I moved up to Vermont 33 years ago last weekend, from Brooklyn, NY, in the 2nd year of Bernie's first term as Mayor. He wasn't much more than a curiosity to most. Gary Trudeau had him bring "Greetings from the People's Republic of Burlington," in a Doonesbury comic on July 5th, 1981. Bernie won by 10 votes.
Vermont at the time was a liberal Republican state, back when such a thing was possible. The two Senators were Robert Stafford, a liberal Republican, and Democrat Patrick Leahy, who is still there. The sole Congressman was Jim Jeffords, another liberal Republican, who, as a Senator years later when he replaced the retired Stafford, made headlines by renouncing his party and caucusing with the Democrats.
The reason that Leahy was able to win is that, though the state was solidly Republican, Burlington, the Queen City, was very much a Democratic stronghold. In fact, the Democratic Incumbent Mayor, Gordon Pacquette, was so entrenched in this solidly Democratic city that, in 1981, the Republicans did not even bother to field a candidate against him.
Bernie ran against Pacquette, and was elected as a protest vote. Bernie won by a literally a handful of votes, and many who voted for him, I discovered in conversation, had really just voted against Pacquette in protest, never thinking that Bernie could win. It only took 10 of those protest votes to become Mayor.
That first term, with only one sympathetic vote on the Board of Alderman, he could get little done, which is why he continues to say that he can't do this alone. He knows from experience.
When he ran for re-election in 1983, 2 short years later, both the Democrats and Republicans ran strong candidates. Did the two split the opposition, you may ask? No, they split 48% of the vote! Bernie got 52% against both of them. And his "independents," his "Progressives," won a majority on the Board of Alderman as well. And he got things done.
I stayed in Vermont for 15 years before moving back to NYC. Bernie and I did not agree on every issue over the years. But I will tell you this -- first with Burlington voters, and then with the rest of Vermont, including the red-neck, rural population -- the more people get to know him, and see what he's about, the more they like him, and the more they vote for him.
And that is why, when he ran for re-election in 2012, he received 71% of the vote.
As a friend of mine, a Vermont native, reminded me the other day, "Most Vermonters have little idea what socialism means one way or the other, but they hear Bernie taking their side and speaking honestly, and so we trust him."
Now, I see people here in Kosville who attempt to appear "above the fray." They are not against Bernie, you see. They are just concerned about whether or not he can win.
Riiight.
You can't get 71% of the vote if you only get the liberals to vote for you - even in Vermont.
The more people know Bernie, the more likely they will be to vote for him. The only obstacle, then, is not his politics; not the Socialist label; not whether or not he wants single-payer health insurance, as some someone tried to claim here the other day; no. The only obstacle is making sure that people get to know him.
The more debates there are, the more likely that Bernie will win. The more rallies there are with tens of thousands of people, the more likely Bernie will win.
It's that simple.
6:12 AM PT: Rec list. I'm honored. Thanks!