The social-democratic understanding of FDR and the New Deal is completely warped. Bernie in charge cannot bring a new deal. Even if "the left" won the house and the senate we would not have brought out New Deal equivalent reforms. FDR brought reforms in the thirties for one of two reasons. First to undercut revolutionary communist currents in the labor movement or because the labor movement was strong enough to win them. Regardless of which one caused it, we do not have the necessary conditions to repeat it. Labor is weak, global and especially domestic communism is not strong enough. A Bernie presidency would have had some rousing speeches, but otherwise would have been the same milquetoast obstructionism that any other Democrat experiences.
The social-democratic understanding of FDR and the New Deal is completely warped. Bernie in charge cannot bring a new deal. Even if "the left" won the house and the senate we would not have brought out New Deal equivalent reforms. FDR brought reforms in the thirties for one of two reasons. First to undercut revolutionary communist currents in the labor movement or because the labor movement was strong enough to win them. Regardless of which one caused it, we do not have the necessary conditions to repeat it. Labor is weak, global and especially domestic communism is not strong enough. A Bernie presidency would have had some rousing speeches, but otherwise would have been the same milquetoast obstructionism that any other Democrat experiences.