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If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

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Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

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They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

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You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2016 / Open Thread: Jeb Bush, Sad Trombone Candidate

Open Thread: Jeb Bush, Sad Trombone Candidate

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“Education is when you read the fine print. Experience is what you get if you don’t.” Some people need to learn by doing, and despite the political power of his formidable family Jeb may be about to find out what it’s like to wake up as a cockroach. Politico reports on the deathwatch:

MANCHESTER, N.H. – Frustration inside Bush world has begun to spill into open view, with even the most outspoken family loyalists admitting it may soon be time to move on.

With the New Hampshire primary just days away and polls showing him still trailing Marco Rubio, there is an increasing sense that Jeb Bush is running out of time to demonstrate strength.

Many donors and influential supporters, bound by a deep and longstanding connection to the patrician clan, say they will remain with Bush no matter what. Yet others, deeply distressed by the rise of Donald Trump and Ted Cruz and eager for the Republican Party to rally around a mainstream candidate with viability, say they have come to terms with Bush’s long odds and the possibility they will eventually get behind someone else.

“I acknowledge reality. There’s going to be three or four candidates remaining after New Hampshire,” said former Minnesota Rep. Vin Weber, a Jeb Bush adviser who also worked on George W. Bush’s presidential campaigns. “I think the field is going to narrow pretty quickly. We’ll see what happens in South Carolina, and from there you can see the dynamic starting to winnow the field pretty quickly.”

While Weber said he would remain with Bush as long as he was in the race, others said they may soon head for the exits. Barring a strong showing, they said, Wednesday could be a day of deep reflection for them…

… Bush’s top aides are still struggling to keep restless supporters in line. On Thursday, three days after the former governor barely registered in the Iowa caucuses, the pro-Bush super PAC Right to Rise held a conference call with top donors to outline the path forward. At one point, Mike Murphy, a longtime top Bush adviser who oversees Right to Rise, was pressed by a donor on why the super PAC’s substantial spending had yet to improve the former governor’s poll numbers.

To many of Bush’s closest followers, the thought of him dropping out is almost unthinkable – particularly if Rubio emerges as the leading establishment candidate. Among Bush’s top advisers, the dislike of Rubio — who for years was a junior figure to Bush in Florida politics and is seen as deeply disloyal — is intense. One top Bush fundraiser said that on conference calls with the campaign Rubio has been called “Judas,” a reference to the biblical figure who had betrayed Jesus.

But with the governor struggling, some – for all their feelings of closeness to the family – hint that they are beginning to think about the possibility of a 2016 campaign without him…

Let. Us. Savor.

And in possibly the worst sign yet for John Ellis — Slatepitch!

BEDFORD, New Hampshire—George W. Bush never really suffered for his sins. But his kid brother sure has. The demise of Jeb Bush has been a source of immeasurable pleasure for, well, nearly everyone. His campaign is a nine-figure boondoggle that suckered cronies from Greenwich and Dallas into investing in a can’t-miss-opportunity. That grating WASP aura of entitlement he wore melted nearly instantly with a choice piece of hectoring about his paucity of energy. Pundits took so much pleasure in Jeb Bush’s plummet that they couldn’t imagine it could ever be reversed.

With his few remaining breaths as a candidate, however, Bush may have a path out from his debacle, an actual shot at the nomination. For months, he tried and failed to crush Sen. Marco Rubio. But he wielded the hatchet like a man who would rather be sailing. What he needed was a wingman. Last night, Gov. Chris Christie, with his bully’s instinct for weakness, baited the golden boy into choking—thereby, relieving Bush of all the throbbing pressure to stage a miraculous New Hampshire comeback…

As Republicans scrounge for their center-right tribune, they will find themselves coming full circle. Christie has no cash and no organization beyond New Hampshire. Kasich is out-of-synch with his party; his moderation won’t play outside a few suburban pockets. Which only leaves one…

Bush has now embraced the fact that he’s a scion. Although he’s kept his brother on the ranch, he brought his mother to the stump. In town hall meetings, he has begun to comfortably celebrate his brood. “The Bush thing, people need to get over it,” he told a crowd in Bedford, in an extended riff about his love for his family. Even the phrasing of that willful claim of indifference echoed one of his father’s idiosyncratic rhetorical tropes (“the vision thing”). Like his dad and grandfather, his presentation oozes with a New England prep school sense of noblesse oblige, talk of “servitude” and “purpose.”…

And when a Bush scion talks about “servitude” and “purpose”, the Lee Atwaters and Karl Roves perk up their little rat ears. Right to Rise should still have a few hundred thousands at its command, and if all that ratfvcking money can’t put another Bush in the White House, at least it should be enough to keep that high-booted little pretender Rubio out of it…

Reader Interactions

234Comments

  3. 3.

    Nate Dawg

    Got into it on Facebook with some Berniebro who defended his right to call Madeleine Albright a “C**t.”

    This quickly devolved into him telling me how women didn’t have it as bad as blacks, so c**t > N-CLANG.

    WOW.

    Also just realized that the Democrats are going to lose the general election this year. Probably time for me to mosey on back to a blue state.

    Fuck this.

  4. 4.

    Felonius Monk

    I still think Trump missed a golden opportunity during last night’s debate to eliminate Jeb? by just saying at the very beginning «Where’s your mommy?». But if Jeb? can help eliminate Rubio, I guess he will serve a useful purpose.

  6. 6.

    John Dillinger

    “Although he’s kept his brother on the ranch . . . ”
    ==========================================================
    Always with the narrative. He sold that campaign prop soon after leaving the White House.

  8. 8.

    Nate Dawg

    I never saw Obots calling Clinton a C*** on Facebook. I’ve seen it numerous times, from multiple sources (Different friends of friends.)

    I do think this year is different.

  9. 9.

    divF

    at least it should be enough to keep that high-booted little pretender Rubio out of it

    So does Rubio only have The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys ?

  11. 11.

    Cacti

    @Nate Dawg:

    This quickly devolved into him telling me how women didn’t have it as bad as blacks, so c**t > N-CLANG.

    I never knew that black and woman were mutually exclusive categories.

  12. 12.

    Tracy Ratcliff

    I see that Jeb! has the same command of the English language that his brother does. “Servitude” means slavery or incarceration, not public service.

  13. 13.

    Nate Dawg

    I don’t get it at all. I think it’s the Reddit – Gamergate crowd spawning this filth.

    That said, I don’t really have much else to say for Hillary other than “She’s better than a Republican.”

    Serious question: Is there one awesome thing she’s done that liberals can be proud of?

  14. 14.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Nate Dawg:
    Because the Hillary supporters now are not the Hillary supporters then, by and large. The base shifted around. Bernie picked up the asshole Naderite and PUMA fringe. They are a fringe. The vast majority of Democrats will rally around Hillary with joy like they did with Obama.

  16. 16.

    Mike J

    @Nate Dawg:
    CHIP
    lobbied for the first-ever U.N. Human Rights Council resolution on human rights and declared that “gay rights are human rights.
    Told the UN, “women’s rights are human rights” (which wasn’t popular to say out loud at the time.)

  17. 17.

    David Koch

    @Nate Dawg: I wouldn’t limit it to Reddit. Some of the left blogs believe the only way to win is to tear down Clinton in the ugliest way. To wit, they dry hump all of Trey Gowdy’s eGhazi smears.

  18. 18.

    Cacti

    @David Koch:

    There’s nothing in Sanders’s speeches or persona that should be triggering this (unlike Trump). But nevertheless the Dudebro wing supporting Sanders are really sexist.

    Sanders is about the last Democrat I would have pictured being popular with knuckle dragging bro culture. But there it is.

  20. 20.

    Nate Dawg

    @Mike J: Thanks, this is good stuff. SCHIP is legit. The Humans Rights stuff is good too, but 6 million kids getting healthcare is huge.

  21. 21.

    max

    And in possibly the worst sign yet for John Ellis — Slatepitch!

    You left out the best line!

    Judging from the chatter among reporters at the back of Jeb’s events, the media wants nothing more than to proclaim his return from the dead. Against the odds, and despite his many months as a punch line, Bush has earned the right to rise.

    max
    [‘He’s one of the media members, and he buried the lede, but hey, truth in advertising.’]

  22. 22.

    mclaren

    “That Bush thing, people need to get over it.” — Jeb Bush, 2016

    Three trillion dollars down a rathole in Iraq, a million Iraqi women and children dead.

    “That Bush thing, people need to get over it.” — Jeb Bush, 2016

    The greatest economic collapse since the Great Depression. 5 trillion dollars of value wiped out overnight. Unemployment at 10% Tens of millions of homeowners lost their homes, their bank accounts, their life savings, their jobs, their cars.

    “That Bush thing, people need to get over it.” — Jeb Bush, 2016

    The middle class destroyed, employment still not recovered after 7 years of economic hell, record high child malnutrition and child homelessness.

    “That Bush thing, people need to get over it.” — Jeb Bush, 2016

    Infrastructure crumbling, cities that can’t afford to run their busses or keep their streetlights on, entire cities like Detroit reverted to wilderness with wild dogs roaming through the ruins of formerly thriving businesses and houses.

    “That Bush thing, people need to get over it.” — Jeb Bush, 2016

    Hurricane Katrina run amok, crocodiles feasting on human MREs, people huddled on top of flooded stadiums, deputies shooting down homeless drowning men and women and children like dogs because they tried to cross the river to safety…

    “That Bush thing, people need to get over it.” — Jeb Bush, 2016

  24. 24.

    Anya

    Bill Clinton needs to stay silent & save his energy for the convention speech. He contributed to Hillary’s loss in 08 and would be shame if he cost her the nomination this time.

  26. 26.

    David Koch

    Lil’ Marco is absolutely getting annihilated on Twitter. Even his biggest voting bloc (the beltway media) is dumping on him.

