Bernie Sanders Q&A | Cambridge Union

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[Music] foreign [Music] for those of you who are new here welcome to the Cambridge Union um before we start with this very exciting visit just a couple of housekeeping notes um the questions today have been pre-selected for the Q a so there'll be no regular q a with hands as we normally do and at the end of the event if you wouldn't mind remaining seated until the senator and his guests have left the chamber otherwise I would like to welcome a man who has galvanized the young the old the black the white of not just America but probably the whole world among a common message of reversing social inequality social democracy and fairness please join me in giving a warm warm welcome to Senator Bernie Sanders and some water thank you [Applause] thank you all very much for being here this morning this is a beautiful room you know in America we think a building is old if it's a hundred years old so this is really beautiful and it's an honor and I thank you very much for inviting my wife Jane Jane's stand okay uh and let me Begin by expressing the condolences of my family and the American people for the tragic loss of life in Manchester um you know what happens there is indescribable and it makes clear why in a world that is growing smaller and smaller in so many respects that it is imperative that among other things the transatlantic relationship that has been so strong and important since the horrors of World War II and some of you may not fully appreciate what that wall was 50 million people killed and one of the results of the transatlantic relationship is we have made progress obviously not enough in preventing conflict and bringing people together in making it clear that just because somebody speaks a different language and is across the channel or a few miles away from you that they need not be enemies that we can come together and that's true not only for the UK and Europe it's obviously true for your brothers and your sisters in the United States and in countries all over the world and it especially at this very difficult moment in world history when we are combating terrorism and we need to work together to keep each other's countries safe when we're dealing with the horrific crisis of climate change when we're dealing with economies all over the world that are struggling when we're dealing with oligarchies in which a handful of very very wealthy people increasingly have control over our countries and over the entire planet it is absolutely imperative that we work together to address these crises and I want to tell you that in my country the younger generation people your age there has never been and I say this quite honestly a generation which is more open which is more honest Which is less discriminatory Which is less intolerant of nonsense and racism and sexism and homophobia than the generation in the United States and I know it is true here and I believe that with all of the new technology that is out there if we use that in that technology sensibly for the benefit of human beings not use that technology to figure out how we can better spy on each other or better kill each other if we use that technology in a positive way your generation has the opportunity to create the kind of world that this planet has never seen we can extend human life we can cure diseases that are now killing people right now today thousands of poor children around the world are dying from easily cured diseases where medicine costs a few cents that they cannot afford we can transform our Energy System your generation can do that and for the sake of this planet your generation must do a lot better job than my generation has done in expanding human opportunity and improving human life that's your responsibility and I'm absolutely confident that working with the young people in the United States and in China and India all over this world you can do extraordinary things um yesterday as some of you are aware president Trump withdrew the United States from the Paris agreement on climate change first of all his decision was stupid [Applause] and it was dangerous for my own country and clearly as the largest and wealthiest Nation most powerful Nation on Earth it was a setback for the entire planet when Trump ran for president he indicated his opinion that despite all of the scientific evidence Trump himself understood uniquely that climate change was a hoax and I want you all to appreciate how absurd it is how dangerous it is for the president of the most powerful Nation on Earth to reject science you are here and everything that you do and every public policy that must be developed has got to be based on science on facts not alternative facts but on real facts and that's what you're learning here at this great University you and I know that climate change is real that climate change is caused by human activity and you also know that climate change right now is causing devastating problems in my country and all over the world and you also know that if we do not get our act together boldly the dangers that we face today will only become much worse in the future and what the scientists tell us is there will be more flooding more drought more extreme weather disturbances more acidification of the ocean more rising sea levels which will threaten countries all around the world especially poor countries and what the Department of Defense and the CIA in the United States as well as other national security agencies all over the world will tell you is that if in countries around the world people cannot grow their food because of drought cannot find clean drinking water there will be mass migrations of people and when there are mass migrations of people from one area to the other it creates a situation where conflict is more likely so climate change is also a very serious International Security issue that's the bad news the good news is that we have the technology we have the knowledge and that knowledge and Technology will only grow as to how we can transform our energy system in the United States in the UK and around the world away from fossil fuel and become a leader in the fight against climate change and I hope you all appreciate that the need to the need to combat climate change is a very clear example of the need for international cooperation the United Kingdom alone is not going to stop the warming of the planet no matter what you do in this country China can't do it alone India can't do it alone Germany can't do it alone this is a situation where we are all in the same boat and