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The Billionaire Class Fully Understands What Is At Stake. That's Why A Handful Of Them Are Pouring Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Into The Current Elections. Their Goal Is Not To Strengthen The Middle Class, But Continue The Trend In Which The Rich Are Getting Richer At The Expense Of Everyone Else.

-Bernie Sanders

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The Billionaire Class Fully

Bernie Sanders

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The Billionaire Class Fully Understands What Is At Stake. That's Why A Handful Of Them Are Pouring Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Into The Current Elections. Their Goal Is Not To Strengthen The Middle Class, But Continue The Trend In Which The Rich Are Getting Richer At The Expense Of Everyone Else.

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In America, We Have Lost Millions Of Decent-paying Jobs. That Has Got To End.

Rescind The Appointment Of [steve] Bannon. We Will Not Be Involved In The Expansion Of Bigotry, Of Racism, Sexism, Homophobia.

I'm Not Going To Get Establishment Support. I'm Not Going To Get The Support Of The Governors And The Senators, With Few Exceptions, And Many Of The Major Organizations.

I Am Running For President As A Democrat. And If Elected, Not Only Do I Hope To Bring Forth A Major Change In National Priorities, But Let Me Be Frank, I Do Want To See Major Changes In The Democratic Party.

20 Million People Thrown Off Of Health Insurance, Prescription Drug Prices Raising For Seniors, Privatization Of Medicare: Devastation. And We've Got To Fight Back Against That.

I Think We Bring Together That Broad Coalition Including Russia To Help Us Destroy Isis And Work On A Timetable To Get Rid Of Assad, Hopefully Through Democratic Elections. First Priority, Destroy Isis.

We Can Have Paid Family And Medical Leave. We Can Make Public Colleges And Universities Tuition-free. These Are Not Revolutionary, Radical Ideas. They're Kind Of Common Sense.

If Trump Is Elected President... I Just Don't Know What America Looks Like Four Years After His Election, In Terms Of The Kind Of Bigotry That Will Be Erupting, In Terms Of The Kind Of Divisiveness That We Will See, The Kind Of Demagoguery That We Will See.

I Don't Think Any Sensible Person Would Disagree That The Invasion Of Iraq Led To The Massive Level Of Instability That We're Seeing Right Now. I Think That Was One Of The Worst Foreign Policy Blunders In The Modern History Of The United States.

Now Is The Time To Alter Our Government. Now Is The Time To Stop The Movement Toward Oligarchy. Now Is The Time To Create A Government Which Represents All Americans And Not Just The 1%... No More Excuses. We Must All Become Involved In The Political Process.

All Over This Country You Have Progressive Communities Like Madison And Burlington, But We've Got To Go Well, Well, Well Outside Of Those Communities. We've Got To Go To The Rural Areas. We've Got To Go Where A Lot Of Working People Are Voting Republican.

We Know The Legislation That Passed The House. It Was The Worst Piece Of Legislation Frankly Against Working Class People That I Can Remember In My Political Life In The Congress.

If You Look At The Newspapers Here - The Washington Papers - Most Of The Discussion Deals With Campaign Gossip.

It's Not Something Where You Can Say, One Time You Said This And Now You Said This. That Doesn't Peel Off Any Of His People. The Only Way That You Can Do It Is By Out Alphaing [doanld] Trump, And I Think That's What Marco Rubio's Attempting To Do.

Health Care In America Must Be A Right, Not A Privilege.

I Think, The Most Progress I Have Agenda, The Progressive Platform In The History Of The Democratic Party. So We Have Got To Continue Bringing People In, Fighting For An Agenda That Works For Working Families And Having The Courage To Take On The Big Money People Who Today Control Our Economic And Political Life.

The Government Of Our Great Country Belongs To All Of The People And Not Just A Handful Of The Wealthy.

Given The Fact That Poverty Is Growing, More And More Americans Are Losing Health Insurance, Health Care Costs Are Going Up, The Middle Class Is Shrinking, The Gap Between The Rich And The Poor Is Growing Wider. That Speaks To The Weakness Of The Opposition. People Do Not Like George W. Bush. But I Think It's Fair To Say That They Are Not Flocking To The Democratic Party, Or See The Democrats As A Real Alternative.

The Affordable Care Act Has Clearly, As Secretary Clinton Made The Point, Done A Lot Of Good Things, But, What It Has Not Done Is Dealt With The Fact We Have 29 Million People Today Who Have Zero Health Insurance, We Have Even More Who Are Underinsured With Large Deductibles And Copayments And Prescription Drug Prices Are Off The Wall.

I Think We're Going To Win A Very Good Share Of Those Delegates. I Think You've Got Major States Coming Up. And I Think The Important Point Is That People Throughout This Country Are Resonating To Our Message.

We Need A Strategy. And The Goal Is To Bring Millions Of People Together.

In The Economy Today, Everybody Understands That We Need A Well Educated Workforce. This Is 2016. When We Talk About Public Education, It Can No Longer Be K Through 12th Grade. I Do Believe That Public Colleges And Universities Should Be Tuition Free.

Politics Is Not A Baseball Game With Winners Or Losers. What Politics Is About Is Whether We Protect The Needs Of Millions Of People In This Country Who Are Hurting.

I Supported Barack Obama Originally. I Supported Him For Reelection And The Alternative Of A Mitt Romney Is Very, Very Clear To Everybody. And I Think The President Has Done A Good Job In A Number Of Areas. But One Area That Has Concerned Me From Day One Has Been His Reliance On Wall Street Type People In Terms Of Financial Matters.

