Sometimes experience does count, and in union there is strength. Jon Ralston, go-to guy on Nevada politics, in the Reno Gazette Journal:
… Saturday may well be the day that altered the course of the Democratic presidential race, when Hillary Clinton blunted Bernie Sanders’ campaign, when she was forced to work as hard as she ever has for a week (with a little help from a lot of friends) and slingshotted her with new momentum into South Carolina and then Super Tuesday. Nevada may indeed prove to be the day that saved Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
But the caucus, which Clinton won by about 5 percentage points, also cemented Prince Harry [Reid] as a man Machiavelli would have bowed to, a man who with one eye who still sees the field better and is still more dangerous, effective and cunning as any pol the state (the country?) has ever seen. Clinton may not have won Nevada if Reid had not interceded last week when the man feigning neutrality saw what everyone in the Democratic elite saw: Sanders erasing a once mountainous lead and on the verge of perhaps winning Nevada and rendering inoperative the “Hillary is more electable” argument…
In the middle of last week, Reid made a phone call, first reported by The New York Times’ Amy Chozick, to D. Taylor, the head of the parent of the Culinary Union local in Las Vegas. Before that call, the Culinary, facing difficult contract negotiations and seeing no advantage in enmeshing itself in a bloody internecine fight, had declared it was more Swiss than Hispanic. With the Culinary not endorsing and unwilling to even engage in the caucus, turnout at six casino sites on the Las Vegas Strip was forecast at a combined 100 or so. That is, insignificant.
But Reid did not stop there. He also called casino executives, sources confirm, with a simple message: “Let your people go.”
That is, he wanted to ensure the workers would be allowed time off from work to caucus. No one said no to Prince Harry.
Despite their common public neutrality, Taylor and Reid surely believe, as do most Democratic power brokers, that a Sanders nomination would be a disaster. Reid knew that Taylor would get his swarms of organizers to turn out mostly Latino workers, who would likely vote for Clinton.
A gamble? Yes. But like going all-in with a straight flush.
And it paid off.
On Saturday, Clinton not only won all six casino sites, most handily, by a combined delegate count of 109-52. And instead of an aggregate 100 or so employees, hundreds of workers showed up to caucus, thanks to Reid to Taylor to organizers…
Corner Stone
I miss football.
HinTN
Wouldn’t want to fight him!
zzyzx
And that’s why you become a member of a party and learn to work with others instead of being a purist.
Gex
@zzyzx: And hey, all Bernie had to do was somehow win over those folks. All Reid did was make it easier for them to participate. Bernie’s revolution takes that as a prior condition for what he will accomplish.
Corner Stone
If what has been reported is accurate, and HRC took 77% of the African American vote in NV, then I think as a Bernie supporter, we’ve got a bit of a problem.
Forked Tongue
@zzyzx: But what about your feelings, your beautiful feelings?
chopper
dang, and the berniacs at GOS were just starting to cement themselves around blaming DWS for the great revolution never coming to fruition. now reid throws his hat into the conspiracy.
stinger
Thanks for posting that video–I’d heard of it but hadn’t seen it.
Corner Stone
I wonder what kind of childhood you had if you were named Hogan Gidley.
Svensker
Listening to Canadian friends discuss Donald Trump is simultaneously hilarious and frightening. What are you guys thinking/drinking down there, anyway?!?
Annie Laurie, why do you need Rutgers seeds for your garden? Johnny’s Seeds in Maine has lots of short-season tomato seeds and they’re such a great company. I always tried to buy from them when we were in NJ.
Steve from Antioch
@Corner Stone:
Machine politics and the racial swift boating paid off for Clinton.
zzyzx
Even though I’m a Clinton supporter, I’m glad to see that the English Only chant thing has been debunked.
http://www.snopes.com/sanders-english-only-huerta/
FlyingToaster
Thank goodness.
Despite wags quoting Suffolk polls (Paleologos is the new Scott Rasmussen, I swear), I don’t see Bernie surviving that hairpiece. The media will be all in for Trump anyway; I think “Benghazi” and “va-jay-jay” are going to be ‘way less effective than “socialist” or “non-Christian*”.
All that has to happen now is for Pmurt to live to November. He’s not looking that good, honestly.
* in the Bible Belt.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Corner Stone:
If your revolution depends on a massive turnout and it doesn’t even come close to 2008’s turnout, then you have an even bigger problem. Seems like paying close attention to how and what Obama did to win in 2008 instead of criticizing him and hand-waving it away maybe would have been the smart play.
James E Powell
First. I think of him more as a Duke than a Prince, though I get that if you want to make a 16th century Machiavelli reference you go with Prince. But when I hear Prince Harry I think of Charles’ & Diana’s younger son.
Second. What’s all this dark talk about Clinton’s campaign, how she won in Iowa and Nevada, and how she’s got all these people working to ensure her nomination, etc? Why isn’t that considered Clinton being good at politics? Why isn’t that a quality one would want in one’s party’s nominee?
“All in the game, yo, all in the game” 21st century political philosopher Omar Little.
debbie
@HinTN:
When Reid had that accident while exercising, Glenn Beck was convinced The Mob had tried to off him.
James E Powell
@Corner Stone:
I think it depends on how much money your family had. And for how many generations.
Kay
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
Well, though, if the Democrats have turnout problems that problem remains because it’s combined totals. Pointing to Bernie Sanders isn’t going to fix it after March. What’s the Clinton’s team theory for why turnout is lower than 08 and maybe more importantly, is the Democratic Party ready to deal with increased turnout on the GOP side? We have two problems we didn’t have in ’08. Ours is lower and the GOP side will be higher.
When Sanders is out that will remain true, and it could be worse.
SiubhanDuinne, Annoying Scoundrel
Finally, seeing that video, I understand what Applejinx was going on about yesterday. Made no sense to me at the time, but I didn’t feel like engaging with her (or him; not sure, it’s the internets).
FlyingToaster
@James E Powell: Some people just don’t want dynasties, period. Some people just don’t like Hillary Clinton. I understand, even when I disagree.
In ’08, I was an Edwards supporter, then Obama. I swore up and down that if Clinton hired Mark Penn again, I would not fucking vote for her.