    Brit Hume: Rubio’s Debate Performance Reminded Me Of Dan Quayle

  28. 28.

    Nate Dawg

    I disagree. Clinton can land a punch on Sanders (possibly). The gloves need to come off w/ Bernie. Obama was just better at the game. Sanders won’t be.

    EDIT: What Omnes Omnibus said

  33. 33.

    Cacti

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Because the Hillary supporters now are not the Hillary supporters then, by and large. The base shifted around. Bernie picked up the asshole Naderite and PUMA fringe.

    Picking up the Nader 2000 celebrity endorsers too.

    Just because they were disastrously wrong then doesn’t mean we should ignore them now, right?

  36. 36.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Omnes Omnibus: And some of this is purely partisan. I know a number of folks who thought she was a very competent Secretary of State who, once she formally announced she was running, went back to grasping at every rumor and innuendo because she was now back to being a political and partisan actor.

  39. 39.

    Cacti

    @kc:

    The concern trolling by old white Democratic men over “Berniebros” is exquisite.

    I guess Bernie’s joined the ranks of the concern trolls, since he denounced his bros just this morning.

  40. 40.

    Some Guy

    “The failure to help build up a credible fighting force of the people who were the originators of the protests against Assad—there were Islamists, there were secularists, there was everything in the middle—the failure to do that left a big vacuum, which the jihadists have now filled,” Clinton said. As she writes in her memoir of her State Department years, Hard Choices, she was an inside-the-administration advocate of doing more to help the Syrian rebellion. Now, her supporters argue, her position has been vindicated by recent events.

    if only we had listened to the royal families of Qatar and Saudi, and helped al Qaeda earlier and oftener, we wouldn’t have to worry about ISIS. / HRC

  41. 41.

    Fair Economist

    @Nate Dawg:

    Serious question: Is there one awesome thing she’s done that liberals can be proud of?

    Hmm –

    Identified the vast right-wing conspiracy (it was very real).

    Designed a better health care plan than Obamacare.

    Got the sanctions in place that got Iran to agree to the nuclear deal.

  44. 44.

    Adam L Silverman

    @kc: Kristol, or one of his proteges, is clearly advising Senator Rubio. You can tell in his memorized, and oft repeated, oft repeated, oft repeated, oft repeated…

    What was I talking about? Oh yeah: talking points.

  45. 45.

    BR

    @Nate Dawg:

    I agree. I’m still dissatisfied with both Clinton and Sanders, but I do think Sanders needs to be tested. I think back to the months of nonsense that Obama had to contend with, with several instances where the media gave saturation coverage for weeks to attacks against him (Rev. Wright, Ayers, “clinging”, etc.). And each time Obama managed to personally pull a rabbit out of a hat and fix the situation — it wasn’t his campaign that did it, he did it personally. We need to see that Sanders has that in him.

    I’m less worried about Clinton because she’s been attacked for so long that I think everyone has pretty much made up their mind about her. But on the flip side that means that any possible win with Clinton is going to be a narrow win.

  46. 46.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Some Guy: I have no quibble with Secretary Kissinger being referred to that way, but how exactly are you getting there with Secretary Albright? I’m just curious what you think she did that arises to the level of war crimes.

  47. 47.

    Mike in NC

    The laughable JEB! ad run during Super Bowl — featuring his imbecile AWOL brother — extolled his readiness to be Commander-in-Chief, all the while ignoring his own efforts to dodge the draft by being classified as a phoney Conscientious Objector.

  48. 48.

    Fair Economist

    @Some Guy:

    if only we had listened to the royal families of Qatar and Saudi, and helped al Qaeda earlier and oftener, we wouldn’t have to worry about ISIS. / HRC

    No, she thinks we should have been choosing who to help, rather than letting the Gulf Arabs pick.

  49. 49.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Amir Khalid: I honestly have no idea. Also, he has no real way to make them stop. All he can do is what he’s doing. Telling them to stop and stating, as he did last month, that if Secretary Clinton gets the nomination that he’ll support her.

  50. 50.

    Cacti

    @Nate Dawg:

    Susan Sarandon for Preznit!

    She said “I don’t vote with my vagina”.

    Which then implanted a mental picture of Susan Sarandon in a voting booth attempting to cast a ballot with her lady bits.

  52. 52.

    Joel

    @Nate Dawg: “I think it’s the Reddit – Gamergate crowd spawning this filth”

    1) Those guys aren’t Democrats
    2) I think it’s time to curate your Friend list.

  54. 54.

    CaseyL

    I don’t remember the Obama-Clinton feud getting this ugly this fast in ’08 (then again, Twitter wasn’t around yet). There’s a lot of old Hillary hatred out in the world, and while I don’t want to think it’s because of her gender, the fact that MRAs and PUAs are flocking to Sanders is making it hard to think otherwise.

    Don’t like Hillary for her reputation for incrementalism? OK- that’s something we can talk about.

    Don’t like Hillary because you see her as a corporate shill? OK – that’s something we can talk about.

    But the stuff I’m seeing on FB and GOS is making me sick. Hillary as “evil incarnate”? Hillary’s “never accomplished anything” and “lies all the time”? Excuse the fuck out of me? I’m close to unfriending a whole bunch of people who should know better.

  55. 55.

    chopper

    @Nate Dawg:

    Serious question: Is there one awesome thing she’s done that liberals can be proud of?

    you could have asked the same of obama back in early 2008.

  56. 56.

    David Koch

    @kc:

    Kathleen Geier, a freelance contributor to The Nation and herself a Sanders supporter, says while she has gotten her fair share of ugly online comments from male Clinton supporters, the level of vitriol coming from what she calls a “tiny minority” of Sanders boosters troubles her.

    “I think they’re doing harm to the cause,” she says. “I haven’t seen people treat Obama supporters like this, or supporters of other male establishment candidates – just Hillary. So it’s definitely misogyny.”

    She’s a Sanders supporter, who’s not old or male. How are U going to smear her?

  57. 57.

    BR

    @CaseyL:

    I do remember seeing people say things like that about Clinton at Daily Kos back in 2008. But there was very little other popular social media around in 2008, and social media tends to amplify peoples’ extremes and let them say things they’d never otherwise say in person.

  58. 58.

    divF

    “lies all the time”

    The Sanders people shouting “liar” at Hilary on TV after the Iowa caucuses made me immediately think of Joe Wilson shouting “You lie” at Obama during the President’s speech to a joint session of Congress in 2009. IOW, I expect that from GOP RWNJs, not from members of the Democratic party.

  59. 59.

    Nate Dawg

    As far as I remember, the Obots were pretty self-policing and shut most blatant misogyny down. It wasn’t a c-word and b-word free for all like it is now.

    I agree with the rest: these are people who are using the campaign to enjoy a women-hating circle jerk. They also seem to lack a basic understanding of American civics. In other words, most of them weren’t around for 2008.

  61. 61.

    Anne Laurie

    @Cacti:

    Sanders is about the last Democrat I would have pictured being popular with knuckle dragging bro culture.

    For the knuckle-draggers, “not that Hillary [redacted]” was the only important factor. I doubt most of them could tell you one salient fact about Bernie Sanders; he’s just Not Hillary.

  62. 62.

    Kropadope

    @Nate Dawg:

    Got into it on Facebook with some Berniebro who defended his right to call Madeleine Albright a “C**t.”

    I love how its always some person somewhere else where we can never verify the claim. And all the ditto heads nod “uh-huh, uh-huh.”

    @CaseyL:

    Hillary’s “never accomplished anything” and “lies all the time”?

    Hillary’s list of accomplishments is mighty short for someone who has been in public life as long as she has and doesn’t give me a lot of confidence that she’s learned from previous failures. Her approach toward healthcare, for example, decades later and she’s still Ms My-Way-Or-The-Highway.

    As far as dishonesty, look at the campaigns she ran against Obama and so far against Sanders; trying to paint Bernie’s criticism of the overheated tone of the gun debate as sexism, she and her surrogates claiming Bernie wants to end Medicare, the other night during the debate she raised two issues that Bernie was discussing earlier during the debate and cited those as issues that Bernie was ignoring which makes her a more rounded candidate, and that’s not even all the ones just off the top of my head

  63. 63.

    David Koch

    @Cacti: when you are personally worth $50,000,000 million dollars, you’re financial insulated from making horrible choices that damage the world. They probably never even see the damage from their darken limousine and private jet.

  65. 65.

    Some Guy

    will vote for Sanders in the primary.
    will vote for Clinton in the general.
    will vote all down ballot races.

    but the acrimony between the two camps, and the misogyny and wingnut talking points disguised as “left critique” from misguided BernieBros online, is bogus and stupid.

  67. 67.

    chopper

    @Kropadope:

    I love how its always some person somewhere else where we can never verify the claim. And all the ditto heads nod “uh-huh, uh-huh.”

    i’m sure you’d have the same criticism if nate brought up instead a story of someone saying shit about a bernie surrogate. surely.

  68. 68.

    qwerty42

    @Adam L Silverman: Some of what you hear from these folks (and “Reddit – Gamergate crowd” mentioned by Nate and others does make some sense) would make you think they were Kronstadters or something, such is their committment to The Cause. This is nothing Sen Sanders would want in any way. I’m trending to HRC, but I like Bernie. Difficult not to.

  69. 69.

    Mike in NC

    The creepy plastic-headed Burger King from the stupid TV ads is actually more acceptable as a presidential candidate than JEB!

  70. 70.

    J R in WV

    @Mike in NC:

    I didn’t know Jeb? was a CO – why does he want/think he should have the football, aka nuclear launch codes?

    It would be his duty to destroy humanity if we were attacked with multiple nuclear fusion weapons, as opposed to something the Democratic People’s Republic or Korea built. Or even Pakistan. Real nukes, like the Russians build.

    I don’t think a C.O. could do that, or would want the responsibility to deal with it.

