The long term perspective is more important than deciding who to vote for in November.

In the wake of one of the most successful challenges to corporate political control this country has seen since the civil rights movement, the key thing now for Bernie supporters is developing a long term vision and strategy for transforming our movement into a sustainable progressive political organization(s) independent of corporate Democratic control.

As we approach the November election, Bernie supporters in Illinois face a disagreeable choice between a megalomaniac, proto-fascist con-man and a confirmed corporate Democrat and cold warrior.

The specific dilemma facing us is whether to vote for Hillary Clinton as a tactical move to stop the ascendancy of what might be America’s first European style fascist or to renounce lesser evil voting--which paved the way for Donald Trump--and vote for Green Party candidate, Jill Stein.

While that question is important, I’d argue that the election is not the most important thing for us. Now that Bernie has endorsed Hillary, some of us may vote for her and others may not.  However, Trump’s campaign is imploding and defeating him is largely up to Hillary Clinton.  We can’t push voters to her, she has to attract them, just like Bernie did.[i]  So we should not we devote all our political energies to that effort.

Regardless of the personnel changes made at the DNC, the Party remains solidly under the control of the wealthy donors from FIRE (finance, insurance and real estate) plus Silicon Valley, and Hollywood. Those donors, investors really, are not going to give their power away.  As long as they are in control, they will never allow the Party that they have bought and paid for to enact Bernie’s progressive platform. 

To realize Bernie’s political revolution, we’ve got to be long-term thinkers as well as short-term actors in November.  And in the long term, the choice we face is whether to take-on corporate power from within the Democratic Party or from the outside--whether to a mount a tea party type fight for power from inside or to build our own progressive multi-class political organization on the outside.

In either case, the goal must be to defeat the corporate Democrats by electing progressive governing majorities in the legislatures.  That goal, if achieved, represents the ultimate victory of the Bernie movement.  If we focus only on defeating Trump and remain within a corporate controlled Party, pressuring for individual issues, then Bernie’s movement will have failed. 

Hopefully Trump will be defeated this time, but under the second Clinton presidency the ground that nurtured a menace like Trump—ground that Bill Clinton prepared--will still exist, and it will continue to nurture new more effective right wing menaces.

So go ahead and vote your conscience in November.  But let’s be aware that if Hillary wins, she and her supporters in the Party will undoubtedly ignore most of the promises she made to the left. (She’s already tacking right to attract Republican donors).  If Jill Stein gets over 5% or more, that will be a victory and a good sign for the long term, but in the near future, it will change little.   

If, by the end of 2018, Bernie’s political revolution has grown into a sustainable independent political organization (a party?) that wins legislative seats at the local, state and national levels, that will be the political revolution Bernie is talking about and the revolution we are fighting for.