Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Hey Washington Post, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” is supposed to be a warning, not a mission statement.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

An unpunished coup is a training exercise.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

He imagines himself as The Big Bad, Who Is Universally Feared… instead of The Big Jagoff, Who Is Universally Mocked.

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

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

Ron DeSantis, the grand wizard, oops, governor of FL.

Republicans don’t trust women.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

“woke” is the new caravan.

You are here: Home / Politics / Politicans / Bernie Sanders 2016 / Live Stream to Senator Sanders’ Remarks

Reader Interactions

393Comments

  1. 1.

    Stella

    I was looking at the California map. Bernie is doing well up in marijuana growing country.

  7. 7.

    West of the Cascades

    Early returns in California (12% reporting) not looking good for Bernie, down 62-36.

  8. 8.

    Adam L Silverman

    @NotMax: Fine! You get an apostrophe! And you get an apostrophe! And you get an apostrophe!

    Its after midnight, you all are lucky I do anything at this hour.

  9. 9.

    burnspbesq

    I hope I’m overthinking this, but that’s not conciliatory music being played in that venue. That’s declaration-of-war music.

  11. 11.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Cacti: Its all about putting the blame on someone else so they can try to claim to the Clinton campaign H/R folks that they were never involved with the scorched earth strategy. They have potential jobs to protect.

  14. 14.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    The characterizations of Sanders’s state of mind aren’t particularly flattering either. Aides portray him as angry, hurt, and actively deluding himself about both the reasons he’s losing and the possibility he may still win:

    Sanders is himself filled with resentment, on edge, feeling like he gets no respect — all while holding on in his head to the enticing but remote chance that Clinton may be indicted before the convention

    In your guts, you know he’s nutz.

  15. 15.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Mike J: There was a Neil Young song in there about 20 minutes ago. It was up for about 40 seconds. I’m guessing someone realized they didn’t have the money to pay the licensing fee and pulled it.

  17. 17.

    cmorenc

    With California increasingly looking like a Clinton win by a solid margin, I’ll bet there’s a tug-of-war going on between the Jeff Weaver vs Tad Devine factions within his top staff over what Sanders says in his address – fight on vs laying groundwork for conciliation/unification. Early indications are toward the latter bc of Thur meetings between Sanders & Obama & Reid at Sanders request – but who knows until he actually speaks.

  18. 18.

    gf120581

    @Cacti: Boy, did that article make him look awful. A petty, spiteful, angry little man who’s more concerned with payback than any type of real strategy. Apparently he’s enraged at Sherrod Brown for backing Hillary and still wants Frank and Malloy removed. And, of course, the DWS matter.

    Can’t wait to see how the meeting with Obama goes. Obama will be civil, but I expect the hammer to fall. Reid as well.

    One thing’s for sure, the contrast between Hillary’s grace and magnanimous behavior tonight and the sore loser painted in that article is rather glaring.

  20. 20.

    ? Martin

    Man, still 62/37 with 16% in. I’m shocked. Even Sanders’ staff are now trying to unwind this.

  21. 21.

    Bobby Thomson

    Yawn. It’s all over but the Downfall parodies.

    Sit down, Bernie, you fat mother fucker.

  23. 23.

    Mike J

    @cmorenc:

    tug-of-war going on between the Jeff Weaver vs Tad Devine factions within his top staff over what Sanders says in his address

    Politico says it’s not a Weaver-Devine fight, it’s all Bernie being an asshole personally.

  24. 24.

    dmsilev

    @? Martin:

    Even Sanders’ staff are now trying to unwind this.

    I read that article differently. That’s “Sanders aides are trying to keep their job prospects with other Democratic campaigns open”.

  25. 25.

    Elie

    @Cacti:

    I don’t think that they threw him under the bus. I think they were candid dealing with a complex situation and man… they did what they could to try to get the best outcome. It was Bernie who called the shots. Right or wrong that is not disrespectful to him — at least I don’t think so…

  27. 27.

    seaboogie

    Seems kind of Trumpish (like Sanders himself, in his crank-i-tude) for networks to broadcast footage of an empty podium, ad naseum. I anticipate a lot of booing amid the cheering

  29. 29.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Major Major Major Major: Who knows. Its the problem with the purity patrol folks. Ultimately, no matter how hard they look, there are no true Scotsmen. And that includes themselves. Someone will eventually come along and argue that they’re not committed enough.

  30. 30.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @gf120581: Apparently he’s enraged at Sherrod Brown for backing Hillary and still wants Frank and Malloy removed.

    Always fighting the real enemy, is our brilliant revolutionary. I also liked the revelation of how he decides to share his email lists: Loyalty to people in safe seats who have endorsed him trumps tight races that could actually advance his stated agenda. Or, as Trump might put it, Bernie is nice to people who are nice to him. Some other people are not nice.

  31. 31.

    Mnemosyne

    I picked up the latest Fearless Flyer from Trader Joe’s and discovered that they, too, have succumbed to Hamimania. Page 15 of the Mango issue.

    ETA: Found a link, in case anyone thought I was kidding.

  34. 34.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    He was never stable to begin with (calling for the ouster of the first Black President in 2011).

    But the crowds and adoring coverage he received on MSNBC really drove him over the edge.

    out there with these natives,
    it must be a temptation to be God.

    — Heart of Darkness

  36. 36.

    Mnemosyne

    @? Martin:

    I’m not shocked. California is not just a liberal state, we’re a strong Democratic state. Start implying that the Democratic Party is corrupt and calling Barbara Boxer a bitch and there will be consequences.

  37. 37.

    Elie

    @gf120581:

    They need Bernie to help bring his people along — if possible. Yes, he is not a nice person. Obama is used to that and won’t take it personal. What he wants from Bernie is what it will take to get what he/Hillary need to succeed with all the Democrats this fall. Obama is used to knife fights but that is not what this will be. Bernie will get what he wants — as long as he gives what is needed. There will be certain assurances necessary and unwritten, certain consequences if not honored.

    Bernie’s career is over after this I would think. Who would ever want to work with him and how could he ever again get any traction from the inside. We’ll see. Maybe he can make more of this. He was in the end, more like Trump than folks imagined…

  40. 40.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    I’m placing the over/under on the length of his speech at 45 minutes.

  41. 41.

    cmorenc

    We’re about to find out if Bernie is going to stick with being a raging asshole, or else whether he realizes and embraces that the way to maximize his strategic aims and position post-California is to play a hardball version of conciliation, where he indicates he’ll contemplate coming aboard team Dem/Clinton, but preconditioned on still-formidable terms beyond what he’s already been given. Still Bernie the asshole, but a more realistically calculating asshole.

