Sanders has the courage of his convictions

Bernie Sanders has spent almost 40 years serving in elected office. Sanders served as mayor of Burlington, Vermont, before being elected to the U.S House and Senate.

During those four decades, Sanders has displayed an incredible consistency. He has fought for his beliefs, even when doing so was unpopular.

The Democratic Socialist from Vermont had the dedication and courage to fight for peace and LGBT rights at times when public opinion made it difficult for politicians to do so.

There are many wonderful candidates running for the Democratic nomination. The Kansas Democratic Party is allowing voters to use ranked choice voting in its presidential primary.

I will continue to follow the primary and remain open to new information, but Bernie Sanders will almost certainly be my first choice for president. 

Voters should consider choosing a fighter who stands by his beliefs and does the right thing, when other politicians are often blown astray by political winds.

Opponent of the Iraq War

In Oct. 2002, Bernie Sanders, then a member of the U.S. House, voted against the invasion of Iraq. Former Vice President Joe Biden, one of Sanders’s rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, voted in favor of going to war.  

The U.S. House voted in favor of authorizing the military invasion by a vote of 296 to 133. The U.S. Senate voted for the war 77 to 23.

Sanders explained his position during a speech in Congress one day before the vote.  

“I don’t think any member of this body disagrees that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant, a murderer, and a man who has started two wars. He is clearly someone who cannot be trusted or believed,” Sanders began. “The question, Mr. Speaker, is not whether we like Saddam Hussein or not, the question is whether he represents an imminent threat to the American people and whether a unilateral American invasion of Iraq will do more harm than good.”

Sanders predicted the great harms the war would ultimately create for both Iraq and the United States.  

“I have not heard any estimates of how many young American men and women might die in such a war, or how many tens of thousands of women and children in Iraq might also be killed,” Sanders said. “As a caring nation, we should do everything we can to prevent the horrible suffering that a war will cause. War must be the last recourse in international relations, not the first.”

Sanders also expressed his concern that the war could be, “extremely expensive,” at a time when the country had a national debt of $6 Trillion. (That now seems quaint by comparison. Our current national debt is $23 Trillion).

Sanders also worried about unintended consequences.

“Who will govern Iraq when Saddam Hussein is removed, and what role will the U.S. play in an ensuing civil war that could develop in that country?” Sanders asked.

The 2003 U.S. invasion led to a civil war in Iraq that killed at least tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Thousands of American soldiers died fighting in the war, which created conditions that ultimately led to the rise of ISIS.

The Iraq War was the single worst disaster in modern American political history. The Bush Administration and a majority of both houses of Congress were wrong. Bernie Sanders, and a minority of his colleagues, were right.

Advocate for diplomacy and peace

In September 2015, Senator Bernie Sanders spoke eloquently in support of the Iran nuclear deal. Much of his speech echoed his fateful comments on the Iraq War 13 years earlier.

“It is my firm belief that the test of a great nation, with the most powerful military on earth, is not how many wars we can engage in, but how we can use our strengths and our capabilities to resolve international conflicts in a peaceful way,” Sanders said. 

As Sanders advocated for a diplomatic approach to Iran, he explained the devastating cost of the Iraq War for the young men and women America sent to fight it.

“I fear that many of my Republican colleagues do not understand that war must be a last resort, not the first resort,” he said. “It is easy to go to war. It is not so easy to fully comprehend the unintended consequences of that war.”

“In Iraq and Afghanistan, we lost over 6,700 brave men and women, and many others have come home without legs, without arms, without eyesight,” Sanders continued. 

“Let us not forget that 500,000 veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan came back to their families with post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury.”

“The suicide rate of young veterans is appallingly high. The divorce rate of those who serve is appallingly high, and the impact on their children is appallingly high. God knows how many families have been devastated by these wars.”

Sanders also highlighted the devastation the war brought to Iraq.  

“We should also not forget that many hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi men, women, and children died in that war, and those whose lives who have been have been completely destabilized,” he said. “Hundreds of thousands of people whose lives have been totally altered, including those who are fleeing that country today with only the clothes on their back as refugees.”  

LGBT Ally

As a Congressman in the U.S. House, Bernie Sanders defended the dignity and rights of gay Americans in the 1990s, when few other politicians were willing to do so.

In 1995, Rep. Duke Cunningham, a Republican from California, spoke derisively about members of Congress who would, “put homos in the military.”

Sanders defended the dignity of gay Americans who have served their country in the armed forces.

“Was the gentleman referring to the many thousands and thousands of gay people who have put their lives on the line in countless wars defending this country? Was that the group of people that the gentleman was referring to?” Sanders asked.  

Cunningham acknowledged he had used the phrase. Sanders admonished his colleague for attacking gay Americans who have defended their country.

“You used the word, ‘homos in the military.’ You have insulted thousands of men and women who have put their lives on the line. I think you owe them an apology,” Sanders added.  

Today, Sanders supports overturning President Trump’s ban on transgender Americans serving in the military. He also supports the Equality Act, which would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity in employment, housing, and public accommodations.

A Profile in Courage

In 1996, Sanders was one of the few members of Congress to vote against the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which denied equal rights to same-sex couples.

DOMA denied recognition under federal law to same-sex marriages, which prevented members of  same-sex couples from receiving Social Security survivor benefits, insurance benefits, immigration rights, and from being able to jointly file their taxes.

The law also allowed states that banned same-sex marriage to withhold legal recognition of same-sex marriages performed in states that permitted such marriages.

The U.S. House voted in favor of DOMA 342 to 67, with Sanders opposed.

The U.S. Senate subsequently approved the bill 85 to 14. Delaware Senator Joe Biden voted in favor of DOMA.

Senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, both of California, Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, both of Massachusetts, Ron Wyden, of Oregon, and  Russ Feingold, of Wisconsin, voted against the bill.

President Bill Clinton signed DOMA into law.

The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the part of the law that denied federal benefits to same-sex couples in 2013 in Windsor v. United States.

The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the part of the law that allowed states to withhold recognition of same sex marriages carried out in other states in June 2015 in Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.

Bernie Sanders addressed the significance of his vote against DOMA as he campaigned in Oct. 2015 for the Democratic Presidential nomination in the 2016 election.

“In 1996, I faced another fork in the road, a very very difficult political situation. It was called the Defense of Marriage Act, DOMA, brought forth by a Republican-led Congress,” he said. “And its purpose was clear — to discriminate against gays and lesbians into the law, and let us all remember that gay and lesbian rights were not popular then as they are today.”

“There was a small minority in the house opposed to discriminating against our gay brothers and sisters, and I am proud that I was one of those members,” Sanders added.

Bernie Sanders has displayed a remarkable consistency throughout his political career.

If you were to talk to Sanders at any point in his life, his core values of opposing war, advocating for equality, and fighting for working Americans would shine through.

If you agree that these are values worth fighting for, you could ask for no better champion in the White House than Bernie Sanders.