And STILL haven't. Sanders lost in a LANDSLIDE in 2016, but misogynist revisionism keeps reframing that FACT. In 2016 Sanders lost at the end of March. He just refused to leave. You insult 66M Hillary voters every time you re-write that historical fact.
fivethirtyeight.com/features/sande…
fivethirtyeight.com/features/sande…
In 2016 Sanders was crushed by his lack of outreach to black voters. A trillion #ButHerEmails articles subverted that fact about Sanders' run. This time the virus forced his hand. But the MSM that never laid a glove on Sanders in 2016 demanded his exit as the virus spread.
Pundits lauding Sanders for changing narratives never once lauded Hillary for shifting the entire American political system to FINALLY consider a woman. That she was wildly more qualified than Sanders didn't stop him from calling her unfit and unqualified.
Everyone forgets that it was Sanders who created the Crooked Hillary mantra. His supporters would follow HRC and throw dollar bills at her entourage. Sanders called black voters who chose her "low info" and his supporters targeted WOC at her events. Stop erasing these facts.
We are all supposed to feel sorry for Sanders now and pretend he is a groundbreaking politician. But he "borrowed" his signature issue #MedicareForAll from both Hillary circa 1993 and John Conyers who wrote the first M4A bill more than 20yrs ago--which Sanders didn't co-sponsor.
The historian in me chafes at revisionism that benefits white men and erases women and POC. Sanders did both. He opened his 2020 bid saying it "wasn't enough" to be a woman or POC or gay to run for POTUS. And did the MSM call him out for it? No. Sanders always got a pass.
So while others invent a narrative in which Sanders is an under-sung hero, I look at the reality: Sanders and his team misrepresented two stellar candidates--our BEST candidates-- Kamala Harris and ("my friend Elizabeth") Warren, both of whom ran rings around him.
The MSM ran with the fake news narrative of female unelectability versus white male inevitability. Harris was held to account for her work as a prosecutor while Sanders was never held to account. Warren was tasked with showing her homework on M4A while Sanders never was.
Warren got more endorsements than any other candidate. Her work was deemed "visionary" AND pragmatic, while Sanders was deemed plodding and intransigent. But white male inevitability will out and we were left with Bernie and Biden out of the most diverse field in history. Sad.
So I am not acceding to this false narrative about Bernie, the curmudgeonly grandpa being the savior we coulda, shoulda had. The real saviors were Hillary, Kamala and Elizabeth and we trashed them for an 18th century reflexivity that holds no place for women and/or BIPOC.
The facts remain for anyone who chooses to acknowledge them. We lost yet another opportunity to allow women to lead after 244yrs of never being represented. Lauding the rise of white male mediocrity over the demise of female accomplishment is one awful narrative to feed our kids.