But she didn’t. She learned from her ’08 mistakes. The bozos aren’t in her campaign this time. She’s listening when people tell her, “Don’t do that bullshit.”
This is a good thing.
Tripod
The Democratic regulars didn’t have a turnout problem. Bernie Sanders did.
Democrats are voting overwhelmingly for Hillary.
Spare us the bosh about ideological betrayals and the evils of the DLC.
FlyingToaster
@Kay: How many people are crossing the aisle to vote for Trump in the primaries?
How many people can’t see daylight between the Democratic candidates and are waiting for the general?
JMG
One possible reason for lower Democratic turnout might be the as the polls show, most Democrats like both candidates, and thus feel less pressure to take sides, while polarizing Trump is driving both his GOP supporters and opponents to the polls.
It’s about this time every election cycle we hear about Republican enthusiasm and Democratic ennui, no matter who winds up winning.
Anne Laurie
@Svensker:
I don’t have the conditions or the attention span to start seeds, so I buy plants. We really liked the flavor of the Rutgers variety, the one year I managed to find a plant, but apparently most of the people interested in growing them are skilled enough to do so ‘from scratch’.
oldgold
@Kay:
Generally, attendance on Saturday afternoon is much better at the circus than the library.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Kay:
If the general were held today with Trump against either Hillary or Bernie, I think Trump could win. Seven months of watching Trump will make it clearer and clearer that he’s totally unfit for the office, giving Hillary time to sharpen her message and work on her appeal to the youngs – Obama will be stumping hard for her too, which will be an enormous benefit.
Kay
@Tripod:
But they’re splitting a lower (total) turnout. Will there be more “regulars” down the road? Bernie Sanders won’t be in charge of that. Would turnout have been higher without Sanders? That seems doubtful. Clinton will obviously be depending on “non regulars” at some point.
MazeDancer
It’s never right to block people’s franchise. Can’t see how it would have been more fair for the Culinary workers to not get time off to vote. Would be a kind of Hispanic filter limiting their input. And if the workers are mostly Hispanic women and happen to prefer Hillary, that’s Sanders lack of persuasion.
It’s not right for college students to be denied their votes, and they’re mostly Bernie supporters. So how was all that organizing busses to the polls from campus in NH anything other than good politics? No one argued that wasn’t fair.
Tripod
@Kay:
I think you’re assuming facts not in evidence. For rank and file Democrats the nomination was a forgone conclusion, HRC is running as a defacto incumbent, and this is reflected in turnout.
bemused senior
@Kay: I don’t think you can equate primary turnout with GE turnout, though we must work to ensure GE turnout is high. Motivation to choose between Bernie and Hillary seems to me likely to be much less than motivation to choose between either Dem and He, Trump. I can’t recall where I saw the very recent poll showing that Dem voter approval for both Bernie and HRC was very high (like in the 90+% range). In a caucus state the misery factor of attending a caucus is much higher than voting in the GE, as well.
Baud
Lower turnout because the people are protesting the silencing of the Baud! 2016! message.
Germy
http://notesironbound.blogspot.com/2016/02/seven-years-of-politics-on-brink.html
weaselone
@Kay:
I’m just not sure that the primary turnouts are indicative of turnout in the general. Certainly, they are not at 2008 levels, but they aren’t particularly low by historical standards. There are only two democrats in the race and despite the bickering of the two sides on the internet, there is every indication that either candidate would be acceptable to must democratic voters. The problem for Bernie is that the members of his revolution should be highly invested in his candidacy and be voting in the primaries. That they are not suggests that either there is no revolution, or that a lot of the revolutionaries consider the candidates to be equivalent.
Roger Moore
@Gex:
This. Bernie is the one who’s supposed to be a revolutionary who will shake things up by getting marginalized groups to participate, throwing our standard political calculus out the window. If his best hope is for an important Democratic demographic group to stay home, there’s something deeply wrong with his plans.
LanceThruster
25% of the AA vote in NV got it right at least.
Kay
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
I don’t know about surrogates anymore. Obama busted ass in ’10, we saw huge crowds in Ohio and then they didn’t vote. It was like pulling teeth to get them out in 2012, we had Obama and Sherrod at the top of the ticket and I think GOP turnout was depressed here because Romney was such a bad fit for their voters. They’re going to be rabid to get the WH back. They’d vote for a stuffed bear as long as it meant their long-held dream of total domination plus bonus points for denying O a 3rd term.
Baud
@Tripod: I’ve heard that explanation as well.
@bemused senior: Wasn’t it at the last town hall where both Bernie and Hillary were booed when they tried to criticize the other?
Luthe
@Kay: The question is how much of the low turnout is lack of enthusiasm and how much is vote suppression.
Baud
@Kay: True, the GOP is now where the Dems were in 2008 (not in terms of reality but perception).
Chyron HR
@Steve from Antioch:
And yet some silly people still refuse to take Sanders’ supporters seriously.
pamelabrown53
@Gex:
Exactly. The big point that Ralston missed as a political reporter is that Harry freed more people to caucus but he couldn’t tell them for whom they should caucus.
BTW, it’s time we got rid of caucuses. If you disagree, I’d like to know why.
Baud
The one thing everyone seems to agree on this primary season as that the entire primary process needs severe top-to-bottom reform on the Democratic side. Absolutely no one likes it.
Germy
The Simpsons took a swing at our current GOP field in this clip called “The Debateful Eight”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CHQlZiJ8YM
Iowa Old Lady
If Trump is the R nominee (and I assume he will be), it’s possible that will depress turnout from more traditional Rs. I see lifelong Rs at the gym who are horrified by Trump. Perhaps they’ll be replaced by his new voters. I don’t know. But the folks I see will have trouble. I doubt they’ll be able to bring themselves to votes for Clinton. They’re more likely to stay home.
Really though, it’s so early that all we can do is speculate.
pamelabrown53
@Steve from Antioch:
What do you mean by “racial swift boating”? Without an answer you’re just being incendiary.
The Sheriff Endorses Baud 2016
@Kay: If Romney was a bad fit for Ohio Republicans, what does that say about Rubio?