that is why we have got to work together and we will continue to work together despite what president Trump thinks uh I want to say a few words about some of what is going on in the United States because I know it is of interest to you and uh I should tell you that it goes without saying uh that Donald Trump is not one of my favorite presidents and I think uh it goes without saying that a very strange times in the United States today we have a very strange president and let me just describe some of my concerns about what Mr Trump says and what he does Now in America as in the UK what people are mostly concerned about which is kind of natural is what is happening to their own lives how are they doing and what you should know that in terms of domestic policy uh the disastrous budget that Donald Trump has recently presented to Congress will go down in history as the most reactionary anti-working class budget ever presented by any president in American history and I want you to understand what it is which will give you some kind of clue as to where Trump and his billionaire friends are coming from this is a budget which over a 10-year period will cut approximately two and a half trillion dollars from programs that impact the lives of working people the elderly the children the sick and the poor and at the same exact time As Trump is going to cut Health Care going to throw 23 million people off of Health Care at the same time is he's going to cut back on preschool education at the same time as he's going to cut back on after school programs at the same time as he is going to make it harder for young working-class kids in America to get a college education at the same time as he's going to make massive Cuts in Environmental Protection Trump is going to give two and a half trillion dollars roughly the same amount of money in tax breaks to the top one percent Trump is proposing in the United States and I know not all of you are familiar with this we have a tax called the estate tax which applies to the families of very very very wealthy people when the person the head of the family dies only the top two tenths of one percent are impacted by the estate tax 99.8 percent of the families do not pay a nickel if Trump is successful which he will not be but if he is successful in repealing that tax over 300 billion dollars in tax breaks will go to the richest 5 000 families in America so the essence of what he is trying to do is a Robin Hood proposal in Reverse you all familiar with Robin Hood in this country Robin Hood took from the rich and gave to the poor what Trump is doing is Robin Hood in Reverse taking from the poor the most vulnerable people in the most pain and giving to the very very rich and what is doubly ugly doubly ugly is probably not a term here used in Cambridge all right very ugly is that he ran for president saying that he was a champion of working people and unfortunately I think what many of his supporters and what the American people are saying is that much of what he said in the campaign was simply lies not true at all now in addition to Trump's disastrous Health Care proposal and I know it's hard again it's hard for you to appreciate that in the wealthiest country in the world you have had a National Health System here since I think 1948 and I know what has its up and downs up and downs and it strengths and its weaknesses but what you established in this country in 1948 I want you to know was revolutionary because what you said what the government then said is that we believe that back in 1948 three years after the war that every person in the United Kingdom is entitled to health care as a right of being a citizen of this country now you may take it for granted but we in the United States do not take it for granted it is a big big deal which you should be very very proud of now right foreign and what you did here impacted countries all over the world who understood that Healthcare is a human right Trump's proposal at a time when we already have 28 million people who have no health insurance I don't give you I want to don't want to give you a long lecture on the Dismal American Health Care System you probably don't even know what the word deductible is you know what deductible is you don't even know good I'm glad you don't what a deductible means is you may have an insurance policy but that policy does not kick in go into effect unless you have spent five thousand dollars or ten thousand dollars so you can get really sick and have insurance but you can't go to the doctor because you don't have the five hundred dollars that it costs that you have to pay out of your own pocket sounds pretty crazy does it not and yet many millions of Americans who have insurance have to deal with deductibles co-payments and high premiums what Trump did in the midst of that disastrous Health Care system he decided after deep thought to make it even worse Trump said okay we got 28 million people who have no health insurance how can I expand that number and bring it up to 50 million people you know we only have 320 million people so 50 million if Trump gets his way which he will not 50 million people would have no health insurance think about what it means all of you no people who have become seriously ill have had injuries have had accidents think about what it would mean if you could not go into the National Health Service what do you do when you are sick what do you do if you develop a lump in your breast or if you have a stomach problem or a heart problem and you cannot go to the doctor because your lack the funds that is what is existing in many parts of America and the result is that every single year thousands of people die unnecessarily because they don't get into the doctor's office when they should that is what is going on in your sister country across the Atlantic and what Trump is trying to do is make a bad situation even worse many of us not only will fight back and resist his disastrous proposal which will be so harmful to so many Americans we will look to the UK as an example and we will fight for our own national health program which will guarantee Health Care to every man woman a child who will look different than your system but the goal will be to make sure that all of our people are covered with high quality Care in a cost-effective way [Applause] thank you now it is not only Trump's attacks on the working class and middle class of America and his support for the billionaire class by giving some of the richest people in the world enormous tax breaks that concern me it is also Trump's disrespect for democracy for tolerance and poor