    So maybe he was a fraud? Is a fraud, rather!

  71. 71.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Sanders’ whole campaign is dishonest. He got drunk on the applause and what started as a well-meaning attempt to change the dialogue became a deluded old man’s last hurrah. I just hope he doesn’t Nader the whole process.

  72. 72.

    Some Guy

    @divF:

    the point was to not point out the chronology of not yet to come, or seek applause, but to allow an ideological space for some guy voting D to embrace and eschew.

  73. 73.

    Cacti

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Sanders’ whole campaign is dishonest. He got drunk on the applause and what started as a well-meaning attempt to change the dialogue became a deluded old man’s last hurrah. I just hope he doesn’t Nader the whole process.

    Like I said in an earlier thread. I think the worst of the bro behavior is yet to come. Once the campaign shifts to Nevada and South Carolina, and the black and brown voters don’t obey the revolution’s demand for compliance, things are going to get very ugly.

  74. 74.

    Kropadope

    @chopper: Umm, yes I would. Also, I would never even consider going onto some other political forum, talk about rude the Clinton supporters (t)here are , and use that as a basis to declare all Clinton supporters everywhere to be rude. I would very rightly be ridiculed, that’s absurd.

    Right from the very beginning of this campaign, arguments I presented in favor of the Sanders campaign have been dismissed with “well, people on Twitter/Facebook/whatever are saying X, therefore all Sanders supporters believe X and I’ll just ignore that you’re saying Y.”

  75. 75.

    Nate Dawg

    @Kropadope: If you’re calling me a liar, then I’ll rise to the challenge and send you screenshots, if you’d like.

    I like Sanders. I agree with his platform. His character is inspiring, and he’s a genuinely good guy.

    I’m not sure why the MRA-crowd likes him too. I guess they have to have one candidate, and Ron Paul is out, so it’s Sanders. I have no idea. It’s very bizarre. Sanders couldn’t be further from them in temperament, messaging, and beliefs.

  77. 77.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Some Guy: Disagree with you about the primary vote, but have no other problem with you. Bernie gets the D nom., he gets my vote and anything else I can do.

  78. 78.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Adam L Silverman: OT, but since you ain’t got an author contact in the roster, did you find this bit from the people Ammo’s folks don’t believe should have the land interesting? And can you include comments on the fed truck joy ride video in tomorrow’s (or to be more precise, the next) bunker standoff post? I suspect there are some mental health issues in play here. Or there, to be more accurate.

  79. 79.

    Nate Dawg

    @Kropadope: Did I ever say that ALL BERNIE supporters are like that?

    Here’s a fucking clue. The reason we use the term “Berniebro” is because this is a group of people DISTINCT FROM Bernie supporters. They are two different groups, although they overlap.

    Of course the vast majority of Bernie supporters are normal, thoughtful, engaged people who care about the future of the country and want to see it move in a more positive direction than the establishment candidate promises to do. I have no beef with those poeple. Hell, I might even be one of them.

    Undecided here, really, but the Berniebros do absolutely nothing for their supposed cause. (Which I think is the tell–they don’t want to, nor believe they can, actually win. This is a kabuki style exercise for them, not a real political movement.)

  82. 82.

    Kropadope

    @Nate Dawg: It doesn’t even matter. Even if it is true, you’re basically trying to smear a large group of people with the actions of some internet asshole. That’s total BS and an explicitly defined logical fallacy.

    @chopper: I’ve criticized Bernie Sanders and I’ve complimented Hillary Clinton on this forum. Ditto for particular supporters of each. I’m not monomaniacally in favor of one candidate. I’m trying to point out that there exists a clique of Clinton supporters on Balloon Juice who are deliberately trying to create a hostile environment for Sanders supporters.

  83. 83.

    Nate Dawg

    Hey, here’s something. Fresh off the heels of the first African-American president, we are almost guaranteed to have either a Jewish, a female, or a Latino president.

    Ain’t that something?

  89. 89.

    Kropadope

    @Nate Dawg:

    Here’s a fucking clue. The reason we use the term “Berniebro” is because this is a group of people DISTINCT FROM Bernie supporters. They are two different groups, although they overlap.

    Sorry, there have just been too many times when people have pointed to these random assholes to dismiss a point that I was making rather than to debate it. Add to that the fact that virtually every thread lately has an out of left field “here’s why I hate Sanders supporters” conversation running, it encourages that sort of behavior. If that wasn’t your intent, I apologize, but you have people like cacti to blame for my jumping to that conclusion.

  92. 92.

    Cacti

    @Nate Dawg:

    Oh okay, so I guess Sanders was smearing his entire support group when he called them out today?

    You’re not making any sense.

    When the candidate himself makes a point to distance himself from a subset of his fans, you’d think that would be the gold standard of proof that Berniebros, 1. Exist in fact, and 2. Are becoming more than a minor problem for the Sanders campaign.

  93. 93.

    burnspbesq

    The process is weeding out some of the candidates who are manifestly unqualified for the job. Alas, it’s not weeding out all of them.

  95. 95.

    gwangung

    @Omnes Omnibus: Also, define “white.”

    A hell of a lot of POCs (particularly WOC) were dogpiled by these jerks.

    Dismissal of these occurrences seems…privileged. And more than a little enraging.

  97. 97.

    burnspbesq

    @Nate Dawg:

    I don’t really have much else to say for Hillary other than “She’s better than a Republican

    If you don’t get that that’s all you need come November, there isn’t much hope for you.

  98. 98.

    Nate Dawg

    @Kropadope: Honestly, I like Bernie. If his supporters can convince the Democratic majority who is currently favoring Clinton that he is a viable general election candidate, he would have a chance to win the nom.

    The truth is that if/when Clinton attacks him hard, the howling on the fringe is going to drown everything else out. And we’ll be discussing who is a sexist and who isn’t instead of whether Bernie can respond to hardball politics. Maybe.

    I’m waiting for the “While you were running around with a slumlord, Rezko, in Chicago” or whatever HRC said in the South Carolina debate in 2008 that kicked off the giant slime machine.

    Oh, and Republicans are asking the same thing re: Rubio. If they don’t vet him now, we will get to in the general. :-)

  99. 99.

    gwangung

    @Kropadope:

    I love how its always some person somewhere else where we can never verify the claim. And all the ditto heads nod “uh-huh, uh-huh.”

    Fuck off.

    People have been pointed out to you, people like Angry Black Lady, Arthur Chu and others, and you STILL come off with this shit.

    FUCK YOU.

  100. 100.

    Adam L Silverman

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): Eye am always watching…

    I saw both of those articles earlier today. There isn’t much you can say about the Burns’ Paiute Tribe other than they are correct. They have a longstanding, well documented, and legitimate set of grievances that should be redressed, but most likely never will be. The thing that has to be remembered is that the subcultures within the American extreme right is overwhelmingly racist. Either secularly racist or adhering to a racist/racialized version of Protestantism. Specifically Christian Identity. So as far as they are concerned the Burns’ Paiute just don’t matter.

    As for young Mr. Fry: he clearly has some serious issues. Its important to remember that he’s, on one of these videos, referenced having ADD/ADHD. And that he’s 27 and was on vacation with his parents when this all started and decided to leave the vacation early to go do his hacker and IT thing for Bundy and company. Combine that with his racism, the fact that he belongs to what we were calling a cult well into the late 1980s (Jews for Jesus), and his other odd behavior and he’s just whacked.

  101. 101.

    TallPete

    @Kropadope: I’ve been called a Berniebro by cacti myself just for offering a pro-Sanders comment. I couldn’t tell if Cacti was being prickly or just a prick. I’m thinking it was the latter.
    Anyway Cacti doesn’t seem to be representative of most of BJ..

  102. 102.

    David Koch

    @Eric U.: he says he’s not a socialist, but a democratic-socialist.

    in the past he has called himself a socialist. that he’s running from that tells me that even he doesn’t think it’s a marketable brand.

  105. 105.

    burnspbesq

    @Some Guy:

    HRC has a lock on the War Criminals vote.

    False. There is no evidence, and no reason to believe, that Cheney, Rumsfeld, Gonzalez, or Addington are going to vote for her.

  106. 106.

    Kropadope

    @efgoldman:

    Nah. Arguments that Sanders and his supporters make just presuppose an impossible, never-before-seen level of green lanternism, that’s all.

    I don’t really think that’s the case. Bernie has shown himself while in the Senate of being able to reach across the aisle and temper his goals to get things done. Bernie has been quite explicit in his campaign that his goals, especially his farthest reaching ones, will be tough to reach. He says quite frequently that he can’t do it all himself and that it’s important for everyone to vote. His campaign even puts out messages stressing the importance of voting every election; midterms, special elections, and all.

    I don’t doubt that there are some nitwits out there expecting Bernie to be able to get everyone a pony, simply by virtue of getting elected. I don’t doubt that such people exist for Clinton too. I don’t think Sanders is to blame for setting such unrealistic expectations. That said, however, looking at both candidates records, I honestly believe that Sanders is the better candidate to make the pragmatic choices and effective compromises.

  107. 107.

    sm*t cl*de

    @Tracy Ratcliff:

    I see that Jeb! has the same command of the English language that his brother does. “Servitude” means slavery or incarceration, not public service.

    You can’t blame Bush the Minor for the illiteracy of some sh1tweasel at Slate. Foers may put the word in Bush’s mouth, but I can’t see any evidence that he has actually used it.
    As for the rest of the flaccid cliche-laden wordwooze that has trickled out of Foers’ word processor like so much sweetcorn diarrhea, the less said the better.

  108. 108.

    Cacti

    @TallPete:

    I’ve been called a Berniebro by cacti myself just for offering a pro-Sanders comment. I couldn’t tell if Cacti was being prickly or just a prick. I’m thinking it was the latter.
    Anyway Cacti doesn’t seem to be representative of most of BJ..