During The 1999 Debate Over Permanent Normal Trade Relations With China President Bill Clinton Said, 'in Opening The Economy Of China, The Agreement Will Create Unprecedented Opportunities For American Farmers, Workers And Companies To Compete Successfully In China's Market. Wrong: Our Trade Deficit With China Has Increased From $83 Billion In 2001 To A Record Breaking $342 Billion In 2014.

Records Breaking

Real Change Never Occurs From The Top On Down, [but] Always From The Bottom On Up.

The Struggle To Create A Nation And World Of Economic And Social Justice And Environmental Sanity Is Not An Easy One. The Struggle To Try And Create A More Peaceful World Will Be Extremely Difficult. But This I Know: Despair Is Not An Option If We Care About Our Kids And Grandchildren. Giving Up Is Not An Option If We Want To Prevent Irreparable Harm To Our Planet.

In My View, It Is Not A Question Of Trump Having Won The Election, It's A Question Of Democrats Having Lost The Election. Democrats Need A Strong Progressive Agenda Which Says To The Working Class Of This Country, We Are Going The Stand And Fight For You, We're Going To Raise The Minimum Wage, Pay Equity For Women, We're Going To Rebuild The Infrastructure, And We're Going To Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right. We're Going To Make Public Colleges And Universities Tuition-free.

I Was Elected By The Democrats To Be Chair Of The Veterans Committee, Which I'm Very Proud Of. And Now Am The Rankings Member On The Budget Committee, Leader Of The Democrats In Opposition To The Majority Republicans.

At A Young Age, I Became Very Aware That Not Only Did My Family Have To Struggle But That Families Around The Country Were Struggling As Well. Also, Being Jewish And Having Lost Relatives In The Holocaust, I've Always Been Aware Of The Meaning Of Prejudice. These Are Things That Have Remained With Me Throughout My Political Career.

This Is What Oligarchy Looks Like: Today, The Top One-tenth Of 1 Percent Owns Almost As Much Wealth As The Bottom 90 Percent. The Top One-hundredth Of 1 Percent Makes More Than 40 Percent Of All Campaign Contributions. The Billionaire Class Owns The Political System And Reaps The Benefits From It.

I Do Believe That Billionaires And Multi-millionaires Should Be Paying More In Taxes.

I Don't Think Everybody In Vermont Loves Me.

The Right Wing In This Country Is Waging A War Against Women, And Let Me Be Very Clear, It Is Not A War That We Are Going To Allow Them To Win.

You Cannot Be A Party Which Takes Money From Wall Street, Which Is Not Strong On The Pharmaceutical Industry, Which Is Ripping Us Off Every Day, Which Is Not Strong On Health Care In Taking On The Insurance Companies, Which Has Not Shown A Desire To Stand Up And Fight The Economic Establishment, And Then Tell Working Families That You Are On Their Side. People See Through That.

Now, Why Would My Supporters Be Supporting Somebody Who Doesn't Want To Raise The Federal Minimum Wage Of $7.25 An Hour, A Starvation Wage, Doesn't Want To Do That. Why Would Anybody That Supports Me Support A Candidate Like Trump Who Wants To Throw Millions And Millions Of People Off Of Health Insurance? We Need To Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right, Not Throw Millions Of People Off Health Insurance As Trump Wants To Do.

Why Is It That Two-thirds Of White, Rural Men Voted Republican? Why? That's What We Have To Address. That's Crazy. These People Are Working Longer And Longer Hours.

Republicans Win When People Are Demoralized And You Have A Small Voter Turnout, Which By The Way Is Why They Love Voter Suppression. I Believe That Our Campaign Up To Now Has Shown That We Can Create An Enormous Amount Of Enthusiasm From Working People, From Young People, Who Will Get Involved In The Political Process And Which Will Drive Us To A Very Large Voter Turnout.

Freedom Of Speech, The Right To Dissent, The Right To Protest, That Is What America Is About. And Politically Every Leader In This Country And Every American Has Got To Stand Up Against Any Form Of Violence. That Is Unacceptable.

Freedom Of Speech

The United States Must Join The Rest Of The Industrialized World, Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right.

In A World Of Massive Wealth And Income Inequality, Europe Must Support Greece’s Efforts To Build An Economy Which Creates More Jobs And Income, Not More Unemployment And Suffering.

Don`t Go To The Dark Side. Don`t Go Bashing Immigrants Or Muslims.

I Am Very Proud Of The Campaign We Ran And The Supporters That Came On Board.

At The End Of The Day, If Millions Of People Come Together And Say, We Are Not Going To Be A Xenophobic Society, We Are Not Going To Be Throwing Millions Of Latinos Out Of This Country, We Are Not Going To Be A Racist Society, We're Not Going To Be A Sexist Society, We Will Prevail.

The End Of The Day

I Think Katrina Is One More Indication Of How Inefficient And Corrupt This Administration Is, And Indicates The Absolute Lack Of Seriousness That [george W.] Bush Has In Making The Government Respond To The Needs Of The People. They Are So Separated From The Lives Of Normal, Low-income People That It Never Occurred To Them That If You're Poor And Have No Money, No Car, That You Can't Leave.

One Of The Issues I'm Really Happy About Is That Recently, Secretary Clinton And I Worked Out An Agreement On Higher Education, Making Public Colleges And Universities Tuition Free For Every Family In America Earning Less Than 125,000 Bucks. Didn't Go As Far As I Wanted. But That's 83 Percent Of The Population In This Country.