traditional American values and institutions when the president of the United States attacks the media that is the mainstream media the New York Times CBS The Washington Post major media outlets and says to people in the country that when you turn on TV and when you read the newspapers don't believe a word of it it is all a lie it's all fake news now I want you to think about every politician including myself criticizes the media it's part of the process all right and we all think we're getting treated terribly by the media but nobody in American history who has been president of the United States has told his constituents that everything they see and hear and read in the media is a lie don't believe a word of it think about what that means if you cannot believe what is in the papers what is in on television if you are told that everything is a lie then who are you going to believe and The Logical conclusion as expressed by a United States congressman is that the only person you can believe the only source of information that you can trust comes from the mouth or the tweets of the president of the United States do you follow how dangerous that is that is how you end up denigrating democracy when you bring about massive mistrust in the media but it is not just his attacks on the media he also has attacked the Judiciary you know in the United States as in other Democratic countries you have separations of powers we don't have one person making all of the decisions what we have is Congress making laws of President vetoingo signing those laws and then you've got a supreme court and other judicial branches determining whether or not among other things the legislation passed is constitutional Trump attempted to pass a ban on Muslims the Constitution of the United States says that you can't do those things you can't discriminate against somebody because of their religious beliefs and the courts sustained that belief and ruled that what Trump had proposed was unconstitutional Trump's response was to say that the judge who made that ruling was a so-called judge in other words that when judges rule against you you denigrate the entire judiciary bring disrespect to an independent branch of government and that is a very very dangerous thing to be doing furthermore and I say this not in a partisan way it does not give me any pleasure to say this I disagree I had my strong disagreements with Barack Obama who I I saw his picture on the wall here I gather he spoke here some years ago he and I are friends we've had our disagreements disagreed very strongly with President Bush but respected him as somebody who tried to bring the country together in his own way but we have now a president and I'm embarrassed to have to tell you this who lies all of the time he lies all of the time now a few months ago he made a statement that nobody not a Republican or Democrat supported and that is he claimed that in the last election where he won he said three to five million people voted in that election illegally now I won't go through the whole electoral not elect the election process in the United States we have 50 states each state has its own uh process but nobody no Republican election official no Democratic elected official agreed with Trump on that now why did he say that why did he say that three to five million people voted illegal if that were true that would really suggest that the electoral system in the United States was hopelessly broken the people could not believe the results of any election the reason that he said that was a very clear effort to try to undermine democracy some of you may or may not know that right now in the United States there is a major effort on the part of Republican governors in many states to try to suppress the vote you know what that means what you would think that in a democracy we would want to make it easier for people to participate we want to say I don't care what your views are election day is coming we want you to vote the higher the voter turnout the better that is what most people in America believe in 1965 legislation was passed and signed by President Johnson which basically ended discrimination against African Americans who in many parts of the country especially the South we're finding it impossible to vote and participate in the Democratic process it was a major step forward in expanding American democracy sadly a few years ago by a five to four vote the Supreme Court got it made much weaker that Voting Rights Act the day literally the day after that legislation was passed you had Governors and attorney generals all over the country figuring out ways how they once again could make it harder not only for people of color but for poor people for older people and for young people to vote and under the guise of fighting voter fraud of which virtually does not exist in the United States our system is pretty good very very very few examples of voter fraud but ostensibly trying to fight against this voter fraud they put up hurdles and obstacles for poor people to have to get identification cards which might cost them money might require them to go across town to get it a very clear example of trying to keep people from voting who might vote against these Republican Governors and others when Trump says that three to five million people voted illegally what he was essentially saying to Governors all over this country you keep it up you make it harder and harder for poor people for people of color for people who will vote against us to participate in the Democratic process now it is one thing for me to disagree with Trump on his tax policies or his health care policies disagreement over policies is what democracy is about but when you have the president of the United States trying to undermine democracy when you have Governors and Senators who do not want to participate in free open and fair elections that is the very opposite of what the United States of America is supposed to be about and what I say to those governors and what I say to president Trump is if you are afraid to participate in a free open and fair election get out of politics and get another job foreign [Applause] Trump's domestic policies of tax breaks to billionaires and cuts and programs to working people that bother me it is not only his attacks and efforts to undermine American democracy which frightened me very much uh I am also outraged by the demagoguery of the Trump Administration in trying to divide the American people up based on the color of one's skin based on one's country of origin based on one's religion what presidents and leaders of any major