The last few days have been a bit of a whirlwind, politically speaking. Most of it has to do with the onslaught of chaos that followed Donald Trump's abrupt firing of FBI Director James Comey -- a move political scientists agree is off the spectrum of normalcy in the history of the American presidency. Before his termination, Comey was leading an investigation into the Trump team's alleged ties to the Russian government. Keith Ellison, deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee, has said "we are witnessing a constitutional crisis." Calls for impeachment are in the air, along with a good deal of conspiracy theorizing.

In sum, the republic as we know it may be its closest yet to tatters. Enter: Bernie Sanders, the senator from Vermont and the country's most popular politician. He -- alongside Democratic Sens. Patrick Leahy, from Vermont, Kirsten Gillibrand, from New York, and Maggie Hassan, from New Hampshire -- is encouraging workers to take control of the means of production.

This isn't some right-wing conspiracy theory, but the intended result of two bills introduced to relatively little fanfare last Thursday. The first, the WORK ("Worker Ownership, Readiness and Knowledge&quot Act, would direct more than $45 million in funding to state-level employee ownership centers, aimed at providing training and technical assistance to current and prospective worker-owners. A second piece of legislation would establish something called the US Employee Ownership Bank, via $500 million in funds for low-interest rate loans and financial assistance for workers who want to buy out the businesses where they work and either incorporate them as worker-owned cooperatives or establish employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs), which give workers an ownership stake in their company.

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http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/40596-amid-constitutional-crisis-bernie-sanders-urges-workers-to-seize-means-of-production