The American People In My View Will Never Support A Candidate Whose Major Theme Is Bigotry.

Please Don't Suggest That I Think We Normalize Relations With Tehran Tomorrow. We Don't. But I Would Like To See Us Move Forward, And Hopefully Some Day That Will Happen.

Do The Elected Officials In Washington Stand With Ordinary Americans - Working Families, Children, The Elderly, The Poor - Or Will The Extraordinary Power Of Billionaire Campaign Contributors And Big Money Prevail? The American People, By The Millions, Must Send Congress The Answer To That Question.

When You Talk About Heroines And Heroes, At The Top Of The List Has Got To Be The Single Moms Of America.

The American People Are Growing Extremely Unhappy With Establishment Politics, With Establishment Economics, And You Know What Else? Even With Establishment Media.

Charles Kernaghan Is A Legitimate American Hero... Through His Determination He Has Forced The Leadership In Our Country And Many Other Countries Around The World To Pay Attention. Kernaghan Has Done More To Expose Child Labor Than Has The Whole Department Of Labor That Has A Budget Of Hundreds And Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars, Because He Has The Guts And Determination To Do It.

We Still Have People In The Active Duty, And If People Are Feeling Ill, If They're Experiencing Various Symptoms And They're Still In The Active Duty, They're Less Likely To Come Forward Because That Could Result In Their Medical Discharge.

The Hardest Thing About Going To College Should Not Be Paying For It.

Hillary Clinton Does Represent The Establishment. I Represent, I Hope, Ordinary Americans, And By The Way, Who Are Not All That Enamored With The Establishment, But I Am Very Proud To Have People Like Keith Ellison And Raul Grijalva In The House, The Co-chairmen Of The House Progressive Caucus.

I Think The Media And The Candidates Have Got To Talk About Why The Middle Class Is In Decline And Why We Have Massive Levels Of Income And Wealth Inequality.

The Main Problem Of America Is That You're Seeing People Working All Over This Country Two Jobs, They're Working Three Jobs, And They're Getting Nowhere In A Hurry. They're Working Hard. They Can't Afford To Send Their Kids To College In Many Instances. They Can't Afford Child Care For Their Little Babies. They're Worried To Death About Retirement.

It's Immoral And Wrong That The Top 1 Percent Of The Usa Owns Almost As Much Wealth As The Bottom 90 Percent. We Should Look At Countries Like Denmark And Sweden And Norway And Look At What They've Accomplished For Their Working People.

I Love Music, I'm Very Eclectic. On My Ipad I Have The Complete Works Of Ludwig Van Beethoven.

When I Talked About Boeing And I Talked About General Electric, What I Was Referring To Is An Outrage... Right Now You Have A Loophole Such That These Guys Are Putting Their Profits, Multi-billion Dollar Profitable Corporations Putting Billions Of Dollars Into The Cayman Islands, Bermuda, And Other Tax Havens.

At A Time When The Average Student Is Graduating From A Four-year College $27,000 In Debt, When Hundreds Of Thousands Of Capable Young People No Longer See College As An Option Because Of High Costs And When The U.s. Is Falling Further And Further Behind Our Economic Competitors In Terms Of The Percentage Of Young People Graduating From College, No Agreement Should Be Passed Which, Over A Period Of Years, Makes A Bad Situation Worse And Will Make College Even Less Affordable Than It Is Today.

The Fossil Fuel Industry For Too Long Has Shifted Enormous Costs Of Carbon Pollution Onto The Public.

I Will Tell You Is The Antidote To [donald] Trump Is A Very Strong Progressive Agenda That Says, Yes, I Know You`re Angry. And You Know What? You Should Be Angry Because You`re Working Longer Hours For Low Wages. You Have A Right To Be Bitter And You Have A Right To Be That.

I Think People Cast Their Votes For A Number Of Reasons. I Think If You Look At Your Polls, You'll Probably Find That Many, Many People Think That Our Views Are Closer To What They Believe The Future Of America Should Be. That Our Views Are Closer On Economic Issues. And A Lot Of Those Polls Come Down To Demographics, To Age, To How Much Money You Are Making.

What You Don't See On Television Is People Dying Today Because They Can't Get To A Doctor And They Can't Afford Prescription Drugs. That's Why They Are Also Dying. They Are Dying In Iraq Because They Are Poor And They Have Gone Into The Military Because They Can't Afford To Go To College. They're Dying Because They're Living In Communities Where Asthma Rates Are Extremely High Because The Air Is Filthy. The Suffering Of The Poor And Working Class People Is A Virtual Nonissue For The Media. But That Is The Reality.

I Am Very Glad, Anderson, That Secretary Clinton Discovered Religion On This Issue But It's A Little Bit Too Late. Secretary Clinton Supported Virtually Every One Of The Disastrous Trade Agreements Written By Corporate America.

Income And Wealth Inequality Have Reached Obscene Levels, The Threat Of Climate Change Is More Frightening Than Ever, And The Billionaire Class Is Now Allowed To Spend Unlimited Amounts Of Money To Buy The Candidate They Want. And It Is Up To Us To Stand Up And Fight Back. If We Stand Together, There Is No Limit To What We Can Accomplish.

As President, I Will Fight To Make Tuition In Public Colleges And Universities Free, As Well As Substantially Lower Interest Rates On Student Loans.

When A Mother Has A Baby, She Should Stay Home With That Baby.

We Have Two And Half Million Individual Campaign Contributions, More Than Any Campaign In History.

