{"id":30471,"date":"2016-12-31T18:20:00","date_gmt":"2016-12-31T18:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/merryjane.com\/bernie-sanders-person-of-the-year-2016\/"},"modified":"2016-12-31T18:20:00","modified_gmt":"2016-12-31T18:20:00","slug":"bernie-sanders-person-of-the-year-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/merryjane.com\/culture\/bernie-sanders-person-of-the-year-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Bernie Sanders Is My Person of the Year"},"content":{"rendered":"

It may be painful to admit, but Donald Trump deserved to be named Time<\/a><\/em>’s <\/a><\/span>Person of the Year for 2016<\/a>. Who else defined the year? During the Republican primary<\/a>, he laid bare the hopeless splintering and dissatisfaction of his party. He dominated the media during the general election with his never-ending quest to lower our collective standards for public behavior<\/a>. And then, he won<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When we look back at Trump’s rise to power 10 years from now, hopefully we won’t remember it as the beginning of an era of a dominant oligarch, but rather as the year a <\/span>real, meaningful opposition solidified and got to work<\/a>. This is why I hope that when we look back on 2016, we remember Bernie Sanders as the person of the year<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Bernie Sanders is likely never going to be President of the United States. Barring an unusual dispensation from Father Time and an uncharacteristic change of heart from the center of the party still angry over <\/span>the hard-fought primary<\/a>, Bernie wouldn’t make the best 2020 candidate. But, that doesn’t really matter.<\/p>\n

Bernie Sanders awakened millions of young people to a political movement this year. He drew jaded people from all walks of life who didn’t see themselves represented anywhere in mainstream politics back into the fight. While President Obama filled the country with hope in him with his 2008 victory, Bernie Sanders filled a generation with <\/span>renewed hope in themselves<\/a>. As Bernie said during his speech at the Democratic National Convention, “Election days come and go, but the struggle of the people to create a government which represents all of us and not just the one percent, a government based on the principles of economic, social, racial, and environmental justice, that struggle continues.”<\/p>\n