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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.

-Bernie Sanders

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This Is What Oligarchy

Bernie Sanders

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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.

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The Republicans Are Many Things, But They're Not Dumb. And If Millions Of People Begin To Stand Up And Fight Back, They're Going To Be Thinking Twice About Doing Very Bad Things.

Not Only Did I Vote Against That War, I Helped Lead The Opposition, And If You Go To My Website, Berniesanders.com, You Will See The Statement That I Made In 2002. And It Gives Me No Pleasure To Tell You That Much Of What I Feared Would Happen The Day After Saddam Hussein Was Overthrown, In Fact, Did Happen.

When We Are Fighting For Huge Stakes - We're Fighting For The Future - Future Of The Planet In Terms Of Climate Change. We're Fighting For The Future Of American Democracy.

I Want To Break Up The Wall Street Banks. Hillary Clinton Doesn't. I Want To Raise The Minimum Wage To 15 Bucks An Hour. She Wants $12 An Hour. I Voted Against The War In Iraq. She Voted For The War In Iraq. I Believe We Should Ban Fracking. She Does Not. I Believe We Should Have Tax On Carbon And Deal Aggressively With Climate Change. That Is Not Her Position.

In The 1980s And 1990s, Jack Welch, The Ceo Of General Electric, Laid Off Over 100,000 Employees. His Reward? When He Retired From Ge, He Received A Golden Parachute Of Over $400 Million Dollars. This Is The Kind Of Corporate Greed And Irresponsibility That Is Destroying The Middle Class And Must Be Ended.

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.

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

Not Just For The U.s. Senate But It Also Means For School Board And City Council. We Need To Revitalize American Democracy. We Need To Have People At All - All Over This Country, Having The Courage To Take On Big Money And Demand A Set Of Policies That Work For All Of Us And Not Just For The Few.

High-speed Trains In Japan Can Now Reach 375 Mph - Twice As Fast As Any Public Transit Train In The United States. America's Railroads Were Once The Envy Of The World. Today They Are In Disrepair And We Are Falling Further And Further Behind The Rest Of The World. We Need To Rebuild Our Crumbling Infrastructure, Including Rail. When We Do That We Not Only Make Our Country More Productive And Efficient, We Create Millions Of New Jobs.

[iranians] Are A Sponsor Of Terrorism Around The World And We Have To Address That.

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

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.

We Must Fundamentally Restructure Our Student Loan Program. It Makes No Sense That Students And Their Parents Are Forced To Pay Interest Rates For Higher Education Loans That Are Much Higher Than They Pay For Car Loans Or Housing Mortgages.

After All, Wall Street Is Clearly The Most Powerful Lobbying Force On Capitol Hill. From 1998 Through 2008, The Financial Sector Spent Over $5 Billion In Lobbying And Campaign Contributions To Deregulate Wall Street.

I Would Like To See Somebody Who Speaks For The Underdog, For The People Who Don`t Have This In Healthcare Benefits. So I Would Like To See A Candidate Who Has The Guts To Opposition That America Could Be A Land For All People, Not Just The Land Control By The Super Rich.

I Think People Have A Right To Speak. And You Have A Right If You're On A College Campus Not To Attend. You Have A Right To Ask Hard Questions About The Speaker If You Disagree With Him Or Her.

The Greed Of The Billionaire Class Has Got To End And We Are Going To End It For Them.

Education Should Be A Right, Not A Privilege. We Need A Revolution In The Way That The United States Funds Higher Education.

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.

If You Take Donations From Wall Street, You Can't Be Independent.

We Must Never Allow Demagogues To Divide Us Up By Race, By Religion, By National Origin, By Gender, Or Sexual Orientation. Black And Whites, Latino, Asian-american, Native American, Christian, Jew, Muslim, And Every Religion - Straight Or Gay, Male Or Female - We Must Stand Together. This Country Belongs To All Of Us.

Native American

I Think We Need To Take On The Greed Of The Billionaire Class, A Disastrous Campaign Finance System.

You Need A Democratic Party Which Is A Grassroots Party, Which Makes Decisions From The Bottom On Up, Not Just From The Top On Down.

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.

As A Result Of The Digital Age And The Decline Of First-class Mail, There Is No Question That The Postal Service Must Change And Develop A New Business Model.