  42. 42.

    dmsilev

    @Ernest Pikeman: Even though it’s in Politico, the article is well worth reading. You get the sense that if Sanders does decide to press on after tonight (or after the DC primary next week at the absolute latest), he’ll be booking his own plane tickets and hotel rooms since he won’t have any staff left.

  46. 46.

    Rand Careaga

    Sanders and aides laugh at the idea that he’s damaging the party and hurting Clinton. They think they don’t get enough gratitude for how much they held back, from not targeting more Democratic members of the House and Senate who opposed him to not making more of an issue out of Clinton’s email server investigation and Bill Clinton’s sex scandals, all of which they discussed as possible lines of attack in the fall. They blame Clinton going after him on gun control for goading him into letting loose on her Goldman Sachs speeches.

    “If they hadn’t started at it by really going hard at him on guns, raising a series of issues against him, that really was what led to him being much, much more aggressive than he otherwise would have been,” said Tad Devine, the consultant who helped engineer Sanders’ plans for a protest candidacy into a real campaign (and convinced him to run as a Democrat).

    (Emphasis added) Bitch made me do it! Jesus…

  47. 47.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @Elie:

    I called this from the beginning. They both appealed to angry white guys right from the beginning, but Trump’s a much better marketer. I predicted Bernie would lose 49 states to Trump in a head to head because neither one is temperementally suited to be president, but Trump wouldn’t call for raising everyone’s taxes so that “those people” would get free stuff. Sanders and Trump are equally as delusional and uninformed, no question about it.

  48. 48.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Mnemosyne: It’s still early – the margin will probably get a lot closer than this. Still crossing fingers for a Hillary blowout, though.

  49. 49.

    hovercraft

    @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch:
    Of coarse it’s him, Josh Marshall reported this a couple of weeks ago. He is the source of all the resentment. He’s an angry old man who finally got his moment in the sun, And then people started telling him that it couldn’t last forever and he started lashing out, blaming everyone but himself for not being able to sell more people on his vision. As the candidate it is your job to bring people to your side, if you can’t do that it’s on you.

  50. 50.

    Elie

    This guy is a rough ride on everyone is my guess. I bet he has had many troubled relationships with not only colleagues but family. He is always right, even when he is wrong. Always bitter and always chasing happiness that eludes him by just that much, Stories are always bitter and without mercy for himself as well as others. He tends to idealize new friends and then they always become the object of his scorn and judgement. I know one just like him in my personal life and it aint fun.

  51. 51.

    GregB

    People are taking the unmitigated douche-bags at Politico seriously and not with the ‘Democrats are in disarray’ grain of salt?

  52. 52.

    Mnemosyne

    @MisterForkbeard:

    It will probably get closer, but I know quite a few people who didn’t like that Bernie’s campaign was starting to target the Democratic Party and wondered why the hell he was running to be the head of it if that was the case. That shitshow in Nevada really pissed a lot of party loyalists off.

  54. 54.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @Major Major Major Major:

    This Politico piece is every uncharitable thought I’ve had about the Sanders campaign put together, in print.

    That’s a part of why I’m treating it skeptically. A combination of it confirming my already held biases and rats not fleeing a sinking ship without first tying the captain to the mast make me suspect that there are people in that piece who are stretching the truth to make themselves seem as blameless as possible. “It wasn’t me, I swear! It was Bernie the whole time!”

  56. 56.

    gf120581

    @Mnemosyne: Just an FYI, but threatening Barbara Boxer probably isn’t a wise move going into an election in CA. Just saying.

  58. 58.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    I can’t believe he’s losing California by 25 points when he had Simon & Garfunkel on his side.

  60. 60.

    ShadeTail

    Uh, are people really throwing around a *Politico* article as evidence about the Sanders campaign? What next, Breitbart.com?

  63. 63.

    Redshift

    @Rand Careaga:

    from not targeting more Democratic members of the House and Senate who opposed him

    Seriously? Did these clowns actually think that “targeting” Democrats who supported another candidate would be a good strategic move? How exactly would that get them more votes?

    They may think they’re trying to preserve future job prospects, but they’re not doing a very good job of demonstrating they’d be worth hiring.

  65. 65.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    Gabriel Debenedetti Verified account
    ‏@gdebenedetti

    For what it’s worth: Sanders is still at his hotel here in Los Angeles. The motorcade hasn’t left for the rally site.

    Retweets
    44
    Likes
    41
    10:01 PM – 7 Jun 2016

    I’m going to bed. Good night and well done, fellow citizens.

  67. 67.

    Adam L Silverman

    You have to wonder what kind of drugs they give this poor woman on C-Span that has to take these calls and emails while waiting for Senator Sanders to talk. You’d think she’d have lost it on air by now and gone full on Network.

  69. 69.

    Elie

    @Rand Careaga:

    If only they had known what they would have experienced if she had actually gone after Bernie like she could of. That whole Jane and the Burlington College thing would not have been a sidebar nor would have the income tax thing for which I think there was more about that than they might have imagined. They had no idea…. but that’s ok. Hahahahaha…

  71. 71.

    Cacti

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    That’s a part of why I’m treating it skeptically. A combination of it confirming my already held biases and rats not fleeing a sinking ship without first tying the captain to the mast make me suspect that there are people in that piece who are stretching the truth to make themselves seem as blameless as possible. “It wasn’t me, I swear! It was Bernie the whole time!”

    Obviously, the story was fed to Politico by people with their own careers to think about.

    But let’s be real here. Is it really much of a reach to imagine that Bernie is privately an angry old crank?

  73. 73.

    Ernest Pikeman

    @GregB: Douchebags have direct quotes from Weaver and Devine, not just “Democrats familiar with the matter”.

  74. 74.

    RobertDSC-Quad Intel Mac

    I don’t give a fuck what he has to say. Get off the stage, you dumb motherfucker. Go away. Forever.

  77. 77.

    Jonathan Holland Becnel

    Bernie loses big today. Sucks.

    Oh well. ON TO THE CONVENTION!

  79. 79.

    Cacti

    @goblue72:

    I see the bleeding rectum of BJ has spoken.

    But enough about you.

    The thread’s about your defeated cult guru.

  80. 80.

    Frankensteinbeck

    I distrust the Politico article. There is one devastating quote from a high level Sanders operative about the Kentucky fight, but other than that it’s all unsourced. It makes sense, but I’ve seen too many inside stories turn out to be ‘journalists’ making up what they want to hear.

    EDIT – Note that it has lots of quotes from Weaver and Divine, but none of the quotes really say anything new except that one email.

