BS Hits the Fans

Or, the longer version of why I’m unfriending and unfollowing Bernie Sanders supporters.

I didn’t want disappointment to turn into dislike, and that was happening. I decided it would be better for me to walk away sad than to walk away mad. Better for both sides. This has been an extremely sad few weeks for me.

The root of the matter is that my friends either:

·         didn’t read what I posted,

·         didn’t believe me when I pointed out for the last year that Bernie Sanders was consistently flooding the internet with deceptive memes,

·         don’t care that he is a dishonest bully who is trying to steal the Democratic Party’s platform and take credit for what others have done – while at the same time criticizing them and lying about them

·        crashed a primary and is taking money that he does not deserve from the party

If people don’t read me, don’t trust me, or aren’t loyal to the people that mean so much to me, I don’t understand why they would want to be my friend on Facebook since most of what I do there is politics and writing.

Not long ago, most of my friends were saying too many old white men in politics was a problem, and that we needed more women, young people, and minorities. They hated that McConnell tried to hold the country hostage in order to get his way. They damned the media for being irresponsible. Black Lives Matter, stricter gun laws, and education mattered greatly to them. I was the one who vowed to point and laugh at people who rejected facts and weren’t honest but many of my friends agreed that facts matter, and that we need to demand facts and honesty from everyone (including media). We all disliked bullies.

Then, I noticed friends sharing Bernie Sanders’ dishonest memes in which he touted being the only person speaking about a number of issues. Before long, he was claiming that only status about just about everything any Democrat had ever said or done (done being the important word, since he blabs and others do) and, apparently, some people think the only thing that matters is wagging fingers and raging, because they pretended that Sanders and Warren were the only ones doing anything. But, the truth is, until Sanders launched his ‘steal the Democratic Party right out from under their noses’ campaign, both of them were little more than one flat note tunes with little to show for all their screaming. Yet, their fans call them progressive. 

Progress: move forward or onward in space or time

I think move is the important word in this definition. Twenty-five years of screaming the same thing without getting anywhere doesn’t count by my estimation. Senator Sanders has introduced 354 bills (20 this year) throughout his career. Three of those were enacted: two renaming post offices and one a Veterans COLA in a year when SS also received a COLA. To me, the fact that this man has had so few successes means he either doesn’t work well with others, he doesn’t care enough about his bills to rally support, or he lacks the pragmatism or intelligence to know what he can get through. This is not presidential. 

Most disappointing to me, though, was the change in people after Senator Sanders announced he was taking the Democratic Party hostage by jumping into the Democratic Party primary with the stated goal (originally) of “forcing” Hillary Clinton and the party to his way of thinking. To me, a person who sets out to “force” the people he has always criticized and rejected to do things his way is a bully. Suddenly, some of my friends didn’t think hostage taking and bullying were so bad anymore. Nor did they think the last thing we needed was a dishonest, old, white man anymore.

Some of the very people who were so unhappy with the dishonest media are in hostage-taker, bully heaven now that the media is misrepresenting in favor of their no-tangible-success, screaming hero. Because, I guess, screaming and shaking a finger is good enough for them. This shouldn’t have been the surprising, sad realization for me that it was because, after all, if they were willing to fall for and share his deceptive meme invasion, they weren’t nearly as discerning or astute as I wanted to believe they were in the first place. When I see them sharing right-wing lies about the person he most wants to bully – it’s inexcusable.

Suddenly, stricter gun laws wasn’t a priority anymore, because Sanders has a horrible record on that issue. And, my news feed was starting to look like a Tea Party convention with nonsense typed in all caps, crazy punctuation, total BS lies passed off as truth, memes and hashtags (Seriously,friends? This is how you want to look?) as directed by his campaign. I was disappointed. 

Disappointment turned into disgusted, though, when I saw people I knew liking and sharing the disgusting meme that Sanders’ supporters created with the Black Lives Matter activists pictured, and the words Stupid Lives Matter, I asked everyone who was a Sanders supporter to please unfriend me. Some did. I’m slowly weeding out the others as I see his face and disgusting deceptive messages on my feed.