Felonius Monk
@Baud:
That does happen when you run a whisper campaign. :-)
Kay
@Luthe:
That’s a question I know the answer to! :)
Voter suppression might shave points on the margin depending on where the votes come from but I canvassed here in ’12. We literally started in April and ended up basically making a personal visit to every voter because the goal was 8k D votes out of this county. It would have been more than that if Mitt Romney hadn’t been so weird and unappealing because we would have had to counter (more) GOP voters. We didn’t have any side switchers to speak of- these were people who had voted for O in ’08. In this state, I would say early vote was such a a benefit to Democrats it trounced any effect of suppression easily.
I’m fine with the reality of a lower turnout but discrediting Bernie Sanders theory changes nothing about that.
zzyzx
@pamelabrown53:
The two cases I can see for caucuses is that they’re good for determining intensity of desire for the candidate which itself is a test to see how well they might run in a general and also that it gets used to build up parties. People go to second level meetings and get involved and some stick around.
I do like the idea of various different rules (Can you get majority support in states? Can you inspire people to show up for long meetings? Can you get party members to support you? Can you figure out arcane rules quickly to maximize your odds?) because those are skills that can both show how good of a general election candidate someone will be and how good they might be in the office.
Kay
@The Sheriff Endorses Baud 2016:
I think Rubio would be a bad fit for the voters the GOP claims didn’t come out for Romney but I’m a little worried about Rubio with the youngs. The young(er) youngs aren’t “Democrats”. They’re new voters. There’s a fresh batch every 4/8 years and they don’t have a history.
I’d rather have Rubio than Trump because WTF is Trump? He’s anything he says he is on any given day.
Gex
@pamelabrown53: What’s with the challenge??? I’ve never said anything pro or con about caucuses. For the record I’m fine with either candidate, and work very hard not to have the really negative feelings I have had in response to some of Sanders’ supporters color my opinion of him as a candidate.
I did read on a different thread that the Democratic party in general has pushed for a change from caucuses to primaries, but often get blocked by state level Republicans because the party pays for caucuses and the state pays for primaries. So maybe issue your challenges elsewhere.
All I’m saying is that it is unreasonable to complain about workers being allowed to participate, the particulars about which process they are participating is irrelevant.
DCrefugee
If someone like Howard Dean had ever done something like that on camera, they’d be hounded out of the race. Oh wait…
Iowa Old Lady
I could do without caucuses. They make it too hard for people to participate.
For years, I taught 100 miles from home, so I had to live there during the week, which meant I couldn’t participate.
Mike J
@Corner Stone:
People would assume you were a friend of Cloyd.
Oh, you said GidLEY, not GidNEY. Nevermind.
Corner Stone
@LanceThruster:
The other 75% are too dumb to do anything but what they’re told?
Germy
Onion headline:
Nation To Honor Harper Lee By Ensuring Novel About Horrors Of Racism Always Remains Relevant
gwangung
A) I really am surprised that Bernie is not bringing in significantly higher turnout. Turnout has GOT to be higher for him to make an electability argument.
B) On the other hand, a lot of polls are suggesting that Dems see them as equally likeable and acceptable. Again, that impacts Sanders’ electability argument.
C) Some observers were suggesting that Sanders’ training of volunteers were not as good as Obama’s in 2008 (and presumably probably not as good as Clinton’s this year). That’s troublesome.
MikeB
Longtime Vegas resident here, the casinos owe Harry big time, especially MGM,
the vampire squid of Las Vegas, who almost went under during the recession but were
saved by Reid’s clout with creditors. He’s called the shots politically for decades here
and has never failed to promote gaming interests. Folks were surprised when he won
re election during the conservative wave, but there was no way the casino people
were going to let him lose. Reid and the casino’s rule the state…
Power dynamics aside, he’s a good guy tho and we’ll miss him in NV and nationally.
Baud
I’ve read that in other countries, you have to pay dues to join the party. I’m tempted by the notion of an “App Store” type of model where you pay 99 cents to buy membership into the party, which gets you voting privileges in the primaries. For whatever reason, people seem more invested in things they pay for, even if it’s a nominal amount.
Jacel
@FlyingToaster: It’s like I have a twin, on the trajectory of supporting Edwards, then Obama, and feeling happier about Hillary than eight years ago. If our primary was today, I would vote for Bernie. But that’s because I’m happy he’s in the race, not because he’s not-Hillary.
ellennelle
gee. pity her campaign was forced to be rescued by prince harry. what does that say about her management skills? or her powerful feminism, for that matter.
why was that again? she’d lost a 25 point lead? all by herself? oh, right; that other guy.
and what was prince harry’s powerful magic? why, good ol’ party machinery.
yup. just a few choice phone calls from a political power broker to a few choice connections, also with power, and poof! that 0 point lead inched all the way back up to 5?
wow; impressive. maybe we should just turn the whole process over to such power brokers making phone calls to powerful connections. oh, wait. i believe that’s what we’re calling “super delegates.”
honestly, folks; as screwed up as caucuses are in this whole process (i frankly don’t trust either one so far, NV even less than IA if just for the chaos factor), why should we trust any of those results? there is nothing democratic about them whatsoever. they’re more like church socials where members are voting on who’s in the xmas play. and the dem super delegates are a sham, just open enforcement of old guard party power on the “democratic” process.
no wonder voters are fed up. and no wonder they’re flocking to anti-establishment candidates. i mean, how democratic is it that one candidate has won the votes of over 150k voters, and the other barely 92k, yet that one now has 51 delegates, and the other 50?
say what you will and choose who you like, for whatever reasons, but if your choice ignores these simple questions about the democratic process, then …. not at all sure what to say.
except that voters are watching this mess. the ones who are really invested in the democratic process are pretty disgusted with it. not at all proud.