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.

I Would Say That, You Know, Being Jewish, What Has Been Most Significant In My Life Is Understanding What A Hitler - What Horrible Politics Can Mean To People And I Think That's Been One Of The Motivating Factors In My Life In Fighting Against Racism And Bigotry Of All Kinds Because When It Gets Out Of Hand, As We Have Seen And We Are, You Know - It's Obviously Has Unbelievable Repercussions.

The American People In Congress Have Got To Ask Themselves A Very Simple Question. Why Are We The Only Major Country On Earth Not To Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right?

These Are The Same People Who Believe, In Some Cases, The Federal Government Should Not Play Any Role In Providing Health Care To Our People Or Protecting The Environment.

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 Think The Issue Of Income And Wealth Inequality Is In Fact A Moral Issue.

I Thought The Bush Economic Policy Was A Disaster. We Lost 500,000 Private Sector Jobs During His Tenure.

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

The Decision Is I'm Going To Do Everything I Can To Fight For The Working Class Of This Country, The Low-income People Against Income And Wealth Inequality, Do Everything We Can About Climate Change.

I Think, Clearly, We Got To Work Closely With China To Resolve The Serious Problems We Have, And I Worry About Putin And His Military Adventurism In The Crimea And The Ukraine.

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As The Longest Serving Independent In The History Of The United States Congress, As Somebody Who Came Into Office By Defeating An Incumbent Democratic Mayor In Burlington, Vermont, I Know Something About Third Party Politics. And I Respect Jill [stein].

I Voted Against The War In Iraq. I Voted Against The First Gulf War. I Think War Is The Last Resort - The Last Option Of A Great Military Power Like Us. I Think That We Need To Focus On Building Coalitions. Yes, Isis Must Be Destroyed. But It Should Be Destroyed By A Coalition Of Muslim Nations On The Ground With The Support Of The United States And The Other Major Powers In The Air And In Training The Troops There.

I Think It's Important That Members Of The United States Senate Spend Time Not Just On Capitol Hill But Making Contact With Ordinary People And Engaging Them In The Political Process.

If You Look At Virtually All Of The Issues Of Importance To The People Of America - Issues Like Making Public Colleges And Universities Tuition-free - Hillary Clinton Is Now On Record For Doing That For People Making $125,000 A Year Or Less. You Know What? That Is Pretty Revolutionary. That Will Transform The Lives Of Millions Of Families In This Country. That's What Clinton Stands For.

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We Have To Transform Our Energy System.

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We Have To Say To The Billionaire Class, Enough Is Enough. You Cannot Have It All. You Are Going To Pay More In Taxes.

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I Think That The Media Spends Far Too Much Time [on Personalities].

I Am Going To Do My Best To Try To Create A Country In Which Children Are Not Living In Poverty, In Which Kids Can Go To College, In Which Old People Have Health Care. Will I Succeed? I Can't Guarantee You That, But I Can Tell You That From A Human Point Of View It Is Better To Show Up Than To Give Up.

If You Ask Me About My Views On The Environment, On Women's Rights, On Gay Rights, I Am Liberal. I Don't Have A Problem With That At All. Some Of My Best Friends Are Liberal.

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

I've Run For Statewide Office Plenty Of Times, And People Know Me.

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 Think You Have An Enormous Amount Of Fear And Uncertainty In This Country. And It`s Not Just From San Bernardino Or From Paris.

It's Better To Show Up Than To Give Up.

Donald Trump's Language Has Been Atrocious, His Behavior Toward Women.

The Light Bulb Going Off In My Head Was A Fear That In This Pivotal Moment In History, When America Faces So Many Serious Problems, When The Middle Class And Working Class Of This Country Are Being Decimated, That There Were Not Voices Out There Representing The Tens Of Millions Of People Who Needed A Voice. And The Idea Of Going Through A Campaign Where There Is Not A Serious Discussion About The Most Important Issues Facing America, Where There Are Not Voices Out There Representing People Who Are Hurting - That Seemed To Me Unacceptable.

There Is Nobody That I Know Who Believes That Bank Of America Is A Human Being Who Should Be Entitled For The Same Constitutional Rights That The People Of Our Country Are.

Washington Is Dominated By Big Money.