country any country are supposed to do in the year 2017 is to bring people together not divide them up but what we have what we have seen in Trump's campaign and what we are seeing now are attacks on many of our Latino brothers and sisters in the United States he had the nerve to suggest that people from Mexico were criminals and rapists attacks against Muslims and attacks against other minorities I don't have to tell anybody in Europe that what demagoguery is always about is picking on is what we call scapegoating people who are in the minority so when people are in trouble and they're unemployed rather than understanding why unemployment is too high why wages are too low what demagogues do is blame the problems on minorities and people who do not have much political power so in the United States if you're unemployed there are people who are brain blaming Farm Workers who are making eight dollars an hour picking strawberries or blaming Muslims for their problems and what we have got to do in the United States what has got to be done in the UK what has got to be done all over the world is to understand the Hara and the pain that has gone on for so many centuries when we judge people by the color of their skin or by their religion Dr Martin Luther King Jr who you know is one of not only the Great American leaders but one of the great leaders in this world in modern times he made the statement that we judge people not by the color of their skin but by their character as human beings who they are as human beings and together in the UK Europe and in the United States we must stand up and oppose any effort to start scapegoating people to start tearing Humanity apart based on religion or countries of national origin we've got to focus on the real problems facing our planet and not let demagogues in the United States or any place else divide us up [Applause] and in that regard I also find it rather strange very strange given the history of the United States that our president today representing a nation which has led the world in promoting democracy all over the world we spend many many millions of dollars historically trying to help countries figure out how they can develop Democratic foundations we now have a president who seems to be more comfortable with autocrats and authoritarian politicians than with leaders of democratic nations frankly many Americans are scratching their heads that's an American term it means we are confused scratching their heads and trying to figure out why Trump has such an affinity for Vladimir Putin a man who has severely repressed democracy in his own country who has spent the last number of years trying to destabilize democracy in other countries and you were all familiar with the horrific role that Russia played in the American election with regard to their cyber attacks as well as in other countries and a man who is trying to weaken the transatlantic Alliance why and we really don't know and that's what we're looking at right now but we do not know why he would have an affinity with such a person furthermore Americans are wondering why president Trump has such kind words for president duterte of the Philippines who was Siri who is seriously undermining civil rights and civil liberties in his own country and why he seems so comfortable with the leaders of Saudi Arabia a hereditary monarchy which treats women as third-class Citizens which promotes wahhabism a radical and extreme version of Islam that has spread dangerously throughout the Muslim world so those are just a few we don't have enough time for me to give you all of my concerns about President Trump but those are just some of them but having said that let me also remind you of several facts number one Trump won the presidency by winning a majority of the electoral votes he lost the popular vote by almost 3 million votes to secretary Clinton so he lost by quite a lot three million votes is a lot but he won the Electoral College which made him president number two when you hear Trump speak or you read what he says in the papers do not believe that what he is saying represents what most Americans think what he says represents what some Americans think that is true but not what most Americans think according to recent polls for a president who has been in office for four months they do this polling you know historically he is the least popular president today of any president who has been in office for four months so I don't want you ever to have the impression that what Trump is saying reflects the majority of the American people because it does not um but let me maybe uh answer a question that might be on some of your minds and that is okay uh how did it happen that Trump won the election how did it happen that a candidate who turned out to be the least popular candidate ever win the American election and I will tell you some things that in this regard you may not be familiar with and that is that in the United States today while we are in fact the wealthiest nation in the history of the world while we have a whole lot of people who are doing phenomenally well the truth is there are many many millions of working people who have been left behind by the global economy and often these are working class people in rural areas of America where you once had a town where you had a factory producing real products paying people decent wages often with a union and all over this country all over my country those factories have gone and people are either unemployed or working for half of the wages or two-thirds of the wages that they previously received you have a situation in America where millions of single moms or families cannot afford the high cost of child care you know how much it costs in the United States of America to send your kid to pre-kindergarten school it costs 10 or 15 000 a year which is a lot of money if you're earning Thirty or forty thousand dollars a year in fact it's an impossible cost so all over America you have working class families struggling about what am I going to do with my three-year-old how do I good find decent affordable child care when I'm out working because it's very hard to come by you have families in America who are worried to death about the future of their children families see their dads and their moms working longer hours for lower wages a hundred years ago workers in America fought for a 40-hour work week and yet today we have millions of people working two or three jobs trying to make ends meet half of all the workers in America people 60 who are older have nothing in the bank as they face retirement I want you to think