Within the two main parties, yes. Sanders seems to me an honest New Deal Democrat, whose positions would not have surprised Eisenhower particularly. The fact that he is considered a radical extremist is an indication of how far the political spectrum has shifted to the right during the neoliberal period, with the Democrats becoming what used to be called “moderate Republicans” and the Republicans drifting off the spectrum, hardly recognizable as a parliamentary party in the traditional sense – as has been recognized, incidentally, by the most respected conservative political analysts, notably Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute, who describe today’s Republican party as a “radical insurgency” that has pretty much abandoned traditional politics.

Sanders’s policy proposals are also fairly closely aligned with popular opinion over a long period. Take for example his much-maligned call for national health care. It is supported right now by about 60% of the population – a remarkable figure, considering its scant support in the mainstream and regular vilification. That’s nothing new. National health care has had quite high popular support for a long time. In the late Reagan years, polls showed that a large majority thought health care should be a constitutionally-guaranteed right, and about 40% thought it already was in the Constitution (because it is so obviously right). Obama’s proposal for health care reform at first included a public option, supported by a large majority, but was dropped with little discussion. When media and commentary refer to the idea at all, they call it “politically impossible” – meaning that the population doesn’t matter, only financial institutions and pharmaceutical corporations.

This “politically impossible” idea is hardly utopian. There is something like that in other developed societies, and elsewhere. And it’s far preferable. US health care is an international scandal, with over twice the per capita costs of comparable countries and some of the worst outcomes. A lot of the malfunction traces to privatization, with its high administrative costs, bureaucratization and waste, profit-making, etc. National health care also should not be hard to institute, contrary to many charges. It could, for example, begin by simply lowering the age of eligibility for Medicare (a much more efficient system, which would be even more so if it didn’t have to work through the inefficient privatized system). That would cause almost no disruption, should quickly lower costs, and can be continued insofar as it is successful. Another step would be to drop the legislation, I think unique to the US, which bars government negotiation of drug prices – and is opposed by some 85% of the population. That leads to very high drug prices, also a consequence of the extreme protectionist provisions introduced into what are ludicrously called “free trade” agreements. The pharmaceutical corporations claim that their huge profits are necessary for research and development, but that is very doubtful. Economist Dean Baker, in particular, has provided strong arguments supporting better ways of funding R&D.

The same is true of free higher education, again common elsewhere – from rich countries with high educational standards like Germany and Finland to poor countries with a fine higher educational system like Mexico. In fact, higher education was virtually free in the 1950s in the US, when it was a much poorer country. The GI Bill provided education to a huge number of people who would never have gone to college, a great benefit to them and to the country. And even the private colleges were affordable. There are many reasons for the explosion in costs, including the neoliberal programs of starving public facilities. But it’s hardly clear that calling for free higher education is either utopian or radical.

Same with higher taxes on the rich, supported by most of the population for a long time while their taxes go down, another illustration of the increasing replacement of democracy by plutocracy. Same with a financial transaction tax, and other proposals that are hardly utopian or radical.