A Nation Will Not Survive Morally Or Economically When So Few Have So Much And So Many Have So Little.

Economic Inequality

We Had The Opposition Of Virtually The Entire Democratic Leadership In Every State In This Country.

It's Absurd We Remain The Only Major Country On Earth Not To Guarantee Health Care To All People And Paid Family And Medical Leave.

The Last Point That I'd Make. I Had A Hearing. I Had All Of The Veterans Groups In Front Of Me. And I Said To Them, Tell Me When A Veteran Gets In To The V.a., Understanding There Are Waiting Lines And Real Problems, When A Veteran Gets Into The System, Is The Quality Of Care Good?

Can I Work With Corporations? Are There Good Corporations Doing Incredible Cutting Edge Research And Development? Absolutely They Are. And We Should Be Proud Of Them.

Research And Development

I Think, When The African-american Community Understands My Record On Criminal Justice, My Record On Economics, The Agenda We're Bringing Forth, Raising The Minimum Wage To $15 An Hour, Dealing With The Fact That We Have More People In Jail, Shamefully, Than Any Other Country On Earth, That I Am Against The Death Penalty, Secretary Clinton Is Not, I Think, As People Become Familiar With My Ideas, We Are Going To Do Better And Better.

This Is What I Would Ask Of The American People, And That Is, And The Media Does Not Do This Terribly Often - Put Things In Contact.

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

I Come From A Rural State. People Drive 50, 100 Miles To And From Work Every Single Day. That Is True All Over America.

I've Lost Six Different Times. You Can't Say, 'well, He Lost, That's The End Of The World.' You Have To Say, 'okay, You Lost, What Did We Do Wrong?

Israel Has An Absolute Right To Exist - Not Only To Exist - But To Exist In A Way That They're Not Under Threat Of Terrorism.

Hillary Clinton And I Have Worked Together On A Higher Education Proposal Which Will Guarantee Free Tuition In Public Colleges And Universities For Every Family In This Country Making $125,000 A Year Or Less. We're Going To Fight For Paid Family And Medical Leave. Those Are The Issues That The American People Want To Hear Discussed, And I'm Going To Go Around The Country Discussing Them And Making Sure That Hillary Clinton Is Elected President.

In Any Democratic, Civilized - Even Non-democratic Nations, If You Are A Nation, It Means To Say That In Our Case, If There's A Hurricane In Louisiana, The People Of Vermont Are There For Them. If There's A Tornado In The Midwest, We Are There For Them. If There's Flooding In The East Coast, The People In California Are There For Us.

Kid Gets Caught With Marijuana, That Kid Has A Police Record. A Wall Street Executive Destroys The Economy, $5 Billion Settlement With The Government, No Criminal Record. That Is What Power Is About. That Is What Corruption Is About. And That Is What Has To Change In The United States Of America.

I Know That Virtually Every Member Of The Senate Understands We Just Cannot Turn Our Back On Men And Women Who Have Put Their Lives On The Line To Defend Us And Who Are Hurting Today.

I Talked To A Lot Of Black Lives Activists In Various States. What I Learned Is That The Relationship Of Police Departments Around The Country With The Black Community Is Far, Far More Severe And Awful Than I Had Originally Known.

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.

We Are Living At A Time Where A Handful Of People Have Wealth Beyond Comprehension - Huge Yachts, Jet Planes, Tens Of Billions Of Dollars, More Money Than They Could Spend In A Thousand Lifetimes. But At The Same Time, Millions Of People Are Struggling To Feed Their Families Or Put A Roof Over Their Heads Or Find The Money To Go To A Doctor.

I Do Not Want To See Perpetual Warfare In The Middle East.

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.

Do Not Tell Me That I Have Not Shown Courage In Standing Up To The Gun People, In Voting To Ban Assault Weapons, Voting For Instant Background Checks, Voting To End The Gun Show Loophole And Now In A Position To Create A Consensus In America On Gun Safety.

Assault Weapons

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

It Is Time To Tax And Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol. It Is Time To End The Arrests Of So Many People And The Destruction Of So Many Lives For Possessing Marijuana.

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.

People All Over This Country Are Shouting At Each Other. And What We Need To Do Is Bring People Together To Work On The Agreement Where There Is Broad Consensus And That's What I Intend To Do.

