Shirley Chisholm would like a word.
This quote from Bernie reinforces how he’s running a third-party campaign. Most if not all third party candidates run against “the entire political establishment”. But Bernie’s the first in my lifetime to do it from within a major party.
He’s not just an independent who disparages the Dem Party. His core message since ever, and especially since 2015, is “I’m better than the Democratic Party”. That’s a third party message.
Ross Perot was the only third party candidate in my life to make a real dent in the two-party system. Bernie is unique in that he runs as a third party candidate *using the structural power of a major party*.
Which means he’s using the power of a powerful coalition to run against that very coalition. And like most third party candidates, he reserves most of his negativity for the major party closer to him ideologically. That’s the competition.
He’s using the platform of a coalition to say that coalition is the enemy. It’s the difference between saying “we need to make our coalition better” and “we need to defeat it”. It’s totally corrosive.
