In 2003, my then-Congressman, Rep. James P. Moran (D-VA) made what was the latest in a serious of bad and/or unconscionable decisions. He effectively blamed the Iraq War on the American Jewish community. Moran already had a bad relationship with the Jews in his district, owing to a voting record that was thought by many to be antagonistic toward Israel, with some matching rhetoric.
This wasn’t the first time the Congressman got himself into hot water. Mr. Moran was involved in at least three assault cases from 2000-2001. His wife filed charges against him in June 2000 alleging that he assaulted her during a confrontation; police dropped the case due to lack of evidence. Later that year, Moran angrily carried an 8 year-old African-American boy from a parking lot into a recreation center. Moran said that the boy had “threatened to take his keys by pretending to have a gun.” The boy said he was merely admiring the Congressman’s car.
He further got shady loans from a lobbyist and from MBNA, when both had legislation pending before Moran’s committee. So deeply questionable were his ethics that the Washington Post scorched him in several editorials, despite their generally left-leaning stance (at least by Virginia’s then-standards).
After Moran’s divorce, two paramours of Moran showed up at his house on his birthday in May 2001 at the same time, proceeded to duke it out on the front lawn, leading Moran to physically escort one off his property.
This reached a fever pitch in 2003, when Mr. Moran told an antiwar group that "If it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq, we would not be doing this. The leaders of the Jewish community are influential enough that they could change the direction of where this is going, and I think they should." But this was early into the 2003-2004 Congress, and as we all know, voters have short memories. By the time the 2004 primary rolled around, local Democratic power brokers were back on the Moran train. The voters weren’t all sanguine, however, and then-unknown attorney Andrew Rosenberg mounted a spirited challenge to Moran in the primary. Virtually all of the Democratic establishment lined up behind Moran and did everything they could to stymie Rosenberg’s insurgent campaign, going so far as to keep the party’s voter file from him in a hastily arranged policy of not providing data to anyone challenging a sitting Democrat. Sure enough, Moran prevailed by a relatively unimpressive 58-42 margin.
Surprised by Rosenberg’s showing, Moran went on to deepen the gulf between himself and Rosenberg’s voters. He refused to take Rosenberg’s concession call, he declared Rosenberg’s voters to be non-Democrats, and his supporters introduced a resolution condemning Rosenberg for circulating a newspaper editorial on election day calling Moran unfit for office. Moran went on to win the general election, but his spiking of the football after the fact left many Democrats unwilling to do much for his campaign, and this brings me to the crux of this diary: we don’t need to do the same thing to Bernie Sanders’ supporters. Unlike Mr. Moran, for whom I refused to vote that fall, both Sanders and Clinton are good people and they represent impassioned constituencies. Ultimately, I believe that are better served by letting the process play out, taking the fight to Trump now, and letting Sanders complete his candidacy gracefully. Rep. Moran made it clear that he was willing to cast off all of Mr. Rosenberg’s voters. We can’t do this without a large majority of Bernie’s voters.
I say all this as not only a Hillary supporter, but one with family members who have come to embody some of the worst characteristics of the “Bernie bullies.” I’ve grow tired of their tactics, as well as those of some others, but politics is a bloodsport, and primaries are the bloodiest part. When it comes to facing down a bona fide sociopath this fall, I want Team Bernie in the trenches with us. Whether they will be depends a lot on how we carry ourselves going forward, and if it takes swallowing the resentment that many of us have built up toward the Sanders campaign, then I think that’s a small price to pay to get as many of his voters on board with Hillary as possible.