Germy
Chuck’s Freudian slip:
Chuck Todd congratulates Rubio on his win in South Carolina. Todd quickly corrected himself, but it was a telling moment nonetheless.
http://crooksandliars.com/2016/02/chucks-freudian-slip
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay: Rubio is weaseling about abortion and gay marriage already– what? who, me? I just think the states should be in charge! Still think those matters will be a problem for him., especially since Cruz looks like he’ll be hitting them hard over the next few weeks. Also, as a lot of left-leaning journalists are trying to get the horse-race types to notice, Rubio wants to complete eliminate taxes on unearned income– capital gains and dividends. “Mitt Romney would pay nothing!”, a good response to the rumored endorsement coming up.
Rubio is much more a neocon than Trump, though as you say, he’s so fucking mercurial who knows where he’ll be four, six, eight months from now.
Corner Stone
@Kay:
I don’t know what this means.
Baud
@gwangung: Some people have speculated that he didn’t expect to do this well, so he may not have planned as well as Obama. I do recall Bernie saying last year, however, that he was not interested in a “message” campaign and would only enter if he thought he had a real chance of winning.
different-church-lady
Getting your people to turn out to vote: isn’t that, like, cheating or something?
Mike J
@pamelabrown53:
I think it means, “my side lost.”
different-church-lady
@zzyzx:
No, no, no, that’s why it’s MORE IMPORTANT THAN EVER THAT WE PUT BERNIE OVER THE TOP, SO HE CAN KILL THE ELITES FROM THE INSIDE!!!
Felonius Monk
@Baud:
Well, I see you have already been hard at work on this.
Baud
@ellennelle: Maybe we should recall Obama, since it was the caucus states that put him over the top in 2008.
Like I said, I hope there are reforms. But we’re not changing the entire process in the middle of the game.
ETA: Fixed reference.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
it shows, and you sure take a lot of pixels to say it
Kay
@The Sheriff Endorses Baud 2016:
I wonder if Clinton could peel away (or get back) some older voters, because they have higher turnout so 70% of 100 of them is better than 30% turnout of 200 of The Unreliables. Not to be so cold and all, but there it is :)
Chyron HR
Wow. You lost NV by 5%, guys. That’s a pretty respectable performance.
And your response is, of course, to completely and utterly lose your shit.
I wonder which of the people who magically appeared out of nowhere last fall demanding that we love and adore Sanders will be the first to start arguing in favor of actual fucking apartheid after SC?
cmorenc
@Kay:
If Donald Trump is the GOP nominee, there will be more than enough voters who might have otherwise had reservations about voting for Hillary who will swallow that and vote for her because she’s far more acceptable to have as President than Trump – who will vote for her, to more than offset those who would have voted for Trump no matter what + GOP partisans who will wince at the dogfart aroma that voting for Trump requires their getting past. How far Trump has gone down the path of open racist demagoguery and insultingly crass behavior toward women may be catnip to an uncomfortably large group of Americans because they mistake it for candor and strength – will be unacceptably repellent to a greater portion of the population, especially moderate women.
scav
Oh, Heartland ‘Merka. Where “nice guys” are a little paranoid and randomly shoot guns out the back door without raising anything but utter shock! when random people end up dead on the other end of random bullets scattered elsewhere. And the whole thing is hardly a news event. I’m not entirely sure which half of this equation are the scarier of the two electorates being tapped. (NYT)
Kay
@Corner Stone:
Because I think we should be saying “why is Democratic turnout low?” rather than Bernie Sanders theory is discredited. They both may be true but one doesn’t matter outside this primary- indeed the theory behind saying it is “Sanders is weaker”. Weaker than what? His own theory?
Baud
@Felonius Monk:
I think technology can replace political parties. It’s worked well with teachers in the classroom.
.
.
(Just kidding. Don’t ban me, Kay!)
aimai
@chopper: They already have a few diaries up attacking Reid for this. Maybe DWS can go out and take a smoke break, or something, from her permanent ten minutes as a hate figure.
gwangung
@Baud: Personally, I don’t think he thought it through (and this is unlike Obama). In order to get his agenda through, he needs to turn Congress. Some commenter suggested a 30 for Bernie, a targeted list of candidates who are pinpointed at key Congressional races to turn the seat blue so he gets a majority in the House. Instead, all I’ve seen is a lame list of maybe 25 people who support Bernie, where I have no idea how they’re polling or if they’re in key races.
That’s management and administrative vision, which is needed to turn the ideological vision into reality.
Germy
Republican Congressmen, backed by airline money, kill research on legroom and passenger safety
https://theintercept.com/2016/02/21/backed-by-airline-dollars-congress-rejects-effort-to-address-shrinking-legroom/
gwangung
@cmorenc:
Let’s not forget Latinos. They will be MOTIVATED to vote against Trump, not unlike Prop 181 in CA>
Mike J
@zzyzx:
It’s the sort of thing a community organizer would understand. Of course if you have a low opinion of community organizers…
aimai
@Kay: I just think this is a bizarre way of looking at it. We are coming off eight years of Democratic rule and we have two great candidates. Turnout is low because most people are indifferent between Bernie and Hillary, and figure that they will vote for the nominee when the time comes around. Primaries are exciting only for some voters and, in my experience, for voters who want a chance to “vote the bums out” or who are not sure they are going to be able to get revenge for perceived slights. 2008 was a wave election, filled with excitement, because the Democrats were longing to throw the bums out and had extreme anxiety about who would be able to do it I think most people right now are indifferent between HRC and Bernie and figure that overall its a party of grownups who will put up a grown up candidate who will fight against pure evil (Trump) or mini me evil (all the others) quite successfully. Very few people bother with primaries and we are simply seeing that even among that select few people aren’t that concerned about whether its hrc or bernie. The differences beween them are actually pretty small.
Thoroughly Pizzled
@ellennelle: Maybe you can take over the party and change the rules. But that’s more difficult if you claim that everyone else is bought and paid for.
Felonius Monk
@Baud:
Technology has, in one instance, replaced a political candidate, e.g. Marcobot. But, admittedly it is faulty technology.
NCSteve
So, Reid’s Machiavellian masterstroke was to make a few calls that made it easier for more people to turn out and caucus for whoever they wanted? More democracy? That was his masterstroke?
The fiend! A plan of diabolical cunning whose byzantine twists and turns are nearly incomprehensible to all but a few savvy insiders with decades of experience in the ways of politics. God save the nation from such horrible electoral manipulation in November.