  82. 82.

    Redshift

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    which part(s) of it strike you as untrue?

    I’m inclined to agree with GregB that anything about Democrats in Politico should be taken with a grain of salt. They’re not an unbiased source that should be trusted unless you have contrary information. However, the emails and quotes are pretty bad.

  86. 86.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @dmsilev:

    Why does anyone keep expecting anything from him other than for anything to be all about him? He’s incapable of it. He’s a small man.

  87. 87.

    Adam L Silverman

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne: C-Span just reported that the motorcade has left his hotel to make his way to Santa Monica. They are estimating he should start his remarks in approximately 30 minutes.

  88. 88.

    patroclus

    Well, I’m inclined to distrust Drudgeico, but the key will be this speech right now. If he’s gracious and humble and congratulatory, he can overcome the implications of that article with one good speech.

  94. 94.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @RSP:

    How could this revolution of whiny delusional idiots ever have failed?

  96. 96.

    Mike J

    @dmsilev:

    Now, maybe if a sea lion somehow waddled out and walked over to Bernie’s podium,

    Can you answer this one question about your policies?

  97. 97.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Redshift: that, and the fact that Bernie’s self-righteous crankitude and general uselessness has been self-evident for months now, mostly in his near total indifference to down-ticket races, especially when put in the perspective of his obsessiveness about the convention and the platform. Also, Cornel West.

  98. 98.

    burnspbesq

    Funny map: Sanders is winning the redneck, separatist counties–and nothing else. He could become Emperor of Jefferson.

  101. 101.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Mnemosyne: I was a definite vote for Bernie before that, to be honest. The Nevada convention really pissed me off, as did Bernie promising a contested convention. That shit is bad news, and everyone who’s read the slightest bit of political history should know that.

  103. 103.

    Elie

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Well, when you get certain personality traits converge from multiple sources, it starts to be hard to think that there isn’t some truth there. Besides, Bernie has spoken for himself most of the time. He is an unrepentant asshole and makes no bones about it. Unlike Trump you don’t have to worry about his feefees. He can take it… He wants what he wants and thinks what he thinks. No apologies.

  105. 105.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne: It’s only 1:15 in the morning on the east coast. He wants to make sure all the pot heads have come back from 7/11 with their cheetos before taking the stage.

  106. 106.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Cacti: Its an attempt to salvage potential job opportunities with either the Clinton campaign, one of the surrogates for the campaign (PACs, advocacy groups, etc), and other Democrats running for Federal and State office. These people have bills to pay. And for Weaver and Devine, they don’t want to be permanently exiled. Frankly, I’m amazed it took this long. So some of it is likely accurate and some of it is likely inaccurate and some of it is a hyperbolic caricature of what has actually happened. You’ll notice that Weaver, especially, has now gone out of his way to try to demonstrate that his fingerprints aren’t on anything.

  108. 108.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @burnspbesq: I don’t know CA geography, but I gather those are the kind of “conservative” Democratic voters who count, like in West Virginia, and not the kind that don’t count, like in South Carolina?

  109. 109.

    Miss Bianca

    @Cacti:

    Devine knows campaign chairman Paul Manafort from, among other things, their collaboration on the campaign of ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych

    My God…both Devine *and* Manafort worked for this guy?

  113. 113.

    CaseyL

    All politicians are late to their events. In Sanders’ case, though, I imagine he’s in a royal blue funk. CA isn’t going well so far; certainly not the blow-out victory he hoped for.

    What a charmless crock he turned out to be. Sad!

  116. 116.

    Cacti

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Its an attempt to salvage potential job opportunities with either the Clinton campaign, one of the surrogates for the campaign (PACs, advocacy groups, etc), and other Democrats running for Federal and State office. These people have bills to pay. And for Weaver and Devine, they don’t want to be permanently exiled. Frankly, I’m amazed it took this long. So some of it is likely accurate and some of it is likely inaccurate and some of it is a hyperbolic caricature of what has actually happened. You’ll notice that Weaver, especially, has now gone out of his way to try to demonstrate that his fingerprints aren’t on anything.

    Considering Devine has been a sort of personal bad luck charm for Democratic Presidential candidates over 4 different decades, it amazes me that he’s still held in high regard as a consultant.

  117. 117.

    fuckwit

    Put a fork in it. It’s done.

    I have a dream. It’s a dream that Bernie suddenly changes into the statesman he ain’t, and makes his own “I have been to the mountaintop” speech, telling his young supporters that it will be up to them, not him, to lead the country to a promised land of soshulism and environmentalism and the redistribution of all the loot that the 1% have stolen from everyone else. And to keep on keeping on. And to support Clinton, and to run for office themselves.

    But I don’t think he can do it.

  118. 118.

    dmsilev

    @Adam L Silverman: Which is interesting, since Weaver has been seen as the guy pushing for bern-it-down for the last few months. And he’s a long-time Sanders loyalist, not a campaign hired gun brought in just for this race. If _he’s_ bolting for the exit, well, it’s time to revive an old meme and put together a Downfall parody video.

  120. 120.

    MisterForkbeard

    @dmsilev: The only way this happens is if Hillary gets indicted for something totally off-the-radar (giving secrets to the Chinese or something), not even the normal guesses like “Felony-using-a-private-email-server-I-guess” that normally gets tossed around and is ALSO incredibly unlikely.

  121. 121.

    RSP

    @goblue72:
    And you know something that’s really sad? I may not particularly Sanders as a person or politician, but I respect his policy proposals and goals. A majority of Democrats just disagreed on the methods to get there. And I think your candidate in this speech is going be a lot more gracious than you’re being now; at least I hope so.

  122. 122.

    Ernest Pikeman

    @Amir Khalid:

    Simon and Garfunkel were going to give Bernie a second song to use for his campaign, after America. (Simon was, anyway; he owns them all.) Now I’ll never find out what song it was going to be. Pout.

    Uncharitable of me but I giggled at “America” playing at Sanders’ rally.

    “Michigan seems like a dream to me now […] Kathy, I’m lost, I said, though I knew she was sleeping, I’m empty and aching and
    I don’t know why. Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike…”

  123. 123.

    fuckwit

    @burnspbesq: Said the great sage Mike Patton (who himself hails from Jefferson-land): “The only difference between rednecks and hippies is their politics”.

  124. 124.

    patroclus

    @fuckwit: Indeed, he could give a “dream shall never die” speech. That would be epic. But I have some doubts. This is his moment.

  125. 125.

    gf120581

    @Adam L Silverman: I doubt Weaver cares. He’s only worked for Sanders and has no real ties to the party or anything. He’ll slink back to his comic book shop after this.

