Bernie Sanders and the Establishment

There's this thing about Bernie Sanders and his supporters that I find very strange. They set themselves up as rebels against the establishment, which they call a cabal or worse and promise to "destroy," and then get indignant when the establishment fights back. They are, for example, constantly complaining that the media ignores Bernie and finds ways to downplay his successes. One of my sons told me about the color-coding switch above. That and the post below come from r/bernieblindness," documenting the intentional media blackout of Bernie Sanders and his campaign." A typical post:

During the time biden was far ahead in the delegate count before california, when googling primary results, you got a bar graph of the delegates. as soon as cali came in, they changed to a list without a graphic. Posted byu/sarcasticallyabusive

There are lot of amusing miscues on the site, but the people who count mentions on the tv news and column-inches in newspapers say it isn't true, and Sanders' media coverage has roughly matched his poll numbers. It certainly seems to me that Sanders got a lot of coverage between Iowa and Super Tuesday when he was in the lead. And even if Bernie's complaints were true, why would you think the "corporate media" would cover you fairly after you spent all day savaging them?

Today we have been treated to a lot of this:

If Biden wins the nomination, it will be a real lesson in how power works. Bernie was on track to win, Biden had no campaign, and they all knew it. So a few phone calls were made behind the scenes to Amy, Pete, Beto. Several million was put into a pro-Warren Super PAC. Voila!

Um, no, it isn't that easy. But, you know, there are reasons why so many Democratic Party leaders have endorsed Biden: first, they like him. Second, Biden has been playing the party insider game for forty years: attending other candidates' fund raisers, sharing his donor lists, endorsing their campaigns, helping them get riders added to bills, etc. So when he called on them for favors, they said yes. Is this puzzling? As Ezra Klein pointed out, persuading people like Amy Klobuchar and Mike Bloomberg to support you is exactly what a Democratic president has to do to get anything done, and Sanders has so far been completely unable to do it:

Sanders’s supporters have been furious, for weeks, that Warren hasn’t dropped out and endorsed Sanders. What they haven’t done is ask why Sanders hasn’t been able to convince her — or any of the major Democrats who have already dropped out — to endorse him. Whatever case Biden is making or deals he’s offering, Sanders isn’t matching him. Or perhaps the well has been poisoned by Sanders supporters filling Twitter with tweets calling Warren a snake and the Democratic establishment a cabal.

Ok, so you want a revolution. For that, you need an outsider candidate like Sanders. I understand that. But if you're going to attempt a revolution, shouldn't you assume that the people in power are going to oppose you? Did you think the establishment was going to meekly roll over and let you win?

If you want a revolution, you should stop complaining that the establishment treats you unfairly and beat them. If you can't, if you're stuck fighting to make the world better one election and one spending bill at a time, don't despair. Change comes with maddening slowness, but if we fight for it it will come.