    Was that the thread where you were giving cover to a fellow Bernfeeler calling Clinton supporters “hysterical”?

    Is it just that you weren’t aware of the sexist baggage carried by the terms “hysteria/hysterical”?

    Otherwise, your defense of it seemed exceedingly bro-ish.

  110. 110.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @TallPete: If you have an opinion, you should be prepared to defend it here. Some people are assholes. Sometimes I am an asshole. At sometime, you may be. Elbows get thrown here during the discourse. It happens.

  111. 111.

    Kropadope

    @TallPete: He’s the exemplar of the people I describe, but he’s not the only one. I’m all about second chances, though, so I won’t call them out till they go off the rails again. I’m not trying to bring fights from outside this thread into this thread.

  113. 113.

    NotMax

    Hillary, it has often struck me, would make a top-notch upper-middle manager, Bernie a fine sales/marketing officer.

    Neither, IMHO, would make a great president, but also not an abysmal one.

    Still and all, either is a darn sight better option than the entire Republican field combined.

  114. 114.

    Kropadope

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I don’t think Sanders is to blame for setting such unrealistic expectations.

    I provided my reasoning for why I believe this in the very post you took the excerpt from. Perhaps you might be interested in trying to rebut me on a factual basis instead of just dismissing what I say out of hand?

  115. 115.

    Cacti

    @Kropadope:

    He’s the exemplar of the people I describe, but he’s not the only one. I’m all about second chances, though, so I won’t call them out till they go off the rails again. I’m not trying to bring fights from outside this thread into this thread.

    I don’t think you’re a bro, little flower. Just a starry-eyed true believer.

    The former is toxic, the latter, just annoying.

  118. 118.

    David Koch

    @Kropadope:

    Bernie has been quite explicit in his campaign that his goals, especially his farthest reaching ones, will be tough to reach.

    which one of his goals isn’t far to reach?

  119. 119.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Adam L Silverman: I did not know that he was J4J – the town he’s listed as from is overwhelmingly Xian, white, RW, and presumptively racist based on my experience with residents there. I’d never have imagined any kind of Jew would live there.

    I confess it’s getting irritating to see these whackjobs destroy sacred Native land, which also happens to be legally, if shamefully, claimed by the US government. It feels like spitting in my eye and I got no kinfolk who ever lived or died there. I do, however, view the flora, fowl, and fauna as mine since I’m a US citizen.

  120. 120.

    WarMunchkin

    @Nate Dawg:

    I never saw Obots calling Clinton a C*** on Facebook. I’ve seen it numerous times, from multiple sources (Different friends of friends.)

    Was around in 2008. Can confirm that anti-woman hatred is constant. And yes, there were also (Democratic) people calling Obama the n-word.

    I do think this year is different.

    Nope. But I’ll admit I haven’t heard much anti-Semitic rhetoric towards Sanders yet.

    @Cacti:

    When the candidate himself makes a point to distance himself from a subset of his fans, you’d think that would be the gold standard of proof that Berniebros, 1. Exist in fact, and 2. Are becoming more than a minor problem for the Sanders campaign.

    This is exactly, to the letter how villagers create environments where Democrats are repeatedly forced to denounce their base, and, when they do, fuel speculation and the media cycle. See MoveOn.org, 2008. I don’t want to say that there are no Paulite-derived Sanders supporters, but the logic you’ve used is damaging. If Sanders had said that he didn’t think this was as big of a problem as some made it to be – he would have been shit on. Now that he denounced it, Berniebros are renewed as fodder for politicos.. As it stands, in the example articles about Berniebros, one of the two people mentioned as criticizing Clinton in a gendered manner is a woman.

    @CaseyL:

    I don’t remember the Obama-Clinton feud getting this ugly this fast in ’08 (then again, Twitter wasn’t around yet).

    It was this bad – and don’t forget that that John Edwards was still around, causing a three way ultimate clusterfuck of a pie fight.

    There’s a lot of old Hillary hatred out in the world, and while I don’t want to think it’s because of her gender, the fact that MRAs and PUAs are flocking to Sanders is making it hard to think otherwise.

    Hillary hatred has been constant and will be constant for at least nine more years, until the end of her Presidency. (blah blah election’s not over yet, but, come on, Sanders is done in March). The difference is that MRA and PUA has become part of vernacular in the last eight years – and we have labels to give to these people (bros, redpillers, The Game, etc). Misogyny is an old ideology – but communities dedicated to it have been far less common.

  121. 121.

    Nate Dawg

    Sorry. It was my understanding that people talk about all sorts of outside things in Open Threads. Considering today Bernie Sanders himself repudiated Berniebros, it was also timely.

    I didn’t want to start a conversation about Bernie so much as that I’m extremely pessimistic about the general. I think the Berniebros are the canary in the coal mine for Hillary, who will be the nominee.

  122. 122.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kropadope: where do all those excited college students get ideas about “free college” and a “political revolution”?

    I’m fascinated by this new tactic, at least as presented by Sanders supporters here, that he’s all about incrementalism and reaching across the aisle. Much less thrilling than when Bernie shouts on his own behalf.

  123. 123.

    Kropadope

    @David Koch: I’ll go with lowering interest rates for student loans. I mean, any goal is tough with the rabid Republicans running the house, but on it’s face that goal doesn’t seem like too much of a stretch.

  124. 124.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @TallPete:

    Using the term hysterical is sexist? WTF

    Um, yes. Hilarious is the preferred term for exceedingly comedic. Oh, you meant shrill and excitable, for reasons you consider unwarranted? You bet yer ass it is.

  125. 125.

    Cacti

    @TallPete:

    You’ve got to be kidding me. Using the term hysterical is sexist? WTF

    Google is your friend.

    I’ll help you out here though:

    For at least two thousand years of European history until the late nineteenth century hysteria referred to a medical condition thought to be particular to women and caused by disturbances of the uterus (from the Greek ὑστέρα hystera “uterus”), such as when a newborn child emerges from the birth canal.

  128. 128.

    Nate Dawg

    @WarMunchkin: Your experience and mine may be different, but I was around on Kos, Facebook, and even more blogs back then (when the blogosphere still existed) and I don’t recall seeing the constant, unrelenting use of sexist slurs against Clinton. Were there instances of it? Sure. Did people do it all the time, and then defend their use of the term? I didn’t see that. I saw other supporters shut them down. The MRA crowd has a full-throated justification for the use of these slurs, and they are derailing the message of his candidacy by lodging sexist slurs against Hillary (and Albright and Steinem).

    The joke in 2008 was that Hillary lodged complaints about sexism when it wasn’t even there. (It was, but not that mainstream.) Today, it is there in a *big*, *big* way. This is the SJW vs. MRA feud usurping the Democratic primary. It’s not that big of a deal at the moment, but I wonder if this is a harbinger of things to come.

  130. 130.

    Keith G

    @Nate Dawg: Jesse Cryst. Take a handful of X@nax and calm the fuck down.

    A number of people who hang out on social media say stupid shit. So what? But using them as a proxy for some larger group is sadly misguided.

    And it does not matter. The only person who can beat Hillary is Hillary* and certainly not some cognitively deficient turnip typing stupid shit on Facebook.

    * And I do find some of her campaign choices bit unnerving.

  131. 131.

    Kropadope

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    where do all those excited college students get ideas about “free college” and a “political revolution”?

    I’m fascinated by this new tactic, at least as presented by Sanders supporters here, that he’s all about incrementalism and reaching across the aisle. Much less thrilling than when Bernie shouts on his own behalf.

    You know, you can have both achievable goals and stretch goals simultaneously. It’s not impossible. Not only does Bernie have both, but he has the pragmatic approach necessary to make progress on both.

  132. 132.

    Adam L Silverman

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): The original reporting on him indicated that he was Jews for Jesus.

    As to the destruction they are causing: I’m in complete agreement. Personally, I’d have even less problem with leasing Federal land, or state land for that matter, for commercial interests provided three things actually happened:
    1) The usage was better regulated and there was enforceable, and enforced, provisions/stipulations for reclaiming the land once the usage was done.
    2a) The fees charged need to be raised; though they don’t have to be raised so high as to create a profit
    or
    2b) Fees can remain really, artificially low, but a portion of all commercial profits that are made as a result of exploitation of public lands has to be returned to the public purse, separate and aside, from existing corporate taxes. Basically a profit sharing arrangement.
    3a) At the state level these funds, like they do with oil revenue in Alaska, are distributed to every citizen in the state. At the Federal level those funds are put to good use maintaining and upgrading infrastructure, as well as reclaiming and maintaining Federal lands that are used.
    3b) Any revenue from public land exploitation of those lands that were originally tribal land would see a portion of the profit sharing specifically designated for the tribes that had the land taken.

    I’d also like a pony.

  137. 137.

    Kropadope

    @efgoldman: I really hate repeating myself, but:

    Bernie has shown himself while in the Senate of being able to reach across the aisle and temper his goals to get things done.

    Just wanted to add here that he touts this in his campaign speeches and in debates. As well as…

    Bernie has been quite explicit in his campaign that his goals, especially his farthest reaching ones, will be tough to reach. He says quite frequently that he can’t do it all himself and that it’s important for everyone to vote. His campaign even puts out messages stressing the importance of voting every election; midterms, special elections, and all.

    You’re arguing against the caricature of Bernie, not Bernie himself. I recognize Bernie’s record as a pragmatic politician and how that helps his potential to get important work done as president. Whether you choose to believe so or not, he is discussing the difficulties of policy making and his history of Senate dealmaking on the campaign trail. What you’re doing is a lot like when Glenn Beck would say “no one is talking about this.” Just because you didn’t see it and/or because you made that assertion doesn’t make it true.