    Devine, however, yes, he wants to work again. Who would hire him is beyond me, however. This guy has so consistently worked on losing campaigns that he should be reincarnated as a black cat.

  126. 126.

    amygdala

    24% lead for Hillz in California, with nearly 25% of the vote in? Time to call it, methinks.

  129. 129.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Miss Bianca: Yes. As I’ve written here before, Devine had a very small contract/piece of the work. Manafort and his team had the large contract and the bulk of the work. Manafort has also worked for several other dictators. Both working for them in their home countries and serving as their formal agent and lobbyist here in the US.

  130. 130.

    Jonathan Holland Becnel

    @dmsilev:

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel: On to the Convention? Seriously? Do you really think even a single super delegate is going to flip from Clinton to Sanders, never mind the hundreds that he’d need?

    No, I don’t. The narrative for berners like me is how to incorporate the progressive agenda at the convention and future elections.

    Basically, how do we get non establishment dems elected.

    Agree with me or not, but the youth of the party are sick and tired of the status quo.

  134. 134.

    scav

    @patroclus: For some reason, I slipped over to

    If you took all the girls I knew
    When I was single
    And brought them all together for one night
    I know they’d never match
    My sweet imagination
    Everything looks worse in black and white

  135. 135.

    seaboogie

    @goblue72: Politics is a game of chess, and strategery. Clinton has played it well. And you are the guy that just upends the whole board in a whiny fit, because your team did not have the strategery…

    Clinton was gracious in her win, and we’ll see what your fella does next – whether he’s in it for the cause and the people, or just for himself. Remember that he doesn’t really have any Senate allies, and he’s been there for a long time….

  137. 137.

    Adam L Silverman

    @CaseyL: Its also possible Secretary Clinton called to speak with him. Or the President did. Or Senator Reid. Or he just decided he needed time to rework his speech and compose himself.

  138. 138.

    AxelFoley

    Anyone see NR lately?

    Oh, never mind. I see goblue has picked up the douchebag slack.

    And look, we’ve been graced by Jonathan Holland Becnel. A twofor!

  139. 139.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @RSP:

    don’t be a sore loser.

    What? Do you want to take the only thing GoBlue has? You Monster!

  143. 143.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel: That’s a good, positive message to take forward. For all the people who voted for Bernie and who are sick of the status quo, the key is to do the best you can. That means supporting the best option (at the moment, Hillary) and working to elect more and better democrats in the future. Younger reps like Tulsi Gabbard can really point the way here.

  145. 145.

    Miss Bianca

    So why *is* it that the hard-core Sandernistas have suddenly come “orking” back for this thread?

  146. 146.

    Adam L Silverman

    @dmsilev: That’s why I think this is really about reputation damage control and future earning potential protection for the members of the campaign staff.

  148. 148.

    Brachiator

    Some of the California voting at my polling place was a mess. There were 34 candidates flowing over 2 pages and people spoiled their ballot by voting for 2 people. Long lines also, so some people I think just chose to override that office. Not to sure what the other options were. Some people in a hurry skipped some categories. This will have some impact on the Kamala Harris v Loretta Sanchez race.

    A few dopes had changed their registration from non partisan to Independent, instead of correctly leaving this alone. Some Republican voters wanted to change to Democrats, maybe so they could vote for Bernie. This was not allowed but created delays while explanation was given. The people who voted by mail made the better choice. Still the volunteers handled all this well and kept things moving.

    I am pleased that so far a strong showing for Hillary. We will see what things look like in the morning.

  149. 149.

    Miss Bianca

    @Adam L Silverman: I had a vague recollection after I posted that that you had already said something about it. I guess it was still a shock to me.

    ETA: It just seems…sleazy.

  151. 151.

    patroclus

    @Miss Bianca: Because they’re Democrats and Bernie is about to deliver an epic, gracious, congratulatory, far-sighted unification speech that takes Trump to task and calls on all progressives to come together and work for the common good?

  152. 152.

    burnspbesq

    Sanchez’ lead on Sundheim is holding very steady at six and a half percent.

  153. 153.

    Mnemosyne

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel:

    Basically, how do we get non establishment dems elected.

    I’ll tell you, but you’re not going to like it. You do it the same way the Tea Party Republicans did — you show up at the Democratic Party’s precinct meetings for your neighborhood, you volunteer to be a precinct captain, and you work your butt off until they trust you enough to help pick the candidates for school board. Work your ass off to get that candidate elected to the school board. Work your ass off again to get him/her elected to the state legislature. Work your ass off to get your next preferred candidate elected to the school board. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

  154. 154.

    dmsilev

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel: That’s reasonable. One of the structural issues I had with the Sanders campaign, and a big reason why I’ve been cool towards him, is that it was unrelentingly focused purely on _him_ and showed almost no interest in building the down-ticket support that would be needed to actually _implement_ his revolution. If his movement wants to live on beyond this week, that needs to change, and the real question is whether Senator Sanders can bring himself to reorient things.

  155. 155.

    RSP

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel:
    Don’t pretend to speak for young people because I’m one of them. I’m in college right now, and I can only speak myself, but I don’t think the party is corrupt, not in the sense that you mean probably. Bernie lost to Clinton fair and square under the same rules and regulations Obama and Clinton herself competed under. In 2008, Obama won and Clinton lost. In 2016, Clinton has won and Bernie has lost. End of story.

    ETA: I care about the Democratic Party because it is a vehicle for change. Commenting on blogs and whining on them is not.

  156. 156.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel: The issue isn’t establishment versus non-establishment. I know that’s the shorthand and the media loves it. What you want is to adjust the course of the party and its members on a number of positions. And while getting traction at the national level is good, what really has to happen is build from county to county, then up to state and state to state. Then national. You want it so that you’re not at war with the party. You want to carefully and effectively place people that will move things in the direction you want into both party positions and elected positions. And while you can have a national, as in the entire country, strategy to do this, but if you try to do this from the top down it won’t work. You also are going to have to temper the most strident voices calling for purity. Politics is about compromise. So what compromises are you willing to accept? And American governance, at every level, is about process. So what is the plan for achieving these changes through the processes we have given how poorly they often function?

  158. 158.

    CaseyL

    @Miss Bianca: Kind of makes you wonder how their job interview with Sanders went. And kind of makes you wonder why anyone would hire them.

  159. 159.

    scav

    And youtube segued to

    I can’t for the life of me
    Remember a sadder day
    I know they say let it be
    But it just don’t work out that way
    And the course of a lifetime runs
    Over and over again

    No I would not give you false hope
    On this strange and mournful day
    But the mother and child reunion
    Is only a motion away, oh, little darling of mine

    ETA: and now it is Slip Slip Sliding!