about it for a moment if you are 63 years of age and you're going to retire from your job in a couple of years and you got zero money in the bank how do you feel about life you are very anxious you are frightened about the future as I mentioned earlier many millions of Americans cannot afford to go to the doctor when they get sick and what I've said many many times in the United States that I repeated here it wasn't so much that Donald Trump won the election it was that the Democratic party lost the election because the Democratic party turned its back ignored tens of millions of people who are in Desperate economic conditions now the truth is that after eight years of Barack Obama the economy of the United States was much better when he left than when he came in unemployment was down the deficit was down financial institutions were much more stable but having said that there were millions of people who felt that nobody was listening to their pain and one of the results of that which is incredibly shocking incredibly shocking is that for many millions of people in America people in States like Kentucky or in West Virginia and in other parts of America you know what is happening life expectancy is going down you know what I mean by that throughout modern history because of improvements in health care in medicines in public health in general in the environment people live longer lives everything being equal you will live longer lives of your than your parents who live longer lives than their parents that's what has happened in large parts of America today people are now living shorter lives than their parents which is absolutely an extraordinary development and the reason for that has a lot to do with the despair the feeling of helplessness and hopelessness which many millions of people now experience they are making eight dollars an hour they have no room for advancement they are worried to death about their kids and they are turning to drugs go to States like West Virginia go to States like Kentucky there is an epidemic of opioid addiction of heroin addiction serious problem in my state serious problem all over this country out of hopelessness comes addiction to drugs comes alcoholism and increased numbers of suicide now I tell you that because it's not well publicized but if you want to know why Trump won one of the reasons and there were others one of the reasons is he said to those people who are feeling hopeless right now who are feeling that nobody is listening to them that he Donald Trump will stand up for them that he will fight for them he will take on the political establishment he will take on the economic establishment he will stand with these people who have for so long been forgotten unfortunately Trump lied but the reality is he had no intention of standing up for those people you're standing up for the billionaire class which is what he was doing but unfortunately those people responded to that call because in my view the Democratic party did not provide an alternative for them did not address their very very serious needs there's another issue I want to talk about which is true here in your country true all over the world and it is an issue that must be dealt with and it is not talked about enough if you were to ask me what my major concern is with regard to the future of the United States I would tell you that I worry very much about the growth of oligarchy you all know what oligarchy is you're all smart guys all right what oligarchy is our Nations which are increasingly controlled by a small number of people what does that mean it means that in the United States today and I hope you hear this the top one tenth of one percent not one percent one-tenth of one percent now owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent 20 people in the United States this Row in this row own more wealth than the bottom half of the American people over 150 million people 20 people here 150 million people there today in America while people are working two or three jobs in incredibly long hours 52 percent of all new income generated goes to the top one percent in America for the last 40 years well well before Donald Trump we have seen a process by which the middle class is shrinking the average the worker right in the middle of the economy the male worker is earning significantly less than he did 40 years ago today you got that so I want you to put yourself into the head of that worker that working class person 40 years have come and gone and that worker is making less in real inflation accounted for dollars than he did 40 years ago and since the Great Recession of 2008 many women have seen a decline in their wages as well but it is not only this grotesque level of income in wealth inequality in the United States which is troubling and it is very troubling the other part of it which many of you probably do not fully understand is the degree to which big money dominates the political process now if one of you decided to move to the United States and become an American citizen and then you decided to run let's say for governor of a moderate side state well state of Michigan the state of Illinois moderate slide states do you know how much money you would need to run for governor of the United States Senate you would probably need 50 60 million dollars to run for office what happened a few years ago six or seven years ago the United States Supreme Court made a very bad bad bad decision in a case called citizens united and what they decided in that case is that if you were a multi-billionaire we were restricting your freedom of expression if you cannot go out and buy elections and so the Supreme Court says now if you are a large corporation if you are a billionaire you now have the freedom we're going to get rid of the campaign Finance laws that we had passed you now have the freedom to spend as much money as you want and very few people around the world appreciate what that really means we have multi-billionaire families we have a family called the Koch brothers anyone here to those families all right the Koch brothers are the second wealthiest family in America they're worth some 80 or 90 billion dollars On Any Given year including this year they will spend hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars on elections from the presidency to the Senate to the house to a local school board election making sure that candidates who represent the wealthy and the powerful will win I just came back a few weeks ago from the state of Montana where I supported a candidates for the United States Congress he ended up being outspent ten