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

I'm A United States Senator, And I Have A Responsibility To The People Of My State - Also To The People Of This Country.

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?

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.

I Am On The Health Education Labor Committee. That Committee Wrote The Affordable Care Act. The Idea I Would Dismantle Health Care In America While We're Waiting To Pass A Medicare For All Is Just Not Accurate.

Health Education

Trickle Down Economics Is A Fraud. Giving Tax Breaks To The Rich And Large Corporations Does Not Create Jobs. It Simply Makes The Rich Richer, Enlarges The Deficit And Increases Income And Wealth Inequality. We Need Economic Policies Which Benefit Working Families, Not The Billionaire Class.

Together, Leading The World, The U.s.a. Will Rid Our Planet Of This Barbarous Organization Called Isis.

When Millions Of People Stand Up And Fight...they Win.

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

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.

I Don't Believe In Trashing My Opponents. I've Never Run A Negative Ad In My Life. I Believe In Talking About Issues, Sometimes Fighting For The Media To Talk About The Issues, But That's What I Do, And The People Will Decide.

...poverty In America Today Leads Not Only To Anxiety, Unhappiness, Discomfort And A Lack Of Material Goods. It Leads To Death. Poverty In America Today Is A Death Sentence For Tens And Tens Of Thousands Of Our People.

There's No Question To My Mind And I Think No Question To Any Objective Observer's Mind That The Dnc Was Supporting Hillary Clinton And Was At Opposition To Our Campaign. So I'm Not Quite Shocked By This. And That Is Why Many, Many Months Ago I Made It Clear That I Thought Debbie Wasserman Schultz Should Resign, Should Step Down.

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.

Donald Trump Is Toast.

The Democratic Party Has Been Very Strong In A Lot Of Areas, In Fighting To Make Our Country A Less Discriminatory Country. And That Is Enormously Important.

What The Supreme Court Did In Citizens United Is To Say To These Same Billionaires And The Corporations They Control: 'you Own And Control The Economy, You Own Wall Street, You Own The Coal Companies, You Own The Oil Companies. Now, For A Very Small Percentage Of Your Wealth, We're Going To Give You The Opportunity To Own The United States Government.' This Is The Essence Of What Citizens United Is All About - And That's Why It Must Be Overturned.

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.

What Does A Political Revolution Look Like? It Means That 80 Percent Of The People Vote In National Elections, Not 40 Percent. It Means That Billionaires Can't Make Unlimited Campaign Contributions And Buy And Sell Politicians. It Means That The U.s. Government Represents The Needs Of All The People, Not Just The 1 Percent And Their Lobbyists.

Political Revolution

Campaigns And Elections Are Not A Game. They're Not A Game. They're About Trying To Change America. We're The Wealthiest Country In The History Of The World. We Should Not Be Having Flint, Michigan, Or African-american Communities All Over This Country Where Schools Are Failing. Those Are The Issue We Got To Pay Attention To And Not At This As Come Kind Of Silly Game. And That Is The Critique That Bothers Me. That's What Bothers Me About Media Coverage.

Brothers And Sisters: Now Is Not The Time For Thinking Small, Now Is Not The Time For The Same-old, Same-old Establishment Politics And Stale Inside-the-beltway Ideas.

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

At A Time Of Massive Inequality, I Think We Can Raise Substantial Sums Of Revenue To Address The Needs Of Working Families, The Elderly, And The Children, By Asking Those People Who Are Doing Phenomenally Well To Start Paying Their Fair Share.

I Will Challenge Anybody With Regard To My Record On Lgbt Issues.

When We Talk About The Healthcare Crisis In America We've Got To Also Be Talking About The Dental Crisis And How To Address It.

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

Let's Ask Why It Is That We Pay, By Far, The Highest Prices In The World For Prescription Drugs, And Your Medicine Can Be Doubled Tomorrow, And There's Nothing That The Government Can Do To Stop It.

I Was Not A Great Student At The University Of Chicago. I Think That Is - The Record Will Bare Me Out. But I Spent A Lot Of Time Reading History, Sociology, Psychology - Reading Everything Except What I Was Supposed To Read For Class The Next Day.

I Am Deeply Concerned - About Virtually Everything That Trump Is Talking About And Has Talked About In His Campaign And The Kind Of People That He Is Appointing.

