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2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: The Ad That Moved People the Most: Bernie Sanders America [View all]Gothmog
(154,590 posts)83. The DNC had nothing to do with Sanders being soundly rejected by Jewish, African American and Latino
voters. Sanders was a very weak candidate who made silly promises that he could never deliver on. Sanders misled his followers by promising that he could win the nomination and force the GOP to agree to unrealistic proposals based on a non-existent revolution. That revolution exists only in a fantasy world and has not been evident in the real world http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/robert-schlesinger/articles/2016-04-15/bernie-sanders-bad-delegate-math-and-fantasy-revolution
He went on to argue that he's going to win because he'll pile up votes now that the contest has moved out of the Deep South. This is a shorthand version of an argument that Sanders and his allies have been deploying recently in an attempt to downplay Clinton's lead in pledged delegates "having so many Southern states go first kind of distorts reality" he told Larry Wilmore, host of "The Nightly Show," earlier this week.
There's a lot wrong with this formulation, as Paul Krugman wrote in The New York Times this morning. It suggests a world view redolent of former half-term Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's toxic pandering to "real America." In Sanders' case, he's saying that red-state Democrats should be discounted because they're too conservative. But that's simply wrong, Krugman notes: Clinton isn't "riding a wave of support from old-fashioned Confederate-flag-waving Dixiecrats," she ran up the score by scoring lopsided victories among black voters ("let's be blunt, the descendants of slaves," he writes).
And the fact that the Deep South is conservative should be irrelevant, given that Sanders argues the principle obstacle to his super progressive agenda is campaign finance corruption rather than, say, ideology. Either he's leading a national movement, as he claims, or he's not.
Thus more broadly, his attempt to delegitimize a swath of voters lays bare a fundamental inconsistency of the Sanders campaign: One of his basic answers about how he's going to accomplish his aims whether winning the Democratic nod, winning the general election or enacting his agenda is the forthcoming revolution. His super-ambitious agenda will prove to be achievable substance rather than unicorns-and-rainbows fantasy, he said Thursday night, "when millions of people stand up, fight back and create a government that works for all of us, not just the 1 percent. That is what the political revolution is about. That is what this campaign is about."
And that's fine: If he can summon the revolution, then more power to him, literally and figuratively. But the Sanders revolution is breaking on the hard realities of math. The revolution will not be televised, the old song goes; but it can be fantasized and it can be measured, in votes and delegates. And in every calculable respect, it's coming up short. That leaves Sanders to bank on an anti-democratic sleight of hand to secure the nomination. That's not a broad-based revolution; that's a palace coup.
Here's why: Despite Sanders' recent string of victories, there is no sense in which he is winning this race. As The Washington Post's Philip Bump wrote earlier this week:
There's a lot wrong with this formulation, as Paul Krugman wrote in The New York Times this morning. It suggests a world view redolent of former half-term Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's toxic pandering to "real America." In Sanders' case, he's saying that red-state Democrats should be discounted because they're too conservative. But that's simply wrong, Krugman notes: Clinton isn't "riding a wave of support from old-fashioned Confederate-flag-waving Dixiecrats," she ran up the score by scoring lopsided victories among black voters ("let's be blunt, the descendants of slaves," he writes).
And the fact that the Deep South is conservative should be irrelevant, given that Sanders argues the principle obstacle to his super progressive agenda is campaign finance corruption rather than, say, ideology. Either he's leading a national movement, as he claims, or he's not.
Thus more broadly, his attempt to delegitimize a swath of voters lays bare a fundamental inconsistency of the Sanders campaign: One of his basic answers about how he's going to accomplish his aims whether winning the Democratic nod, winning the general election or enacting his agenda is the forthcoming revolution. His super-ambitious agenda will prove to be achievable substance rather than unicorns-and-rainbows fantasy, he said Thursday night, "when millions of people stand up, fight back and create a government that works for all of us, not just the 1 percent. That is what the political revolution is about. That is what this campaign is about."