I Worry Very Much About Kids Growing Up In A Society Where They Think: "i'm Not Going To Talk About This Issue, Read This Book Or Explore This Idea Because Someone May Think I'm A Terrorist." That's Not The Kind Of Free Society I Want For Our Children.

It Means Joining With Allies To Deploy Renewable Energy Technologies -- Both At Home And Around The World -- To Confront The Very Real And Present Danger Of Potentially Irreversible Climate Change.

We've Had A Number Of Economists Supporting Our Legislation. And Here's Where We Are. The American People Can Judge. Six Largest Financial Institutions In America Today Have Assets Of Roughly $10 Trillion; Equivalent To 58 Percent Of The Gdp Of The United States Of America.

We Do Not Need To Have A President Who Insults Mexicans And Latinos And Muslims And Women And Veterans And African-americans, We Need A President Who Brings Us Together, Not Divides Us Up.

Let's Be Honest, Dental Care In America Is Extremely Expensive, Period.

Interestingly, A Lot Of The Polling That I See Is Not Along Racial Lines, But Along Generational Lines. We Are Doing Better And Better Among Younger People, Not So Well Among Older People, Whether They're African-american, Whether They're White Or Whether They're Latino.

African American

The Case To Be Made Is That We Have Got To Get People Involved - Continue To Get People Involved In The Political Process At Every Level.

So As A Nation, We Have A Right To Be Very Proud Of The Successes That We Have Seen Because Of The Struggle Of Millions Of People To Create A Less Discriminatory Society. That Is Something We Should Be Proud Of, But There Is One Struggle In Which Not Only Have We Not Succeeded But In Which We Are Losing Ground And That Is The Fundamental Struggle For Economic Justice.

If A Financial Institution Is Too Big To Fail, It Is Too Big To Exist.

People Understand That The Economy Is Rigged. They're Working Longer Hours For Low Wages. All New Income And Wealth, Almost All, Is Going To The People On Top.

Between 2013 And 2015, The Wealthiest 14 People Saw Their Wealth Increase By $157 Billion. This Is Their Wealth Increase, Got It? Not What They Are Worth. Increase. That $157 Billion Is More Wealth Than Is Owned By The Bottom 40 Percent Of The American People. One Family, The Walton Family, Owns More Wealth Than The Bottom 40 Percent.

We Can Combat Climate Change Effectively. What We Are Lacking Now Is Not The Brain Power, Not The Knowledge, Not The Technology. What We Are Lacking Is The Political Will Power, And We Need Your Help By The Millions To Tell Congress To Stop Worrying About Their Fossil Fuel Contributors To Their Campaigns And Worry About Their Kids And Grandchildren.

I Am A Fierce Supporter Of Planned Parenthood, Naral, And Gay Rights In This Country.

I Have Introduced A Constitutional Amendment To Overturn Citizens United And Make It Clear That The Congress And State Legislatures Do Have The Ability And The Power To Regulate And Get Corporate Funding Out Of Political Campaigns.

Citizens United

Finally, Let Understand That When We Stand Together, We Will Always Win. When Men And Women Stand Together For Justice, We Win. When Black, White And Hispanic People Stand Together For Justice, We Win.

Wall Street Is Greedy, Reckless And They Operate Illegally. That's Fine. But What Do You Do?

What The American People Want To See In Their President Is Somebody Who Not Necessarily Can Win Every Fight, But They Want To See Him Stand Up And Fight For What He Believes, Take His Case To The American People.

If There Is A Large Voter Turnout, Not Only Do We Retain The White House, But I Think We Regain The Senate. We Win Governors' Chairs Up And Down The Line. So I Believe If You Want To Retain The White House, If You Want To See Democrats Do Well Across The Board, I Think Our Campaign Is The One That Creates The Large Voter Turnout And Helps Us Win.

Here's Something That I Believe We Have To Do As We Put Together An International Coalition, And That Is We Have To Understand That The Muslim Nations In The Region - Saudi Arabia, Iran, Turkey, Jordan - All Of These Nations, They're Going To Have To Get Their Hands Dirty, Their Boots On The Ground. They Are Going To Have To Take On Isis.

You Know, Let Me Be Very Clear. I Supported Barack Obama Originally.

There Are Three Major Political Organizations In This Country: The Republican Party, The Democratic Party And The Koch Brothers Party. With Billions To Spend On Campaigns. Think Tanks And 'educational' Organizations, The Koch Brothers Are The Most Powerful. We Must Overturn Citizens United, Move To Public Funding Of Elections And Pass Real Tax Reform.

What I Think People Should Realize Is That Programs Like Social Security, Programs Like Medicare, Programs Like The Veterans Administration, Programs Like Your Local Park And Your Local Library - Those Are, If You Like, Socialist Programs; They're Run By [and] For The Public, Not To Make Money. I Think In Many Ways We Should Expand That Concept So That The American People Can Enjoy The Same Benefits That People All Over The World Are Currently Enjoying.

There's Issue Of A Corrupt Campaign Finance System, Where Big Money Interests And Wall Street Are Trying To Buy Elections.those Are The Issues That Are Resonating.

I Think What You've Got Are Millions Of People Who Are In Trouble Today. They Really Are. They're Confused. They're Working Longer Hours For Lower Wages. They're Seeing Productivity Going Up But Their Kids Are Worse Off Economically Than They Are. They're Looking At A Campaign Finance System In Politics And They See Corruption, Big Money Buying Elections. Nobody In Congress Is Listening To Them.