to one through independent expenditures in other words they can put as much money as they want independently into any campaign in America so the result of that is we are ending up with a Congress that does what president Trump wants give huge tax breaks for the billionaires reject the reality of climate change and cut programs for working people this is an enormous threat to the future of American democracy it is why we have got to overturn citizens united and move toward Public Funding of elections in that regard the UK Germany and other countries in Europe are far more advanced than we are in terms of running Democratic elections um the reason that we need International cooperation is that we have international problems and one of those problems is that in my country and in your country and around the world trillions of dollars of corporate profits are stashed in tax Havens whether it's the Cayman Islands Luxembourg Bermuda or elsewhere these are very profitable corporations who end up not paying a nickel of taxes in some cases to their host countries that problem is not going to be solvable in my country alone it is going to have to be solved internationally corporations that make billions of dollars in profits cannot be allowed to get away with escaping their tax responsibilities and we have to work on that we have to work on an issue with regard to the power of major financial institutions in the United States the largest Six banks have assets equivalent to 58 percent of the GDP of the United States they have power all over the world and in small countries they are far more powerful than the governments of those countries and that is why together we've got to work to break up these large financial institutions last point that I would make about oligarchy and distribution of wealth this is not just an American problem or a British problem this is a global problem and I want you all to think seriously about the dangers inherent when in this world the top one percent on more wealth than the bottom 99 percent what it means that the wealthiest eight people in the world own more wealth than the bottom half of humanity than 3.6 billion people it's not an issue that's going to be on the front pages of the paper you're not going to see it discuss much on TV groups like Oxfam do a great job in trying to get the word out but this is an issue of enormous consequence over the last many years as a world and as a nation we have made progress in terms of trying to combat racism in America you all know we elected our first African-American President Barack Obama we have made progress and still have a long way to go in combating sexism we have made progress in combating homophobia just a few years ago a conservative Supreme Court ruled that gay marriage would be legal in every state in this country we have made progress in a number of areas that we in the United States and around the world should be proud of but there is one area of enormous consequence we are not making progress we are moving in the wrong direction and that is the struggle for economic rights the struggle to create economies in my country in your country and around the world that work for all of the people and not just the people on top so let me conclude in the way I began and that is that your generation has an opportunity to make extraordinary transformations of what is going on in this planet and if you stand together with your brothers and sisters around the world and if you don't allow demagogues to divide us up by race or Creed or Nash country of origin the future can be extraordinary and that future rests in your hands and I am confident that you will be doing the right thing to make that future a future that Humanity will be proud of thank you very much thank you thank you okay [Applause] thank you [Applause] okay fire away what do you got okay uh two questions from me and then we'll go to our audience ones firstly at the beginning of your book which is this one oh yeah I forgot to mention yeah yeah well the reason I'm here my publisher wants me to mention we wrote a book this is the book it's actually a very good book if you're interested in politics and American politics um it's on sale outside um afterwards uh you said that before and before and after the campaign you ended the sort of 2016 election campaign far more optimistic about America than you did when you'd begun do you still believe this is Trump president absolutely I mean for Jane and myself we had an opportunity to visit between the two of us every state in the United States and by the way I know that many of you are already been to the United States and I hope you come back and I hope you visit us up in the northeastern part of America or a small state we're a beautiful state but what I saw in speaking to well over a million people in meetings like this except meetings that were a little bit larger than us or as I saw the beauty of my country which I am not fully appreciated before you know as a senator from Vermont I spent most of my time in Vermont getting around my state which is my job but running for president you had the opportunity to go all over this country and it's a diverse country uh different peoples different problems but I was mostly exhilarated by the fact that we ended up winning not just 22 out of the 50 states we ended up getting taking on the entire Democratic establishment uh 46 of the vote but we won and I believe every single state the votes of young people under 40 by the way not so young people who are either black or white or Latino Asian-American or Native American so when I think about why I am optimistic about the future I believe that in my country the young people and I believe that it's true all over the world have a very different vision of where this world should go than do current leaders all over the planet and young people in my country are the least discriminatory generation in the history of this country they're well beyond racism and sexism and homophobia and they are prepared to think big which is what we need to do and not small they're prepared to imagine a very different kind of world with different types of relationships between peoples than currently exists so yes I am today very very optimistic and notwithstanding Trump I am very optimistic about the future in my country and the rest of the world thank you and also just a question of Interest what would you say has been your favorite Republican policy well I think I am needless to say not a conservative but conservativism honest conservativism has some very valid or legitimacy in other words in my state interestingly