I’m not asking anyone to be like me or to think like me. I’m simply saying that I never, ever want to see his face or hear his name again. I know that’s not going to happen but I can at least control my Facebook page. Also, it’s going to take some time and reflection to understand how much I should trust people who are easily manipulated, and willing to help bully people and organizations that are extremely important to me. The people who are trying to bully me on his behalf, by posting memes (ugh) about how I am splitting my party that he crashed in order to split it when I point out how deceptive he is are making my head spin. 

Consistency matters to me. Asking me to think attending a MLK march many years ago makes a person qualified to be president (I did the same and don't consider myself qualified) but that I am not supposed to take seriously his rape fantasy essay written after that because it was so long ago is inconsistent.

Words matter to me. Honesty matters to me. The Democratic Party and protecting it from infiltration matters to me. What if Sarah Palin and Donald Trump decide they want to run as Democrats next time, since people who may or may not be Democrats but pretend they are will criticize every Democrat who calls them on their own BS?

Short-sighted, Hat-trick, Preying Candidate Sanders Strikes Again

When Candidate Sanders has spent a couple of years trying to claim credit for everything that the people he criticizes have actually said and done and accomplished, and people are finally checking records and noticing that he has no actual accomplishments other than renaming a couple of post offices, it makes sense that he would scramble to introduce a bill or two. It would probably surprise no thinking person that he would choose something that would appeal to the very people he preys on – uninformed, knee-jerk-petition signers who jump before thinking. 

His gullible soldiers would flood the internet with memes praising him if he announced he was going to make the sun come up tomorrow, or that he supported eating food daily. So, I am not at all surprised that they are praising him for introducing a bill to make Election Day a holiday. Who doesn’t like holidays? Who wouldn’t support this idea even if they had no intention of ever voting for him or anyone? Who would criticize him for this?

I would.

There are a number of other actions that would more effectively protect rights to vote. Even though he stated this is ‘just a first step’, that’s not what his meme pushers are hearing. Nor, are they asking the important questions like why this instead of something more effective like 24-hour polls, mail-in voting, making sure no one has to stand in line to vote, Election Week instead of Election Day? How about getting rid of electronic voting machines that can be easily manipulated? Automatic voter registration for everyone who has a social security number? 

The problem with introducing this bill is that it creates a false illusion, which seems to be the trick Candidate Sanders pulls out of his hat most often. Declaring a day a holiday only ensures people will receive holiday pay; it does not guarantee that people will not have to work that day. Nor do we want everyone to have that day off work. I doubt there is a single person who wants healthcare workers to have that day off. Are hospitalized patients going to be left on their own for the day, or sent home for the day? Do we want fire fighters and law enforcers to get the day off? Can we life without a White Castle for the day?

Refusal to think things through is just one more reason to admit Candidate Sanders is not qualified for the office he seeks. Added to his lack of experience, diplomacy, and honesty, it isn't a very pretty picture.

BS Analogy 4

Bradley's mother put her foot down. The birthday party invitation list would include family only. His brothers would be there and he could invite cousins. That was it. No one else. He could decide if he wanted a sleepover with male cousins only, or a pizza party with the girls. Bradley chose a sleepover.

Since her son shrugged off every attempt to elicit menu or entertainment ideas, Bradley's mother bought salsa and chips (his favorite), popcorn, and pretzels. Even though the party would start after dinner time, she picked up ingredients for chili dogs just in case, and she baked a chocolate cake with chocolate icing (also his favorites). She and Bradley's father rearranged furniture in the basement to make room for corn hole, the game these cousins always ended up playing when they got together.

