Today I stood in the longest line I have seen in years to see Bernie Sanders speak [View all]

[Bjorn Against]

Today I stood in the longest line that I have seen since Barack Obama was in town to declare his victory in the primaries seven years ago.

When I arrived at the Bernie Sanders event in Minneapolis this morning the line was already stretched for several hundred feet all the way up the block and that line only continued to rapidly grow after I stepped into it. I could not even see the end of the line once they started letting people in but it went back a long ways, it was easily two to three city blocks long.

I just barely made it inside, they had to close the doors shortly after I entered because they could not fit any more people. They had to set up speakers outside so that the people who could not get in were able to hear the speech.

The event was originally going to be held at a union office that can hold no more than a couple of hundred people, once they realized that was not going to be big enough they moved it to a gymnasium at the Native American Center, but this was not even close to being big enough either. When Bernie took the stage he had to apologize to the crowd for running out of food, he was not expecting a crowd of this size and he promised to be more prepared the next time. I don't think anyone who was there was bothered by this however, if the biggest problem an event is facing is that they get too many people to show up the organizers of that event should be very happy.

Bernie delivered an excellent speech that drew several standing ovations, it is rare to see this kind of excitement at political rallies these days but I think Bernie is really speaking a message that people have been wanting to hear for a long time. People are excited to see a candidate who is able to speak out against the corporate interests because he has not taken money from them.

When I saw the massive turnout for a rally that was originally intended to be a small event I had to wonder what the Koch Brothers are thinking right now. They can spend their billions but they can't get this many people to show up for their candidates, instead people are showing up to rally around the candidate who is doing more than any other to challenge the corporate interests that are trying to buy our elections.

Some have been trying to dismiss Sanders as a fringe candidate, but if he keeps attracting the number of people to his events that he attracted today anyone who tries to claim he is fringe will get laughed at.

Bernie Sanders has a voice that appeals to mainstream Americans. Bernie is not the fringe, the 1% is the fringe. The Koch brothers are the fringe. The bankers are the fringe. The average American has far more in common with the people who want higher wages for workers than they do with the people whose primary goal is to increase the Koch family fortune.

When Bernie comes to your town make sure to show up because if we can get turnouts like this at all of his events we will prove to the world that we are the mainstream Americans that are going to take on the Koch brothers fringe.