Bernie Sanders: An Epitaph

Before I begin: Bernie Sanders is a good man. And he's obviously been a good, if quirky, Senator for Vermont.

But he can't be president because he won't relinquish any ground on his signature position: Medicare for All. The American people are too incremental for that. There are too many of us, feeling too many things at once. It's herding cats, and the cats are grumpy.

Medicare for All is scary, even though it's not a bad idea. The cost of it, spread out over the years, really isn't that bad. But that doesn't matter. Americans are too wary of those who "have everything figured out," even though that may be exactly what's needed.

The times don't demand that kind of a person. Especially now, when we have a president who simply won't obey any established norm of good behavior, who wants everything his way. Amidst that, Bernie Sanders stands astride, kind of in a land of his own.

Policy isn't the point in this election. Some kind of ethics are. We are in such a firestorm of awfulness that we're crying out for just plain normal, just someone who will react and act the way a normal person would. That feels like a lot to ask for, largely because of the cult that has formed around 45. It will die slowly, and hard, but in the meantime, we have an opportunity to just take a breather.

Medicare for All gets in the way of that. It's like the kid who, after winning his flight in a golf tournament, wants to take on the adult champ. Wait a minute, the dad says. Be happy with what you have. You're going to get burned. You may be good, but you're reaching too far. Bernie thinks replacing 45 is getting in the way of his master plan. More of us think the opposite.

Besides, we already have Obamacare, as challenged in the courts and legislatively as it has been. Amazingly--or not so amazingly, in a tribute to the lawyers and legislators who devised it--it has withstood test after test. The sensible thing to do is to go back there and fix the problems--the enormous deductibles, perhaps the allowance of coverage by parents up to age 26, which, though I get it, always struck me as excessive. The white, lower-middle-class has complained about it from the start, and it might be a way to get some of them--enough, say, to eject 45--into the fold.

Joe Biden's in the perfect place to promote that, having been a major player in the Obama Administration. We knew it wasn't perfect, but we thought it was better to get a start on it, he could (and, it says here, should) say. Now we can improve on it.

Tinkering with the machinery that's already been established has struck Americans as being the best thing to do. It's not radical, it approaches the other side with an offer of consensus, and it doesn't bully people, as 45 insists on doing. Depending upon the results of the election, it might just work.

I've written here more than once that Joe Biden isn't the best candidate the Democrats can conjure, and despite the fact that he seems to have emerged from the catfight for the nomination, I haven't changed that view. But he's the guy we've got, and we need to get behind him.

If there was a 'time' for Bernie, it was last time, but the white liberals (including me) thought Hillary Clinton was a shoo-in and a pile-on after getting the first black guy into the White House; you know, as long as he got in, let's get a woman in there, too. Nobody cried loudly enough when the Clintonites manipulated the primary vote, and nobody noticed until it was too late her arrogance and the effect her "deplorables" comment had on hardening support for the irresponsible carnival barker we now have there (which it sure did). She strode around in white instead of getting into jeans and denims and getting with the folks, and got the rug pulled out beneath her. The Russians played their role, but her missteps can't be discounted.

In another time, Bernie Sanders might have pulled off the incredible upset. But it's too late now; the tide has turned and he can't reverse it. He found his ceiling and couldn't get beyond that. He needs to address the young ones that, understandably, got behind him with passionate idealism. We don't want you to lose your spirit, he could say (appearing with Biden), but you've got to keep the big picture in mind. We're here, first and foremost, to correct a terrible mistake. You can see what it is and where we've gone because of it. The future is yours; that was never in doubt. But the point right now is to get back on the rails and be great again. Be sure to vote in November. It's your country that's at stake.

Something like that. It could be his greatest legacy. He has no choice if he really wants to defeat 45. And that's absolutely necessary.

Be well. Be careful. With some luck (counting the days to the peak of this pestilence; Apr. 27, it says elsewhere), I'll see you down the road.


Mister Mark