In Community After Community, There Are Unemployment Rates Among Young African-americans Of 30 To 40 Percent. Thirty To 40 Percent! Kids Have No Jobs, They Have No Future. That Is An Issue That Has Got To Be Dealt With Simultaneously As We Deal With Police Brutality, Voter Suppression And The Other Attacks That Are Taking Place On The African-american Community.

The Future Of The Democratic Party, The Future Of This Country Is Involving Young People In The Political Process, Getting Them To Stand Up For Their Rights, Dealing With Student Debt, Which I Got To Tell You Is Just Crushing People All Over This Country, Making Public Colleges And Universities Tuition Free, Those Are The Ideas We Are Bringing Out, Demanding The Wealthy And Large Corporations Start Paying Their Fair Share Of Taxes. This Is What Younger People, Working Class People Want. That Is The Future Of The Democratic Party.

I Think Our Message,the Clinton Campaign Was Very Strong. Remember, This Is Their Fourth Campaign In South Carolina. Two For Bill Clinton. Two For Hillary Clinton. They Had It Well Organized. They Did Well. And Icongratulate Them. We Came Into That State At Something Like 7 Or 8 Percent In The Polls. It Was A Tough Road For Us To Hoe. But I Want To Thank All Of Our Supporters, The Members Of The South Carolina State Legislature.

The United States Must Lead The World In Reversing Climate Change. We Can Do That.

The Fed Has Got To Become A More Democratic Institution That Is Responsive To The Needs Of The Middle Class, Not Just Wall Street Ceos.

If We Can Create A Climate Among People That Says That Any Serious Candidate For President, Senate, Governor, [the] House Is Going To Have To Talk About Income Inequality, Raising Wages In America, Trade Policy - That's A Huge Success. It's Not Putting Pressure On A Candidate. It's Mobilizing People.

It's Time To Make Our Government Work For All Of Us... And Not Just The 1%.

Government Work

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.

If You Looked At Jeb Bush's Campaign, It's More Than Just Money. It's The Nature Of The Candidate And The Message And All That Stuff.

We Are Living In The Richest Country In The History Of The World, Yet We Have The Highest Rate Of Childhood Poverty Of Almost Any Major Country And Millions Of People Are Struggling To Put Food On The Table. It Is My Absolute Conviction That Everyone In This Country Deserves A Minimum Standard Of Living And We've Got To Go Forward In The Fight To Make That Happen.

I Intend To Introduce Legislation That Will Make Police Accountable For Their Actions And Limit Uses Of Force In Cases Where It Is Unnecessary.

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.

I Have Not Heard Almost Anybody Suggest That Raising The Minimum Wage To The Level We Have In Vermont Has Been An Impediment To Our Economy Which Is Doing Reasonably Well ... If Somebody Is Going To Work That Person Has Got To Receive At Least A Wage That They Can Go Out And Live With Dignity On. That's An Extremely Important Point.

We're Not Going To Give Tax Breaks To Billionaires And Then Cut Back On The Needs Of Our Elderly Or Poor Or Kids Or Education. We're Not Going To Privatize Social Security - In Fact, We're Going To Strengthen It. We're Going To Provide Quality Education For Every Kid In America, From Preschool Through College. We Have To Take On These Corporate Leaders Who Are Selling Out The American People, Whose Allegiance Is Now Much More To China Than It Is To The United States. If We Have The Courage To Take These People On, I Think We Can Overwhelm George W. Bush And His Friends.

I Think We Should Look To Countries Like Denmark, Like Sweden And Norway, And Learn From What They Have Accomplished For Their Working People.

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.

I Have Been In The Democratic Caucus In The Senate For Over 24 Years.

In And Out Of Government, I've Always Been Willing To Take On Complicated, Sometimes Unpopular, Issues And Work Them Through To Have A Solution.

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.

Hillary Clinton Is A Person Who Has Enormous - I Have Enormous Respect For, Has A Very Distinguished Career.

It's No Great Secret, Number One, In My View, And I Think The View Of Most Americans, That Congress Itself Is Pretty Dysfunctional. We Are Not Addressing The Real Needs Of The American People. And Second Of All, Philosophically, There Is A Huge Division Between The House And The Senate.

