Sanders' legacy may far exceed his capabilities Hal Burdett

Barring an event or events of biblical magnitude, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is heading full throttle toward once again losing his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.

That should not surprise any serious student of American politics. Sanders would be the first to tell you he's not a conventional Democrat but rather a democratic socialist. Albeit, one who has both caucused with Democrats for much of his congressional career and agreed to serve, if elected, as a Democratic president - whatever that means.

For some reason, Sanders and his supporters register righteous indignation that the National Democratic Party establishment would conspire to ensure that an actual Democrat, not a democratic socialist, should be its standard-bearer in the November election.

Even more bizarre is the Democratic Party's insistence that it would not tip the scales against Sanders's quest. It is tantamount to the College of Cardinals pledging not to stand in the way of the Lubavitcher Rebbe assuming the Throne of St. Peter.

The 's' word has been anathema to Americans of all political stripes, particularly those of a certain age, despite democratic socialists having little in common with national socialists.

To argue that these distinctions are two sides of the same coin is as patently disingenuous as to claim there is no difference between the democratic socialist governments of Denmark and Sweden today and the national socialist dictatorships of Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy in the 1940s.

Closer to home is the often overlooked fact that U.S. socialist presidential candidates Eugene V. Debs in 1912 and Norman Thomas two decades later exerted significant influence over Democratic party platforms.

Debs's impact on Democratic President Woodrow Wilson led to the adoption of the federal income tax, the Federal Reserve, direct election of U.S. senators, labor reforms, and, later, women's suffrage.

Furthermore, the U.S. Socialist Party had a profound effect on the New Deal agenda of Franklin D. Roosevelt in the early 1930s, highlighted by the nation's first social safety net in the form of the Social Security Act, as well as unemployment insurance, the 40-hour week, and child labor laws.

As for Sanders's legacy, it is a foregone conclusion that Joe Biden, the likely Democratic nominee, will promote, in one form or another, much of what the Vermont senator has been advocating seemingly forever: widening access to affordable health care, a more reasonable minimum wage, actions to combat climate change, and ensuring that the wealthiest corporations and individuals pay their fair share of taxes.

There should be no illusions that Sanders and his supporters will be anywhere close to satisfied with the moderate pace at which Biden and the Democratic Party establishment will deem acceptable for achieving progressive goals.

But virtually every plank in the Sanders platform, which struck most Democrats as at very least borderline radical four years ago though far less so this year, will be realized within the lifetime of most Americans living today.

And, yes, this includes single-payer health insurance, which will eventually be recognized as the only route to sustain affordable health care, which Biden, as well as Sanders, considers to be a right rather than a privilege.

Meanwhile, perhaps, it is time to reconsider the following comment by six-time Socialist presidential candidate Norman Thomas: "The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism. But, under the name 'liberalism,' they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened."

Thomas's prophecy may still seem revolutionary to many, if not most, Americans today.

But to Sanders's younger followers, who are less likely to quake in fear of creeping or galloping socialism, it is merely evolutionary.

Caption: Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., speaks to reporters about coronavirus in Burlington, Vermont.

Charles Krupa/AP