2020 Democratic presidential primary

Because the institutional obstacles do exist and no single candidate can fix them without pretty much completely reorienting a whole lot of peoples' relationships to politics and their representatives

The point in the WaPo article about the likelihood of actually enacting that agenda even if Sanders became President, given the realities of having to work with Congress, is the issue that would probably most concern me tbh.

― silent as a seashell Julia (Sund4r), Tuesday, 19 February 2019 16:02 (six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

vs candidate x, whose name is....?

Could everyone who believes what presidential candidates say they are "going to do" is literally linked to reality please move to the kids' table, where there will be party favors and Jell-O.

what flavour

it's not him I object to as much as his idiot BernieBro base that might still not vote for the Dem candidate in 2020.

― fuck the NRA (Neanderthal), Tuesday, February 19, 2019 9:54 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the ignorance needed to write something like this is frankly astounding, considering the relationship “our side” is supposed to have with facts

vs candidate x, whose name is....?

Every candidate faces those obstacles but if electing Sanders results in similar policies that you would get from Biden or Klobuchar, what is there to get excited about?

It’s politics baby what need have we of facts

Every candidate faces those obstacles but if electing Sanders results in similar policies that you would get from Biden or Klobuchar, what is there to get excited about?

why even bother engaging in politics at all then really

A sanders or warren victory would, at the very least, send a different kind of message about the american people want than a harris or gillibrand victory. Transformative progressive policies aren’f just parts of sanders’ platform—that’s the core of what he represents as a politica figure.

Estimates from multiple surveys estimate between 6-12% of people who voted Bernie in the Primary voted for Trump but go on, bestow your facts upon me k3ller

*Trump in the gen election that is

Can you please cite these?

Even if it’s true, it’s not Bernie’s fault. There was a slew of reasons Clinton was an unpopular candidate, some her fault—like having voted for the fucking Iraq War—and some not, like the massive disinformation campaign that grew from the email hacks.

25% of hillary backers voted for mccain in 2008 iirc

if we're playing that game

Sounds like a good reason to nominate him actually

I don't think 6-12% is exceptionally high for primary voters crossing over? I thought similar estimates had over 20% of Clinton voters voting for McCain in 08? No expert on these stats, though.

I'm still p pro-Sanders/Warren btw. Just thinking out loud, I guess.

6xp

Yeah. I have a theory that he helped Hillary if anything because he got more people interested in the political process. If hillary was seen to have run unopposed people may have been more skeptical or bored by her than they were.

(Granted it didn't prove anything as it was one of three estimates and even Larry Sabato stated there's no good case to be made that BernieBros swung the election):

https://www.npr.org/2017/08/24/545812242/1-in-10-sanders-primary-voters-ended-up-supporting-trump-survey-finds

Anyway i apologize for the diversion, onward and downward.

Xxpost a lot of Hillary supporters in 08 weren't democrats. Like my mother for instance

I can support this theory with stats but you need to go through my office assistant to get them.

Self xp

xps to sund4r but are you predicting/speculating that there are other dem candidates that get better policies through?

if so, idk do i see that. obama struggled enough and im not sure anyone in the field is in his class

if the argument is "theyd all achieve the same but bernie is an old white man" then hey good for u kinda thing thats fine

if the president might be an aspirational figurehead type that doesnt get bogged down in wonkishness (that might possibly only serve to combat that aspirational quality cf obama again) then bernie would imo seem a better bet than many again

Yeah. I have a theory that he helped Hillary if anything because he got more people interested in the political process. If hillary was seen to have run unopposed people may have been more skeptical or bored by her than they were.

I didn’t say it wasn’t a bad theory. It is a theory though.

I actually think it's pretty sound, though of course basically impossible to verify or debunk

I wasn't necessarily making an argument for other candidates over Sanders. I was tempering my enthusiasm for the platform announcement (which did sound good). 3xp to darraghmac

Without any clear statistics (and how would we get them?), it seems pointless to me to try to analyse the extent to which a primary candidate helped or hurt the winner of the nomination, unless he e.g. refused to endorse her or campaigned against her in the general, which did not happen.

In any case, the idea that he was a nader-type spoiler is preposterous

he ran his campaign past a point where he had any reasonable path to victory. at the very least you can make a claim that that wasn’t good for Clinton. unless of course you’re operating with this theory that the guy who spent half a year making the country associate Clinton with Goldman Sachs and disillusioning Democrats on her was actually good for her.

Did people blame Jesse Jackson for Michael Dukakis's loss?

She associated herself with goldman sachs

ah yes, it was bernie who forced hillary into a decades-long relationship with goldman sachs, the scoundrel

You could point to 50 things that provided the margin of victory for trump in this election because the margin was so slim. Bernie’s not the only thing, but he’s on that list, same with the 00 election and nader. (That one is more clear cut.) if the Dukakis margin had been thin too, that might be a credible claim.

xp

as well argue that hillary spoiled his run

but ooops we all know that a berniebro did that once boo hiss

You could point to 50 things that provided the margin of victory for trump in this election because the margin was so slim. Bernie’s not the only thing, but he’s on that list, same with the 00 election and nader. (That one is more clear cut.) if the Dukakis margin had been thin too, that might be a credible claim.

xp

― iatee, Tuesday, February 19, 2019 12:37 PM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

There's no evidence that Bernie is even on the list.

Is there a precedent for someone losing a primary to a candidate who then lost the presidency, then running against the president the following elections?

Like, has it ever occurred to you that (1) people were already disillusioned with her due to, among other things, 2008 and the Bill Clinton years and (2) that anything negative that could be said about her would have been brought out by the Trump campaign regardless, and (3) she wasn't a good candidate? xp

no none of that has occurred to me

Is there a precedent for someone losing a primary to a candidate who then lost the presidency, then running against the president the following elections?

― Van Horn Street, Tuesday, February 19, 2019 12:40 PM (fifty-four seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Not exactly the same thing, but Jackson lost the 84 primary to Mondale, then ran again in the 88 primary. Gore also lost in the 88 primary but didn't run for president again until 2000.

romney?

I could use a comparative yardstick but this seems fast

Bernie Sanders campaign confirms they raised $1 million in the first 3.5 hours since his announcement.

— Alex Seitz-Wald (@aseitzwald) February 19, 2019

I agree Clinton was not a great candidate and yet she did win relatively soundly vs Bernie.

anyway I don’t have the time nor interest to argue about politics with berniebros rn, I am glad that he won’t win the nomination this time because he would obv be a terrible president even if he won. anyone who supports him over warren should do some soul searching as to how they ended up in that spot.

Sure, when he was an out-of-nowhere upstart and Clinton had 100% of the party's backing and an otherwise clear field. And yet he won as many states against her as she did against Obama in 08. xp

berniebrooooos

I think out-of-nowhere upstarts have a distinct advantages these days, you see that everywhere now. I mean one could say she won despite the disillusion you were referencing.

acting as a sort of "activist president" interested in activating citizens to help pressure existing power structures/institutions into necessary change, inviting people to take a more participatory role. In other words exactly what O ended up not doing with the base who were excited about him.

^yes absolutely this

https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif BERNIEBROS https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif
https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif BERNIEBROS https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif
https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif BERNIEBROS https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif
https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif BERNIEBROS https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif
https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif BERNIEBROS https://media.tenor.com/images/1287ca6f11f1301aa4c60dca8e701d3f/tenor.gif
BERNIEBROS

I identify as a bro but not a bernie bro—just a supporter.

I don't think they needed the alert tbh