I halfway expect Hillary to pick Rahmbo as her Chief of Staff, too!

Where are they going to get their resources? Who's going to organize it? What are they going to teach? Yates is saying:

"There would be teach-ins and public meetings in towns large and small. No political event, no protest, no rally would be fail to have an educational component. Sanders’ talking points could be used to deepen understanding, by asking questions and pushing the discussions toward fundamental causes."

It's like anything else, somebody has to do it and to do it they're going to need organization and resources. The closest we have to anything like this is the election process itself. Candidates solicite money so they can go around the country or state "educating" people about their views and opinions, they have town hall meetings, commercial ads, send out flyers with information, etc. This election will reportedly be in the 6-8 billion dollar range. Imagine what we could do with a billion dollars toward an independent movement.

I remember when the billionaire Omidyar pledged 250 million toward his new media enterprise which includes The Intercept. The purpose was to educate and inform. I couldn't help wonder how that money could be better used to organize an independent movement instead of just another blog on the internet.

That's been a criticism from some regarding participating in this political system at all, that it wastes precious resources and time we could be spending on real constructive educational campaigns instead of simply electing more politicians to "represent" us, which everyone knows they don't. Perhaps it's just not practical to attach something like an anti-capitalist movement or any issues oriented movement to the political sideshow. Besides the fact is, Sanders is not a socialist, he is not anti-capitalist, so there would be inconsistencies and contradiction from the start.

This is what I talk about with my neighbors and clients as I putter in the garden. They don't all agree, so it is a lively chat. If there was a teach in they would consider me arrogant and not show up. If someone else did a teach in I think they would only be teaching preaching to the converted.

I think sites like this could work - they could come and try and convert us.

I missed that Greywolf diary - what a treat!

There is an educational component already. Have you been to a Bernie Sanders rally? He is teaching us. That's what the whole thing is. What I thought was so incredible was how the students listened. I was a teacher for 28 years and it is an amazing feat to get kids to listen to you. I witnessed a classroom of 7000 students listen so intently, that you could hear a pin drop.

I agree with you that there needs to be more of a movement. That's why we should embrace the Leap Manifesto. https://leapmanifesto.org/en/leap-year/ It is an outgrowth of Naomi Klein's book, This Changes Everything, and other progressive movements. The teaching materials and formats are already in place. The Leap Manifesto embraces all of the same progressive issues as Bernie Sanders. Climate change vs. capitalism is at the core.

I have been feeling low this week, like everyone else. It's time to snap out of it! I absolutely have no doubt that discouragement is a large part of the Clinton campaign efforts. It was already clear to me at the Iowa caucuses, when I read accounts of how Clinton supporters aggressively took charge of the meetings. And also, clearly, they were aided by the Iowa Democratic Party, who did not provide adequate workers to manage the process.

I think we all need to get some fire back. And I think we should be promoting the Leap Manifesto right next to Bernie Sanders. The Leap Manifesto originates in Canada, but it is for us and the whole world as well.

That is the basic question. I don't think that 70's style teach-ins would work now except for the leaning or converted among us. The movement does not ally with either of the major parties and the Greens could be a start, but are perceived as a small anti-group now. So what? Take over the Democratic Party and drag it back to what our questionable history tells us it used to stand for? That is where I am in this revolution.

Feeling down after an artificial high is normal. Your comment about the educational component is true, but it is also a chicken and the egg arguement. You have to build up a large following first, then start the educational process to sustain the movement. There will be Clinton minions infiltrating all the media outlets including this one. Our biggest obstacle is setting false expectations and then saying it is too hard. If you want change you have to work for years, we are on the precipice of a change from conservative austerity in the US. There will be pain and disappointment but we must continue the fight. The Clinton's are betting this is a flash in the pan, they win the nomination and the White House for eight years. They will be able to extend their stamp for the next 30 years because they will be followed by a Republican administration. If we continue the fight and they lose the nomination or White House, there will be a change in culture in the Democratic Party. The worst case scenario is we keep fighting and winning states, but come up short on delegates to get the nomination. In order for them to secure the support of the movement Sanders gets to pick DNC chair and name Vice Chairs. We start working on candidates for state offices as well as Congress.

The movement continues and we change the direction of the country. We are making progress, the next month will be much better. Keep up the fight.

I think most of us are against unregulated capitalism, at the very least. I don't think it matters so much what the nametag is - some people are more disillusioned with capitalism than others, but I think we can probably agree that capitalism as a political ideology by itself doesn't work, as it's amoral and is simply an economic system, not really a political one. It shouldn't be treated as some infallible entity that can do no wrong.

I think we should promote the suggestion of Catherine Austin Fitts, that we stimulate the economy with equity not debt.