I Think The Democratic Party Has Got To Make Fundamental Choices.

Ever Since [donald]trump Has Been Opening His Big Mouth, You`re Seeing All These Bitter People, Latent Racists Who Are Becoming Emboldened. You`re Seeing Some Ugly Stuff Happening Around This Country.

Do I Consider Myself A Part Of The Casino Capitalist Process? No I Don't. I Believe In A Society Where All People Do Well.

This Is A Very Important Issue That The Corporate Media Chooses Not To Talk About A Whole Lot, That We Have An Economic System Which Is Rigged, Which Means That At The Same Time As The Middle Class Of This Country Is Disappearing, Almost All Of The New Income And Wealth In America Is Going To The Top 1 Percent. You Have The Top One-tenth Of 1 Percent Owning Almost As Much Wealth As The Bottom 90 Percent - 58 Percent Of All New Income Is Going To The Top 1 Percent.

People Are Hurting And Angry, And They Want Something To Be Able To Stand Up And Fight For. That's What I Believe The Antidote Is To Trumpism.

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

Republicans Talk A Good Game About Veterans, But When It Came To Put Money On The Line To Protect Our Veterans, Frankly, They Were Not There.

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.

Countering Violent Extremism And Destroying Isis Must Be Done Primarily By Muslim Nations With The Strong Support Of Their Global Partners.

This Is What Income Inequality Means In America, And Why The Gap Between The Very Rich And Everyone Else Is Growing Wider. According To A Recent Study, Ceo Pay Is Now 295 Times More Than The Pay Of A Typical Worker. In 1965, The Differential Was 20 Times. We Must Create An Economy That Works For All, Not Just The Top 1%.

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.

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.

We Don`t Need To Drive Up The National Debt By Giving Tax Breaks To Millionaires And Billionaires.

A Job Should Lift Workers Out Of Poverty, Not Keep Them In It.

It Is Not Good Enough To Say, "well, Hey, I Vote Every Two Years. I Vote Every Four Years." That's Fine, But That Is Not Good Enough.

Not Good Enough

I Think The Way For [marco] Rubio To Say To [donald] Trump Supporters, Hey, Essentially He's Conned You. He's A Con Man. That's What They Do. You Pour Gold People.my Goodness, That's Not The Way To Bring Them In.

What The People Here Have Said Is That Given The Enormous Crises Facing Our Country, It Is Just Too Late For The Same Old, Same Old Establishment Politics And Establishment Economics.

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.

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.

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

As A United States Senator, I've Got To Do Everything That I Can To Make Sure That Trump Does Not Become President.

To My Mind, What Is Most Important Now Is The Defeating Of The Worst Candidate For President That I Have Seen In My Lifetime, Donald Trump, Who Is Not Qualified To Be President By Temperament, Not Qualified To Be President By The Ideas That He Has Brought Forth.

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.

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

I Believe Strongly That We Can Protect Our People Without Undermining Our Constitutional Rights And I Worry Very, Very Much About The Huge Attacks On Privacy That We Have Seen In Recent Years - Both From The Government And The Private Sector. I Worry That We Are Moving Toward An Orwellian Society, And This Is Something I Will Oppose As Vigorously As I Can.

Every Candidate Running For President Has Got To Answer The Following Very Simple Question: At A Time When We Need To Address The Planetary Crisis Of Climate Change, And Transform Our Energy System Away From Fossil Fuels And Into Energy Efficiency And Sustainability, Should We Continue To Give $135 Billion In Tax Breaks And Subsidies Over The Next Decade To Fossil Fuel Companies?

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

The Good News Is That We've Seen In Recent Years Significant Reductions In The Cost Of Solar Panels And Wind Production. We Know How Significant An Impact We Can Have By Moving Towards Energy Efficiency And Transforming Our Transportation System. So We Know What Has To Be Done. We Have To Develop The Political Will To Do It, And, As President, This Would Be An Issue Of Huge Concern To Me.

Defy The Pundits Again And Reach For A High Voter Turnout That'll Shock The Establishment.

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

We Need To Demilitarize Local Police Departments So That They Do Not Look Like Occupying Armies. We Want Police Departments That Look Like The Communities They Are Serving.

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.