  138. 138.

    goblue72

    @Nate Dawg: A guy who foisted on the American public the phrase “depends on what the meaning of “is” is”, and who finger wagged “I did not have sexual relations with that woman”, and who yes, committed perjury and was disbarred – is the last person who should be lecturing anyone on factual accuracy.

  139. 139.

    Ruckus

    I’m wondering if we could get through the primary season without needing to be committed? Many/most of us here have decided on our primary candidate, some are waiting for more info or to be convinced about which of the two we have to vote for. But damn we are fighting fucking ridiculously among ourselves. We have half a nation to beat, let alone each other. The two candidates are not that far apart on all the important issues, they just aren’t. All this bullshit is good for the other side, because it signals that we and by association our candidates don’t have our shit together.
    Remember, it doesn’t really matter which one you like if one of the slime candidates manages to win.
    Remember that both of our candidates will support the other if they lose the nomination.
    Remember that our candidates are better than this, maybe we should at least try to be.

    I’m a pretty hard core liberal and I’m pretty disgusted with about 40% of my side of the aisle. Some of that 40% comments on this blog.
    Big Fucking Picture people, Big Fucking Picture.

  142. 142.

    goblue72

    @Keith G: No kidding. Anonymous Reddit users say stupid crap online. News at 11. Rand Paul probably attracts a similar odious demographic on Reddit and other online forums as well, if from the right wing. I don’t consider Rand Paul a doucebag for that either. (What I DO consider him a douchebag for is his stated policy positions.) Angry, young, white males who hang out on the nether regions of the Internet are attracted to anti-establishment candidates. Color me SHOCKED. Next thing you’ll tell me is that there is gambling going on here.

    Meanwhile, Gloria Steinem – and Madeliene Albright – two acutal NOT anonymous people with actual positions of influence this week called any young women who voters for Bernie Sanders a traitor to their gender, and most likely in thrall to their libidos.

    So when is Hillary Clinton going to denounce THAT? Isn’t that a reflection on Hillary Clinton as a candidate?

    It either cuts both ways or it cuts neither.

  143. 143.

    goblue72

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I can guarantee I have spent a LOT more of my personal time (and money) in the meatspace working for progressive policy issues, candidates and the Democratic Party than you, or most of the commenters here. And not just in Presidential Election years, but every single year. So sorry bub – but your weak ass sauce just don’t play.

  144. 144.

    Anne Laurie

    @TallPete:

    Using the term hysterical is sexist?

    A hundred years of political history, boiled down: “Hysteria”, from “wandering uterus”, has been used as an all-purpose attack on women who spoke up since at least the early 1800s. Any complaints, personal or political, about the mistreatment of slaves/women/children/animals/pacificts/foreigners/poor people was labelled by the men with the medical & legal degrees as “hysterical” — a consequence of deranged female anatomy wrecking our poor weak undersized brains. (It was also very specifically used to target gay men and pacifists as too-much-like-women.)

    Using it to address someone’s political comments, therefore, is best avoided. It’s like telling some you have a Black friend — quite possibly you do, but the phrase has been so poisoned by racists (conscious or otherwise) that nobody with good sense uses it to defend their opinions any more.

  145. 145.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @goblue72: a true hero, you are

    wait, you worked for Democrats? isn’t one of your most frequent self-righteous screeches that you’re not a Democrat?

    lose you character-bible?

  146. 146.

    goblue72

    @efgoldman: And absolutely no record of winning anything. She lost on Hillarycare – with a Democratic House and Senate. She’s got very little in the way of any legislative record – she has 3 bills that she sponsored that became law – two to name a post office and one to name a historical site. Her record as Secretary of State was modest as best, with no real signature achievements under her watch. The big stuff – the Iran nuclear deal, opening of relations with Cuba, the Paris Accords for climate change – all happened during Kerry’s tenure.

    I keep hearing about these Hillary Clinton super-powers – about how she has the “experience” to get things done and will get things from the GOP that Sanders cannot. But her resume tells an other story.

    I’m not saying Sanders would have it any easier. But if the argument against Sanders is that he will never get anything from Congress, I don’t see any counter-argument from the Clinton camp that actually points to any facts on the ground.

  147. 147.

    ruemara

    @Ruckus: I’m not committed. But the more I see of Bernie supporters, the less I am committed to Bernie in the primary. Neither excite me, but one group is actively repulsing me. Like repulsor waves of repulsion. Which is sad, because that was what I thought my natural group would be. Whatever. one of them will win and then I’ll work for them to be president and unlike one candidate, with a fucking mile long & wide coattail so they can be productive.

  149. 149.

    Kropadope

    @efgoldman:

    And if he gets the nomination, what do you think the Republiklowns are going to do. A nice, fair discussion of the issues? Hah.
    They’ll try to do it against HRC, too, but she’s got decades of fighting back, and lots of campaigns from which to learn, and built-in good will with major Democratic constituencies.

    First of all, the whole reason I’m supporting Democrats right now is because they’re supposed to be better than that. This is why I’m very concerned about the impact that Clinton, who has engaged in plenty of this dishonest caricaturing of both Sanders and Obama, will have on the culture of the Democratic Party. That cacti and Jim, Foolish Literalist, would lie so aggressively and you would just argue it’s OK because “Republicans will do it too” adds a lot of weight to that concern.

    I don’t want “both sides do it” to become true.

    And second, if the Republicans are going to do this to the Democratic candidate, they sure as shit don’t need out help. There’s plenty of factual bases (basises?) to criticize Bernie on that you don’t need regurgitate these condescending lies.

  150. 150.

    ruemara

    @goblue72: You do know Hillary wasn’t president for “Hillarycare”, right? Like, she wasn’t in elected office at all? Why the vehemence? And she did start the ground work for Kerry. It wasn’t just Kerry waltzing in and charming people with the facelift and a dazzling smile. I get you don’t want her, but it’s ok to think she’s qualified, but not the set of policy positions you hope to have defining a democratic president in 2017. You don’t have to demonize her to prefer Bernie Sanders.

  151. 151.

    Redshift

    @goblue72: Weird – I’ve worked on many Democratic campaigns, too, and in none of them was it considered a good idea to repeat Republican attacks against associates of a primary opponent. But I’m sure that must be because you’re a more impressive big-time Democrat than me…

  152. 152.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    And absolutely no record of winning anything.

    two Senate elections in a state that looks a hell of a lot more like the larger country than Vermont.

    ut if the argument against Sanders is that he will never get anything from Congress,

    The argument against Sanders is he can’t win the general, even while he poisons the electorate with purity standards and fairy tales. Surely with all your field experience with the party you can grasp that

    Hey, where’s that one you’ve been doing lately that you’re the voice of Young America? That one’s funny, too

  156. 156.

    seaboogie

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Sanders’ whole campaign is dishonest. He got drunk on the applause and what started as a well-meaning attempt to change the dialogue became a deluded old man’s last hurrah. I just hope he doesn’t Nader the whole process.

    I fundamentally disagree with this. FTR, I am not a Bernfeeler, but I respect his passion on the issues that are important to him, and he is moving the Overton window – at least for the Dems. And kudos to him for knocking down the BernieBros for their douchitude. He is not deluded, nor is he Nader-esque. I have not one doubt in my mind that if Clinton gets the nom, he will go full-force behind her and tell his purity ponies the import of what is at stake, and that to support her supports all of our collective goals.

    However, I do admit that this is probably a once in a lifetime opportunity for him to change the narrative, and while the GOP is going full on racist/crazy/fear party , that has given him the ability to bring some “not safe – don’t say liberal” issues to the front, and even say “socialist” proudly.

  157. 157.

    gwangung

    @ruemara: Yeah, a segment of avowedly Sanders supporters target women and POC (and woe be to WOC), but that gets brushed off and ignored. Happens a lot when the targets are people of color.

  158. 158.

    Kropadope

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Well, after having had it explained to you multiple times that Bernie has a (1)record of pragmatic dealmaking, (2)that he touts this record during his campaign events, (3) that Bernie is very clear in explaining that getting anything, big or small, done will be difficult and he won’t be able to do it magically by himself, and (4) that Bernie is always telling supporters that it’s vitally important that they vote in every election and put good people in every seat; you continue to insist otherwise. Not only that, but instead of presenting facts, you simply insult the person making the claim and return to making these same claims.

    I’d say that qualifies as lying on, in this case, 4 subjects. Although there are more.

  160. 160.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kropadope: you don’t know what lying means, I think what you mean is I’m a big meanie. Sorry if I think the stakes are too high for self-congratulatory fantasies.
    The passion of the Sanders campaign doesn’t come from the kind of fine print you harp on. “Political Revolution” is a phrase he introduced to the primaries. And I think you’re about a week away from a “LEAVE BERNIE ALONE!” video

    @seaboogie: He’s moving the Overton window, as you say, only for Dems, and doing it by setting unrealistic standards and running down Hillary Clinton, then self-righteously and dishonestly claiming he’s not doing that. I’d love to have a better GE candidate than Hillary Clinton, we don’t.

  161. 161.

    Kropadope

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: You’re deliberately ignoring facts presented to you that directly contradict your arguments, you don’t rebut with facts of your own, you continue making the same arguments as though no one questions the veracity of your statements.

    It is dishonest and deliberately so, therefore it is lying.

    ETA:

    The passion of the Sanders campaign doesn’t come from the kind of fine print you harp on.

    Anyone can make big promises. Big promises alone don’t inspire passion. The reason people are passionate about Bernie is that he offers not only big ideas, but a plan to get them done, as well as a way forward at times when political reality keeps the big things off the table.

  162. 162.

    seaboogie

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    He’s moving the Overton window, as you say, only for Dems, and doing it by setting unrealistic standards and running down Hillary Clinton, then self-righteously and dishonestly claiming he’s not doing that. I’d love to have a better GE candidate than Hillary Clinton, we don’t.