We Are Moving In Exactly The Wrong Direction In Higher Education. Forty Years Ago, Tuition In Some Of The Great American Public Universities And Colleges Was Virtually Free. Today, The Cost Is Unaffordable For Many Working Class Families. Higher Education Must Be A Right For All - Not Just Wealthy Families.

They Talk About Class Warfare -- The Fact Of The Matter Is There Has Been Class Warfare For The Last Thirty Years. It's A Handful Of Billionaires Taking On The Entire Middle-class And Working-class Of This Country. And The Result Is You Now Have In America The Most Unequal Distribution Of Wealth And Income Of Any Major Country On Earth And The Worst Inequality In America Since 1928. How Could Anybody Defend The Top 400 Richest People In This Country Owning More Wealth Than The Bottom Half Of America, 150 Million People?

I Fully, Fully Concede That Secretary Hillary Clinton, Who Was Secretary Of State For Four Years, Has More Experience - Hat Is Not Arguable - In Foreign Affairs.

Every Three Weeks Before An Election The Tv Ads Expressing Great Concern About Our Trade Policy And The Loss Of Jobs To China And Other Low-wage Countries. And Then It's Forgotten About The Day After The Election.

I Think, With Trump, The Major Point Is This Guy Has Business Enterprises All Over The World. And You're Looking Just At Immense, Immense Conflict Of Interest.

It's Not In The Interest Of The Corporations Who Own The Networks To Actually Be Educating The American People So That Are Debating The Real Issues. It's Much Better To Deflect Attention Away From Issues And Get Into The Story Of The Day.

Wall Street Has Enormous Power Over The Republican Party, Enormous Power Over The Democratic Party.

Democrats Need To Become A 50-state Party. You Can't Have A Great Party On The West Coast And The East Coast. You Need To Have A Party In All 50 States.

I Believe In Public Funding Of Elections, Absolutely. But This System Iscurrently Very Antiquated And No Longer Applies To Modern Day Politics.

No President, Not The Smartest, Best Human Being In The World Can Do It Alone. You Cannot Take On This, The Power That Is In Washington, To Billionaires And Lobbyist, The Military Industrial Complex, All Of This Money And Power, You Can`t Do It. You Need A Mass Movement Of American Who Are Looking In Congress And We Say Directly.

I Will Do My Best To Transform Our Trade Policy And Take On These Corporations Who Want To Invest In Low-income Countries Around The World Rather Than In The United States Of America.

I Don't Want To Get People Nervous Falling Off Their Chairs, But Social Security Is A Socialist Program. It's A Program By Which The United States Government Has Said That When You Get Old You Should Have A Steady Source Of Income.

Don`t Take It Out On The Muslims. Don`t Take It Out On Latinos. Try To Help Us Work Together To Create A Country Where Your Kids And You Can Have A Decent Standard Of Living. It Has To Be A Bold And Radical Agenda.

Working Together

In Terms Of Iran And In Terms Of Saudi Arabia, Of Course They Hate Each Other. That's No Great Secret. But John Kerry, Who Is I Think Doing A Very Good Job, Has Tried To At Least Get These People In The Room Together Because Both Of Them Are Being Threatened By Isis.

Big Business Is Willing To Destroy The Planet For Short-term Profits

The Billionaire Class Fully Understands What Is At Stake. That's Why A Handful Of Them Are Pouring Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Into The Current Elections. Their Goal Is Not To Strengthen The Middle Class, But Continue The Trend In Which The Rich Are Getting Richer At The Expense Of Everyone Else.

The Irs Says It Wants To Make Sure Companies Can Give Their Employees A Choice Between A New Cash Balance Plan And The Traditional Defined Benefit Plan. The Real Question Here Is Whether Companies Should Be Required To Give Their Workers That Choice.

Where America Has Got To Move Is Not Growth For The Sake Of Growth, But It`s Got To Move To A Society That Provides A High Quality Of Life For All Of Our People. In Other Words, If People Have Health Care As A Right, As Do The People Of Every Other Major Country, Then There's Less Worry About Growth. If People Have Educational Opportunity And Their Kids Can Go To College And They Have Child Care, Then There's Less Worry About Growth For The Sake Of Growth.

We Need To Take A Hard Look At The War On Drugs And The Number Of Non-violent Offenders Who End Up Getting Their Lives Destroyed By Going To Prison. We Need To Look At Mandatory Minimum Sentencing And Give Judges More Flexibility When There Are Issues Of Drug Abuse Or Addiction.

I Do Believe That We Should Substantially Lower Student Debt In This Country, Which Is Crushing Millions Of People. We Pay For It, In My View, By A Tax On Wall Street Speculation. The Middle Class Bailed Out Wall Street In Their Time Of Need. Now, It Is Wall Street's Time To Help The Middle Class.

I Don't Run Against Hillary Clinton. I Run On The Most Important Issues Facing America.

I Think, In My Own State, I Can Tell You That People Do Want To Hear A Serious Discussion On Serious Issues.

When My Republican Colleagues Talk About Family Values, They Mean That A Woman Should Not Be Able To Have The Right To Control Her Own Body; That Women Should Not Be Able To Purchase The Contraceptives That They Want. Those Are Their Family Values, Not Our Family Values.

Social Security Is A Promise That We Cannot And Must Not Break.

The First Thing That I've Got To Think About Is: What Does A Donald Trump Presidency Mean For The People Of My State And For The People Of This Country? And For The People Of The World? I Think It Would Be An Absolute Disaster. It Would Be Beyond A Disaster.

