Primary Defense: Q&A with Political Science professor David Milbrandt
Professor Dave Milbrandt is a political science superhero.
He teaches at San Dimas high school by day and at Citrus College by night. He has been teaching political science at Citrus for about six years. Milbrandt was exposed to politics early on. Growing up, politics were his own sport–a full contact sport. Always interested in political science, Milbrandt has written and published one novel, “Chasing Deception” which deals with local politics and is working on his follow up novel. His novels integrate his passion for journalism and background in politics.
With the 2016 presidential election shaping up to be a heavyweight battle to the White House, Milbrandt stresses that political science is not just a major in college, but something that governs our way of life. Something we can fix, not fear.
What are your thoughts on Donald Trump becoming the presumptive Republican nominee due to Cruz and Kasich dropping out?
You have people who were hoping Ted Cruz could take it all the way here. He kept losing more and more states. I think the challenge is that when they lose Ted Cruz, they lose the conservative in the party. Some of my facebook friends, and I have friends on both side of the aisles, are saying that it’s a unity ticket. But I also have people saying without Ted Cruz, they don’t know who they’re going to vote for.
I think the republicans are going to have a hard time without Ted Cruz and John Kasich because they have Donald Trump left. Trump is not liked by major segments of the party: the establishment, the conservatives. People don’t know if he really is a republican. He’s been a democrat for a couple of years. Donald Trump has jumped all over the map, making it difficult for conservative voters to think he’s trustworthy. It’s going to be a fun little competition this summer.
Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders are neck in neck in delegates, but Clinton has superdelegates. What’s your opinion on that?
Super delegates are an interesting thing. They want to have people who have been around the party who have had a chance to have a voice in the party. The problem is, you have someone who is still contending for it. The problem is, Bernie Sanders hasn’t always been a loyal democrat. He’s an independent. He’s a socialist. It’s fine to be a democratic socialist as he says he is, but he hasn’t catered and tried to bring in democratic support traditionally. Because he hasn’t been pushing for democratic support traditionally, he doesn’t have the democratic establishment behind him. The establishment behind him are the superdelegates. Hillary Clinton has been a loyal democrat for 40 years. That gets you superdelegates and that gets you a win.
Bernie Sanders is very proud of how he’s not taking large contributions. That’s not how you win a presidency in 2016. You need large contributions. You need your donor support. It’s great that he has all these donors that give him $27 or $37 or a small amount. It’s wonderful. The small time donations show that he’s a man of the people, but that only gets you so far. When you have to raise $1 billion, that’s a lot of money. You need big donors. That’s against Bernie’s principle and that hurts him.
The superdelegates are there. The democrats put them there. It’s their choice. Bernie has to play by the same rules that Hillary does. He likes to be independent which is great when you’re a senator. It’s not so great when you’re running for president of the United States of America.
What would you say to the student voters who have been turned away because they registered as Independent and weren’t able to vote?
I would tell millennials that they need to research parties and figure out which one they believe in and support it. There are about 7-8% who are actually Independent. The rest of them lean to one party or another. It’s okay if your party doesn’t agree with 100% of what you agree with. 75%? Pick the party and sign up for it. Be a republican, be a democrat, be a libertarian, be whatever party that’s most like what you believe in. I’d rather be a part of the solution than out there in this group that can’t vote for somebody because of how you registered. But find out about a party and participate in the next cycle.Find out which party you like, support their values and get connected to them.
Maybe your party will never come out on top in elections, but stick with them. The millennials can change the platform. Morph it into what you like. They may not be bad parties but you’re not going to be in the winner’s circle. I’d rather be with a party that’s going to make a change.
People are saying that Sanders might not win the primary, but he has started a social movement.
I think he has began a social movement. I think what he’s going to do is pull Hillary to the left. She might be there anyway but she doesn’t want to go there if she doesn’t have the support, but she has Bernie for cover. She’s sort of supporting the ideas and values Bernie has and heading in that direction. I think that helps out the democratic party and Bernie supporters. You can say he helped the democratic party that way. He moved the country that way. That’s a win. It’s not about getting into the oval office. It’s about getting policies changed.
Sanders has the votes of the millennials. It’s not just because of free tuition in college and legal weed. He’s listening to folks and people are engaging with him. He’s this old guy who’s getting young people to vote for him. That really says something. They’re “feeling the Bern.”
Hillary Clinton is not strong in that way, but she has Bill Clinton. He’s a genius in that but Hillary is not. He goes around with her pulling people in, I that helps the party.
Normally the U.S. election is watched by other countries, but why do you think this election in particular is being so closely watched by the world?
Donald Trump. I think Donald Trump is the key reason people are concerned. Nobody knows what he is. He’s such an enigma in his statements because he speaks off the cuff, and is very unrehearsed and some would say unpolished. Because of this, his statements can make other countries look scary.
I teach the Great Gatsby in my high school English classes. Donald Trump is like Daisy Buchanan, they both play dumb but they’re not dumb. Donald Trump is not stupid. He went to Wharton then he went to work. He’s run businesses, but he’s playing to that less educated, angry American audience. That gets him his votes. I think people are afraid that he will enact the policies that he said he will, in the way he says he’ll do them. He has chants at his rallies. “What are we gonna do? Build a wall. Who’s going to pay for it? Mexico.”
Whether he’s actually saying that to get votes or not is another question. A lot of people may agree with Donald Trump but his presentation style can be offputting to some, which is what makes people nervous and interested.
Why would you encourage millennials to vote?
I would encourage millennials to vote because they need to have their voice heard. We live in a republic which means that we pick people that make decisions for us and not every time is our voice heard. If they don’t get involved, don’t participate in a campaign, they don’t get involved with social causes they care about or involved with social advocacy groups, then what are they doing? They’re part of the problem.
We will not vote if it interrupts our Starbucks run.We will not vote because we didn’t bother to read about the issues but know all about the Kardashians or who’s on “Pretty Little Liars” or the last vine we saw with a cat.
It is criminal, metaphorically speaking, to not vote in a country where we are allowed to do so. People have died to give us the vote. You are disrespecting that legacy by not voting. Your issues will never be heard if you don’t vote. There are countries where you are threatened about how you will vote. You are free to vote for or against whoever you like. The only consequence is that somebody might rip the bumper sticker off your car. They might throw an egg at your car or key it. That would be pretty bad, but that’s about the worst that can happen to you. We are free to vote and free to speak our minds. And if we do not vote, we may not be free to speak our minds very much longer. That’s what frightens me.
