John Anderson Tribute

John Anderson, the independent candidate for President In 1980, died  last week at the age of 95. I wanted to note his passing since I supported him early on, but ended up voting my fear and going with Jimmy Carter.

Carter lost and we had Reagan.

I found it interesting that Reuters quoted his daughter, Diane Anderson as saying her father "really believed the two-party system was broken in 1980. Everything he wanted to prevent unfortunately came to pass."
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/12/05/568489924/john-anderson-independent-for-president-in-1980-dies-at-95

Marsha Sutton, in a San Diego Tribune Commentary pointed out the similarities to Bernie Sanders:

We understood we were working for a noble cause that exceeded our individual interests. We believed in the magical possibility of breaking from the traditional two-party system in favor of a moderate who spoke the truth with integrity and conviction.

My favorite button features a caricature of Anderson showing only his white hair and the outline of his glasses. The similarity to buttons sported by Bernie Sanders supporters in 2016 is obvious.

Perhaps there is more than a caricature that makes the two similar. It’s not their politics certainly, but the comparison lies in each man’s honest desire to change the established political culture.

A lot of people who denigrated the Sanders campaign neglected that there is a lot of dissatisfaction with the two party system. So, when a candidate who is seen as having integrity comes around he tends to get a lot of attention.

Unfortunately, Anderson was coming from the Republican Party which went on to become fringier and fringier.  Some people like to think that Trump signifies the death of that party while neglecting that there is a website called democraticautopsy.org.

While I like Bernie, his politics, and his attempt to revive the Democratic Party (or expose it for the fraud it is): I don't see myself voting for him or a democratic party line.

I just hope other people wake up to the fact that the US political system has been ill for an incredibly long time.