case for how they can beat Trump by proclaiming how they can beat Trump. Biden and Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar all argue they can beat him simply by being not him — reaching out to moderates, proposing nothing too drastic.
There is research from political scientists that suggests “throw the bum out” may well be the most persuasive election pitch a candidate can make. “Over the past few decades, American politics has become like a bitter sports rivalry, in which the parties hang together mainly out of sheer hatred of the other team, rather than a shared sense of purpose,” Alan Abramowitz, a professor of political science at Emory University, said outlining “negative partisanship” to Politico magazine recently.
The goal in an election is to motivate your team to come out and express their hate. Trump has certainly taken that strategy, to an extreme.
The question for candidates like Biden and Buttigieg is whether they can get their team excited enough to counter that. Sanders comes with built-in excitement among a group of what could be the Democratic base — young voters — who often don’t show up to vote in high numbers. If they’ll turn out for him, that’s his electability argument right there.
But here on the campaign trail, watching his supporters react to him and his policyheavy speeches, it’s clear Sanders doesn’t fire them up most by talking about their resentment of Trump. His applause lines are about developing a shared sense of purpose.
Long-shot candidate Deval Patrick, during his own speech to the by-then almost empty arena at the 100 Club, said a problem with America is that “we have learned to shout our anger and whisper our kindness.”
Sanders doesn’t whisper. He has a cranky, barking style. But what he shouts about is an agenda of compassion and kindness. He expresses those things with anger that grows out of their absence in Trump’s government, and in government in general. He shouts it loud: the kindness and anger all at once.
So far, it seems to be working.