Kay
@Baud:
Actually Bernie Sanders repeated ( or mangled) a public schools fiction that is extremely popular but demonstrably untrue:
Maybe he meant Finland. What he said is true of Finland but you can’t just apply this willy nilly, Bernard. My heart sank, I must say.
scav
@Germy: If you’re worried about evacuation, shouldn’t you just pay for the free-market solution of first class seating instead of relying on the socialized big government jack-booted thuggery of shoving everyone’s survival down our throats?
Corner Stone
@Kay:
I have re-read this thread and have missed what exactly the “Bernie Sanders theory” is and what is the line of argument that discredits it?
bemused senior
Kay, I have always enjoyed your posts because you have a concrete, circumstantial, informed view of politics from the ground level of an activist. So I would really like to hear why you are equating turnout in the three just-finished primary/caucus states with probable GE turnout. Don’t you think the motivation to get to the polls will be different for a voter comparing the outcome of a Bernie-HRC race and a Democrat vs Trump race? I am not at all diminishing the need to work hard on GE turnout.
debbie
@SiubhanDuinne, Annoying Scoundrel:
You’re right. Context is everything. I was wrong.
CaseyL
@Kay: This. Older voters are known to reliable turn out to vote. Youngs, not so much – and I think it has more to do with the lack of civics education than anything else.
Somewhere along the line, voting stopped being something you did as a civic duty, and more something you did as an act of self-validation. As far as I can tell, nowadays if the candidate doesn’t excite you, doesn’t speak directly to or for you, or isn’t exactly what you want in a candidate… people under age 30 or 40 just don’t vote.
I’m an Old now (which BTW, is a source of constant shock) – old enough to have been raised to consider voting a civic duty. You NEVER “not vote.” It is, really, the least one can do as a citizen of a democracy.
LesBonnesFemmes
@zzyzx: This.
Chyron HR
@NCSteve:
Democracy is for white people, and the few minorities who know how to vote the “right” way.
Mike J
@scav:
In a survivable crash people in the forward part of the cabin are the most likely to be injured or killed. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Belafon
I would buy that if the polls and enthusiasm were showing trouble. Neither showed it.
I realize it would be nice to believe that some mystic force (Harry Reid) swung the caucuses in favor of Clinton, but all of the details lead me to believe that she was ahead, was going to win it, and did. Not every win requires some epic description. Sometimes, people just go vote.
Baud
@Kay: All those white countries look alike.
SiubhanDuinne, Annoying Scoundrel
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Hey, be nice to ellenelle; her keyboard has no shift key.
Fair Economist
@Baud:
Except he has to say that to run an effective message campaign. Campaigning to lose just makes you a joke. So regardless of what he planned, he was going to say that.
I’m inclined to think he was intending a message campaign, because the campaign isn’t designed to win a general. Single-payer isn’t going to win an election campaign in the US and Bernie has to know that. If he were running to win, he would have put his focus on the banks, jobs, and wages, and single-payer would have been a sideline at best.
Corner Stone
@scav:
Fascinating timing in that I just re-watched the Discovery channel’s two hour piece on a team of scientists crashing a passenger plane (I think something like a 737) into a desert to do safety research. Turns out you have a higher chance of dying or severe injury the closer to the front of the plane you sit.
Ah, here is more about it and it’s a 727.
scav
@Mike J: @Corner Stone: How cunning of those socialist engineers!
AnonPhenom
but Hillary is NOT Establishment….nor Reid, nor Taylor, nor etc. etc.
different-church-lady
@Belafon:
Hey, at least it’s a step up the maturity ladder from “RIGGED COINS!!1!”
Baud
@CaseyL:
That’s how I feel as well. And if not self-validation, a transactional endeavour. People aren’t citizens so much as customers of government, and if the deal isn’t good enough, they won’t vote. It’s really a triumph of libertarian philosophy.
Kay
@CaseyL:
I don’t know how I turned into the defender of 20 year olds but take a look at this census graph– look at ’88 and ’96. I think the spike is when the age was lowered.
I don’t know who those 1990’s people are but they have some explaining to do :)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Fair Economist: I think he started out running a message/discourse-shifting campaign, but I remember watching him, I think in early December, and thinking, “Holy Crap, he thinks he can win it all”.
Baud
@Fair Economist:
Oh, I agree. There’s the difference between Bernie and Lawrence Lessig.
(Along with all the other differences between them.)
different-church-lady
@Baud:
Did you notice the number of people on the interspheres in 2010 saying some version of “I didn’t give Obama all this money so that he could…” It was like they thought they were buying the candidate with their frequent $25 chip-ins.
different-church-lady
@Baud: Lessig ran the first presidential campaign in history exclusively devoted to generating course material.
Belafon
And any Democrat that wants to argue that the only way Clinton won was because more people were allowed to vote will have their Democratic/progressive/liberal card taken away by me.
Fair Economist
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I had the same thought around the same time. That was when he actually starting attacking Hillary some while before he’d really been avoiding attacks on her or even being supportive. I’m not whining, I’m just saying he started acting like he wanted to *beat* her and not just influence her.
FlipYrWhig
@ellennelle: waaaaaaah! Caucuses are unfair when Bernie loses them! Why aren’t people waking up to the nefarious Democratic strategy of having more people vote for the other candidate? Christ almighty the stories you guys tell yourselves.
different-church-lady
@Belafon: No, you don’t understand, this was a seated US Senator appealing to people to vote, as opposed to Ber… oh, wait…
Kay
@Belafon:
Well, no one should say that because we a version of this same fight in ’08, except that time the union was on the other side in that one.
There was even a toxic waste dumping dispute. Just switch some of these names around or plug in a new one. Starts with an “S” rather than an “O”.
gwangung
@Fair Economist:
That’s still puzzling to me, though. Given the apparent groundswell in support, wouldn’t you think he’d fine tune his message to add those additional beats? And wouldn’t he adjust his message to be more appealing to blacks and Latinos?
Mike J
@FlipYrWhig:
I rmember when Republicans called Obama’s win an “electoral coup.”
