Shahab M., an incoming UC Davis junior who was youngest Northern California volunteer on the Barack Obama 2008 Presidential Campaign, writes to us from Netroots Nation:
From July 15th through July 19th, I had the pleasure of attending the Netroots Nation conference in Phoenix, Arizona, which is the largest gathering of progressive activist leaders in the nation. The conference was well organized and it was clear that after over a decade of holding such conferences, the organizers had the skills and the experience to ensure the smooth flow of events at the conference. Panel discussions made up the vast majority of my time at the conference, with topics ranging from Facebook Ads to U.S. Foreign Policy, all with a progressive focus.
Throughout the conference, I was looking forward to Saturday morning, when Martin O’Malley and Bernie would both engage in a question-and-answer session with a leading progressive journalist from the Los Angeles Times. Finally, the day of the event dawned and as I arrived at the conference half an hour before the session was to begin, the line to enter the event hall had already grown extremely large, showing the great amount of interest in the event on the part of the conference attendees. O’Malley started out with a respectable but mediocre performance, spouting largely recycled sound bites with lukewarm reaction from the audience.
However, midway through O’Malley’s remarks, the Black Lives Matter activists began the protest which would come to dominate the headlines about the conference. O’Malley was clearly flummoxed by this demonstration and he proceeded to fumble on this issue of great significance. Then, however, Bernie came to the stage and began the passionate remarks on income inequality which have made him a force to be reckoned with in this election cycle. In a notable departure from his standard remarks, he addressed the elephant in the room with great poise and tact, showing his genuine concern about issues of not only income inequality but also racial inequality in the United States today. In my opinion, the Netroots Nation conference will prove to be one of Bernie’s greatest moments, as it showed him to be a populist leader rather than a scripted career politician.
However, the true highlight of my trip to Phoenix came that night, when I joined over 11,000 others, most of them locals, at the largest rally Bernie had addressed up until that point in his campaign. The crowd was loud and passionate, roaring their approval as Bernie railed against the corruption and greed of the 1 percent. The best part of the rally for me was seeing so many people from so many different backgrounds of so many different colors, creeds, and ages, coming together to support the candidate who they all agree best represents what America truly stands for.
The main lesson I took away from the conference as a whole and the campaign rally in particular was that contrary to what the pundits say is the case, and what the moneyed interests hope is the case, the average hard-working American does indeed care about the political process and does indeed want their voice to be heard in the halls of power. Those true job creators are united in their support for the one candidate who truly values them and works for them, Bernie Sanders.
The header image was adapted from “Feel The Bern Phoenix AZ_44” by peoplesworld, distributed under Creative Commons License CC BY-NC 2.0.