What My Campaign Is About Is A Political Revolution - Millions Of People Standing Up And Saying, Enough Is Enough. Our Government Belongs To All Of Us, And Not Just The Hand Full Of Billionaires.

Political Revolution

When You Look At Somebody Like A Netanyahu, To Simply Not Understand That This Is A Right-wing Politician, A Guy Who Kind Of Crashed The United States Congress To Give His Speech There, Ignoring President Obama, Not Even Consulting With Him, Using It For Political Purposes Back Home, A Guy Who Has Supported The Youth - The Growth Of Settlement, I Think The - The Overreaction And The Destruction Of Gaza Went Too, Too Far. Israel Should Not Be Bombing Schools Or Homes, Just Terrible Damage There.

I Have A Long History In Fighting For Civil Rights. I Understand That Many People In The African-american Community May Not Understand That.

I Think - You Know, I Can't Speak For 13 Million People, But I Think Most Of My Supporters Understand Trump Has Got To Be Defeated. We Need To Elect As Many Progressives As Possible. And We Need To Continue The Fight To Create An Agenda Which Works For Working Families And Not Just For Wealthy Campaign Contributors.

The Postal Service Is A Vitally Important Institution For The American People. It Must Be Saved.

The Democrats Have Got To Open The Door To Young People. Welcome Them In And Understand That It Will Be Messy, That Many Young People Are Not Professional Politicians. The Democratic Party Is Going To Have To Adjust Itself To Their Reality, Rather Than Force Young People To Be Adjusted To The Democratic Leadership's Reality.

We Need A Very Progressive And Strong Agenda To Bring People Into The Political Process Because I Worry Very Much About The Future Of The American Democracy Where So Many People Are Giving Up.

I Think We've Got A Number Of States Coming Up That We're Going To Do Extremely Well And Possibly Winning, Including California And New York State.so I Think We Do Have A Path To Victory.

I Believe The Democratic Party Has Got To Be Firmly On The Side Of Working Families, Taking On The Big Money Interests, Who Today, To A Very Significant Degree, Control Our Economic And Political Life.

Instead Of Fighting Isis, (the Saudis) Have Focused More On A Campaign To Oust Iran-backed Houthi Rebels In Yemen.

The Message Is Resonating, Not Just In Wisconsin, But All Over America, The People Are Sick And Tired Of Establishment Politics, Establishment Economics. They Want Real Change.

I Believe, Along With Pope Francis And Almost All Scientists, That Climate Change Is Threatening This Planet In Horrendous Ways, And That We Have To Be Aggressive In Transforming Our Energy System Away From Fossil Fuel And Defeat The Keystone Pipeline.

The Republican I Ran Against, At The End Of The Campaign, Had Decided That I Was "a Friend Of Terrorists" And "a Friend Of Pedophiles." That's The Kind Of Crap They Came Out With. I Expect That's The Kind Of Crap They'll Come Out With Again.

Low-income People, Racial Or Ethnic Minorities, Pregnant Women, Seniors, People With Special Needs, People In Rural Areas - They All Have A Much Harder Time Accessing A Dentist Than Other Groups Of Americans.

We Need A Growing Middle Class, Not One That Has Been Disappearing For 40 Years. We Need A Vibrant One Person-one Vote Democracy, Not One Which Is Dominated By Billionaire Campaign Contributors. It's Time For A Political Revolution. It's Time To Make Our Government Work For All Of Us, And Not Just The 1%.

Political Revolution

Sometimes The Media Says, Well, This State Had An Election, It's The End Of The Campaign. It Is Not. We Have Dozens Of More States To Go. We're Feeling Good About The Future.

In 2013 Citigroup Had Profits Of $6.4 Billion In The United States. They Paid No Federal Income Tax And, In Fact, Received A Rebate From The Irs Of $260 Million. That Same Year J.p. Morgan Had $17.2 Billion In Profits In The U.s. They Also Paid No Federal Income Tax. Do You Think It's Time For Tax Reform?

Giving Up Is Not An Option If We Want To Prevent Irreparable Harm To Our Planet.

Irreparable Harm

Democracy Is One Person, One Vote And A Full Discussion Of The Issues That Affect Us. Oligarchy Is Billionaires Buying Elections, Voter Suppression And A Concentrated Corporate Media Determining What We See, Hear And Read.

The Tpp Is Another Corporate-backed Agreement That Is The Latest In A Series Of Trade Policies Which Have Cost Us Millions Of Decent-paying Jobs, Pushed Down Wages For American Workers And Led To The Decline Of Our Middle Class. We Want American Companies To Create Decent-paying Jobs In America, Not Just Low-wage Countries Like Vietnam, Malaysia Or China. The Tpp Must Be Defeated.

The Disastrous Invasion Of Iraq, Something That I Strongly Opposed, Has Unraveled The Region.

I Would Have Put More Emphasis On Bringing Working Class People Together To Fight For A Government That Works For All Of Us.

Clearly We Must Do Everything We Can To Protect Our Country From The Serious Potential Of Another Terrorist Attack, But We Can And Must Do So In A Way That Also Protects The Constitutional Rights Of The American People And Maintains Our Free Society. We Can Do That Without Living In An Orwellian World Where The Government And Private Corporations Know Every Telephone Call That We Make, Every Website We Visit, Everyplace We Go.

The Goal Of Real Healthcare Reform Must Be High-quality, Universal Coverage In A Cost-effective Way.

Healthcare Reform

Black People Are Dying In This Country Because We Have A Criminal Justice System Which Is Out Of Control, A System In Which Over 50% Of Young African American Kids Are Unemployed. It Is Estimated That A Black Baby Born Today Has A One In Four Chance Of Ending Up In The Criminal Justice System.