enough we historically except for the you know before the last 30 years we were repub we were a Republican state very conservative state but what do we mean by republicanism and conservativism in my state you know what it meant in man listen I don't think the government I believe in small government I believe you have the right to live your life you leave me alone I'm going to leave you alone you do what you want I'll do what my mind just don't get in my way I won't get in your way so the idea of in that sense small government being respectful of civil liberties hey if you don't bother me I don't bother you that is not a bad approach now unfortunately modern Republican party has moved away from that kind of small government conservativism into right-wing extremism in the United States so under the guise for example just one example of the hypocrisy of that is you have politicians Republicans going around the country saying I believe in small government get the government off our backs deregulate everything oh by the way government is going to tell every woman in the United States what she can and cannot do with her own body thank you see that is that is not conservativism that is hypocrisy in the sense in the sense that there are people for religious and other reasons who are opposed to abortion and that is their right but what conservativism is not supposed to be about is the government imposing that view on every woman that is hypocrisy and similarly with the very with a very very serious issue that impacts the whole world and that is the invasion of privacy rights which are all familiar with not only from government from our NSA Etc or your government but also from the corporate world which knows everything that you read May well be able to get into your uh into your uh banking accounts and so forth and so on the invasion of privacy and the need to protect the people in around the world from that invasion is a very serious issue we have some conservatives are also speaking up on so those are a couple of areas thank you we're going to take a couple of audience questions um Ethan Axelrod if you can get a microphone to you there should be one there thank you hi uh what should the Democrats be looking for in their 2020 nominee and who might fit the bill possibly including yourself well [Applause] let me respond in this way right now at this moment it is very premature to be talking about an election in three and a half years right now see media likes to do that because it's the easy thing to do you know is he going to run you're going to run blah blah blah blah what is important right now is to focus on the enormous problems facing my country today we're working really really hard on that so what we are doing in terms of the Democratic Party uh is we are engaged in an effort to fundamentally transform the Democratic Party from into a party which brings in a lot of young people and Working Class People and makes it a party where decisions are made from the bottom on up not from the top on down so I have been running all over the country going into so-called conservative areas conservative States uh where Democrats have lost ignore long ignored so in terms of the democratic party what you should all understand you all know that Trump is a Republican president you know that the Republicans control the house and the Senate what you don't know is the Republicans now own control almost two-thirds of the state houses we have 50 states they control almost two-thirds of those and what you don't know is that in the last nine years Democrats have lost almost a thousand seats one thousand seats in a legislative bodies all in the 50 states in this country so we have got to bring fundamental reforms to the Democratic party which means having a progressive agenda and which means mobilizing people around that agenda and not turning our backs on large sections of the United States so it's a little bit early to answer that question thank you um can we now go to Martin Allison Martin thanks uh hi I'm quite a bit older than most of the audience and my um first recollection of American politics was watching the television coverage of the democratic convention in 1968 in Chicago a town I think you know well from University yes um and I wondered whether that kind of divisiveness on the center left encouraged you to be non-aligned and politically independent rather than being a Democrat no it wasn't uh that particular in what Martin is talking about it's a 1968 there was what is historically referred to as a police riot where a lot of demonstrators who were outside demonstrating were beaten very badly by the Chicago Police Department I became an independent because I come from a family A working class family that did not have a lot of money and I understand what happens to families and the people who have to struggle every single day uh to make ends meet and the kind of stress that exists for those families I did a hearing a few years ago I was chairman of a subcommittee in the Senate it was called poverty as a death sentence you know what that means it means that in my country and around the world poor people die at much younger ages than do wealthy people and in America if you are in a the poorest Community you can die 16 years younger than if you are in the wealthiest community and the reason for that is that people live under incredible stress every single day so what I experienced as a kid is knowing what it means to grow up in a family and my wife had a similar experience of where there just was not enough money to do the things that the family require and then I looked at what the Democrats were doing and I did not see them as the party that was standing up significantly in a way that should be done for working-class people and during that period as you recall we had the Vietnam War as a result and I was strongly opposed to that war into the various aspects of American foreign policy so those were the main reasons uh that I chose to run as independent and I should also tell you that right now uh in America depending on the state not every state has this you can give your party identification you can say I'm a Democrat I'm a republican ornament an independent generally speaking now in the nation there are more Independents people who consider them Independence stem cells Independence as they do Democrats or Republicans thank you um another question from Esme O'Keefe Esme thank you can we get a microphone thank you very much for coming to speak to us this morning I wanted to know that with all the hype there was about a potential first ever female