I truly love Bernie supporters. I love their passion. I love their commitment. I love their heartfelt devotion to Bernie Sanders. I also appreciate the vast majority of Bernie supporters who recognize the importance of making sure that whoever the nominee is, that he/she ultimately must end up in the White House instead of any of the psychotic Republican alternatives. I myself will do whatever I can to make sure that the eventual Democratic nominee wins the general election. I will be more than happy to dedicate as much time, energy, and resources (including financial) for our side to win. And by our side, I mean either Bernie or Hillary. That's why I love Bernie supporters.
However…
I cannot stand the Bernie cultists. They, in my opinion, comprise a relatively low percentage of his overall backers. These cultists are an embarrassment to Bernie, to Democrats and to those who recognize the undeniable importance of preventing any Republican from occupying the White House. Bernie cultists are the ones who defend the indefensible, including a data security breach that just happened. Bernie cultists are the ones who adamantly insist they will never support Hillary if Bernie doesn't secure the nomination on the Democratic side. Bernie cultists would happily allow a Republican president to appoint up to 4 Supreme Court justices that will easily be locked in power for the next 30 years, leaving Republicans with a 7–2 advantage for decades. To them, this is preferable t allowing the "immoral, corporate owned, ethically challenged” (their words, not mine) Hillary to become President. Bernie cultists are purists and myopic. They even speak in cultlike language such as "Bernie is The One”, "Bernie is The Only One who can lead us” and " Bernie WILL save us”.
So to Bernie cultists I would say this:
Put down the Kool-Aid. Stop acting so goddamn self righteous. Think big picture. Think Nader 2000 and how well that turned out. And for fuck’s sake, stop acting like you're the victim in this whole thing. You're not. Imagine we’re in the general election and Donald Trump's campaign gained access to Bernie's voter data info. Imagine if Trump's campaign came out and initially said it was just an isolated low level operative who did it. Then imagine it turns out it was a national director of data and at least three others who were involved but only one was fired. Imagine 25 attempts were made to get to your data. Imagine you're initially told you that no data was saved only to find out later that it was saved and stored. You think you'd be acting the same way? Think you'd dismiss the Trump campaign’s actions? I didn't think so.
Clearly, the best defense is a strong offense. How very Rovian to claim victim when clearly some members of Bernie’s team were the perpetrators. Way to completely focus on the punishment with hysteria while ignoring the crime. Bernie, I implore you to call out these cultists. They are damaging you and your campaign more than they can even see. They should be following the example of Bernie supporters. Sadly, I doubt that they will.
I believe in Bernie and do not think for one second that he would have authorized this sleazy behavior regarding the data breach. I think he is a good and decent man, but he's not perfect. See, I'm an admirer and a realist. Not a cultist.