Baud
@different-church-lady: Right. Political leaders have to be responsive to voters, but I feel like this mindset encourages people to walk away too readily and messes with their expectations.
Corner Stone
I think Sanders did pretty well with the Latino vote in NV. And he’s not doing too badly overall with women voters. So arguably, the case could be made that any injection into the event that Reid made had as least as good a chance of helping Sanders or being neutral to the overall outcome. The article reads that he respected Culinary’s neutrality but just asked them to show up and vote.
Chyron HR
Chin up, guys, Bernie can still win SC as long as you get enough George Zimmermans out there “depressing turnout” next week.
different-church-lady
@Mike J: Coup, revolution, what’s the dif’, really.
Germy
@Corner Stone:
So all this time I’ve been suffering in coach I was actually safe as milk!
FlipYrWhig
@gwangung: He genuinely thinks that racial and ethnic tensions are fake distractions stoked by elites and that the only necessary message is consistency a/k/a repetitive dogmatism. So there’s no tweaking the message — that would be salesmanship and he doesn’t believe in that. Or it would be admitting things weren’t right from Day 1, which he doesn’t believe in either.
Baud
@Corner Stone: Someone here said he won the Latino vote, but I haven’t seen confirmation of that.
Corner Stone
@SiubhanDuinne, Annoying Scoundrel:
I thought I was an abstemious man, having dedicated my life to giving away all possessions. Until I met she who had no shift key.
LanceThruster
@Corner Stone:
‘Too dumb’ is your characterization. I’d say HRC’s characterization of ‘super-predators’ and ‘fear of black men in hoodies’ establishes her take on the AA community.
Kay
@Corner Stone:
His joking around after meant to me he’s backing Clinton. 3/4 of the Senate Democrats are backing Clinton. I don’t know why it would be controversial.
I do think he should let go of this caucus as “his” because people there seem to hate it and he (allegedly) blocked a primary in the state because he wants all that Iowa glamour :)
Germy
Last time I flew I had a young teen with restless leg syndrome in the seat behind me. Stewardess gave me a little bag with earphones so I could watch a movie (2″ screen) and there was a hair in the bag with the earphones.
And I understand in first class they have beds and showers!
Svensker
@Anne Laurie:
Makes sense. Burpees it is!
Germy
@Corner Stone: I cried because I had no shoes until I met a man who’d lost his feet. So I asked him “you got a pair of shoes you’re not using?”
FlipYrWhig
@LanceThruster: forget what actual black people think, what SHOULD they think IN THEORY, amirite?
Chyron HR
I agree with LanceThruster, there’s no way Bernie’s “You dumb schvartzers will do whatever a rap musician tells you to, right?” strategy could have failed–there must have been foul play at work!
Mike J
@Germy:
Only on international flights. Virgin Atlantic adds an in flight masseuse and a walk up bar. I always felt too weird about a massage, but I have gotten up to stretch my legs and stopped at the bar.
Baud
@Germy: and hookers and blow.
Brachiator
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
Doesn’t really matter because the election is not held today, and there are too many other factors to consider before you can extrapolate current results into electoral votes, but I get that this registers your impression of Trump’s appeal compared to Clinton and Sanders.
Trump voters don’t care if he is unfit, and they are clinging to him with everything they’ve got. The Democrats will have to do better with the key issues of the economy, security and foreign relations with non-crazy Republicans, if there are any left.
Clinton will also have to do more than her weak message about having experience promising to work hard. Yes, Trump is vague about details, but promises concrete outcomes. America will be safe, America will be great, Americans will have jobs, America will kick butt, America will build a wall.
The Democrats will have problems with immigration, since they are committed to amnesty open borders. Clinton will have to at least pretend to be tougher on Wall Street.
One interesting tidbit. Cruz did very well with younger Republicans, which says something, perhaps unsavory, about the GOP. In any case, these younger voters ain’t voting for Clinton or Sanders, and this demographic may deserve watching as the primary campaign rolls along.
Fair Economist
@gwangung:
Maybe he was too far in on a healthcare theme to shift. It’s hard to shift away from your signature issue midstream.
With minorities, I think Bernie really believes the socialist idea that it’s all about the economics.
Corner Stone
@LanceThruster:
75% of them who vote D in NV seem to disagree with you on that take. And as your original statement was along the lines that “at least 25%” got it right, what other idea are we to take away from your opinion of the 3/4ths that did not “get it right” ?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay: former Gov said on the Tweety show that Rs blocked a primary because the state pays for it, parties pay for caucuses.
@Fair Economist: there’s a theory here that the evil clintonites tricked Bernie in to rushing out his flawed health care plan
Mike J
@Corner Stone: You often hear Republicans say things like, “if the n—-rs weren’t so stupid they’d vote for us.”
Hugely
@Jacel: triplets,
though I was a Richardson guy before Edwards
Belafon
@Baud: The entrance poll sampling was indicating that Bernie was going to win Latinos, so people started using that. There seems to be some significant problems with generalizing based on the entrance polling: it samples polling places, not people, and is a small sample, 200 people total. While we don’t know the actual makeup of the caucuses, Clinton one all of the majority Latino districts. It’s hard to argue she lost the Latino vote and yet won those districts.
Joel
@ellennelle: working political connections is effective politics. To use a historical analogy, long lasting effective governance is more in line with the Holy Roman Empire than the Timurids.
Baud
@Belafon: Thanks. I was wondering how she could have lost the Latino vote in Nevada and still won by five points.
Bex
@Iowa Old Lady: Agree. I talked to some dyed-in-the-wool traditional Republicans last week and they too are horrified by Trump.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: I saw Julian Castro on MSNBC and it seemed like he really wants to make himself HRC’s point man with Hispanic voters, and seemed more than willing to against Sanders. Almost makes you wonder if he’s thinking long term…
Gin & Tonic
@Kay:
Huh? The 26th Amendment was passed in 1971.
pamelabrown53
@Gex:
It was just a question. Sorry if you felt I was attacking you. That was not my intention.
Belafon
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Is there any Democrat that does not have Castro on their short list for VP for either candidate?
