This trend of Senator Bernie Sanders ripping into his own party isn't ending. And I kind of like it, to be honest with you. I like that Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene is calling out her own party. I think the only way we can look forward to change [00:00:15] in the way we're being represented by our representative government is if we are willing to hold our own side accountable. And that appears to be what Senator Sanders is doing. Let's get into it. It is my view that the leadership of the Democratic Party, in many respects, [00:00:32] is way out of touch with where Democrats in general are, where many independents are, where the grassroots of America are. The division that we're seeing in the Democratic Party right now are those who get a whole lot of money from wealthy campaign contributors. [00:00:49] They hire consultants. And I got to tell you that consultant class is so far removed from reality. It is really quite pathetic. Senator Bernie Sanders absolutely ripped into Democratic leadership after eight of his colleagues in the [00:01:05] Senate voted to end the government shutdown without getting any concessions from the Republican Party. He went so far as to call the consultants that establishment Democrats hire and love to funnel money to. Pathetic. [00:01:21] And I think that's actually a generous way of describing these consultants, but I'll take it. Now, after the Senate voted two nights ago to essentially move towards reopening the government, Sanders said the decision was terrible for the American people, made the party look [00:01:39] weak and undermine the political momentum that was already on their side. And as we talked about on the show just yesterday, the issue at hand is the extension of the subsidies for the Affordable Care Act. [00:01:54] Without the subsidies, Premiums for health insurance will double. And Americans are already dealing with the sticker shock since we're in the middle of open enrollment. So Democrats were not only doing something that their constituents wanted, [00:02:10] which was fight, fight back. Fight for us. They were also fighting on righteous ground because wanting to help Americans out by preventing their premiums from doubling is a good thing to do. [00:02:27] And so Republican leadership absolutely refused to, give in to that demand by the Democratic Party, which is gross and disgusting. As we talked about on the show yesterday, I don't think the Republicans were going to budge. [00:02:42] I really don't. So I don't know, I my feelings on this are a little more mixed than I think most people on the left at the moment, because there were Americans who were really suffering. You know, you have federal workers who are expected to show up to work [00:02:58] without getting a paycheck, and that's devastating for their families. You have the whole issue of the Snap benefits. Sure. We all know that Republicans could have tapped into reserve funds in order to make Americans whole in order to ensure that they're getting their full Snap benefits. [00:03:14] But they were unwilling to do that, and Trump was fighting tooth and nail to deny Americans their full snap benefits as the government is shut down. Republicans were not going to budge because Republicans don't care. Democrats barely care, but Republicans, they don't care at all. [00:03:31] So there were already Democrats who were looking to cave. And I understand Democratic voters who are furious with the eight who voted in favor of the procedural vote to move closer to opening the government, [00:03:47] because what these Democrats are doing is they're selling us a lie about how. No, no, no, it's okay. We just. We want to open the government. It's really important that we do that because people are struggling. But don't worry. Republicans promise that they're going to hold a vote, a separate vote [00:04:04] on the Affordable Care Act subsidies. I think the reason why people are angry and our producer, Kate Patino, made this point to me yesterday, I don't want to steal it. I want to give her credit for it because it's a brilliant point. They're lying to our faces about what's going to happen next. [00:04:21] They're making it seem as though they did this virtuous act, because they're somehow still going to fight for the subsidies, but they have no leverage after the government shutdown fight. [00:04:37] And in fact, we're hearing from House speaker Mike Johnson that even if the Senate does hold a separate vote on the extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies will the House would need to pass it as well. And would the House be willing to pass it. [00:04:53] Well, he says, quote, I'm not promising anybody anything. And Democrats know that. So for the constituents who are furious with the eight senators who voted, along with Republicans to move closer to opening the government, I understand their fury. [00:05:12] But I also understand that Republicans don't care about helping Americans who are not going to be able to afford their health care, and will very likely go without in the coming year. Chuck Schumer voted against the bill to reopen the government, but it's been reported that he was well aware that eight of his colleagues were, [00:05:31] in fact, going to vote with Republicans. He did nothing to stop them, and that's unsurprising to me. But as angry as Bernie says he is with Democratic leadership, he did stop short of calling for Schumer's ouster. And that's what we're going to watch in this very last video. [00:05:46] Let's take a look at that. I have to ask you if you support Senator Schumer retaining his leadership role, if you think this kind of a primary campaign is right minded. Look what you got right now. Chuck Schumer is part of the establishment. And I'm sorry to say that many people in the Democratic caucus are part of it. [00:06:05] I would say we have 8 or 9 out of 47 people who I would consider to be progressives. So you can argue and I can make the case that Chuck Schumer has done a lot of bad things, but I think getting rid of him, who's going to replace him? Who's going to replace him? The issue right now is doing primaries, getting people involved [00:06:23] in the political process. We're going to create a government and an economy that works for everybody who have the guts to take on the oligarchs. So I think we need to take on the democratic establishment all over this country. Look, I agree with Senator Sanders that the primary elections [00:06:41] are really, really important. And unfortunately, the primaries tend to have lower voter turnout, so just keep that in mind as we inch closer to the midterms, as we inch closer to the next general election. You know, I care about the primaries way more than the general election, because by [00:06:59] the time we get to the general election, we tend to have two terrible candidates, and we're being pressured to vote for the lesser of two evils. I'm so sick of finding myself in that situation, but I actually want to go back almost a decade. No, a decade ago, 2015, when the Democratic primary involving [00:07:18] then Democratic primary candidate Bernie Sanders was playing out. He was promoting Medicare for all. And regardless of how you feel about Bernie Sanders proposal for Medicare for all, there was heavy pushback from the Democratic establishment [00:07:35] because they claimed it's far better to improve upon the Affordable Care Act. And then after they did everything they could to prevent Bernie Sanders from winning that primary. They did nothing to improve the Affordable Care Act. The fact that we need the federal government to subsidize the [00:07:54] Affordable Care Act means that that policy has already been a failure, a big failure in terms of affordability. And that was the whole point of the Affordable Care Act. You know, the policy that was supposed to have a public option [00:08:09] that was never offered, that was never included as part of Obama's, you know, main policy that he championed. So I actually agree with some Republicans who say, look, this is a broken system if we have to subsidize it. [00:08:24] They're right. I mean, they haven't offered their own replacement policy. They don't have any solutions of their own, but neither do Democrats. And I think it's important to hold them accountable for that. Every time you ring the bell below, an angel gets its wings. [00:08:40] Totally not true, but it does keep you updated on our live shows.