Requiem for a Heavyweight

By Tomas Ricardo, Friend of NewsTaco

I was a fan of Bernie until he started drawing crazy crowds and raising even crazier money. I was most appreciative, on his election to the US Senate as an Independent from Vermont, that he would caucus with the Democrats, providing Democrats with a majority in the Senate. I admired the crotchety ol’ man for his socialism and his what? what would I call his election to the US Senate? Unexpected/ Inexplicable/Unlikely/who did he run against?

‘Este arroz ya se coció’ is our Mexican way of

[pullquote] My grade school arithmetic tells me that the distinguished Senator from the State of Vermont is toast.[/pullquote]

Stick a fork in it.

Hard core supporters of the Senator will say ‘you’re way too early,’ Sir, ‘in writing his campaign’s obituary…’ I think not.

Forget math. I know arithmetic. 2+2=4. Always has, always will. Unless you’re a poet, like the legendary ee cummings who wrote that 2+2 is five. Poets have that license, that freedom, that gift to see the world as others never see it.

In counting delegates to nominate a candidate for the Presidency of the United States, one does not have poetic license. The laws of arithmetic apply. It is a zero-sum game. A finite number of delegates are available, and a win means that the loser has one less delegate. My grade school arithmetic tells me that the distinguished Senator from the State of Vermont is toast. ‘Este arroz ya se cocio` is our Mexican way of saying ‘stick a fork in it…’

[pullquote]Where does Bernie go after Philadelphia?[/pullquote]

Quo Vadis, Mr. Sanders?

The remaining issue is where this distinguished, elderly gentleman, eloquent in his attacks on corporate greed and unyielding in his defense of the common man and woman goes post the Philadelphia Convention.

As a candidate for the nomination of the Democratic Party, will he endorse the nominee of the Democratic Party, democratically selected? Will he work for victory in November as a Democrat against the Republican nominee? Will he urge his delegates, his ardent supporters enthusiastically to support the nominee of the Democratic Party?

Or will he pull a Senator Eugene McCarthy, another crotchety old guy this time from Minnesota, and desert his Party, his country, and retire to the beaches of Cannes, Nice, and the Cote d’Azur, while Hubert Humphrey, also from Minnesota (who defeated McCarthy for the nomination), had to fight an uphill battle against a united Republican Party with Richard Nixon as its nominee. The year was 1968. Imagine the radical deflection in the arc of history if Mr. Humphrey had not lost that close election to Mr. Nixon.

Quo Vadis, Mr. Sanders? To quote Simon and Garfunkel “A nation turns its lonely eyes to you…”

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[Photo by Gage Skidmore/Flickr]

Suggested reading

Rain of Gold is a true-life saga of love, family and destiny that pulses with bold vitality, sweeping from the war-ravaged Mexican mountains of Pancho Villa’s revolution to the days of Prohibition in California.

It all began when Villaseñor’s maternal grandmother sat him down in their little home in the barrio of Carlsbad, California, gave him sweet bread and told him the story of their past. Of his mother Lupe, the most beautiful girl in the whole village who was only a child when Villa’s men came shooting into their canyon.  And of his father Juan and his family, reduced to rags and starvation as they sought refuge across the border, where they believed that endless opportunity awaited.

Lupe and Juan met and fell in love in California, but they found that the doors to the Promised Land were often closed to those from south of the border. His father was forced to take the law into his own hands, in spite of his wife’s objections. With love and humor, Villaseñor shares this passionate love story that celebrates the triumph of the human spirit.

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