The country is yearning for a grown-up. None of the Obama coalition was petulant children.

Including younger voters. He can’t just ignore them and their needs. That’s not what a leader does. That’s what a trump does.

OR have you missed the last two Tuesdays?

That’s a serious turn off for this new Biden supporter. That will dampen enthusiasm for the candidate.

There are a lot of young people who need to be engaged. We should be thinking long term and try to bring them in.

Your acceptance of that fact is not required.

Lose dems.

He will not be elected if you do so.

Every election, some losing group wants to hold the winners hostage.
You're either a Democrat, or you're not.
You either vote for the Democrat candidate, or you risk getting another 4 years of trump.
What do you want? Jeesh!

It really is up to the candidate, the campaign and the party to create, encourage, inspire, whatever one wants to call it, voter turnout. Blaming voters for their choices doesn’t solve a thing. Browbeating then and their desire to be won over by policy and positions surely won’t generate their support.

Well, it looks like Bernie won't be the nominee because he and his campaign didn't create, encourage, inspire, or whatever one wants to call it, to come out and vote. As far hostages go, I see several posts here that pretty much say they are holding their vote hostage until Joe Biden or one of his supporters pay the ransom they desire for it to be released to Joe.

actually say that here. Not saying they didn't but I haven't seen it. I think most, if not all DUers understand the dire need to actually win the WH -- which of course will require the support of all Democrats whoever the nominee is -- and we all know it will be Joe Biden. People who voted in our primary who aren't part of the DU community, I can't speak to as I have no real insight. But I don't know that they are even "threatening" to withhold votes unless ... My view is it just makes good sense to build bridges to those people rather than badmouth and beat up on them for supporting Sanders. They have the same right that you and I do to prefer, support and vote whoever they feel best about whether that's because of policy, "electability", or any other trait. But it makes no sense whatsoever to me for the winning side to chide and flaunt them as losers who do not need to be respected. That's exactly what I see in some if ot many of the comments being posted by the "winners" the past few days. There's no gain in that, but there is potential loss.

feed the bullies.

Then nothing is.

VOTE DEMOCRATIC!

it is that simple.

Party since I was 14. I’ll of course vote.

I know many who won’t.

Candidate and his supporters. Why completely alienate a large group of voters?

...voting for the dem nom...IN THIS ELECTION.. even if its a damn loaf of bread..then maybe they arent emotionally mature enough to vote yet.

“Aren’t emotionally mature enough to vote yet” just perfectly describes the situation.

Every day, every speech, every post. Since you are close to the disaffected, perhaps you can explain it to them in words they can undertand. Please. Because God knows we've sure been trying.

I mean that sincerely. If Biden were to say what you think would work, what would it be?

I would love Biden (and I believe he will) to talk up his educational programs more. Emphasize free CC and how we will pay for it (like Warren). Talk about the importance of public service and how existing loans WILL be forgiven (as was promised). Face his past vote against student debt being excluding in bankruptcy.

Talk up his climate policies more. The need to do something from day one. This is an even more existential threat than the current pandemic (though as a virologist it pains me to say that - and I believe pandemics and climate change are linked).

Now that the field has narrowed, just start taking about the things that affect the short and long term future of young people.

Engage young folks and don’t ignore them or have animosity towards their concerns. Or blame them for falling for Bernie or their idealism.

When I went to vote yesterday, there were lots of young people. They were even volunteering. This is a very red state and Bernie won. He has a message that resonates. Let’s not poo-poo them off.

Costs you Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.
I am completely failing to comprehend how you can say what you're saying here given 2016.
People, including Hillary who decided not to visit some of these 3 states at all in the general election took this stance then.
Then we got Trump.

I am not saying people are right to sit this out or whatever the hell they did in 2016 but I only feel that Wisconsin has gotten more rabidly red, not less in the last 4 years, so like I don't get what you're saying here. We need to shame people into Wisconsin some more, remind them that they were wrong to not be taken for granted last election and we'll be fine this time?

Be nice to us or we won't vote Democratic? Seriously? After 2016, Bernie supporters (some, not all) are pulling this crap again?

First time engaged in this process. Biden should bring them into the fold by addressing their issues. I hope he makes more of a point of it in his upcoming speeches and debates. Or we will lose folks who are more dem minded than not.

