(From Catlin Johnstone w/Newslogue)

Bernie’s campaign manager just kicked David Brock’s ass so hard that his ex-boyfriend James Alefantis screamed and had to take a break from filling in his pizzaria's basement with concrete. Jeff Weaver, who managed Sanders’ campaign during the Democratic primaries, delivered this scathing op-ed for The Hill in response to astroturfing propaganda wizard David Brock’s attempt to blame Bernie supporters for Hillary Clinton’s spectacular failure to win the most easily-winnable presidential election in living memory.

And oh man am I glad that he did. I’m glad that the Berniecrats are ramping up their fight and refusing to take this reprehensible smear campaign lying down, and I’m especially glad that that disgusting parasite Brock is being dragged back into the light to remind everyone just how vile he and everything he stands for is.

Weaver’s professional yet heavy-hitting article concluded with the words, “Imagine if those millions wasted by Brock were used to register hundreds of thousands of new voters or to reach out to Rust Belt working class families. Just imagine.”

[...]

It’s only because this happened on online forums that this didn’t generate anywhere near the national outrage it deserved. Can you imagine if the Clinton campaign was paying people to do that in person? Like, imagine if you were having a conversation about Clinton at a restaurant and someone leaned in from the other table calling you a sexist “Bernie bro”. And then you started noticing that this was happening anytime you tried to mention your political opinion in a public place, only to learn that these weren’t real Hillary supporters or rank-and-file citizens constantly attacking you for your point of view, but employees of the government establishment. Can you imagine how freaked out everyone would be by these people? Everywhere you went your eyes would be darting around like a survivor of a zombie apocalypse anytime you thought about stating a political opinion.

That’s the exact kind of suspicion and paranoia Brock injected into online political discourse. People were suddenly suspicious that the arguments they were pouring so much energy and creativity into articulating and typing out were being wasted on some apathetic shill who’s only there for a paycheck, so a lot of conversations that should have happened never did. Countless actual, sincere Clinton supporters just looking for healthy debate and dialogue were roughly dismissed as shills, and understandably so, but it wasn’t really their fault, and it completely shut down the dialogue. Our whole mechanism for sharing ideas and information on the best strategies for moving forward as a nation had a big, fat monkey wrench thrown in its gears.

More at the link, or here: http://www.newslogue.com/debate/179

Also WayoftheBern will be sponsoring an AMA (Reddit-Speak for Q&A) with Catlin todat at 2pm Pacific time.