The Issue Is To Trying To Figure Out Why We End Up Spending So Much More Than Other Countries.

At A Time When The Post Office Is Losing Substantial Revenue From The Instantaneous Flow Of Information By Email And On The Internet, Slowing Mail Service Is A Recipe For Disaster.

And The Reason That I Was One Of The First, Not One Of The Last To Be In Opposition To The Tpp Is That American Workers Should Not Be Forced To Compete Against People In Vietnam Today Making A Minimum Wage Of $0.65 An Hour. Look, What We Have Got To Do Is Tell Corporate America That They Cannot Continue To Shut Down. We've Lost 60,000 Factories Since 2001. They're Going To Start Having To, If I'm President, Invest In This Country - Not In China, Not In Mexico.

It Would, I Think, Be Hard For Anyone To Make The Case That The United States Is A Just Society Or Anything Close To A Just Society. In America Today, There Is Massive Injustice In Terms Of Income And Wealth Inequality. Injustice Is Rampant.

All That I Can Say Is That We Are Spending Far More Per Capita Than People In Any Other Country, And Our Health Care Outcomes Are In Many Cases Worse In Terms Of Life Expectancy, Infant Mortality And So Forth.

My Mission Is To Raise Incomes For Hard Working Middle Class Families. If You Work Hard And Do Your Part You Should Be Able To Get Ahead And Stay Ahead.

The American People Understand That It Is Grotesquely Unfair - We Are A Society That Prides Itself On Fairness, That Prides Itself On Equal Opportunity, And People Are Looking Out And Seeing, Since The Great Recession Of 2008, 99 Percent Of All New Income Going To The Top 1 Percent.

For Democrats To Win, They're Going To Have To Address The Needs Of Working People. They're Going To Have To Address The Needs Of The Middle Class. And That Means Standing Up To Wall Street, Standing Up To The Greed Of Corporate America. Even Now And Then, Standing Up To The Media. And That Means Having A Candidate Who Can Excite Working Families, Excite Young People, Bring Them Into The Political Process, Create A Large Voter Turnout.

I Don't Want To See Kids In America Being Scared Because They're Hearing People On Television And The Radio Saying Really Ugly Xenophobic And Racist Things.

Social Security Has Nothing To Do With The Deficit.

I Happen To Believe That One Of The Great Crises Facing The Planet Is Climate Change. Donald Trump Happens Not To Think That Climate Change Is Real. Hillary Clinton Takes It Seriously.

What Kind Of Nation Are We When We Give Tax Breaks To Billionaires, But We Can't Take Care Of The Elderly And The Children.

One In Four Corporations Doesn't Pay Any Taxes.

It Costs A Hell Of A Lot More Money To Put Somebody In Jail Than Send Them To The University Of Virginia.

We Can`t Allow Racism And Xenophobia To Gain Traction.

You Want To Know The Way To Raise Money? Put A Transaction Fee On Wall Street, So Maybe We Can Curb Some Of The Speculation And Raise Some Money.

Student Debt Is Crushing The Lives Of Millions Of Americans. How Does It Happen That We Can Get A Home Mortgage Or Purchase A Car With Interest Rates Half Of That Being Paid For Student Loans? We Must Make Higher Education Affordable For All. We Must Substantially Lower Interest Rates On Student Loans. This Must Be A National Priority.

I Would Say That The Key Doctrine Of The Sanders Administration Would Be No, We Cannot Continue To Do It Alone; We Need To Work In Coalition.

Most Republicans Are Not Prepared To Stand Up To The Fossil Fuel Industry Because They Get A Lot Of Their Campaign Funds From The Koch Brothers And Other People In The Fossil Fuel Industry. That Tells Me Why We Have To Reform Our Campaign Finance System.

Campaign Finance

In My View, One Of The Major Reasons That We Have So Many People In Jail Is That We Have Turned Our Backs On A Lot Young People.

When People Get Out Of Jail, It Is Not Easy For Them To Find A Job. It Is Not Easy For Them To Return To Civil Society.

All Of You Are Aware Of The Tragic History Of Racism In America, But For A Very Long Time, African-americans And Their White Allies Came Together And They Struggled And They Stood Up For Justice And They Stood Up To Lynching And They Stood Up To Segregation And The Stood Up To A Nation Where African-americans Couldn't Even Vote In America.

We Have To Fundamentally Rethink Our Trade Policy And Make It Work Not For The Ceos Of Large Corporations, But For Working People. So, If Trump Wants To Develop A Rational Trade Policy Which Demands Corporations Start Investing In This Country, Rather Than China, That's Something That We Can Work On.

As A Result Of The Citizens United Supreme Court Decision, American Democracy Is Being Undermined By The Ability Of The Koch Brothers And Other Billionaire Families. These Wealthy Contributors Can Literally Buy Politicians And Elections By Spending Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars In Support Of The Candidates Of Their Choice. We Need To Overturn Citizens United And Move Toward Public Funding Of Elections So That All Candidates Can Run For Office Without Being Beholden To The Wealthy And Powerful.

I Know Media Is Not Necessarily Focused On These Things. But What A Campaign Is About Is Not Hillary Clinton, It's Not Donald Trump. It Is The People Of This Country, People Who Are Working Longer Hours For Lower Wages, People Who Do Not Have Health Care Or Are Underinsured.