BTW I never said I wouldn’t vote for the nominee. I voted Biden yesterday. But honestly I wouldn’t have if I had been in this thread before I went to the polls. I can’t stand Sanders so wouldn’t have voted for him either.

and learn to vote like everyone else did. Nobody needs to give them special kisses on the forehead.

Are you freaking kidding me? Your vote based on a thread? OMG!

My candidate was out and I had to chose b/w my fifth and sixth choices. I chose Biden but could have gone the other way.

The pure animosity towards young people’s hope in a candidate and their valid concerns is a turn off. I haven’t been in many Biden threads. I expected more interest in bringing people in rather than turning people out.

I’ve been turned out.

There is a reaction to petulance and threats. A reaction to an overwhelming sense of entitlement. A reaction to the politics of hostage-taking.

And letting internet randos influence your vote seems rather absurd, btw b

For the Democrat like I always have.

This is a primary. I would have chosen the other candidate I our PRIMARY.

I would have had to have picked him or one of the others that have dropped out.

This is getting ridiculous. I am a dem and have always been a dem. I have worked for many dem candidates. However, if the people on this thread are indicative of typical Biden supporters (which I very much doubt), I would not be welcomed into the camp. My ideas just don’t seem to match up.

I’m done with this sub thread. Peace to you.

A number of them are

They are explicit in this fact! They are not trying to build the Democratic party, they are trying to use it to their selfish ends, even if it means injuring the party. If they voted like Democrats, Pres. Hillary Clinton would be handling a public health crisis right now.

How much less of a crisis it would be under President Hillary Clinton.

far more reliable.

Camp that can be moved. We are not talking trumpers here.

You don't get a do-over.
President Obama once said, "Elections have consequences."

Huge turn out and Bernie won.

I didn’t vote for him and I am done with Sanders, but we can’t throw all his voters aside as if they don’t count or we don’t need them. And I doubt Biden would think that.

But that’s what I am reading here.

Why wouldn’t we want them?

Want someone to vote against.

They want someone to vote for.

Democrats just impeached DT because of the fact he is completely corrupt and abusing his position.
The Republicans, through fear or idiocy are onboard with DT.
We are in crisis.
You can either vote for Joe Biden or you can join those who no longer care (Republicans included).

Delicate-ass whiners need to stop.

Sure would be nice to have them in November. Not sure why you could care less. But the 3 states could make a difference.

That is a big singular motivating factor in this election so far.

What kind of childish-ass nonsense is that? People have a fucking responsibility to do the right thing. If a young voter needs “hope” or “inspiration” to vote against Trump then they’re a fucking dipshit to begin with and I’ve got no time for that sort of person.

Time to step up and grow up; the choices are going to be Trump and Biden, period — if that choice poses an intellectual or emotional struggle for someone then they’re beyond reach.

Please remind me, I forget.

They want free stuff and they dont vote
Otherwise Sanders would be on top.

That's a right wing talking point.

Medical debt up the wazoo?

There has to be some relief in sight for them.

This thread is seriously making me reconsider my vote for Biden yesterday.

I feel sick to my stomach with all the snark and lack of plain giving a fuck about young people.

I’m back to undecided.

But rude people on the internet should not decide how you vote.

Wants to go?

The message should be of hope.

Not - I’m not trump so vote for me.

And I worked my ass off since I was 14 for the dem candidate. This makes me sick.

People online, even in a competition between friends, is bound to get dicey.

Maybe look at and listen to Joe's message. It is not "I'm not Trump so vote for me." Neither was that Hillary's message.

Do some homework.

Wasn’t a Sanders or Biden supporter this go around based on policy.

I'm not Trump; vote for me, right?

Uh, yeah. That kind of is his appeal. There are hundreds, if not thousands, if threads here about how he's the one to beat Trump. He's the most electable. Policies aren't really his main draw.

But the fact is that if a young voter is uninspired by Biden’s message then they should STILL be willing, eager, and overwhelmingly enthused to vote for him because he’s not Trump.

There’s a deeper reality there that needs to be addressed, regardless of how “inspirational” (barf!) they might find the Democratic candidate for president.

You’ve been working your ass off for Democrats your whole life — nobody had to win you over or promise you shit, so why should this generation require that sort of thing? You were smart enough and astute enough to look at the choices and realize that any decent person could only vote one way.