She gives the example of talking to 3 women in small town Tennessee. Two women had money in the bank and at the time the bank was paying 4 or 5% interest (this must have been a few years ago, eh?). The third woman had started a small business using her credit card and was paying 23% interest. The bank the 2 women had put their money into fell under the umbrella of a big Wall Street bank, as did the credit card. So the Wall Street bank was making 23% on the credit card loan and paying at most 5% to the capital provided by the other 2 women. Nice spread if you can get it.

Fitts suggested that if you could set up a local mechanism with a local bank, the 2 women could offer their capital for investment locally and make maybe 8%, the bank that was handling the transactions might make 4% and the woman who needed the equity for her business would pay 12%, far less than the credit card was costing her.

The added benefit of doing everything locally is this: if you know that a business has borrowed your money, you have a vested interest in making them a success so you shop at small local businesses. Businesses like WalMart send all the profits out of the community to head office; there's no investment in the local community.

This leads to financial prosperity as well as better communities.

I think any populist movement in the US is doomed if it ties itself to the partisan political machine that is firmly in place. After 16 years or more of trying to use the Democratic party as a vehicle for stopping or even mitigating this global insanity, it's obvious that the rigged and owned system is damn near impenetrability. Even on a local level the Democratic Inc. has a firm grip on power. I agree on the scenario presented in the diary. I agree on the necessity to keep the movement that Sanders engendered going after they take the election circus tents down.

As for educating people that's a hard one. A variation on an old hippie maxim, think local act global, runs through my mind. The thing is how do you get the people who understand what's going down to come together and learn or educate without the political structure that is in place and monolithic? People kept saying that OWS should have tied itself to the useless Democratic party. I don't, that neuters and co-opts any insurgency or movement or if it threatens their interest's turns the goon squads loose on it .

It seems to me that the main lesson learned from electing Democrat's on all levels in 2006-Obummer pretty much showed people that it's futile to resist the inevitable world as we find it. I was surprised that people were willing to once again get out and support 'Us not me'. Despite the nasty bait and switch of the Obama campaign/ administration a lot of people were willing to once again take on the oligarchy. What does a political revolution look like? How can one revolt politically using a duopoly that is owned and controlled by the global Visigoths.

When started this strange journey into politics I went to a lot of meet ups organized by DFA. They took place in local bars, public buildings like the Friends church restaurants etc. Not in peoples houses however. They were not about electing Dean nationally they dealt with local issues. The main thing the people attending seemed to want addressed was education. My group was full of teachers that wanted No Child's Ass Left Behind' and teaching for test's gone. Our city at that time had head hunted a corporate school board director from Chicago. They were busy shutting down schools and harassing teachers. We would break into groups and basically caucus and at the end each group of 6 to 8 people would have the designated speaker get up and talk about the problems solutions each came up with.

That was in 2003 when people in my city we're still engaged civilly. They really were all fired up. These days no one in my community really talks about politics, Bernie's campaign being the exception. No yard signs anymore no chatting about politics the silence is deafening. As it's 80% Democratic, the rest are indies or green's' in this 'middle class' district I think it's a question of once bitten twice shy. My neighbors are united in fear and loathing of the Republicans. They are also pretty comfortable financially as this city has been gentrified and 'developed'. They are also busy trying to stay affluent and not go under. These are just my thoughts about educating people about a political revolution.

Who knows what going to happen after Hillary or Trump or some other RW asshole the owners pick is elected. The movement and messages that Bernie represented will continue as there seems to be no limits on these disaster cappies that 'rule the world'.. They will get worse as they always do unless unchecked. I am heartened by the democratic sparks that keep igniting globally. They may get stamped out but they keep coming back and I do believe they will grow. For now I'm going to work locally on community projects and showing up at city meetings as we have a nest of vipers who ran and won disguised as 'progressives' demolishing and privatizing our city. I will not vote for Hillary I was going to write in Bernie if she was selected. I like many will play it like it lays.

One last thing 'Don't follow leaders and watch the parking meters'. The movement for our common good and restoration of democracy does not depend on a leader, a pol, a persona. I feel strongly that this constant searching for a front man or woman is another big waste of time and energy. 'Leaders' on a smaller decentralized level will emerge.

These would be preferably private institutions that are accredited with a very specific mandate. You could study all the liberal arts, journalism, medicine and even business. It would be a place (places) for learning but also an epicenter for political and social activism. This could be done with a fairly small amount of money, allow people of all backgrounds to participate as teacher or student.

I am extremely disappointed that Bernie will likely not win. But we can't let this ground swell die off the way Occupy and other progressive groups have. Bernie himself has said his election is not about him, so we all need to figure out how we will move forward. I live in Vermont and while we have a number of great schools with liberal agendas, none are specifically focused on political activism and social change as their primary purpose (that I am aware)