    Flash back to 2007. Economic meltdown, Bush had fucked up about everything he possibly could. Obama had Edith S. Childs’ “Fired Up – Ready to Go!”. Ready for a revolution and a big change, we were. It didn’t quite play out thay way, and we are also so much better off now. I think that in the spirit of continuing improvement (Hillz will be great at the incremental stuff that Obama has also achieved mostly incrementally), it is not passion-inspriring. So how to get out the vote for MOAR OF THE SAME? I think Bernie brings the “beyond” ideas, and sparks that passion, particularly among the youngs – who were a lot of the turnout for Obama.

  163. 163.

    David Koch

    @Kropadope: but you can see how people think touting both “revolution” and incrementalism is contradictory.

    with regards to deal making, what deal could Sanders’s possibly strike with granny-starver paul ryan?

  164. 164.

    David Koch

    @Kropadope:

    Bernie is that he offers not only big ideas, but a plan to get them done, as well as a way forward at times when political reality keeps the big things off the table.

    What plan?

    What way forward?

  166. 166.

    gwangung

    @NR: This has been going on since September. That it’s still going on and it has to get up to the top guy in February suggests to me that it has been downplayed or ignored in the months that it has been going on. Certainly, many supporters have denied that this behavior actually occurs (and are, at best, clueless).

  167. 167.

    Kropadope

    @David Koch: So, you don’t think there was ever any stage of the American Revolution where the revolutionaries had to, for a time, temper their objectives to fit real-world realities?

    Sure, if you look at the term “revolution” in the most reductionist way possible while simultaneously ignoring every other thing Bernie says, you might think all he has to offer is pie in the sky. But again, he is not shy about discussing how difficult will be or discussing the smaller steps that can be taken that, while not fixing the whole world, will make material differences in many people’s lives.

    Not only would I not say that revolution and incrementalism are mutually exclusive, but I would argue that no revolution can succeed if it fails to be pragmatic when necessary and doesn’t take the increments it can get when it can get them. Revolution doesn’t happen overnight.

  168. 168.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @seaboogie: In 2007 Obama was running against Bush. Sanders can’t run against Obama, although he did think about it back in 2012. It’s a much more challenging race this time. Hillary Clinton was trying to say “we can keep it up” and indirectly, we can protect the ground we gained, till Bernie Dumbledore came along and changed the standard to “We can do anything, if we try! (except gun control or talk about reparations)”

    So how to get out the vote for MOAR OF THE SAME?

    Yup, a hard sell, not made easier by the old wizard getting all those youngs stirred up by promising free college, Medicare for all, and a Revolution (except, I’ll concede for dear, fragile Kodakope, when he mumbles he doesn’t mean it when confronted with the happy talk of the big rallies that are supposed to be an argument for his electability), all while casting his (primary) opponent as the Witch of Wall St.

  170. 170.

    David Koch

    I think Sanders’s goals are very good and it is important to move the public conversation to the left.

    I don’t see Paul Ryan giving Sanders a blank check for free collage. These idiots can’t even pass a routine farm bill were the vast majority of spending goes to red state Whites.

    I don’t see The Turtle giving Sanders 60 votes to break up banks. The Turtle doesn’t care if Sanders gives daily six hour speeches. T

  171. 171.

    NR

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    all while casting his (primary) opponent as the Witch of Wall St.

    Right, because no one would bat an eye at the millions of $$$ that Hillary took from Wall Street if only mean ol’ Bernie hadn’t brought it up.

  172. 172.

    Kropadope

    @David Koch: Like I keep saying, for every big top-line item, there are several smaller, more achievable goals. He’s also no stranger to deal-making.

    So, while it may take a while to get to debt free college; reduced interest rates, making government student loans non-profit, and allowing the refinancing of student loans should each be a smaller lift. He has both big and small goals in all realms of public policy and he discusses these things and puts them up on his website. He’s not trying to hide his pragmatism. Rather the MSM and Clinton campaign are concocting a false narrative in the hopes that as many Democrats as possible miss this. Apparently they’ve been quite successful. Either that or there’s just a group of Democrats that would never consider nominating Bernie, no matter what the facts are.

  173. 173.

    David Koch

    @NR: neither. I don’t think Clinton can anything done either with this Congress.

    They might be able to get immigration reform, only because the votes are there to pass. Orangeman didn’t bring it up for a vote because he was afraid of losing his job (which he ultimately did). They might (stress might) realize that they will never be able to win the WH, baring an election eve terror attack, unless they get the issue off the table, cuz as long as it is on the table it will allow unelectable demagogues to capture the nomination.

    The only other thing they can get done is Supreme Court appointments and executive acts.

    Ultimately the issue is who is more electable; who won’t get disqualified like Dukakis

  178. 178.

    Kropadope

    @David Koch: Temper goals when necessary and cut deals when possible. Same plan overall as everyone else except for Clinton, who’s plan seems to be construct perfect moderate plan, watch Congress fall in line and adopt plan in full upon seeing her exemplary moderation.

  179. 179.

    David Koch

    @NR: Trump and the rest of the clowns get criticized for promising things that can’t occur.

    Certainly Obama was heavily criticized for his promises, ranging from getting bin Laden to seeking a detente with Iran. They called him “naive” and worse for daring to say he would normalize relations with Cuba as president.

    Certainly Dean was heavily criticized for his promises, especially from the warmongering corporate media.

    So in the larger context, I don’t see Sanders being singled out.

  180. 180.

    seaboogie

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I think that….I am not going to change anyone’s mind – even including here. I was going to write something pithy or persuasive (or not) but I think that I am just going to park my ass on my meditation cushion and start with this one soul and then put better energy out into the Universe. Come November, I am going to vote for whomever has a D next to their name.

  181. 181.

    David Koch

    @Kropadope: I still don’t see a plan on how to achieve any goals, big or small, with an obstructionist opposition.

    I mean, no one opposes Sanders’s agenda.

    If there was a Democratic House & Senate and no filibuster, then agendas would be important.

    But absent that the question falls to who is more electable and who won’t get disqualified like Dukakis

  184. 184.

    Kropadope

    @David Koch:

    still don’t see a plan on how to achieve any goals, big or small, with an obstructionist opposition.

    Well, this would be true of any Democratic President, including Hillary Clinton. Frankly, I don’t see why so many people seem to think that she would be so singularly capable of dealing with this. Looking back on their records, I would say she has done a worse job overall in effectively making policy in the face of Republican insanity, she’s even been known to straight up enable it. Bernie, from my point of view, has been an effective legislator both making good policy in the majority and clawing back the crazy in opposition.

  185. 185.

    Ripley

    Actually, Bernie spoke out against it months ago as well.

    *shakes fist, yells* Stop using the c-word! You sound like a bunch of little bitches! *shakes both fists*

  186. 186.

    NR

    @David Koch: I’m talking specifically about the Democratic primary. Bernie gets criticized for promising a bunch of things he can’t deliver because Republican House, while Hillary is portrayed as a down-to-earth pragmatist who doesn’t mislead her followers about what’s possible. And yet she’s also promising things (like $12/hr minimum wage) which also have no chance of making it through the Republican House. Why the double standard?

  187. 187.

    Applejinx

    @Nate Dawg: That’s not hardball politics.

    We got our access to our own data turned off during the ‘DNC computers randomly drop firewalls to see what will happen’ business. That’s hardball.

    Yesterday, our dialers started giving wrong data, connecting to the same Bernie supporters over and over again to annoy them rather than to the lists we told the system to get. We don’t control that system and had to go to in-person canvassing and manual dialing. That’s hardball politics.

    At the Keene office we had a LOCKSMITH show up in his truck outside, and wait. One of our people (older guy, not a ‘bro’) went to ask him what was up. Guy hedged and then said he was there to fix the ATM at the location, and then hung out a little, made no attempt to fix the ATM, and left. We posted people to keep an eye on the door (we have a lease to an office in the building) to prevent anyone from changing the lock to the overall building to which the office is.

    We had someone randomly leave a backpack in the men’s bathroom and then someone else tip us off that there could be a bomb, and our main organizer promptly went into said bathroom to discover that it was just a backpack, and no police were called or anything else dramatic happened related to the backpack. That was a particularly nice trick as we’ve got young people who loooove their conspiracy theories. That’s hardball politics (in the form of judo: fuck with people and let their own drama undermine them).

    Should Hillary get the nomination, I think that machine will blow through whatever Republican like they’re wet toilet paper. They have no idea what they’re in for. It’s like trying to run a primary against Nixon. Huge respect for how far the Clinton people are willing to go, at every level, to win this one. Hardball politics? This is brass-balls politics. They’re a bit like Trump in that they can do anything, any damn thing and get a pass on it. No matter what they do, their partisans will call it CDS and Benghazi truther gibberish. It must be very empowering.

    Can hardly wait to see what amazing things happen today, the day before the primary. I thought two days before the primary was perhaps too early to fuck with the predictive dialer systems, but apparently not so much.

  188. 188.

    Zinsky

    Although he is the same generation as his imbecile brother George, history shows us that the third generation of a dynasty are usually miserable failures. Maybe it’s Gods way of avoiding perpetuity in familial governance.

  189. 189.

    Another Holocene Human

    @Nate Dawg:

    Serious question: Is there one awesome thing she’s done that liberals can be proud of?

    She cleaned up the State Department after 8 years of W done broke it. Not a lot of glory in that, but it’s something.

  190. 190.

    Patricia Kayden

    @GregB: They certainly were. I used to frequest Salon and the comments there were wild back in 2008 between the Obama and Clinton supporters. It got really ugly between those groups.

    Not sure if it’s worse between Clinton and Sanders supporters since I don’t frequent any websites where that war is being waged. I assume that we will all rally around the eventual Democratic candidate like we did in 2008.

  192. 192.

