Support for Sanders the Democratic Socialist

Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton are two people we’ve been hearing a lot from recently, especially if you have been listening to the Democratic debates. Both of them are running for president. The big question now is, who should Democrats vote for? While that question seems daunting, I assure you it is not as hard as it may seem.

In the fifth Democratic debate on Feb. 4 Sanders and Clinton went head to head, talking about how they are the same, and more importantly, how they are different. The moderators asked questions ranging from how many individual contributions they have made to what their views on ISIS are. There was definitely a variety of questions asked, and with each question Sanders and Clinton debated about whose perspective was better.

Some of the public views Sanders as an “evil commie.”  Actually, his political viewpoint (called Democratic Socialism) was shared by American President Franklin Roosevelt, the creator of Social Security. Sanders is also known for wanting free health care and free tuition for public college. Many criticize this as impossible to do, yet if you were to just look at other countries, many of them have free health care and free public college. Critics also emphasize the fact that he would raise taxes, but they do not tell you how much you would save on medical care.

One of the main reasons why I support Sanders is because he runs his campaign on small donations from people and doesn’t take donations from large companies or an affiliated Super PAC. He also cares about his supporters as shown when he helped a woman who fainted in the middle of one of his speeches.

Democratic Socialists believe that the economy and society should be run democratically. This means meeting the public’s needs, and making sure that profits don’t go to just a few people. Most of all, they want a just society and the economy to be transformed such that ordinary citizens can participate in decisions that impact their lives.

Clinton is Sanders’ main obstacle to overcome before he can even be considered for election. Clinton’s main goals, if elected, are to increase minimum wage and level the pay gap between men and women. Sanders shares these goals. So what is so bad about her? Not only does she lack political experience compared to Bernie, a lot of her fundraising comes from her Super PACs. This means that she is getting most of the money for her campaign from rich local and foreign companies. This has historically lead to a corrupted form of government.

I believe that Sanders is the best Democratic candidate we have this election. And hey, how great would free college be for all of us?