And that's fine: If he can summon the revolution, then more power to him, literally and figuratively. But the Sanders revolution is breaking on the hard realities of math. The revolution will not be televised, the old song goes; but it can be fantasized and it can be measured, in votes and delegates. And in every calculable respect, it's coming up short. That leaves Sanders to bank on an anti-democratic sleight of hand to secure the nomination. That's not a broad-based revolution; that's a palace coup.
Here's why: Despite Sanders' recent string of victories, there is no sense in which he is winning this race. As The Washington Post's Philip Bump wrote earlier this week:
In fact, by every possible democratic measure, Clinton is winning. She's winning in states (and territories) won, which isn't a meaningful margin of victory anyway. She's winning in the popular vote by 2.4 million votes more than a third more than Sanders has in total. In part that's because Sanders is winning lower-turnout caucuses, but it's mostly because he's winning smaller states. And she's winning with both types of delegates.
Sanders' revolution was not real which is why he lost the race in the real world. I and many other Democratic voters never took Sanders seriously because I never accepted the premise of his so-called revolution. There was simply no way for Sanders to come close to delivering on his promises in the real world. Sanders never generated his promised revolution and could not deliver on his promises in the real world
The DNC had nothing to do with the fact that Sanders was soundly rejected by Jewish, African American and Latino voters. These voters were smart enough to reject the concept of a silly revolution.
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I am very concerned that his so very big movement with so many millions of followers with so much
boston bean
Dec 2016
#1
If you call minimal media coverage of Bernie's campaign, as compared to Hillary's coverage, a "pass," oookkaayyyyy... don't see it myself.
InAbLuEsTaTe
Dec 2016
#54
I can understand critiquing his coverage, but calling it "minimal" is just insane.
SaschaHM
Dec 2016
#73
Paraphrasing the song: folks believe what they want to believe and disregard the rest.
Magoo48
Dec 2016
#47
The DNC had nothing to do with Sanders being soundly rejected by Jewish, African American and Latino
Gothmog
Dec 2016
#83
They helped her lose in fact...and if we are not careful...we will lose again in 2020.
Demsrule86
Dec 2016
#12
Nonsense - Many people who supported Bernie in the primary were excellent supporters of HRC in the
karynnj
Dec 2016
#48
Why would you say that? You ever thought that maybe without all of Bernie's able assistance and support, the election of asswipe tRump would not have been as close as it was?!
InAbLuEsTaTe
Dec 2016
#52
maybe if the DNC chair hadnt been on the wrong side of a law supported by over 70% of Florida voters
Warren DeMontague
Dec 2016
#77
If 2016 is remembered for no other reason, it will be the year that Bernie arrived
HoneyBadger
Dec 2016
#4
Not to mention Barack Obama didn't leave a portion of Dems hating him in 2004. nt.
SaschaHM
Dec 2016
#36
The DNC has served the party poorly as evidenced by major losses at the state level.
CentralMass
Dec 2016
#63
great, and lets have our public face be a Democrat like Gavin Newsom, who supports legal marijuana
Warren DeMontague
Dec 2016
#79
There is nothing happy or hopeful about an election that you lose in the general.
Demsrule86
Dec 2016
#10
Her heart and mind will remain brighter and more energetic than many of those who
Cal33
Dec 2016
#68
I loved that ad. It made me tear up because many of the scenes were from the Vermont
Vinca
Dec 2016
#16
That's weird. I found it to be sort of alienating as a city dweller that admires diversity and
bettyellen
Dec 2016
#20
The overwhelming majority of the test group thought it was the best. Sorry you didn't like it.
think
Dec 2016
#21
Your criticism of the ad reminds me of what David Brock said about Bernie when he seen it
NWCorona
Dec 2016
#22
Sure the land is, but not the population. It's a storybook life that hardly exists these days.
bettyellen
Dec 2016
#64
We're going to have to recapture this sense of hope and possibility as we fight Trump
portlander23
Dec 2016
#28