General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Bernie Sanders Faces Feisty Democratic Challenger [View all]BainsBane
(53,012 posts)One man's career. Some of us actually believe in principles of self government and equality rather than a hierarchy of human worth that places a member of the political elite above the citizenry or one demographic, whose income is already well above the median, over the the majority.
I happen to believe some common Democratic issues are worth upholding, which is why I oppose efforts to make representatives less accountable to citizens, to hold them above the citizenry. Not everyone believes in civil immunity for the gun industry, placing the profits of gun corporations over the rights or lives of US citizens. Not everyone supports the Minutemen and the F-35. Some of us think the government already spends far too much on war machinery and prefer to see resources directed toward the well-being of citizens rather than Lockheed Martin. Not everyone believes dumping toxic waste in poor, brown communities is acceptable, and it wouldn't occur to us to authorize and then profit from that toxic waste dump. That gets back to the idea of equality, than being populated by poor residents with brown skin doesn't make a community less worthy of a healthy environment than white, more affluent New Englanders.
One thing I happen to believe is that people are within their rights to vote as they please, and that there is something rather unseemly about lambasting someone for not voting as you demand. That is not to say we have to be happy about others vote, but it is their right. None of us is entitled to more than a single vote.
Since, as you say, Party doesn't matter, that should mean that those who feel contempt for the Democratic Party and its voters would stop trying to control the party and lives of those they treat as beneath them, another sign that the values being promoted are more hierarchical than egalitarian.
Perhaps the most crucial point to remember is that except for those who live in VT, that Senate race is not for us to decide. It falls to the voters of VT, just as Manchin's seat falls to voters of WV. Whether random people around the country adore or dislike the candidates in those states has no bearing on those races. I myself am more concerned about the races of my own senators, whose voting records tend to be more consistent with Democratic and democratic values, and more consistent with their own public statements.