This is how they get you–Dems Rub Aloe Hillary on my Bern

After 4 days of watching some or all of the Democrat’s highly choreographed infomercial for Hillary Clinton, I admit my Bern is fading.  And if my Bern is fading, I know yours is.

Like many older Americans, my distrust and dislike of Hillary Clinton goes back to the 90s.  Unlike many, my like and trust of Bernie Sanders also goes back to the 90s.  You see, at the height of Clinton Health Care Reform in the early 90s–I was a staff attorney for (Ralph Nader’s) Public Citizen’s Congress Watch in Washington, DC working for single payer health care reform (better understood as Medicare for All).  Hillary Clinton was the head the of the Clinton Health Care Task Force in the White House and Bernie Sanders was one of our go to Congress members on the Hill.

I watched the Clinton White House cynically manipulate single payer supporters into campaigning for their plan, which would funnel billions into the hands of private health insurers.   I debated her surrogates, such as Rahm Emanuel in congressional district “town hall meetings” around the country. She and her team were the enemy.  Bernie and his staff were the allies.  It was that simple.

During that era, I also watched as the Clinton White House accomplished right wing goals that no Republican President could ever get past the (then Democratically controlled for decades) Congress, rolling back rights for poor single mothers under the guise of “welfare reform,” bailing out corrupt savings and loans, tearing down protections for consumers from the excesses of the financial industry, weakening food safety and of course pushing through the first of the modern “Free Trade” deals, NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement) over the objections of labor, the environmental community and consumers. 

To me the Clintons stand for everything that is wrong with the Democratic party.

So it is no stretch to imagine the degree to which I have been Feelin’ the Bern this political season.   For the first time in my political life, a candidate with some steam behind him has not only been saying the things I want to hear, but I know him to actually believe these things and I would have trusted him to advocate forcefully for his stated goals.

All of this is to say that even though I am a middle-aged white woman, and a lifelong feminist, there was no part of me that wanted to cry last night when Hillary came out in her white pantsuit.

Yet.  I.  Did.

I have to admit it. After a relentless week of people I like and trust, like Bernie, Elizabeth and Joe telling me it was time for Hillary, followed by people I can’t help liking and watching even though I don’t trust them much at all, like Barak and Michelle Obama, and even, dammit, Bill Clinton, oozing their ways into my heart, I was open to the possibility of Hillary Clinton.

When she walked out in that pantsuit, grinning and waving to the crowd, tears poured down my cheeks unbidden.  Come on, Sara, I reminded myself.  Don’t be a sap.  Don’t fall for this.  This is how they get you.  Don’t listen to the whispers, the propaganda machine: Historic moment.  First woman.  She a public servant.  She’s a hard worker.  She’s always been fighting for you, Sara.  Think about the speaking fees, Goldman Sachs, TPP treachery, emails, Clinton Foundation, think about Bill Clinton loose in the West Wing, think about her cronies.

But it’s done.  The spell is cast.  And I am under it.  And I always knew it would be.  Yes, I will vote for Hillary Clinton in the fall if that’s what it takes.  Fortunately I live in California so if the race is tight here, it’s time to move to Canada.