  161. 161.

    pseudonymous in nc

    That Bullshitico article, like ones before it on topics like the dysfunction in the Rubio campaign, was done under a strict embargo: it’s remarkable what senior campaign people will blab to the press as long as it’s published on the stroke of the hour that they’re packing their bags to fuck off to another job.

  164. 164.

    dmsilev

    Sign-watch, minute 50: The person in the foreground with the ‘Viva Bernie’ sign seems to have hit their endurance limit for holding their arms out over their head.

  165. 165.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @Mnemosyne: See, here’s the thing. I hate musicals(all of the Katie) so I’m immune.

    ETA: I said in and out in a one of my comments this afternoon, then I had a craving for.. In-n-Out. I only have them once or twice a year.

  166. 166.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Miss Bianca: Almost all of our professional campaign folks were for foreign candidates and officials. They have to pay the bills between campaigns here. Its why you’ve started to see the conservative parties in Canada, the UK, Israel (Likud specifically), and Australia all start to sound the same in terms of their goals and objectives and platforms, with localized tweaks to account for the different contexts.

  167. 167.

    ? Martin

    @dmsilev:

    I read that article differently. That’s “Sanders aides are trying to keep their job prospects with other Democratic campaigns open”.

    Sure, there’s a motivation but that doesn’t change the result.

  169. 169.

    Mike J

    @Mnemosyne:

    you show up at the Democratic Party’s precinct meetings for your neighborhood,

    And don’t expect everybody there to immediately accept your great ideas. There’s a good chance they’ll disagree with you! Democrats are always going to disagree! Even if things aren’t done your way, you do them anyway.

  170. 170.

    Mnemosyne

    @BillinGlendaleCA:

    That’s what Kevin McCarthy’s character said, too. That’s why he ends up screaming at cars at the end of the movie.

    ETA: I will be going to In N Out in 8 days for my annual birthday dinner. I usually end up going 2 or 3 times a year.

  173. 173.

    NotMax

    Special election for Boehner’s former seat in Ohio:

    Republican Warren Davidson: 76.79%

    Democrat Corey Foister: 21.05%

    Same names will be on the ballot again in November.

  174. 174.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    Is Sanders still waiting to come out? WTF is his problem. It’s 11:40 local. Is there some weird meltdown going on where he’s being talked down from telling his supporters it was all rigged and to vote for Jill Stein? Jesus.

  176. 176.

    Adam L Silverman

    @dmsilev: They were chanting “we want Bernie!” about ten minutes ago. If he’s delayed too long, this could get interesting. People do have to go to work in the morning.

    And the water bottle has been placed on the stool next to the lectern.

  178. 178.

    Cacti

    @BillinGlendaleCA:

    See, here’s the thing. I hate musicals(all of the Katie) so I’m immune.

    Hermano!

    I knew there had to be another one out there.

    When I hear show tunes, I generally want to stab out my eardrums with the nearest sharp object.

  179. 179.

    Adam L Silverman

    “Please welcome the next President of the United States, Bernie Sanders”. This is not an auspicious start!

  181. 181.

    burnspbesq

    Final result in Modoc County (the extreme northeastern county): Sanders 280, Clinton 240, Others 32.

  183. 183.

    divF

    San Francisco is almost all reported, and Clinton is still up by 10+ .
    ETA: In San Francisco. Pelosi’s last minute endorsement ?

  186. 186.

    Jeff Spender

    Speaking as a 28 year old in his second campaign for the state legislature, I can absolutely attest to the greater importance of the bottom-up strategy. It takes a lot of work, patience, and time. It takes money, too because you’ll be traveling.

    Here’s the long and short of it: nothing will change if you’re not willing to do the work to change it. You can’t expect that all you need to do is vote every other year and that will be the end of your involvement. You need to meet people. Make friends. Develop connections. I am personal friends with a state senator, a state representative, and other elected officials who I talk to about policy, politics, and even video games.

    You need to be okay with making enemies who want to tear down whatever you build, because that’s half of the process. And you need to know how to take your ego out of the equation and campaign for people you might not like but who you know will campaign for you when you need it.

    It’s hard, thankless work and you aren’t even guaranteed anything out of it in the end.

  187. 187.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Cacti: Other than Camelot and Lil Abner, I do not do musicals either. I do like opera though.

  188. 188.

    AxelFoley

    @MisterForkbeard:

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel: That’s a good, positive message to take forward. For all the people who voted for Bernie and who are sick of the status quo, the key is to do the best you can. That means supporting the best option (at the moment, Hillary) and working to elect more and better democrats in the future. Younger reps like Tulsi Gabbard can really point the way here.

    The same Tulsi Gabbard that that’s Muslims and has dissed President Obama? That Tulsi Gabbard?

  190. 190.

    Miss Bianca

    @Adam L Silverman: you know, it doesn’t surprise me…really. I guess the way they see it, it’s just like working for a foreign corporation. But working for someone like Yanukovych…I dunno. That seems like a step beyond. Like going to do PR for Union Carbide after Bhopal, or something.

  193. 193.

    CaseyL

    @Adam L Silverman:

    30% in and Hillary still leading by more than 20%. Based on the intro, I’m guessing this won’t be a gracious acknowledgment of reality.

  194. 194.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jeff Spender: If you need anything pertaining to the state equivalent of homeland defense or emergency management or disaster response or policing type of stuff, ping me offline.

    ETA: Also, strategy development and policy formation, as well as strategic communication.

  204. 204.

    joel hanes

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel:

    Basically, how do we get non establishment dems elected.

    You and Sanders have already accomplished a great deal that is invisible on the surface.

    Professional pols such as Shumer and Hoyer are sharp; they will have noticed that the political wind has changed, and they’ll adjust their sails.
    That’s how they’ve survived all these years.
    That is not as satisfying as throwing the rascals out, but it’s how you change America without burning it down.
    Canova’s primary challenge to DWS from the left will not have gone un-noticed either.

    So the Dem Senate will be effectively more liberal than we’ve seen in many cycles, even if not many of the seats change hands. And D liberals in the House will be emboldened.

  205. 205.

    Mike J

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Nate Cohn ‏@Nate_Cohn 43 seconds ago Washington, DC
    The Election Day vote in San Francisco is nearly done. Sanders and Clinton neatly split the Election Day vote.

    But Clinton had banked VBM early. 50/50 same day vote is death for Bernie.

  208. 208.

