The flaw in this line, from Sanders and his coterie, is the unstated premise beneath it, that many ideas popular among Democratic Party primary voters are somehow the exclusive property of 'Bernie', and originated with him. They are not, and did not. Expanding health insurance, increasing the minimum wage, and a variety of other things, are longstanding goals not only of Democratic Party primary voters, but of most Democratic office-holders and officials as well. To state rejecting 'Bernie' is rejecting or opposing these goals, or betraying them, even, is ludicrous. The conclusion of the great preponderance of Democratic primary voters is that 'Bernie' is too flawed as a politician to have a hope of translating his words into enacted law, and too flawed as a candidate, with his Marxist background, to have any chance of success in a nationwide general election.

The example of Corbyn is instructive in other ways. In a long career as a back-bench gadfly, Corbyn said and did things that made it laughably easy to present him as no patriot, as a man who would never stand up and take Britain's side in a quarrel. It would be child's play to perform a similar hatchet job on Sanders, with his Marxist background, and associations as a mature adult with the Socialist Workers Party.





"From Bernie’s perspective, dropping out of a race once you have no chance of winning is peculiar behavior that can only be explained by the work of a hidden hand. For most politicians, though, it is actually standard operating procedure. Only Sanders seems to think the normal thing to do once voters have made clear they don’t want to nominate you is to continue campaigning anyway."





"When things are not called by their right names, what is said cannot make sense. When what is said does not make sense, what is planned cannot succeed. When plans do not succeed, people become uneasy. When people are uneasy, punishments do not fit crimes. When punishments do not fit crimes, people cannot know where to put hand or foot."

Socialization of the means of production may be verboten, but his mindset, his language, from class struggle to revolution, are iconically Marxist. Even without his background, the GOP would find it easy to hang 'Comrade Bernie', 'Bernie the Commie', around his neck. "When I think of Bernie, I think of communism" - trump.

Bernie’s wet dream...

His past associations, as late in his adult life as the Reagan era, open him to devastating attack as not just a 'commie', but as someone who actively sides with enemies of the United States. In a nationwide general election campaign, the man would be in, as they say, a world of hurt....





"From Bernie’s perspective, dropping out of a race once you have no chance of winning is peculiar behavior that can only be explained by the work of a hidden hand. For most politicians, though, it is actually standard operating procedure. Only Sanders seems to think the normal thing to do once voters have made clear they don’t want to nominate you is to continue campaigning anyway."





"When things are not called by their right names, what is said cannot make sense. When what is said does not make sense, what is planned cannot succeed. When plans do not succeed, people become uneasy. When people are uneasy, punishments do not fit crimes. When punishments do not fit crimes, people cannot know where to put hand or foot."