BRATTLEBORO — It's quite disappointing that the only candidates remaining for president are three old, white men: Biden, Sanders, and Trump.
As if we need any more evidence, white male privilege is still a driving factor in the decisions being made. It's illogical to think that out of the millions of eligible people in our country, we couldn't include any women and people of color who are at least as capable and qualified as the three men we ended up with. This is a gross injustice and highlights the systemic biases that prevail.
Both the Democratic and Republican parties have failed by not doing a better job in taking steps to allow and encourage others to step to the forefront.
The systemic biases that exist today can be traced back to our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution, written by relatively wealthy white men, many of whom were slave owners. (Thomas Jefferson enslaved more than 600 men, woman, and children during his life.)
So it's not surprising that biases - especially against women, people of color, LGBTQ , and lower-income people - still exist today because these biases were consciously built into our systems. By “systems,” I mean our judicial, policing, educational, financial, housing, hiring, voting, and yes, how we determine whom we elect to represent us in our government.
Although I'm dissatisfied with the candidates we have to pick from, to me it's clear that only one of the three candidates has dedicated himself to addressing systemic biases, and that's Bernie Sanders.
He's been strongly and consistently advocating for income, health-care, gender, and social-justice issues since he was mayor in Burlington. In my view, he is not the ideal person to lead our country, but he does have unquestionable integrity which puts him clearly above his competition.
Bernie won't lie to us, and he won't take the easy way out to placate his Democratic or Republican cronies. Let's hope he picks a person of color, one who is female or LGBTQ , to be his running mate.
Then we'll know we're heading back on the right track and that, indeed, wisdom does come with age - at least for some.