Here Is What The Practical Impact Of Citizens United Means. What Citizens United Means Is That Corporations Call Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Into Television Ads, Radio Ads, And Other Forms Of Advertising To Defeat Those Candidates Who Stand Up And Take Them On.

For Better Or Worse, When Sen. Inhofe Speaks, The Republican Party Follows. And When The Republican Party Follows, It Is Impossible To Get Real Work Done In The Congress.

I Am Not A Great Fan Of The Payroll Tax Holiday Because I'm Nervous About What It Does To The Future Of Social Security.

What Are The Moral Implications? What Do These People Do When They Have Tremendous Amounts Of Money? They Use That Money To Perpetuate Their Own Wealth And Their Own Power. Every Day, Congress Works On Behalf Of Big-money Interests.

I Think My Main Concern Is Because I Worry About Demagoguery. It`s Real. You See The People Standing Up There And Applauding.

The Truth Is We Have A Political System And An Economic System Controlled By A Few Extremely Wealthy People. Not Barack Obama, Not Bernie Sanders, No One Person Has The Influence By Himself Or Herself To Take On This Enormous Array Of Power Unless Millions Of People Begin To Work Together To Demand Changes.

If We Are A Free Country, We Have The Right To Be Free.

We Have To Invest In Our Kids, We Have To Invest In Our Communities, We Have To Create Jobs. We Have To Make Certain That Kids Are Not Dropping Out Of School And Hanging Out On Street Corners.

The Federal Reserve Has A Responsibility To Ensure The Safety And Soundness Of Financial Institutions And To Contain Systemic Risks In Financial Markets.

Donald Trump Is Toast.

One Can't Predict The Future, That Maybe Our Training And Their Fighting Capabilities Are Improving And We Are Going To Make Some Progress In Destroying Isis.

We're Going To Stand With Working People. We're Going To Take On The Billionaire Class. We're Going The Take On The Drug Companies And The Insurance Companies. We're Going The Take On Wall Street. That's Where I Think The Future Of The Democratic Party Lies.

The American People Want To Raise The Minimum Wage. Every Poll Tells Us That. That Bill Will Not Get To The Floor Of The Senate. The American People Want To Ask The Rich To Pay More In Taxes. But The Legislation That Will Get To The Floor Is Tax Breaks For Billionaires.

I'm Interested In - In That His Power, If That Is The Word, Is Such That He Has Actually Been Able To Be In A Way A One-man Wrecking Crew In The Area Of Deportment And How One Proceeds Politically On The Stump. Marco Rubio Is - Is Attempting, As You Know, To A - To Give [donald] Trump A Fight In Trump's Own Style. I'm Not Sure How That Works, But - But Certainly The Indices Are Good.

What A Grassroots Party Is About Is People Getting Excited, Getting Involved In The Local Political Process, Saying, We Want Our Candidate To Run For Office, We Want Him To Run For Office, And We're Going To Get Involved And Make Sure That He Or She Wins.

If We Invest In Jobs For Our Kids And Do Our Best To Keep Them In School, We Will End Up Saving A Whole Lot Of Lives And Whole Lot Of Money.

The American People Must Make A Fundamental Decision. Do We Continue The 40-year Decline Of Our Middle Class And The Growing Gap Between The Very Rich And Everyone Else, Or Do We Fight For A Progressive Economic Agenda That Creates Jobs, Raises Wages, Protects The Environment And Provides Health Care For All?

Instead Of Talking About Cuts In Social Security, Medicare And Medicaid, We Must End The Absurdity Of Corporations Not Paying A Nickel In Federal Income Taxes.

Medicare And Medicaid

Whether It Is Television, Radio, Newspapers, Magazines, Books Or The Internet, A Few Giant Conglomerates Are Determining What We See, Hear And Read.

You've Got The Top 400 Americans Owning More Wealth Than The Bottom 150 Million Americans. Most Folks Do Not Think That Is Right.

The Problems We Face, Did Not Come Down From The Heavens. They Are Made, They Are Made By Bad Human Decisions, And Good Human Decisions Can Change Them.

We Are Going To Fight To Pass The Long Over-due Equal Rights Amendment.

We Have To Transform Our Energy System.

Hillary Clinton Is On Record Supporting A Doubling Of Community Health Centers In This Country, Which Will Mean That Tens Of Millions Of People - Poor People - Will Have Access To Health Care That Do Not Have It Today. Is That Significant? It Is Very Significant.

All I Can Say Is If You Check My Record Going Back A Long Time, I Have Stood With Those Who Are Hurting. I Have Stood With Those Who Have No Money.

Who Said That Think We Should Normalize Relations With Iran Tomorrow? I Never Said That. I Think We Should Move Forward As Quickly As We Can.

It's Very Easy To Make Fun Of George W.bush, But That Ain't Going To Do It. What We Have To Do Is Knock On Doors And Go Into Communities Where There Are People Who Disagree With Us On Certain Issues.and We Have To Talk To Them. They're Our Friends. They're Our Allies. They're Our Co-workers. We Can't See Them As Enemies.

Any Idiot, Especially One Who Is Prepared To Die, Who Has A Gun, Can Start Shooting Up People.

The Point Is Change Can Come About, But It Only Comes About When Millions Of People Are Actively Involved In Political Struggle, The Billionaires May Have The Money, But We Have The People.

On Many, Many Issues, Hillary Clinton's Views Are Progressive. In Many Areas, They Are Awesome. Where They're Not Progressive, We've Got To Push Her, And The Day After The Election, I Will Mobilize Millions Of People To Make Sure That We Make Her The Most Progressive President That She Can Be.

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