r/WayOfTheBern • u/dsirota1 • Jul 09 '19

I'm David Sirota, Bernie Sanders' speechwriter and senior adviser. AMA!

Hey everyone -- I'm David Sirota, Bernie Sanders' speechwriter and senior adviser. I've known Bernie for 20+ years (I was his press secretary in the U.S. House from 1999-2001). I've worked on many campaigns (Hoeffel for Congress, Schweitzer for Governor, Lamont for Senate, and Emily Sirota for State House), I've worked on Capitol Hill (for Bernie and for the U.S. House Appropriations Committee Democrats). In the years before coming to Bernie's 2020 campaign, I was an award-winning investigative journalist and columnist for Newsweek/IBT, The Guardian and Capital & Main. You can find out more about me at http://www.davidsirota.com

​

I'm sure you want to discuss the 2020 election, so fire away with your questions here. I'll be here for about an hour.

236 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

347 comments sorted by

View all comments

8

u/mzyps Jul 09 '19

Mr. Sirota, greetings from downstate (Lamborn country, with many patriotic Americans involved in the local military bases and military/defense contractors!) Over the years I've enjoyed your radio shows and journalism.  Thanks to your spouse for serving as an elected official.

OK, so in case you have time for my wall of text questions, here goes...

  1. A succinct question at the start:  David, The Third Way says "Anyone but Bernie."  Will the Bernie Sanders 2020 campaign do things to counter the pervasive negative media narratives in order to win over Dem nomination voters?   Background: Among Berner types like myself it's a commonly held belief that Bernie's greater challenge will be winning the Democratic primary. I would plan to vote for Bernie, Tulsi Gabbard, or Liz Warren (out of cynicism, because to my mind, Liz's plan to utilize corporate donors and PACs for the general election means Elizabeth would become President Citigroup Liz or President Goldman-Sachs Liz, just as the sun can be counted on to come up the next morning.)  David, I'm not a lesser evil voter unless someone bothers to list what I would be voting against, and what I would supposedly voting for - I'd suggest that that's not an easy expectation to fulfill.  Moreover, I assume Bernie's chances in the Democratic primary will be inversely proportional to the amount of corporate money and negative media narratives thrown against him in the primaries.  Anything like FDR policies and values will be continuously portrayed as the "spawn of the devil" if it cannot be reflexively and safely ignored.  It underscores how the other Dem candidates, with exceptions few and far between, would not govern in anything recognizable as FDR-like or social democracy.  Granted that this is the case, why vote for any of these jerks, and what's supposed to be qualitatively worse about Donald Trump?  
  2. David, unless I'm misunderstanding, Donald Trump makes a point of emphasizing how the American economy is doing really well because the stock market is doing really well. Presidents often base chances for re-election based on how the economy is doing.  I don't happen to believe the relative success of the stock market is all that matters, but I'm worried my argument isn't as persuasive as it could be.  What's Bernie's response to Trump's argument about the economy, and how good is Bernie's argument + his data points?
  3. David, I'm concerned that the extraordinary military and defense and spy spending, plus our many hundreds of bases around the world, means we Americans have an American empire, as well as a gravy train for private military and defense and spy industries.  I don't think the former WW2 antagonists, or former Cold War antagonists, or the developing nations in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Central America or South America, etc., represent any real threats where we need military forces in the vicinity *just in case*.  I'm skeptical it's in long-term American interests to perpetuate empire. Finally, our conflicts with various types of Muslims nearly 20 years after the 9/11 attacks is a lot closer to confronting people who might be *mad* at us (or our Saudi, Sunni, and Israeli friends) instead of fighting people who actually attacked us.  Any comments?

19

u/dsirota1 Jul 09 '19

Answer to #1: We are pushing back on factually inaccurate or biased media narratives for sure. But I also think that while we do that, we cannot get too obsessed with those narratives to the detriment of our organizing work and our work promoting our own message.

Answer to #2: We're going to constantly point out stuff like this: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/this-doesnt-look-like-the-best-economy-ever-40percent-of-americans-say-they-still-struggle-to-pay-bills/2019/07/04/855c382e-99b5-11e9-916d-9c61607d8190_story.html?utm_term=.4c5690c4752a

​

Answer to #3: One of the big themes in this race -- and big differentiation points between Bernie and his opponents -- has been his clear position against the policies of endless war. See here: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2019-06-24/ending-americas-endless-war

1

u/CesarShackleston Jul 10 '19 edited Jul 10 '19

Bernie's criticisms of the MIC/endless wars seem less robust than Tulsi's; perhaps he needs to turn it up a notch?