Hey, so I wanted to temporarily bring my blog out of retirement because several nerves were struck this whole last week: In particular: The US presidential candidate Donald Trump's remarks that "I alone can fix it", the leaked emails at the DNC finding a way to sabotage Bernie Sanders' support, and my Facebook feed being covered with posts about switching support from Bernie Sanders to any other one candidate that feels they speaks to them, or hanging onto the thread that he still has a realistic shot at the presidency (and he doesn't.)
Now before I get comments accusing me of otherwise: I am a Bernie Sanders supporter. I voted for him by mail in the California primary, and his causes and beliefs align with most of mine. I was equally outraged when he did outperform Hillary Clinton in almost every debate and it was twisted by media companies to show that the opposite was true. I refuse to watch CNN to this day because of it. I sincerely feel that Bernie Sanders would have had a bigger shot to getting the traction and votes he needed, if the system we put together wasn't so stacked against him.
Now those reading are already listing alternatives to Bernie Sanders - I already know who they are. Jill Stein and Gary Johnson, both well-spoken individuals who have impressive campaigns, and I can easily show you the chance they have to get a presidency. I can tell you how to make the gesture with your hand. Just make your index finger and your thumb touch together.
There needs to be short-term and long-term solutions to how to fix this disaster, and believing in one person to fix a giant centuries-old system isn't the way to go about it. One person isn't the reason why this system is broken, it comes from a messy foundation underneath. The short-term solution is picking the candidate who aligns with your views the closest, and has the best shot of winning (in my case, it's Hillary Clinton - yours may vary) but the long-term solution has to be to figure out why our choices have to be this way and change it.
The long-term solution can be solved in my opinion if we start low and work our way up. There are unknown representatives and local candidates running all of the time that have policies similar to the platform Bernie Sanders runs on, but no one really takes the time to sit down and research them. Do the research, vote for officials that have views that align with yours, work your way up the ladder. Fire/replace them. Fire/replace their boss. Fire/replace their boss's boss. It comes down to my main point.
Those with power are only effective when the those under them are willing to let it happen.
In extreme cases, the people willing to let it happen may be kept/forced ignorant to this power through the use of surveillance systems, or harsh policies that limit education. In more moderate cases, the people willing to let it happen is because of fear, or that they don't think there's another option. Or in the easiest way, it comes out due to apathy or willful ignorance.
One person alone can't fix it. In fact it's scary to even have that opinion. If you want to change the system, replace the people responsible for keeping the system in place before the next-go-around. We should have had better candidates this time around, and it's a shame, but we also can't have the notion that one person needs to be kept so high on a pedestal. It's not that black and white.
End Rant.
Post Edit: I use Ballotpedia when making my vote for who to go for. Since I do vote-by-mail, I use this website to type in every name and figure out the platforms they stand on and see if they're worth voting for. It's not biased towards any cause, and it's definitely worth looking into. https://ballotpedia.org/
