Faiz Shakir

populist wise campaigning.

And this gets to my deep, deep frustration with the democratic party of how we don't campaign is to name names, name some villains, get into fights, elevate these kinds of issues.

And then of course, I want to marry that with a policy agenda, but often the policy agenda, you know, is so much in the forefront of our mind that we have no politics by which to, to reach regular people over.

Yeah.

But also, I think the over-unders matter, that the deltas and the margins.

So I wouldn't go all the way to saying, hey, we're still trying to figure out what is the right directional form of politics that matches what people would support.

And for a Democratic Party, it's trying to find its way

I'm arguing that some of these independents are offering a kind of different working class economic first agenda that should influence the way in which we think, right?

Right.

I mean, again, in the wonderful NBC poll, I think it asked, you know, Republicans and Democrats, essentially, would you prefer a candidate who has closer ideology to you or electability arguments?

And it was always been generally the case that Democrats have favored these kinds of electability arguments and still did in that poll, though there's a little bit more ideological.

My appeal fight on this within the Democratic Party ranks has been kind of a rear guard difficult fight, which is that Bernie Sanders is a stronger general election candidate than he is a primary candidate.

And to understand that- And nobody's been able to see it.

It's an unproven- Never been able to get there.

And I would argue, well, sadly, we'll never see it, but I'm firm about my own personal views on that.

And if people were to agree with me on it, then you're saying, well, what about Senator Sanders would move a 5% of conservatives' independence in the column of him?

Well, now we get into the heart of what I think a democratic party should be in and around, is that here's a fight against the billionaire class, a willingness to take on corporate power and corporate greed and corporate influence, a willingness to fight for campaign finance reform in meaningful and important ways, and integrity that you trust, that you wake up every day wanting to fight for working class Americans.

That's clearly what the people associate with Bernie, and I think we want more of that associated with the democratic party.

Unfortunately, this is a political realignment opportunity in America, in my view.

I think you don't always get these opportunities, but right now you've got one, where I think if the right candidate with the right appeal gets that 5%, 7% moving fully over and potentially staying with you, if you campaign.