Brachiator
@Baud:
This was based on initial CNN projections. But the NYT political blog says it’s complicated:
So, Sanders did better than expected with Latino voters, but he still has much to do before he can overcome Clinton’s advantage.
Also, too, entrance and exit polling has got to get better before reporters and pundits can make declarations about the meaning of various elections.
gwangung
@FlipYrWhig: Then he will lose that segment of voters, and rightly so. And THAT impacts his electability.
Germy
@Mike J:
Jesus Christ, last time I flew to Europe my knees were up around my chin the whole time. Coach was like taking a flying greyhound bus.
Thank Ceiling Cat for xanax.
FlyingToaster
@Gin & Tonic: I was 19 in 1980 and I voted. You’re right.
gwangung
@Corner Stone:
A patronizing white guy was talking down to black people?
Germy
I was tossed into moderation for mentioning the name of a pill that allowed me to experience flying coach to Europe somewhat less hellishly.
BillinGlendaleCA
@gwangung:
Gin & Tonic
@FlyingToaster: I was left thinking that Kay might have meant something else that I misunderstood. because she is always so knowledgeable. But 18-21’s have been eligible to vote since McGovern-Nixon in 1972.
LanceThruster
@gwangung:
If Trump wins I’ll also characterize the less than majority vote against him that they ‘got it right’ too. No condescencion, just a statement of opinion.
I’ve seen posters here stating the young were too stupid toe get on board for the big Hillary win so you can spare me your outrage.
sidhra
@Gin & Tonic: I proudly cast my first vote in Massachusetts in that election. For the honest guy.
Brachiator
@BillinGlendaleCA:
And yet, I continue to see stories that Latino voter registration numbers, especially with respect to younger Latinos, is not very high compared with past years and election cycles.
Clinton, Sanders, whoever, have to convince people to vote FOR them, not just AGAINST the other guy.
Also, if Cruz or Baby Rubio ends up being the GOP nominee, things could get interesting.
LanceThruster
@Corner Stone:
She is better than a Rethuglican, but her candidacy is most definitely about her, not them. Her pandering to fearful whites is every bit as repulsive as Trump’s.
D58826
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: Reading an article this morning, on twitter I believe, about how Pres. Bernie will overcome GOP obstruction. The article used free college education as an example.Bernie will submit the legislation and if the GOP stonewalls it he will use the bully pulp and social media to rally grass roots support. First by having his supporters write their congress critter and then if Congress still fails to act then organizing million person marches on Washington to put pressure on Congress. Now if that is his plan it contains more magical unicorns and pixey dust than his economic platform. Right off the bat a couple of glaring problems. The majority of folks in red districts are not part of Bernie’s revolution. If they were the seat would be blue. Second the GOP is pretty good at organizing letter writing campaigns. As for the million person marches, well two can play that game. And the GOP demonstrated they were good at getting out the protesters in the 2010 tea party summer.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Brachiator:
Doubtful, they’re Cubans. There’s a bit of animosity among other Latinos towards Cubans(mainly related to their “special” immigration status).
D58826
@Corner Stone: Without disputing that ‘fear of black men in hoodies’ is often a code word for racists, remember that Obama’s grandmother was afraid of young black men. And Jesse Jackson one time said if he was being followed down the street at night by a group of kids he was less nervous if the group were white kids rather than black kids.. I suspect it’s a lot moire complicated for many people.
CaseyL
@Kay: Erm… the chart seems to show that voting rates by the youngest cohort is always lower than the other age cohorts, which is what I was saying.
I think another part of the problem is that it’s been so long since politics “worked” in this country that young people have no memory of it, doubt it’s possible, and simply don’t consider institutional politics (i.e., voting) relevant to their interests. I keep thinking back to the federal program of revenue sharing with cities, which used to finance everything from transit to anti-poverty programs. Reagan ended it, and cities have never recovered. That’s long enough to forget the program ever existed, and that cities used to flourish under it.
jl
@BillinGlendaleCA: And, from what I hear from friends and acquaintances who ID themselves as Hispanic, the perceived Cuban bigotry towards other Hispanics. Even Argentinians have a better reputation on that score, and they have the problem of their widely despised futball teams held against them.
Ampersand
Well, I’m disappointed that Bernie lost, though I thought he made a good showing.
I’ll vote for Hillary in the general, but I think she’s going to need some help to win it. I know that primary/caucus voters are enthusiastic about her (hey, she’s winning), but I’m not seeing it among the non-diehards, and these are people that were thrilled to vote for Obama. If Trump is the GOP candidate, we need to hope that an establishment GOP type runs “third party” and splits the vote, and if Rubio or some other establishment figure end up being the candidate, we need Trump’s supporters to feel robbed and stay home (I believe that sore loser laws prevent him from being a third party candidate in many states).
Corner Stone
@Ampersand:
Do you mean like actual voters voting for her? Or do you mean more of the dirty tricks like what Reid just pulled in NV?
henqiguai
@Ampersand(#166):
Unlike Bernie, who would win just through the awesomeness of the Bern? We are talking the guy who, after over 20 years in the Federal Congress, hasn’t yet received a single endorsement from his fellows, right? Asking for a friend.
Kay
@CaseyL:
I know but if it goes back to 1964 then when was voting less transactional and consumerist and more of a civic duty?
I’m (admittedly) touchy about the “people want free stuff!” about the youngs argument as of late, but I’m not sure there was a time when we were all better people– less self-interested, less shallow. Younger people voting jumped in 2004 and that was prior to Obama. It was a particular focus of John Kerry’s campaign. if we want people to vote our way we have to ask them.
Ampersand
@Corner Stone:
I meant actual voters, yeah.
@henqiguai:
If Bernie won the nomination, he’d need help as well, but for different reasons.
Applejinx
@Thoroughly Pizzled: And if that’s true, then it looks much like what we’re seeing and the electability argument becomes ‘be coronated, without consulting anyone outside the Beltway’.
Way to go, Harry. I’m not terribly surprised: this is kinda what we’re talking about. We’ll never know if Bernie could have made a moving plea to the head of the Culinary Union and got workers time off to vote. Time off to vote IS in Bernie’s platform, always has been.
