“In a 1974 article titled “Concentrated Wealth Is Causing Economic Illness”, from an unidentified newspaper that was in his papers at the University of Vermont library, Sanders is described as wanting to “make it illegal to amass more wealth than a human family could use in a lifetime”. “The speech that he’s giving today has the potential to be one of those defining moments of the 2016 presidential campaign”, said Mo Elleithee, a veteran Democratic political operative who now runs Georgetown’ Institute of politics, which sponsored the event. When pressed, Sanders often points to the progressive values of nations like Sweden, Denmark and Norway. People are not truly free when they are unable to retire with dignity. In the past, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation was a major alliance against the former Soviet Union.
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Though Sanders may not win this race, but yesterday was a reminder of why his voice is so desperately needed.
“The fight against ISIS is a struggle for the soul of Islam”, Sanders said.
The much-awaited speech drew cheers from college students who waited in long lines in the rain to attend. Still, gray skies weren’t much of a deterrent.
Nearly everything [Roosevelt] proposed was called “socialist”. “The key was to make it inside”, Mesa said. “Yes, after thorough screening, which we have the capability of doing, working with the rest of the world, we should accept refugees from that region”. But Sanders has said his plan would greatly reduce financial burdens for families. Sanders has been quick to praise Pope Francis for offering up critiques of unrestrained capitalism, and made sure to mention the pontiff on Thursday.
“Democratic socialism means that if somebody works 40 hours a week, that person should not be living in poverty, that we must raise the minimum wage to a living wage: 15 bucks an hour over the next several years”, he said. “We must not accept a nation in which billionaires compete as to the size of their super-yachts, while children in America go hungry and veterans sleep out on the streets”. He’s going to talk about what democratic socialism means to him. It builds on what Franklin Delano Roosevelt said when he fought for guaranteed economic rights for all Americans.
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has evoked the policies of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal as the framework for his brand of “democratic socialism”. But he didn’t repudiate the term “democratic socialism”. “And it builds on what Martin Luther King, Jr. said in 1968 when he stated that, ‘This country has socialism for the rich, and rugged individualism for the poor.’ It builds on the success of many other countries around the world that have done a far better job than we have in protecting the needs of their working families, the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor”.
Sanders even wanted everybody to know that his ideology has not been imported.
“It is a vision that we have not yet achieved, and it is time that we did”, Sanders said. “In effect the word has taken on very negative connotations because no one has taken the time to define it differently”.
Attitudes among voters have softened, but a Gallup survey this past June found that a “socialist” would still have trouble getting elected with that label – with 47% saying they would consider voting for a “socialist”, but 50% of voters polled ruling out the idea altogether.
“I don’t want America to succumb to the notion that there’s anything good about socialism”, Kentucky Sen. Sanders’ asks for reforms that many European democracies have accomplished.
“He really represents the Democratic Party regaining its connection with its roots”, Weaver said. A new and effective coalition must be formed with the Muslim nations leading the effort on the ground, while the United States and other major forces provide the support they need.
It won’t be easy for Sanders to reclaim a word so long reviled in American culture.
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“I don’t believe government should take over the grocery store down the street or own the means of production”, he said, rejecting the strict definition of socialism. (So far, Turer hasn’t decided whether to back Clinton or Republican presidential candidates Marco Rubio or Jeb Bush.) “It doesn’t have a great history”. Although still quite early in the campaign process, Sanders can boast more than 750,000 donors, all of whom have given the Sanders campaign an average of about $30 per donation. “But I think it’s going to be slow and gradual because as Americans we don’t like change so he’s going to have to start off slow and not come off too strong”.
