Widgetized Section
Go to Admin » Appearance » Widgets » and move Gabfire Widget: Social into that MastheadOverlay zone
Bernie Sanders Pays Tribute to Fellow Liberal Champion George McGovern
Sen. Bernie Sanders paid tribute to the late Sen. George McGovern today by calling him a man of, ‘conviction and clarity and character.’
In a statement Sen. Sanders said,
George McGovern was a champion for progressive values in America. As a bomber pilot in WW II, he saw the horrors of war and became a strong advocate for world peace. As a U.S. senator, he grasped the tragedy of world hunger and fought to develop nutrition and agricultural programs to prevent starvation. At home, he advocated health care for all, defended working families and the poor and was in the vanguard of the movement for civil rights for women and minorities.
He will be remembered as a man of conviction and clarity and character.
Our nation is faced with a presidential contest that, beneath the two men, is a choice between two very different ideologies. Much of the language that President Obama is campaigning on in 2012 was given voice to in an earlier generation by McGovern. (Both men got the ideology from the founding father of modern liberalism, FDR.)
Here is McGovern at the 1984 Democratic arguing that peace and prosperity should be built from the bottom up, not the top down:
As we are faced with a decision between incumbent president who is campaigning on ending wars, and a challenger who seems hellbent on starting more conflict if is elected, it is important to remember George McGovern’s most famous quote, “I’m fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in.”
No one, not even President Obama, embodies the values of McGovern like Bernie Sanders. Just as McGovern was, Sen. Sanders is the beloved liberal voice of the left. There is a purity and clarity of values that both men share. It was fitting to see McGovern finally being appreciated in his later years. His crushing defeat as the Democratic nominee in 1972 was left to history, and the man was finally given the credit that he deserved for being one of liberalism’s proudest voices.
McGovern’s 1972 campaign is also rightly given credit for laying the roots of today’s activist progressive movement, but even as he entered his 90s, McGovern was still teaching the rest of us what it meant to be a Democrat. As he wrote in his 2011 book, What It Means To Be A Democrat, “Above all, being a Democrat means having compassion for others. … It means standing up for people who have been kept down …”
Bernie Sanders isn’t a Democrat, but the core values of liberalism appear to be weaved into his soul. I can think of no better person to pay tribute to George McGovern than the senator from Vermont who keeps those values alive every single day in the United States Senate.
Related Posts :
A beloved elder statesman of the Democratic Party has told Hillary Clinton that it time to drop out, and has ...
Sen. Bernie Sanders has seen his statements about wealth inequality come under vicious attack from the r ...
Sen. Bernie Sanders praised President Obama's second inaugural address as, 'eloquent in its simplicity a ...
Sen. Bernie Sanders is praising President Obama's support for his constitutional amendment and movement ...
After Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner took Social Security off the table, Sen. Bernie Sanders applauded ...
10 Responses to Bernie Sanders Pays Tribute to Fellow Liberal Champion George McGovern
Public Service Advertisements
Reynardine
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 5:37 pm
If ever there was a man who earned the right to say, “See! I told you so!” it was Senator McGovern (and he said it).
Anne
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 5:44 pm
George McGovern was a steadfast liberal at a time when it was being considered a dirty word. We can only wonder where we would be today if we had been able to elect an honorable man whose views have been vindicated by history instead of the intelligent but ethically shaky, paranoid Richard Nixon. 40 years after his defeat, more and more folks realize he was right.
Colleen
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 7:16 pm
It still is a dirty word. I am tired of being called a communist or socialist because I am a Liberal.
Shiva (Moderator)
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 5:50 pm
Everything that McGovern recognized as necessary the GOP of today despises. They despise their own people who vote for them. McGovern was a good man who cared. A man Obama would do well to follow
Reynardine
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 6:18 pm
My first car, a ’57 Pontiac Superchief, fatally kicked the bucket the night George McGovern was defeated. The McGovern bumper sticker was the last thing I saw of it before it was hauled away. They don’t make Pontiacs any more, and they don’t make candidates like McGovern any more, either.
stenc
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 7:05 pm
Imagine the America we live in now had McGovern been elected President in 1972. A much better place, I would venture to say.
RIP Mr. McGovern.
novenator
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 7:57 pm
This is my 1000th StumbleUpon Submit!
We will miss you George. You were a champion of peace and should have been president instead of that crook Richard Nixon.
Shiva (Moderator)
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 8:15 pm
I cant, and wont tell you how happy I am for you lol
A Walkaway
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 8:33 pm
I was just thinking… he passed only days before what may become America’s finest hour, or America’s darkest hour.
Time will tell us which. I just hope some good will come of his example, and that he won’t be ashamed of this country a couple of weeks from Tuesday.
majii
Oct. 21st, 2012 at 9:50 pm
I will always remember Senator McGovern as a champion of liberalism and democracy and a stand up guy who was willing to put his neck on the line for all Americans. The first vote I ever cast for a presidential candidate, I cast for Sen. McGovern in 1972 when I was a freshman at the University of GA.