But if you postulate a world where only the rich and powerful can do anything, Bernie ends up only making a speech in favor of this, and then you have Harry calling in favors and bam, it happens. Because he has the money, he has the control, and he can do this if it’s what he wants done.
If there was no Bernie, would those people have been asked to participate in the caucuses?
But there is, and they were, and more power to them. Go Culinary Union.
But if you think they’re gonna turn around and not do what he wants after he pulls those strings for them, you’re out of your mind. He now owes them (good, I hope he does good things for them for a quid pro quo).
This is classic machine politics. We wanted to rise above it, but that is a very tall order and it looks like the rabble only got within five percent of the machine this time.
Applejinx
@gwangung: Bernie doesn’t adjust his message. It’s not a thing to be tuned, it’s what he’s figured out over the years. That’ll either resonate with enough people through the primary, or not.
It’s not on Bernie to adjust his message. It’s on us to accept or reject it. Let Hillary adjust HER message if events show that a substantial number of people want Bernie’s message. This is not a thing where half the party fights the other half and winner sends the other half home in disgrace. This is the soul of the party here being reimagined.
Anybody looking to gather all the people up and deliver them to the polls in November is going to have to figure that part out. I look forward to an intense co-opting of all Sanders’ issues except the socialism part, and I hope they don’t fuck up the economy too bad being neoliberal as I think that’s the sticking point for a lot of these people, they absolutely must stick to their money sources.
All the more since Sanders has sucked literally all the grassroots cash up leaving none for anybody else. They HAVE to stick to their PACs, we’re giving them no choice. Remains to be seen what they’re going to do about that in the long run.
Applejinx
@Germy: Sure ’nuff ‘n yes you were! :)
Applejinx
@LanceThruster: In fairness that was 80s Clinton. Is 2016 Clinton talking about bringing superpredators to heel?
It’s not fair to judge Clinton as if she was a Bernie sticking to one point of view her whole career. Both Clintons are famously weathervanes and it applies to their governance. If Hillary decides not to be all ‘boo, superpredators, scary blacks jail them’ then there won’t BE a trace remaining of that attitude.
This is why I’m so interested in which way she tacks and where she thinks the electorate is. If we can make absolutely clear that the electorate will not tolerate racism, or if she thinks her turn will look better if she’s Mrs. Anti-Racism, she will be that whole-heartedly and take full credit for it, and her 80s stuff (or to be even sillier, Goldwater Girl stuff) might as well never have existed. She might even deny she ever said any of it.
I really want to know what Hillary we’re going to get if she’s getting coronated thanks to the efforts of the whole Dem establishment. It matters. I’m not sure I can take her promises at face value but it’s important to know she COULD be the real great liberal hope and hard Left swing, whole-heartedly… if she wishes to be.
Our job is to make her wish to be that, by establishing there’s a market for it and a legacy to be had by it.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Applejinx:
Bernie and Harry Reid have basically been in Congress in the same length of time. Harry is a Democrat, and rose through leadership because of his savvy, hard work, leadership and team building skills. What was Bernie doing, and what has prevented him from speaking to the Culinary Union before now?
Bob in Portland
@chopper: A conspiracy? How about party politics?
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Bob in Portland:
Obama in 2008 was in the same position as Bernie is now (without the constant whining), and kept rolling up delegates, overtaking Clinton by Super Tuesday. What is the difference between Bernie and Barack that could possibly account for that, I wonder?
Rob
“Overwhelmingly”? You need a refreher course in numbers and their relative values. BTW, wasn’t it Bill Clinton and that DLC “crap” who broke down the safety walls between banking functions that led to the economoc collapse a short while back. Support whomever you want but stop accusing Sanders supporters of being thoughtless unicorn chasers with no basis for our beliefs or opinions.
chopper
@Bob in Portland:
how about satire? do you understand satire?
LanceThruster
@Applejinx:
Fair enough but the hoodie observation is recent.
http://realitieswatch.com/hillary-clinton-the-sight-of-a-black-man-in-a-hoodie-is-scary-even-to-open-minded-whites/
jonas
@debbie: Which would have been kinda cool, because he survived and came out more badass than before. “Sure I got a black eye. You should have seen what the other guys looked like.” Then light a cigar and walk away.
P.S. yes, I know Reid is a good Mormon and would be smoking like that. Just play along.
Mark K
People being able to take a bit of time off to caucus? Sounds like democracy to me. Reid did the right thing to ensure that people could do so.
ellennelle
@Joel:
working connections works …for those in power. is that our highest aspiration?
and are those historical analogies our criteria now?
this explains why it feels like walking in mud here; not one ounce of vision amongst you.
ellennelle
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
ever the charmer, jim.
gi’e us a kiss, eh?
mclaren
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
This is purely fallacious. Each election is unique. You can’t transfer the winning strategy from one candidate to another because each candidate has unique strengths and weaknesses and each election turns on different issues.
In an election where the leading Republican candidates declares his willingness to abandon the Republican party and run as a third party candidate if he isn’t treated fairly, worries about Republican unanimity seem overstated.
mclaren
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
The key difference, obviously, is that the global economy had just collapsed in the biggest economic crash since the Great Depression and everyone was running around with their hair on fire wondering whether the banks would shut down permanently and whether the Baltic Dry Index (which had just reached all-time record lows) indicated that global trade had bottomed out at a zero point indicating a new Dark Ages.
At the same time, the Democrats faced a serious establishment war-hero Republican candidate (John McCain) when worries about 9/11 still seemed fresh in everyone’s mind and America was still embroiled in the Iraq quagmire. Most of all, in 2008 we still had the worst president in history — a Republican — running this country into the ground.
Hint: March 2008 and March 2016 represent such totally different situations there’s no comparison. In March 2016, Democrats face a gaggle of fringe lunatic Republicans who couldn’t find their asses with both hands in a hall of mirrors. In March 2016, the U.S. economy continues its slow recovery, marred by the fact that 96% of the gains in this economic recovery have gone to the top 1%. In March 2016, we’ve got a fairly decent Democratic president who is running this country into the ground on foreign policy but slowly dragging it back to sanity on domestic policy.
Big differences.