    Betty Cracker

    Okay, good on Bernie for pointing out that defeating the bigot Trump is job one.

  209. 209.

    Adam L Silverman

    @dmsilev: @Betty Cracker:
    Okay, look like he’s setting them up to be let down. Gone right into “we have to prevent the right wing to control the government and Donald Trump becoming president.”

  210. 210.

    NotMax

    @AxelFoley

    Also the same one whose family are extremist evangelical right-wingers, the main source of funding to stop same-sex marriage in the state.

    She’s managed to tap into the local old boy network and reinvent herself as a toned-down RWNJ in Dem clothing; she’s an embarrassment for and to Hawaii. Somewhere, Patsy Mink cries.

  212. 212.

    divF

    Finally, a non-rural county to Bernie. Santa Cruz is mainly techies, UC students, and retired surfers.

  213. 213.

    pseudonymous in nc

    @CaseyL:

    To be fair, they’re probably tired. Cheering and waving signs for an hour, with no candidate in sight.

    And California (at least from my experience) goes to bed early and wakes up early.

  215. 215.

    Brachiator

    Don’t know how widely this has been reported. From the Guardian. If old news I apologize.

    The Iowa state senator David Johnson became the first elected official to leave the Republican party over Donald Trump on Tuesday, likening the presumptive nominee’s campaign to the rise of Adolf Hitler.

    Johnson announced that he was changing his registration to No Party after Trump levelled accusations of bias at Judge Gonzalo Curiel, an American judge of Mexican heritage who allowed the release of some unflattering documents from a case against Trump University.

    “I haven’t supported Mr Trump at any point along the way but what I am calling his racist remarks and judicial jihad is the last straw,” Johnson told the Guardian.

  218. 218.

    Miss Bianca

    @Jeff Spender: glad to hear you talking this way. I got a chance to hang out last night with the candidates running for state office for our region. it’s great that we’re finally starting to field Democratic candidates for those offices. I’m going to be doing some policy wonkery stuff – maybe a little speechwriting – for our state house candidate (who happens to be a plumber in his professional life!). Means a lot of research and a lot of GOTV and a lot of travel, yes. Keep us posted on your campaigning adventures!

  220. 220.

    MisterForkbeard

    @AxelFoley: What did she say about Muslims? And I can tolerate a bit of anti-Obama speech, depending on what it was. Hadn’t heard about either of those things.

  223. 223.

    sharl

    @Mnemosyne:

    …and calling Barbara Boxer a bitch and there will be consequences.

    ~
    I don’t have a dog in the Boxers-Sanders thing, but I did hear Barbara Boxer on the Diane Rehm Show this morning, and she was generally playing the conciliator between the Sanders and Clinton camps the interview. In fact she said that was also her assigned role when she was asked to show up at the Nevada Democratic state convention, where things went south and she didn’t get the chance to play that role.

    I liked that entire interview, but if you just want to hear her account of the Nevada fiasco, go to 22:29 in the YouTube video* of her interview with Rehm.
    ……..*(Note that – at least for me – the audio and video were slightly out of sync, which I found a bit distracting, but you can just listen to it without watching to avoid that…I don’t know what a video of a sit-down studio interview is supposed to add to the experience anyway, but apparently a lot of Rehm’s listeners like the visuals.)

    Boxer basically said that ‘most…98% of Bernie’s supporters were very well behaved’, but 50-100 “not young” and aggressive people were up close to the stage and refused to move back, even when a Sanders organizer also asked them to move back. They then followed Boxer when she walked out of the venue, hurling nasty invective and whatnot. Boxer said that Sanders was distressed about this, but Boxer told him that maybe “they weren’t your people”.

    I tend to take Sanders at his word (as relayed by Boxer), but by this time Sanders was aware of his “dudebro” problem – greatly magnified by some of HRC’s surrogates in social media, but most definitely a real phenomenon, and a real problem – and Sanders should have spent some money for event security instead of blowing so much of it on advertising and consultants.

    No one needed to propagate the rumor about Berniacs throwing chairs – there was enough verified ugly shit in Nevada without having to fabricate stuff.

  227. 227.

    cckids

    Do you suppose Bernie will give one, JUST ONE, fleeting mention to Hillz & the history that was made tonight?

  228. 228.

    dmsilev

    “Real change occurs from the bottom up”. Yep, he’s pivoting towards pushing for grassroots movements.

  229. 229.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @scav: Think that may have been Ektechrome, most of the slide we took when I was a kid were with Kodachrome.

  231. 231.

    Miss Bianca

    @Adam L Silverman: “Camelot” bears about as much resemblance to Arthurian legend as “Man of La Mancha” does to “Don Quixote”, I imagine, but point taken.

    I started that Holy Grail book, btw.

  232. 232.

    Mnemosyne

    @Miss Bianca:

    You-know-who is a big Camelot fan. He was really funny on “60 Minutes” playing his parents’ old LP for Charlie Rose. There’s a reason Lafayette’s introduction ends with “C’est moi.”

  233. 233.

    NotMax

    @Adam L. Silverman

    July 1, 4:45 a.m. Eastern, TCM is showing the filmed stage production of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street with George Hearn and Angela Lansbury.

    Operatic and deliciously wicked.

  234. 234.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Brachiator:
    He’s going to be damned lonely, but good for him. Republican senators can usually be assumed to be bad people, but standing up and saying ‘I will not side with Trump’ is brave and the right thing to do. Should it turn out to be the only plus sign on his ledger, it counts and it’s solid.

    EDIT – @cckids:
    As long as he doesn’t shit on the party and encourages his supporters to vote Democrat, I’m not going to demand he follow a script or eat any more crow than necessary. It would be classy, but pushing us forward to defeat Trump is what counts.

  235. 235.

    Cat48

    @Rand Careaga:

    Don’t know if Politico story is true, but I haven’t forgiven him for trying to primary Obama & going on msnbc & bashing Obama every day. I’ll never like him.

  236. 236.

    Adam L Silverman

    No concession. “We’re going to fight hard to win the primary in DC and then we take our fight for… to Philadelphia, PA.” “The fight is a steep one and we will fight for every vote and delegate…”

    Looks like the President and Senator Reid are going to have to drop the hammer of reality on Thursday.

  238. 238.

    patroclus

    No concession. No congratulations. No grace. No unification. I’m disappointed.

    Er, on edit, a mealy-mouthed congratulations.

  241. 241.

    cckids

    Well, Bernie’s “going to continue to fight for every vote and every delegate”. “We’re going to take the fight to Philadelphia!”

    Oy.

    And that f*cking crowd booing Hillary. Jackasses.