    Kay

    @Patricia Kayden:

    There were even pieces about “Obama boys”. This is Salon in 2008:

    There is truth to this exaggerated electoral tableau. Young people are voting for Obama; Clinton is a troubling candidate for many women and men; and there is a sense that younger women feel more distant from second-wave feminist leaders than ever before.
    Yet some female voters have begun to express nearly as much disenchantment with the Obama-mania of their peers as with their Clinton-promoting mothers. And even while they voice dismay over the retro tone of the pro-Clinton feminist whine, a growing number of young women are struggling to describe a gut conviction that there is something dark and funky, and probably not so female-friendly, running below the frantic fanaticism of their Obama-loving compatriots.

  193. 193.

    Kay

    @Another Holocene Human:

    I don’t know why Clinton’s surrogates or defenders don’t point to the liberal Senators who have endorsed her.

    Sherrod Brown and Al Franken have endorsed Clinton. It seems obvious to ask Sanders why his Senate colleagues in the liberal wing are endorsing her.

    Elizabeth Warren isn’t the only liberal Senator. She’s not even the only well-known liberal Senator. Brown voted against invading Iraq (in the House) and he co-led the opposition to TPP in the Democratic Party with Warren.

    It’s absolutely fair to ask Sanders why they endorsed Clinton. I am baffled why they’re spending all this time and energy denouncing random Sanders supporters on Twitter or whatever. There is no upside. It’s a waste of time.

  194. 194.

    Kay

    I confess I don’t get why he would spend time on this:

    But Mr. Clinton’s most pointed remarks may have been when he took aim at Sanders supporters who, he said, use misogynistic language in attacking Mrs. Clinton. He told the story of a female “progressive” blogger who defended Mrs. Clinton online through a pseudonym because, he said, the vitriol from Mr. Sanders’s backers was so unrelenting.
    “She and other people who have gone online to defend Hillary, to explain why they supported her, have been subject to vicious trolling and attacks that are literally too profane often, not to mention sexist, to repeat.” Mr. Clinton, growing more demonstrative, added that the liberal journalist Joan Walsh had faced what he called “unbelievable personal attacks” for writing positively about Mrs. Clinton.

    He’s not a pundit commenting on the race or the state of online discourse. Surely he can leave that to the 500 pundits who are writing about it. How many people in that room even know who Joan Walsh is?

  195. 195.

    Arik

    @satby: Are you thinking of jumping into the race? If you are going through all the effort to strength your resume, it might be worth considering. I could see where being in a coma might actually be a desired job qualification for being GOP presidential nominee.

  196. 196.

    sparrow

    @David Koch: These have been debunked as bullshit journalism. You can cherry-pick online discussion all you want, it doesn’t change the fact that the average Bernie voter is not sexist at all, neither is the candidate.

  198. 198.

    Kay

    @sparrow:

    I don’t know why they even went down the “denounce and apologize” road. Under these rules, Hillary Clinton now has to apologize for what Albright said about young women who support Sanders.

    The “denounce and apologize” road never leads anywhere good.

  199. 199.

    sparrow

    @Nate Dawg: Do we have evidence, besides anectdote, that MRAs go for Sanders? I find it hard to believe, personally. Most of these guys are severely misogynist, and want to “go back” to a time when women were subservient to men. Sound like Trump voters to me, or really any right-winger that isn’t one of the talibangelists (and even then…).

    I know people will find this hard to believe, but I spend a LOT of time (probably too much) reading political news about the democratic primaries, and I have never, ever heard anyone say anything misogynist about Clinton. I’ve heard “liar” and other patently unfair criticisms, sure, but this is political debate, where people get overheated and stupid. You could argue the base emotional state behind some of that is misogyny, but I’ve never seen outright hostility that could be called that. I will also say that I rarely see Clinton supporters who are over-the-top either: usually people say something about “no one ever voting for socialism” or just rah-rah support for Clinton. Hard to get mad with either.

    So basically, if the media (or BJ) were not around to tell me how awful the supporters are being to each other (which basically means, more than one mean/unfair tweet was ever made), I would really think this was an extremely civil public debate.

  201. 201.

    Applejinx

    @sparrow: I can tell you that if you were a MRA working in the Keene Sanders office, you would be one very sad puppy. It’s full of extremely awesome, effective women who are running the place, kicking butt and taking names.

    I’m looking forward to going back today and seeing if mysterious forces changed the locks on the doors :)

    Can’t let strong women choose a not-a-woman, now, can we? It’s as if they think about things and have a value system of their own, like a HUMAN BEING or something ;)

  202. 202.

    ochone

    while bernie bros exist, i think clinton does herself no favors in the other direction with her clunky opportunism. for example, in positing that she’s not establishment in the last debate, she said, ‘look at me, i’m a woman!’ or when she implied that sanders is a sexist for saying she was shouting. (sometimes this IS a sign of sexism, but i think you need more than that to make the charge).
    on green lanternism, sure, but it applies to both candidates, not one. anything clinton wants to do legislatively will be every bit as impossible to accomplish as what sanders wants to do. given this, the choice comes down to:
    1. who will at least make the case for liberal priorities, loudly, vociferously, passionately? who at least has a chance of mainstreaming this perspective? on social issues, the answer is both of them, but on economic issues, it’s sanders. obviously.
    2. who will hold the line on economic issues, not let the very worst happen? i’m thinking of things like corporate trade agreements. the answer, again obviously, is sanders.
    3. who is guaranteed to staff an administration with pro-worker advocates? to ask the question is to answer it.
    4. who is less likely to kill a lot of brown people? sanders.

  203. 203.

    gratuitous

    So Jeb! never understood a thing Kafka wrote? Is that because the tale of a man trapped in an incomprehensible system and a situation that just gets worse no matter what he does isn’t part of Jeb!’s experience? “Well, why doesn’t Josef K. just call his father or a fixer?”

  204. 204.

    gvg

    @Kropadope: This is Green Lanternism. Bernie isn’t going to have any sucess in reaching across the aisle once he is the Democratic candidate. He thinks he will (and so do you evidently) because he has had success before but it is different when you are the leader. the GOP will simply turn on him as nuts as they did with Obama and before that Kerry and before that Clinton (both).
    See that is what a lot of this have learned the last 8 years. I actually was unenthusiastic about Hillary because I thought the GOP voters had it in for her specifically before I had realized Obama was a better choice. I was looking for an alternative because I thought I couldn’t stand the noise. I’ve learned it’s no use trying to avoid it.
    Because Bernie is actually making the argument that he can work with the GOP, I consider that evidence that he is a fool on that issue. Now no candidate is perfect and Obama has been in my view a fool on education but THAT is why Bernie isn’t being a good planner in my view. If he was explaining some of the things he could do to block the idiots even if they were simular to things Hillary could do too, well that would make him more worth paying attention to.

  205. 205.

    Kay

    I was wondering about this, too, in light of Sanders college proposals:

    The high-water mark for public education in California was the 1960 Donahoe Act, better known as the Master Plan for Higher Education. In its details, the “Master Plan” was a complex and unwieldy piece of legislation, an interlocking set of legislative benchmarks, expectations, funding commitments, and philosophical principles. But at its heart, it was actually quite simple and intuitive: the Master Plan was nothing more than a blanket commitment from the state to educate all the California students who wanted an education and, in doing so, to facilitate the kind of class mobility that has placed public education at the center of American civic life. The Plan was masterminded by UC president Clark Kerr and signed into California law by Governor Pat Brown, Democrats who brought to completion much of the work of their Republican predecessors. It was politically contentious, but was far from being a revolutionary document. Years later, Kerr would recall the early 1960s as an essentially conservative period, in which the development and momentum of the preceding decades were consolidated, systematized, and rationalized.

    Is it really unimaginable that we could do that again? I watched a documentary on Pat Brown and he sounded a little like Bernie Sanders on “free college” :)

    I don’t know the numbers, but tens of millions of people must have taken advantage of that offer and those people are (probably) alive today. They got free college.

    Is it fair to young people to say “no way you’re getting a deal like that, ever, don’t even ask for it”?

  206. 206.

    moderateindy

    First, please stop trying to paint Sanders as being somehow like Nader. It’s idiotic. Nader screwed everyone by being a 3rd party candidate that siphoned off votes that would have went for Gore, Sanders is vying for the Dem nomination. There is no comparison.
    Second, does anybody truly believe that Hillary is a progressive? She is a well qualified, competent leader, but she is a moderate who will do jack squat about the big banks or wall street. And I’m not talking legislatively, I’m talking about what she’d do, or more to the point not do, from an evecutive branch perspective. I don’t see her using the justice department to aggressively go after Wall Street or the big banks. One of Obama’s greatest failings has been the way the justice department goes after corporate malfeasance. Do a settlement get a fine that is little more than a tax on the ridiculous profits that Company “X” made on their wrongdoing, and then let them walk without havung to admit wrongdoing. I see more of the same from a Clinton admin.
    I don’t see either getting anything done with Congress, but at least with Sanders progressive ideas will be part of the conversation. I’m fine with Hillary, and will gladly vote for her if shes the nominee, but I have no illusions about the fact that she is the status quo nominee. progressive policies won’t be on her agenda, and thus won’t be part of a larger national conversation. Which may not be much, but if those discussions don’t exist at the presidential level, there is little chance for the dial to be moved on such issues. So, Yes, I am invoking the Bully Pulpit platitude.
    Some have raised concern that Bernie might be Dukakis. It is a valid concern. But while I’m pretty sure that the overwhelming majority of Clinton supporters will still vote for Sanders, Bernie is inspiring many people that don’t have a great record of automatically voting. It is very likely that many of those mostly younger voters see Hillary as just another pol, and simply stay home for the GE. Sanders reaches the disillusioned demographic, most of whom view Clinton as part of the establishment, and won’t bother making an effort to vote for her.
    Lastly, hysterical is no more misogynistic than calling someone a moron is a slight to the developmentally disabled. Basically no resonable person hears the word hysterical, and believes it is being directed as a sexist slur. Just because something had a meaning years ago, doesn’t mean that context is still relevant. And to pretend it is, is totally disingenuous. Like I said, moron use to be comparable to someone today using the term retard. It no longer has that connotation any more than hysterical is viewed as something gender specific.

