VPR: Sanders Says He's Working To Make The Democratic Party More Progressive

[Jim Lane]

1. I have to disagree with Bernie on one point

He's quoted as saying: “I think it is fair to say that from an ideological point of view, what the Democratic Party should stand for, we have kind of won that debate."

The Democratic Party was and is a big tent, meaning there's a wide ideological range. An example is single payer. The current Congress is the first in which a majority of the Democrats in the House have cosponsored a bill for single payer. In the Senate, several of the Democrats who are thought to be eyeing the White House have come around to endorsing Bernie's bill. The view that it will "never, ever happen" is certainly less prominent within the party than it used to be.

Nevertheless, there are still many Democrats in the House who are not on board. In the Senate, the roster of cosponsors includes Democrats with national ambitions but still only a minority of the Democratic caucus. I'm afraid I can't join Bernie in saying the debate has been won.

What has happened is that, on single payer and other issues, the overall distribution of positions within the Democratic Party has moved noticeably to the left. Some of that might have happened anyway, but Bernie's campaign certainly had a great deal to do with it.