  242. 242.

    scav

    @BillinGlendaleCA: I used both and I went for Fuji sometimes — it really has all gone fuzzy. But I still have a few buckets of those little containers. Can’t bear to get rid of them now.

  245. 245.

    jl

    @dmsilev:
    I think he is preparing his die-hard fans for going to the convention as head of a movement, not so much a campaign for president.
    How often have you heard the word ‘campaign’ versus ‘movement’ and ‘fight’?

  248. 248.

    cckids

    @Frankensteinbeck: Oh, I agree. But given where his supporters are mentally, he truly needs to start talking these people down & get them away from the “burn everything down!!!” mentality.

  252. 252.

    oldgold

    No, BS you are not “pretty good at math.”

    You are, in fact, delusional – a prisoner of your own BS.

  256. 256.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    I never expected him to concede until after DC votes. I don’t think we should beat up on him for keeping his word that he will fight for every vote. Even his meeting with Obama probably won’t change that.

    If he doesn’t concede after next Tuesday, well…

    And he better turn down the Corrupt™ language, also too…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  258. 258.

    Mnemosyne

    @sharl:

    Boxer basically said that ‘most…98% of Bernie’s supporters were very well behaved’, but 50-100 “not young” and aggressive people were up close to the stage and refused to move back, even when a Sanders organizer also asked them to move back. They then followed Boxer when she walked out of the venue, hurling nasty invective and whatnot. Boxer said that Sanders was distressed about this, but Boxer told him that maybe “they weren’t your people”.

    I have long suspected that the really nasty stuff — not our garden-variety trolls here, but the doxxing and death threats and the crap in Nevada — has been coming from Ron Paul fans who decided last year that Bernie was their new Great White Hope. It’s not his fault that they latched onto him, but unfortunately his campaign encouraged them with some of the rhetoric and never really called them to task for being assholes.

  261. 261.

    Soylent Green

    Fuck this fucking fucker.

    My sense is he will not concede. He believes he will flip the supers.

    Foolish old man drunk on the cheers of college kids.

  263. 263.

    AnderJ

    @Adam L Silverman: not sure whether I care that much anymore now that Hillary took it. The media attention to Bernie will decrease, no significant number of superdelegates will flip, a large number of Hillary endorsement will follow and the attention will shift to the fight between Hillary and Trump. The latter will be all that’s needed to convince the majority of Bernie voters to get behind the presumptive nominee.

  266. 266.

    dmsilev

    I expect a …fascinating conversation between Obama and Sanders on Thursday. I also expect Obama to endorse Clinton tomorrow. I still hold out hope that after DC, Sanders will drop his campaign for the nomination and will instead try to focus more on a grassroots policy-pushing approach. That may be wishful thinking, but I guess we’ll find out next week.

    Good night, all.

  267. 267.

    MobiusKlein

    @cckids: Bernie is not saying any anti Hillary stuff, comes out about wanting some important changes in America.
    Wants his followers to keep pressing important issues. I say he’s doing alright, as far as the unity pony work goes.

  269. 269.

    cckids

    And he’s SURE that the vote count in CA will “narrow considerably”. Jesus, I hope not.

    Come on, CA, come through. Put us out of our misery.

    Not a mention of the Democratic party, not ONE.

  272. 272.

    LesBonnesFemmes

    OMFG! Bernie, what the flip are you thinking? He strung all of us along that he’d concede, and then pulled the carpet. What a dick. He let his crowd boo Hillary Clinton.

  273. 273.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Major Major Major Major: Either the beginning of setting the conditions to end his campaign for the nomination and endorse Secretary Clinton or delusions of grandeur. At this hour I’m really not sure. We’ll see what he says after the DC primaries next week.

  276. 276.

    Debbie(aussie)

    @Adam L Silverman:
    That is so true, Adam. We are into week 4 of our 8 week long election campaign. The current gov’t sounds remarkably like the GOP. Don’t think I’m blinded by partisanship when I say that the opposition doesn’t sound like the Democrats. The funniest thing I’ve seen is the fun some clever clogs has had with the Liberals (conservatives) penchant for three word slogans, named either Jobson Growth or Growthon Jobs ?.

  277. 277.

    Cacti

    We are taking this to the convention…

    Please send more $27 donations, as Jane and I have grown fond of a certain lifestyle that I like to condemn, and are now loathe to give it up.

    #FeelTheGrift

  279. 279.

    WarMunchkin

    I think it was a mostly decent threading of the proverbial needle. The booing at “I congratulated Secretary Clinton” was stupid. But the speech wasn’t attacks, it was just his stump speech. I think it’s fine for him to take it to D.C., but dumb as rocks for him to go pledge to go to the convention.

    We now know that “reassess” his candidacy means figure out how to impart maximum damage to the party – not policy concessions, damage – at the convention.

  281. 281.

    Brachiator

    Not sure if this has already been mentioned. This is where Bernie should be attacking, taking advantage of the chaos.

    The Iowa state senator David Johnson became the first elected official to leave the Republican party over Donald Trump on Tuesday, likening the presumptive nominee’s campaign to the rise of [he who.must not be named].

    Johnson announced that he was changing his registration to No Party after Trump levelled accusations of bias at Judge Gonzalo Curiel, an American judge of Mexican heritage who allowed the release of some unflattering documents from a case against Trump University.

    “I haven’t supported Mr Trump at any point along the way but what I am calling his racist remarks and judicial jihad is the last straw,” Johnson told the Guardian.

  282. 282.

    AnderJ

    Let’s not forget that Sanders probably believed he could win California in a blow out in his favor and is having to mentally adjust to the possibility of actually losing there…

  284. 284.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Debbie(aussie): I wish you all the best of luck. I’ve worked with a number of your senior military folks – lieutenant colonels through major generals – and they’ve all been excellent people who have done you all proud. Though the banana yellow camo they were wearing in Iraq in 2008 looked a bit funky. I think it was supposed to be sand colored, but it looked very, very odd.

  285. 285.

    jl

    @CaseyL:

    ” But if you act like assholes, you’re not doing “the movement” any good. ”

    Sanders has explained how he thinks about negotiations in his stump speeches: you ask for whole loaf and you might get half, you ask for half a loaf and you get crumbs. He wants to run a movement and wants to use it to make the changes he wants. I think he sincerely believes that his input will maximize chances of Democratic victory in November.

    So I think that is what is going on his his head. He has enough delegates to have an impact on the Democratic campaign in the fall, and he wants to maximize that impact. Like it or not, think the guy is an asshole or not, that is the situation.

