Bernie Sanders and the Democratic Establishment Wrestling With His Candidacy

By Maria Behan — SPOTLIGHT

Bernie Sanders is taking on the forces that make people cynical about politics. And that makes the forces that make people cynical about politics-billionaires who feel they’ve bought and paid for politicians, and the politicians who’ve been bought and paid for-nervous and furious.

That nervous fury was on full display at the February 25 debate in South Carolina. The seven contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination-two of them billionaires, most of the rest politicians who have taken large sums from billionaires-squared off for a cockfight.

We can probably all agree that cockfights are best conducted in dim back alleys, but this one was in a well-lit and well-mic-ed auditorium, a setup that laid bare some uncomfortable truths. Some were trivial, like the way politicians talking over one another and frantically waving their hands to be called on are considerably less adorable than first-graders. Other exposed truths were damning and consequential, none more so than when billionaire former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg took credit for the wave of freshman Democrats who stormed the House in 2018 by announcing, “I bough-…I, I got them.”