I hold today’s young voter to the same standard to which I held myself in the 80s while looking at Bush the Elder vs Dukakis — the latter was hardly inspirational, but I sure as fuck cast my first general election vote for him. The Bernie Youth should be called upon to make that same, rather simple, calculus.

they think of themselves as equal, not having to make sacrifices for others who wouldn't consider it at all.

And have fucked it up for everyone else.

The young feel powerless. Not listening to them will only exacerbate that. We dems should try to win them over.

and ruling it (LOL the Republicans/Putin do that! There are many poor older people) we have to admit guilt and beg forgiveness of the powerless feeling young (which is when all other generations felt the most powerful) - this is getting too absurd.

And Bernie didn't even do it well enough or he would not be where he is today vis a vis the nomination. They don't vote and that is why they are, and thus feel, powerless. And they appear to think Bernie does it all without Congress. Where are they working on a single red/purple state Senate campaign to get the 60 needed to cancel student loan debt?

And lots of them are older. And I am no spring chicken myself.

I am not saying beg forgiveness from the young. But why all the nasty snark towards his supporters, who we could try to win over?

toward the supporters generally, but towards the ones threatening that if we don't go court their votes and give them something, they won't vote. This is hard for me to understand - I know it is in my interests to vote and don't have to be courted and voted when old enough to vote. So it sounds very demanding to me - hard to imagine these people's thinking process. To be so into Bernie that you don't care what happens if he doesn't win and so drop the whole process and don't bother to vote without thinking of your own interests.

Biden's bankruptcy bill that makes it harder to discharge student debt in Bankruptcy is something they would have to be willing to forget (by realizing Dotard would only make it harder/impossible if he could). A lot of them will be unwilling to so maybe another group of voters is more likely to change.

then they should exercise the power of their vote and turn out for their candidate. If these legions of disaffected youth want their issues front and center then all they need to do is cast a fucking ballot, for fuck’s sake!

Their are a bajillion kids — the millennial generation is enormous. If they actually started voting then Bernie would be cruising to an easy win.

But guess what — they don’t vote, do they? They go to rallies and shitpost on Reddit and start nasty hashtags on twitter and Instagram and make homophobic videos about other candidates but taking that incredibly difficult last step of spending a few minutes voting is seemingly beyond their capability.

Stop the handholding. Stop the cajoling and the convincing and the pandering. They can vote in their candidate like everyone else, and if their candidate loses they can do what every other voter does and move on to their second choice.

If you want to be listened to then you use your loudest voice, and nothing is louder than voting en masse. Older African American voters did just that a few weeks ago and changed the state of the election overnight. Young people can either learn that lesson or continue to be ignored.

And as for powerless, come on. I have a woman friend who is 64 and hoping to reach 65 and Medicare before the breast cancer comes back.

We can trade sad stories forever. MOST people, old or young, have little power. We do have the power to vote, at least, and I hope everyone who supported a candidate who isn't the nominee will use that vote to defeat Trump.
Nothing the young people want-- nothing-- will happen if Trump wins another term. Much of it can (maybe, depending on Congress) happen if a Democrat wins.

I just heard another. The START agreement (nuclear) is set to expire in January. Trump seems eager to let it expire (ostensibly because he wants China in it, but probably because Putin wants it expired). A Democrat in office in January won't let it expire.

They are the biggest reason I vote. I'm glad that Democrats were wise enough, twice, to not select Bernie as our presidential nominee.

Here's what I would tell "young people." Vote. Nihilism is lying down to trip the ones still struggling.

you come out for it.
They didnt vote and Sanders is down.
Do you actually thing Blotus gives a crap about
education or health care?
He would be sooooooo much better than Biden.

I do think that there's a definite feeling of bitterness about the way they energized Bernie's campaign, and the effect it's having overall, though. Young voters are propping up a campaign that, forgive me for saying so, seems to be built on a lot of magical thinking.

Bernie's proposals will top $50 trillion over the next 10 years, or thereabouts. When asked how he's going to pay for those proposals, he doesn't have a solid answer and reverts to "I can't account for every nickel and dime." As if billions and trillions of dollars is the sort of thing one digs from the couch. Naturally these proposals (M4A, student debt forgiveness, free university tuition, etc.) are extremely attractive to young people. The problem there is that young people, in some cases, have more passion than they do perspective.

When this campaign built on magical thinking is represented by surrogates like Nina Turner, Briahna Joy Grey, and their fellow travelers who take repeated shots at the "Democratic establishment" (and Bernie himself has done the same), of course it creates some hard feelings. Those hard feelings easily transfer to the young people who are largely driving Bernie's campaign. Without them, his campaign goes nowhere.