president do you think that if you had been female you rather than Hillary Clinton would have been chosen as a democratic before you're asking me a loaded question um I try not to look back how's that for a political answer I would say uh that in terms of women in politics we have made some progress give me an example how bad it has been in the United States there's a woman that I suspect mostly of you have not heard of her name is Barbara mikulski she was a U.S senator from the state of Maryland the very small woman but incredibly tough and smart woman for a while she was either the only woman or one of two in the United States Senate this was all of like 30 years ago now I believe if my memory is correct we now have about 22 women in the Senate and we have more and more women in the house but we have a hundred Senators so women constitute all of 22 percent more than they used to we have a long way to go to make sure that women themselves get the representation that they need but when I look at politics and you know maybe Margaret Thatcher would be an example of that it is not just the gender that you have it is what you stand for and what we need are not just women or just men or not just gays or not just African-Americans we need that but in addition to that we need candidates whether they are women or men who are going to stand up and fight for working people and that's [Applause] and having said that let me just say I've known you know Hillary Clinton for now something like 25 years we served in the Senate together and obviously uh in the campaign we had our differences of opinion and it was a hotly fought campaign but I have a lot of respect for secretary Clinton did then and do now okay other thank you for one more time for one more uh Ben kentish can shout from the gallery sure good good uh I am aware that there's an election coming up I've heard that and ironically when we agreed to come to the UK that was before your prime minister called the snap election uh so this is not intentional my being here at this point uh yes there are similarities uh here are the similarities as I see it not being an expert on UK politics uh what Corbin has tried to do with the labor party is not dissimilar from what some of us are trying to do with the Democratic party and that is make it a party which is much more open and inviting for working people and young people and not have kind of what we call a liberal Elite making the decisions from the top on down but making decisions from the bottom on up so that's one area where I think that what Corbin is doing is trying to revitalize democracy bring a lot of new people into the political process and I think that that is an excellent idea that's what we need to do in countries all over the world and certainly what we are trying to do in the United States second of all uh Corbin I think has shown a lot of courage in dealing with some of the economic issues that I do a lot of time talking about in the United States let me be very honest with you if I were to give a speech for example about women's rights people would say that's great that's really important if I were to give a speech about gay rights people say that's great Bernie we need to fight homophobia if I were to give a speech about combating racism and in my country a broken Criminal Justice System people would say that's great we cannot tolerate racism or sexism or homophobia and people respond to that but what is harder for a variety of reasons for people to deal with is the fact that increasingly in this country and Corbin makes this point and in my country we are looking at oligarchic forms of government where the people on top have increased power have increased wealth while the middle classes shrink and why many people live in Desperate poverty that is a an approach that makes certain people uncomfortable they feel uneasy about that but I applaud Jeremy corbyn for raising those issues because at the end of the day if we are going to create governments that work for all of us if we're going to deal with health care and create great Educational Systems and protect the environment and combat climate change and deal with issues like women's rights and gay rights and combating racism we need to have a government of what Abraham Lincoln in America described the government of the People by the people and for the people and not a government of billionaires and large multinational corporations so I applaud Corbin for raising those issues which I think are important for my country for the UK and for every major country on Earth [Applause] thank you thank you [Applause] all right thank you everyone um unfortunately we have no more time for audience questions I'm sorry if you were selected and then we ran out of time but I'm sure you were very pleased that we got to hear from Senator Saunders uh on his own well let me just conclude Again by thanking the Cambridge Union and Jonah thank you very much for doing a great job thank you it was an honor and a privilege for my wife and me to be with you today we look forward to coming back at some point in the future thank you very much thank you thank you very much [Applause] ladies [Applause] ladies and gentlemen thank you all so much for coming uh the Cambridge Union is uh immensely honored today by the present uh Senator Sanders and his wife Jane and we have uh one final piece of business that we want to attend to which is to name both Senator Sanders and his wife honorary members of the society and present them both with certificates to that effect and indeed if they have a fantasy coming back uh membership card so they can get into one of our events I would I would just all right I would just uh warn the senator that if he loses it there's a 40 pound feat but there you go thank you very much thank you thank you um yeah thanks very much everybody for coming um as I said if you wouldn't mind remaining in here until we've left from the back door uh the only other thing coming up in one week's time today I'll be halfway through my exams but we'll also have uh Emma Thompson here the wonderful actress and it would be fantastic to see as many of you down here as possible to meet her but um thank you again Senator Sanders Jane just like that [Applause]
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Channel: Cambridge Union
Views: 68,376
Rating: undefined out of 5
Keywords: The, Cambridge, Union, Bernie Sanders, Senator, Cambridge Union
Id: mZ6CJuHPFOE
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 69min 32sec (4172 seconds)
Published: Fri Jun 02 2017
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