Because Of A Mass Media More Interested In Gossip And Sensationalism Than Real Issues, I Would Say A Vast Majority Of The American Public Doesn't Have A Clue About How The Congress Functions And What Goes On.

To The Degree That Mr. Trump Is Serious About Pursuing Policies That Improve The Lives Of Working Families In America, I And Other Progressives Are Prepared To Work With Him. To The Degree That He Pursues Racist, Sexist, Xenophobic And Anti-environment Policies, We Will Vigorously Oppose Him.

I Think Donald Trump Is Totally Unfit To Be President Of The United States. Let's Not Forget, This Guy Was One Of The Leaders Of The So-called Birther Movement, Which Was An Effort To Delegitimize The Presidency Of The First African-american President We Have Ever Had.

We Are Going To Do Everything That We Can To Protect Working Families In This Country.

I Don't Represent Large Corporations And I Don't Want Their Money.

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

In My View, A Corporation Is Not A Person. A Corporation Does Not Have First Amendment Rights To Spend As Much Money As It Wants, Without Disclosure, On A Political Campaign.

Every Person In America Will Know What Donald Trump Said And What He Is Doing.

I Think Donald Trump Understood That There Are Many Millions Of People In America, The Working Middle Class, Who Are Really Hurting. They Are In Pain.

What Democratic Socialism Is About Is Saying That It Is Immoral And Wrong That The Top One-tenth Of 1 Percent In This Country Own Almost 90 Percent - Almost - Own Almost As Much Wealth As The Bottom 90 Percent. That It Is Wrong, Today, In A Rigged Economy, That 57 Percent Of All New Income Is Going To The Top 1 Percent. That When You Look Around The World, You See Every Other Major Country Providing Health Care To All People As A Right, Except The United States.

Democratic Socialism

Social Security Has Nothing To Do With The Deficit.

I Very Strongly Supported The Agreement Which Makes Certain That Iran Does Not Get A Nuclear Weapon.

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.

Today, The United States Is No. 1 In Corporate Profits, No. 1 In Ceo Salaries, No. 1 In Childhood Poverty And No. 1 In Income And Wealth Inequality In The Industrialized World.

The Occupy Wall Street Protests Are Shining A National Spotlight On The Most Powerful, Dangerous And Secretive Economic And Political Force In America.

Social Security Is The Most Successful Government Program In Our Nation's History. We Are Not Going To Cut Social Security! We Are Going To Expand Social Security!

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.

I Think In Terms Of Who Can Be Trusted, I Think The Evidence Is Clear That There Has Been No Candidate That I Have Ever Seen Who Lies More Often Than Does Donald Trump. I Mean And That's Just Not Me Saying It, That's What Any Independent Media Analysis Has Shown. So In Terms Of Trust, You Really Can't Trust A Word, I Think, That Mr. Trump Has To Say.

You Know, I Think Many People Have The Mistaken Impression That Congress Regulates Wall Street. In Truth That's Not The Case. The Real Truth Is That Wall Street Regulates The Congress.

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.

It Is Incomprehensible That Drug Companies Still Get Away With Charging Americans Twice As Much, Or More, Than Citizens Of Canada Or Europe For The Exact Same Drugs Manufactured By The Exact Same Companies.

I Think What The Secretary Hillary Clinton Has Recognized Is The American People Are Extremely Angry About The Power Of Wall Street, The Greed, The Illegal Behavior Of Wall Street.

A Woman Has The Right To Make Decisions Regarding Her Own Body, Not The United States Government.

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.

I Very Strongly Disagreed With President Clinton On The Deregulation Of Wall Street. I Opposed That Strenuously.

What Some Of Us Believe Is That It Is Possible That If Chemicals Are Related To Gulf War Illness That Some Of The More Severe Symptoms May Not Erupt Until 10 Or 20 Years Down The Line.

A Guy Named Adolf Hitler Won An Election In 1932 ... And 50 Million People Died As A Result ... What I Learned As A Little Kid Is That Politics Is, In Fact, Very Important.

I Believe That Climate Change Is The Great Global Crisis That We Face, Environmental Crisis. I Believe That If You're Serious About Climate Change, You Don't Encourage The Excavation And Transportation Of Very Dirty Oil.

One In Four Corporations Doesn't Pay Any Taxes.

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