I don't think anyone here doesn't sympathize with young people. They've been handed a world where the cost of a decent place to live is out of control in many urban areas... but that's where you gotta be to get a job that pays well, for the most part. Then to get that job, you have to go into ruinous amounts of student debt. Oh, and by the way, climate change is going to fuck the planet up royally, so that's nice. That's always assuming, of course, that they don't get gunned down in a classroom somewhere.

I recognize these problems even though they don't all apply to me, and I recognize the urgency young people feel about them. But I'm also old enough to know that there's no magic wand that we can wave to make it all go away. And right now, Bernie for President is a hideously dangerous roll of the dice. A good chance of incremental change is better, to me, than a small chance of radical change. I'm sympathetic to young folks, but not to the point of being unrealistic about how the world works.

TL;DR This is just generational conflict magnified through the lens of politics, that's all. Older people are content with incremental change. Younger people want a revolution. Same old story, but magnified thanks to the fuckedupness of our times.

And that’s how I feel too.

I’m in academia so am around young people all the time. I can’t ignore them or denigrate them for feeling the way they do.

I care a great deal about young people. I have taught them for 30 years.

I don't see Sanders as a savior for young people because I see only evidence of rhetoric, not action. I see his value as a gadfly and enthusiast who can push a more effective leader further to the left while keeping focus on important issues. But there's little evidence he would be the person capable of making any of his plans happen. I wish he could, but he actually never has gotten much done before.

The much more moderate Obama got much more actually done, even with a hostile Senate.
And Biden's free community college plan (Disclaimer, I teach in community college and am very dedicated to the mission) is more likely to happen than Sanders' free tuition program (because it's much much cheaper and more targeted to help students who need to budget their education-- even those going to 4-year schools would be able to take most Gen Ed courses at the community college and save a lot).

Sanders isn't the only or the best person to get things done. He is the best person for spotlighting the value of really progressive policies and making the more moderate candidates choose more liberal planks. That's an important role.

And why I didn’t want to nor did I vote for BS. I can’t see any of his promises coming to fruition as there are no real plans.

I am also an academic and making education affordable is a passion. The cost of education is too high, especially for those who come from the lower classes who get absolutely no help and have to finance everything.

I do think we should bring younger people into the fold as much as possible. Express how Biden’s plans can get us closer to the goal of affordable education. And I love CCs. I did most of my vet school prerequisites at nights at a CC while I worked full time.

I am alarmed, though, at the attitude of many in this thread regarding the younger voters. I’ll chalk it up to primary tensions.

That's how we got the Farting Fuhrer.

On young people. That’s ridiculous.

necessary to defeat him. That's just a fact.

to 2016. The only data I’ve seen is the share of turnout made up of younger age groups. Haven’t seen a lot of data that the actual numbers are down however. It could be that the share of total turnout is down significantly, but not the actual numbers? There is also quite a bit of data showing never Trumpers voting in primaries thus far (presumably former Rs or Is). No question younger age groups don’t turn out at rates older age groups do. But I think the data may be inconclusive at this point as to whether Sanders did significantly worse in turning out youth than 2016 at this point. Perhaps 2016 was more a reflection of turnout for HRC?

Bernie supporters cannot be "won over", they want Bernie or bust. But luckily, it won't matter because they are an unreliable voting block.

... even if they have to create the conditions for it to happen. These people like Cenk, and MM and Krystal Ball who refuse to vote remind me a lot of the the doomsday cults and armageddonists who think that it's their duty to bring about the End Times. Same principle, different reasons. I guess this 1950's stile "revolution" thing they want isn't going to materialize unless the true believers can do something to make it even WORSE than it is now, thus making "revolution" look desirable. It's just the most insane thing I've ever heard, yet people are really into this shit.

He can forget about the 10-12% who voted for tRump in 2016 and who will probably vote for trump again. They’re not redeemable under any scenario.

He doesn’t have to win over the 80% of Sanders voters who will vote for Biden.

That leaves 8-10% of Sanders voters to worry about, which is a fairly insignificant head count when one considers D voter turnout so far in 2020.

So, no, he doesn’t have to win over any of them.

he cares to do that

He should try to engage young people and what they care about.

or he'd lose the others who voted for him.