the thing that people aren't cluing into is that "reparations" is a kind of code word in competing contexts. if you walk into a church in south carolina, it means transferring wealth downwards, and one would expect sanders to support that. but, if you walk into a hockey rink in burlington and start taking about reparations, what it means to the people there is transferring wealth sideways based on racial characteristics, and nobody at all should support that.

i understand that components in the black community want a simple answer on it, but they're wrong to take that position - and rather than being pandered to, should be called out for taking a simplistic, binary position on race. warren, particularly, should be called out for pandering, here. sanders is right to ask for the term to be defined before he commits to a position that he doesn't just not support, but that has the potential to severely damage him with the kind of voters that are actually going to decide the election, at the end of the day.

i have a simple position on reparations, myself, although it means something different in canada, where the reparations are directed entirely at the indigenous population.

"yes, i have support for reparations. i call that support socialism."

https://theintercept.com/2019/02/26/reparations-bernie-sanders/