[lbo-talk] NY Times: Sanders supporters lament what might have been

[Steven L. Robinson]

The best analogy for the Sanders campaign is Upton Sinclair's EPIC campaign for Governor of California in 1934.  Sinclair broke with the old Socialist Party and ran for and got the Democratic nomination. The regular Democratic Party ran a third party candidate against Sinclair. Since the Republican Party was the largest party in the State at the time, the split ensured the loss of Sinclair.

I would suggest that the prospect of a socialist running on the Democratic Party line along with Trump on the Republican line would most certainly induce a third party candidate - since Bloomberg is strong on certain issues liberal and centrist Democrats feel strongly about (e.g., gun control), he would prove an attractive candidate to much of the party leadership and the Clintonite base.  SR

----- Original Message -----From: Marv Gandall <marvgand2 at gmail.com>To: LBO <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org>Sent: Tue, 18 Oct 2016 22:34:41 -0000 (UTC)Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] NY Times: Sanders supporters lament what might have been


> On Oct 18, 2016, at 12:42 PM, Steven L. Robinson <srobin21 at comcast.net> wrote:> > In all likelihood, Clinton&rsquo;s supporters would have rallied behind Bloomberg who - as you recall - had briefly discussed running for President as an independent.

That would have made for an interesting race - Sanders versus Clinton and/or Bloomberg versus Trump. But memories of the 1981 Labour Party split are still fresh, and not only in the UK, when the lofty expectations of Owens, Jenkins, and other disgruntled establishment types that they would supplant Labour with a new third party of the &ldquo;centre&rdquo; were quickly dashed. That has held back members of the LP&rsquo;s current parliamentary caucus from bolting from the Corbyn-led Labour Party and trying to set up a new political formation in alliance with anti-Brexit Conservatives. 

In the same way, the power of the two-party system would exert a restraining influence on the Democratic leadership to follow those Clinton supporters who were urging a split. 

It&rsquo;s not a hypothetical question for the Republican establishment. It does much to explain why they have absented themselves from the Trump campaign but have not left the party. They think its capture by the renegade right is a temporary phenomenon which won&rsquo;t outlast a crushing electoral defeat. That&rsquo;s the same thinking which animates the right wing of the Labour Party as they look forward to a Corbyn electoral defeat. However, the worry remains in each camp that they&rsquo;ll go down with the ship.

We should also note that Bloomberg has always opted not to run a third party campaign despite being tempted to so so.


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