The Main Attraction himself
Still buzzing from Bernie Sanders' kickoff rally yesterday in Burlington. It was the first truly warm day of the year, in the upper 80s, and there was certainly a festival atmosphere at the Burlington Waterfront, itself a testament to the tenacity and vision of the newest official presidential candidate.
The big draw, according to pre-event scuttlebutt, was free Ben & Jerry's ice cream, and there was a pretty good-sized line of folks looking for some quintessential Vermont beat-the-heat elixir. Notably, the line for buying Bernie campaign paraphernalia was every bit as long.
Another tale making the rounds today, as noted by
Rob in Vermont earlier, is this was a bunch of hippies having a pointless little moment.
Um, no. No, it wasn't.
Local tv station WCAX estimated the crowd at 5000 people, and in this little burg in this little state, that is massive turnout. Especially since this wasn't a Phish reunion concert. I saw signs from as far away as St Croix in the Virgin islands, and everyone knows hippies can't swim ;)
Come on below for my take and some pictures from this historic event
Video of the entire rally can be found here
Yesterday was the 25th anniversary of the day Mrs kamarvt and I started seeing each other, so it was a very good day all around!
Right away, it was apparent that this is a people-powered campaign. Young adults staffed tables strategically located throughout the entrance areas asking for volunteers and donations. Many people were wearing homemade Bernie T-shirts (mrs kamarvt and I have Bernie for President bumper stickers from two years ago!) We arrived about an hour before the official start time, as we had seen over 2500 rsvps on Facebook, and we wanted a good viewing spot. We found a good one right near this guy
Hippie or Veteran? How about Patriot?
Some more of our color guard
Beanie for Bernie ; local artist
Feel the Bern!
Various media types were working the crowd, and Ailson Chang from NPR interviewed a woman right next to us. I rather openly eavesdropped on the interview, and was unsurprised to hear her questions framed as Bernie as a foil for Hillary Clinton and as an expression of Occupy. To her credit, the woman being interviewed did not fall into this frame, stating repeatedly that Sanders campaign is a campaign for president, not for attention, and that she rejects the 99%-1% dichotomy, choosing instead to see the issue as a conflict between those who play by the rules and those who work to rewrite the rules for themselves.
Needless to say, nothing of this interview made it into Ms Chang's report on NPR today.
But she made it into mine :)
NPR's Ailson Chang
apparently this guy was there. He didn't stay until the end, though.
And we'll have to leave it there...
After some tunes from long time Bernie supporters Mango Jam, the program got underway. Highlights included a fiery speech by Bill McKibben, a leading environmental activist and one of the best layman's writers about the issue of climate change
Bill McKibben celebrates abundant solar energy at Bernie Sanders' campaign kickoff rally
and an appearance by Ben & Jerry, who have been Bernie boosters since forever.
Ben and Jerry are always happy on a hot summer day.
That was a theme among all of the early speakers; every one of them has been working with Sanders since he first came on the political scene as mayor of Burlington, and they all spoke to his sincerity, his consistency, and his unwavering willingness to speak truth to power.
After these and more, including a version of God Bless America from a finalist on season 3 of The Voice (sorry, didn't get her name), a roar went up as Bernie Sanders made his way to the podium.
For me, there was little unexpected in his address. Sanders hit all the themes he has been hammering since he arrived in Congress 25 years ago, stayed away from touting his resume (such as community health centers, veteran's affairs, fighting the attack on the post office and against media consolidation) instead keeping to the larger issues of inequality (both income and discriminatory), environmental advocacy, families, student debt, and healthcare front and center. He announced a ten year, trillion dollar infrastructure investment program that he claims will create and maintain 13 million good paying jobs. He talked clearly about the opportunities for American business to lead the way in renewable energy, proclaimed his solid support for a $15 minimum wage and single payer health care, and he went after the greed of billionaires and multinational corporations in stark terms. He laid out the cruelty of the latest Republican 'budget' without resorting to nastiness, and mentioned Clinton and Jeb Bush just once, in passing. He once again challenged the media, right to their cameras, to cover this campaign like adults and not a bunch of Mean Girls.
I've been following Sanders closely since I moved to Vermont back in 1990, so I was expecting pretty much just what he delivered. But I gotta say, there was something so profound about standing in a crowd of thousands, hearing the things I would say if I had the megaphone, and nobody shouting it down as fantasy, hippie pipe dreams, or just unserious.
Aside from the interview I mentioned above and the resulting report on NPR this morning, I do not know much about how the dominant media framed this event, but one thing should not be misunderstood; the thousands of people who came out to this rally were not there to feed an emotional need, not there to move the Overton Window, and not there to Make Hillary Notice Us.
People were there to start the work of electing Bernie Sanders President of the United States.
And that is just as cool as a Vermont winter!