  207. 207.

    Kropadope

    @gvg: Riiiiiiiight. Insisting that he can’t solve the world’s problems alone and that voters need to put good people in every office to help him is, by definition, Green Lanternism.

    Some of you are real pieces of work.

  209. 209.

    moderateindy

    @gvg:

    See that is what a lot of this have learned the last 8 years. I actually was unenthusiastic about Hillary because I thought the GOP voters had it in for her specifically before I had realized Obama was a better choice. I was looking for an alternative because I thought I couldn’t stand the noise. I’ve learned it’s no use trying to avoid it.

    This is exactly how I felt in 08. I was tired of the Whitewater Vince Foster etc garbage and I figured Hillary wouldn’t get a millisecond of a honeymoon from the right, while Obama might. Boy was I wrong.
    While Obama was a more exciting candidate, with his soaring rhetoric, people projected upon him what they wanted him to be. Except for being less hawkish, his actual policy stances were basically identical to Hillary’s. Which is why I never got upset that he somehow betrayed some movement, or the other. If you paid attention to the details he acted in a manner totally in line with what he advocated as a candidate.

  211. 211.

    The Other Chuck

    @moderateindy: While I’ve agreed with almost everything you’ve said (and I’ll still vote for Hillary anyway), my experience has been that the term “hysterical” hasn’t quite gotten as generic as “moron” in all circles — rather, I’d put it on par with “retarded”. This connotation especially holds when it’s a woman under discussion. I’m not about scolding people, but not pushing people’s buttons when you can avoid it is better outreach.

  212. 212.

    Paul in KY

    @gvg: If Sen. Sanders is really saying that he can work with the Republicans to pass his agenda, he’s been smoking better stuff than I.

    The only way his agenda gets passed is with less Republicans.

  213. 213.

    Matt McIrvin

    @moderateindy: One of the biggest policy differences between Clinton and Obama was in their health-care plans: Clinton’s proposal had an individual mandate, and Obama’s didn’t, and this was a big issue of contention. Of course, as it shook out, “Obamacare” did have an individual mandate, just like Clinton’s proposal.

  215. 215.

    tomtofa

    This is what I don’t understand from the people whose position is that nothing matters but Clinton’s greater electability. The latest polls from the Real Clear Politics averages and Quinnipiac (which aren’t too different from previous ones) show that Sanders is more electable than Clinton against every Republican candidate, and has a much higher favorability rating. Sanders’ favorability has room to move either up or down, but Clinton’s is pretty well fixed – everyone knows her by now.

    So how is Clinton more electable? Do people simply dismiss all the data?

    Against Trump
    RCP
    Sanders +7.7
    Clinton +4.0
    Q
    Sanders +10
    Clinton +5

    Against Cruz
    RCP
    Sanders +1.5
    Cruz +1.0 (vs Clinton)
    Q
    Sanders +4
    Clinton/Cruz tie

    Against Rubio
    RCP
    Rubio +1.5 (vs Sanders)
    Rubio +5.0 (vs Clinton)
    Q
    Sanders/Rubio tie
    Rubio +7

    Against Carson
    RCP
    Sanders +0.5
    Clinton +0.4

    Against Bush
    RCP
    Sanders +3.0
    Clinton +2.4

    —

    Favorability (Q)

    Clinton
    Favorable 39%
    Unfavorable 56%
    Hvn’t hrd enough 3%

    Sanders
    Favorable 44%
    Unfavorable 35%
    Hvn’t hrd enough 19%

  217. 217.

    Matt McIrvin

    @tomtofa: The people I’ve talked to about this hit very heavily on the word “socialist”, and that one poll in which many more people said they’d never vote for a socialist than would never vote for a woman. The argument is that Sanders’ advantage will wilt once the Republicans start red-baiting him in earnest.

    I think what’s really going on here is the old “nobody ever got fired for choosing IBM” argument. We don’t actually know whether Bernie Sanders is more or less electable than Hillary Clinton, but we all know that Hillary Clinton is the more conventional choice. So if Sanders is nominated and he loses, the pundits and history books will forever say that it was the fault of the Democrats’ left wing for nominating Sanders. Whereas if Clinton is nominated and she loses, probably only Sanders partisans will insist that Sanders would have won it.

  218. 218.

    Enhanced Voting Techinques

    @kc:

    The concern trolling by old white Democratic men over “Berniebros” is exquisite.

    Sanders is an old, white, male and Democrate, is he not?

  219. 219.

    Applejinx

    @Paul in KY: The only way we get less Republicans is to motivate young, liberal (or socialist) voters to get and stay involved.

    That’s easy to see with Bernie. I’m honestly sorry some of them are dudebros, but they’re still voters and maybe they’re learning economic concepts that’ll help us in the long run.

    Just a thought, but many dudebros magically become less awful once they lose their virginity…

  220. 220.

    Matt McIrvin

    @sparrow: As a general rule, the place where the largest number of the worst misogynistic attacks happen is private emails to publicly vocal women. We wouldn’t see most of them in public. But I suspect some of the male supporters of every candidate will send these, because the key variable is the advocate being female, more than the candidate.

    Rebecca Traister claimed she got a lot of these from Sanders supporters, despite the fact that she is herself a Sanders supporter.

  221. 221.

    chopper

    @Applejinx:

    the only way we get less goopers on the hill is to get people to vote dem in downticket races. that means organizing and fundraising and stumping for those races, from the top on down.

  222. 222.

    tomtofa

    @Matt McIrvin:

    The people I’ve talked to about this hit very heavily on the word “socialist”, and that one poll in which many more people said they’d never vote for a socialist than would never vote for a woman. The argument is that Sanders’ advantage will wilt once the Republicans start red-baiting him in earnest.

    Thanks, that makes sense, if we assume that many of the 44% in favor of Sanders, and the 19% who haven’t heard enough don’t know yet that he is a socialist . . . but, come on, just look at that hair, what else could he be? ;-)

  223. 223.

    Paul in KY

    @Applejinx: I’m not going to help them on that last! However it happens, his agenda will not happen, unless there are less Republicans in House/Senate. Getting our people who don’t vote is a key. If Hillary get’s the nomination, would be find with Sen. Sanders as Veep nominee. Insulates her from assassination attempts by RWNJs (shoot her & the commie is President). he could work on getting out the vote.

  224. 224.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Paul in KY: I think the flaw there is that Clinton and Sanders are both pretty old. Sanders has youth appeal, but either ticket would probably want someone who is actually younger as the VP candidate.

    Kirsten Gillibrand might be a great ideological ticket-balancing pick for Sanders, though she might not want to do it (and they are both white Northeasterners). Clinton wouldn’t run with Gillibrand because they are both from New York, so Julian Castro might be a better choice for her.

  225. 225.

    Matt McIrvin

    @tomtofa: The thing is, though, the fact that Sanders calls himself a socialist is usually the first thing anyone ever hears about him, so it’s hard to imagine that someone who actually has a well-formed opinion about him wouldn’t know that. Some of those “not sure/don’t know” people, though, might be unaware.

    I think the argument relies heavily on the plausible idea that the Republicans are currently holding their fire on Sanders because they want him to be nominated.

  226. 226.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @Matt McIrvin:

    I think the argument relies heavily on the plausible idea that the Republicans are currently holding their fire on Sanders because they want him to be nominated.

    I’m not going digging on Real Clear Politics (which the last time I looked around there didn’t think it important to ID Rasmussen as a right wing poll but did label PPP as Dem), but an awful lot of the polls the Bernie folks are citing right now are national polls.

    We don’t elect presidents via a national election. Start showing me state polls and I’ll pay more attention.

  227. 227.

    Paul in KY

    @Matt McIrvin: Have heard really good things about Mr. Castro. To me, reason for having Sen. Sanders as veep would hopefully be his ability to get his ‘Berniebros’ et al to the booth & voting for us.

  228. 228.

    karen marie

    @CaseyL: I am close to defriending my 27-year-old nephew. His main argument against Clinton? “She reminds me of my mother.” Granted, his mother is a Class A asshole but it’s got nothing to do with her gender. My brother is also a Class A asshole.

  229. 229.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: I prefer Huffington Post’s poll aggregator, myself; it uses much the same data.

    There’s a lot of spread in the polls, and filtering methodology has a huge effect. A Sanders supporter recently pointed out to me that an Ipsos/Reuters poll seemed to support Quinnipiac’s showing Clinton’s national lead nearly gone. But it was inconsistent with numbers for the same poll I’d seen elsewhere, and it turned out that Clinton still had a huge lead after you applied the poll’s “likely voter” filter. Without it, the lead nearly vanished. What that means is beyond me.

    Right now, most primary pollsters don’t seem to be doing state polls beyond the next one or two primaries. I think national polls can be more useful in the general election, though in the last cycle national polls seemed to have an unexplained pro-Romney shift of a couple of percentage points relative to state polls. For primaries, though, they’re less indicative because the primaries don’t even happen at the same time, and the effects of earlier primaries can ripple to later ones by changing media coverage, causing candidates to drop out, etc.

  231. 231.

    Matt McIrvin

    I think one unanswered question is what happens when Bernie scores a blowout win in New Hampshire, as he will almost certainly do. Is this already discounted in expectations, so that he has to meet that spread to be considered a big winner? Or does it create more weeks of publicity about the unstoppable Bernie express, that drives later primary voters away from Clinton?

  234. 234.

    mapaghimagsik

    @karen marie:
    I heard a similar complaint. “Reminds me of my ex-wife”. I was wondering just how many women remind him of his ex-wife, and how lucky she was to get away.

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