When asked about Bradley's birthday, his mother told the neighbor across the street that they had decided to go low-key with a small family affair. Finances were tight. Besides, she and her husband were not fans of the way birthday parties had become huge, expensive, out-do everyone else, who can schmooze and get the most gifts, impersonal, often out-of-hand bashes. Their siblings agreed and had all decided to return to family events for birthdays. The neighbor shrugged and said it didn't matter much to her since her kids didn't really like Bradley much anyway.

The next day, the neighbor stood on her front porch, shaking a fist in the air, and screamed about how horrible it was that Bradley's family hated neighbors. She told everyone who would listen that she was the first and only person to think that people spend too much on birthday parties, that her kids had never been friends with Bradley and never wanted to be friends with Bradley. Sensible neighbors scratched their heads and wondered how she could make such ridiculous claims since, for years, many of them had talked about how ridiculous it was that their children were invited to elaborate parties by classmates who obviously were either trying to buy friends, or were just looking for gifts since they had nothing to do with their kids any other time. Why would this neighbor think they were foolish enough to believe she was the first and only person to make such claims?

On the evening of Bradley's party, hours before guests were scheduled to arrive, the obnoxious neighbor's son and three daughters dropped by Bradley's house. When the son picked up the bag of pretzels and started to open them, Bradley's mother took the bag from him and said she planned to serve them later, when the invited guests arrived. The three sister's yelled a bunch about how rude Bradley's mother was.

The brother pumped his fist in the air, shouted and raged, and insisted that she make chili dogs immediately, and he wanted three, with chopped onions and brown mustard, neither of which she had on hand. Again, the sisters told her she was rude for not jumping at his command.

Bradley's father came into the kitchen and told his wife that she should remain positive and polite, and try to accommodate. "But, they crashed the party and they don't even like Bradley," did nothing to change his mind.

  

Bernie Soldiers Practicing to be Tea Party

They sure made this post easy for me. I’ve wanted to do a blog post comparing Sanders and Soldiers (although soldiers isn’t what I call them but, hey, if they want to emulate right-wingers right down to war language*, I’ll call them what they want to be called) like the people who called themselves teabaggers and then threw temper tantrums when people called them teabaggers. Will be interesting to see if the soldiers do the same when we call them what they’re calling themselves in this directive put out by, I’m assuming, the campaign. 

 

In true tea party fashion, Bernie Soldiers have been flooding the internet with misinformation for close to two years now. I’ve watched carefully as they devolved into caps-locked, hash-tagging, bullies** who hate facts and cry up storms that would probably end California’s drought if their tears could only be directed to something more worthwhile than flooding the internet with pure obnoxiousness. 

I can think of few things more disingenuous than using war language – soldiers, battle plan – or encouraging people to spam (well, to be fair, he did say ‘copy and paste that joker’ but it’s the same thing, while encouraging people to be classy and positive. To me, posting facts instead of rhetoric and hashtags, and following rules of grammar would be classier. Original comments that are pertinent to the article that I’m guessing he doesn’t want Sanders Soldiers to bother reading would be classier.

It says a lot, though, that the Sanders General had to call back his Soldiers from continuing to regurgitate hateful lies (that have been discredited repeatedly) about Hillary Clinton. Tells me the Sanders War Machine must finally realize that people are seeing through all that crap, and it’s not working in his favor. How do they stuff that mess back in the bottle after it flooded the internet all this time?

I don’t think they can.

Flood the internet with joy and hope? Does this remind anyone else of the Bush Administration trying to convince people that the Iraqis would welcome us with open arms and flowers? Who sends soldiers to battle with joy and hope? And who reads tripe like this without choking back puke and saying WTF?

*Other people I don’t like who also use war language

**A person who crashes the primary race of a party that he has continuously criticized, and who lies about that party’s sitting President, and claims he is only doing it to force that party to do things the way he wants them done is a bully. It’s no surprise that his followers also bully people on the internet. Show of hands of the people who have had multiple Sanders Soldiers follow them on Twitter so they’ll have easy access to bulling them every time they post support for a real Democrat in the primary. My way or NO way – that’s a bully.


Recommended:  Joe hit it out of the park with this blog post   




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