    If some of you people are so outraged, why did you not go out and start your damn self finance presidential campaign? But none of you did, did you? So stop the damn whining.

  287. 287.

    AnderJ

    By the way does anyone know how the number of Sanders’ pledged delegates and pledged superdelegates compares to Hillary’s pledged delegates only. It would be great if so little superdelegates support Sanders, that Hillary beats Sanders on her pledged delegates alone. That would put the dream of superdelegates “electing” Hillary to bed.

  288. 288.

    sharl

    @Mnemosyne:

    …his campaign encouraged them with some of the rhetoric and never really called them to task for being assholes.

    ~
    I agree with you (and others upthread) about this. And if disaffected Rand Paul fans, bored anarchists, and Trump-loving agent provocateurs infiltrated Nevada and other events, that is in large part on Sanders as well. Such groups would not likely listen to Sanders anyway – they have their own separate agenda(s), after all – but had Sanders provided event venues with at least minimal contract security who could coordinate with local law enforcement and campaign/event organizers, that would have gone far to keep the assholes under control. But when you’re a man on an ego trip, a guess such Event Planning 101 details are beneath you.

  290. 290.

    Miss Bianca

    @Adam L Silverman: Is he actually in the tent, tho’? Didn’t sound like it to me. But of course, it never has sounded like it to me.

    ETA: I see Amir beat me to it.

  293. 293.

    dogwood

    @CaseyL:
    There never has been a “movement”. It’s resentment, anger, bitterness and plenty of conspiracy theories that has been the core of the Sanders’ campaign. Bernie was a perfect vessel for that anger because he’s not a leader, he’s one of them. They can boo Clinton and Obama for the next few months if Bernie keeps going, but eventually he won’t have the money for these rallies and screaming on Facebook and Twitter isn’t as cathartic as the mass freak out. It is what it is. But it certainly isn’t a “movement”.

  294. 294.

    jl

    Young Turks is having a weird deluded conversation that Sanders is still ‘in it’ for presidential nomination. I don’t think he is.
    That is my prediction, and I may be wrong. But note the time and day if I am.
    Sanders campaign for president will gradually disappear and be replaced by Sanders trying to run his political revolution.
    I think if there is a roll call vote at the convention, it will be some sort of pro-forma Kabuki.
    I suppose meeting with Obama later this week will be a serious start of negotiations.
    At this point, I don’t think conventional political sticks and carrots Obama has will work. Sanders wants to run his revolution and will negotiate with that in mind, not his political future in the established system.

    So, feel free to remind me of my prediction, in case I am wrong.

  296. 296.

    Mary G

    I thought he was pretty good. He started by trashing Trump, he didn’t trash Hillary and he pushed a progressive agenda. If it takes a while for him to see the light coming down the train tunnel, it’s no big deal. I think his PUMAS will calm down eventually.

  297. 297.

    Betsy

    Speech over. Bernie cares more about himself than our country. I’m absolutely disgusted.

  299. 299.

    tastytone

    @LesBonnesFemmes: He always lets them boo her. Because he’s a shitty leader with no scope and a classless fuck to boot. First female major-ticket candidate–chosen over him by millions of people–and all he can manage is “I’m pretty good at math & She was gracious.”

    I care only because I care about his issues–not him–and would prefer not to be associated with him, or with 22yr old myopic, poseur-anarchists when we try to convince people we need a public option.

  301. 301.

    cckids

    @jl:

    He wants to run a movement and wants to use it to make the changes he wants.

    And there’s his problem. He wants to run a movement. As Rachel Maddow just said, he’s not doing the necessary things to BUILD a movement. Everything is just focused on getting him elected, even after it became evident that the math wasn’t there. He just seems drunk on the attention & applause.

  302. 302.

    Anne Laurie

    @Mnemosyne:

    I have long suspected that the really nasty stuff — not our garden-variety trolls here, but the doxxing and death threats and the crap in Nevada — has been coming from Ron Paul fans who decided last year that Bernie was their new Great White Hope.

    Leave us not to forget the Aging White Boomer Males who thought this was their chance to see 1972 all over again, but this time with them as winners. The worst of the misogyny & racism was from people old enough to have been ratfvcking Shirley Chisholm & Gloria Steinem — they never got over the fantasy that McGovern could’ve beaten Nixon if only he’d “shut down” those silly Negroes & women sooner & harder. Hard men for hard times, y’know. Can’t have a revolution without a few sacrificial victims… and somehow those sacrifices never turn out to be the white men from good families…

  303. 303.

    TriassicSands

    @scav:

    I haven’t heard Clinton’s victory speech, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the crowd booed when she mentioned Sanders. It’s what people do today. It’s too bad, but that’s the way it is.

    I remember booing in 2008 and 2012 from both Clinton and Obama supporters. We’re in the age of booing. If Sanders had conceded tonight, which no one should have expected (hoped for, yes, but expected, no) you’d have heard deafening booing, jeers, and who knows what else.

  304. 304.

    Miss Bianca

    @jl: If you really can’t figure out that to certain people here the tenor of his speech seemed aggressive, ungracious, defiant, and borderline delusional – and, that being the case, certain people may have seen less of the “political revolutionary” in Senator Sanders’s posturing than of “arrogant clueless asshole” – well, nothing I say is likely to prove enlightening to you.

  305. 305.

    dogwood

    @Amir Khalid:
    Cent Uygur is a former right-winger. Changing your political party doesn’t change who you are. He used to be a right-wing asshole, now he’s a left-wing asshole.

  306. 306.

    jl

    @cckids: I’d be interested in what Maddow meant by that. Give a link you have one. He used a presidential campaign to start buildng a grassroots movement. What has his presidential campaign produced? He’s developed a large small contributor base, he must have a huge contact list for small donors and workers. He certainly has a platform and agenda. He has gathered a small collection of political allies.

    So, what is missing. A nice headquarters, cool logo, big network of inside-the-beltway influence peddlers? What was Maddow talking about?

  307. 307.

    cckids

    @TriassicSands:

    I haven’t heard Clinton’s victory speech, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the crowd booed when she mentioned Sanders.

    Not even a little (at least from what we could hear on TV). There was actually some applause.

  310. 310.

    Adam L Silverman

    Anne Laurie appears to be in the house, virtually speaking, so I’m off to bed. Between playoff hockey and this campaign stuff, I’m way behind on my beauty sleep. And that’s not a good thing!

  312. 312.

    RadioOne

    I’m a little worried about our left flank. The number of people who thought Bernie Sanders was in any way fit to be President and voted for him in the Democratic primary is kind of unreal.

  313. 313.

    Aqualad08

    Yeah, no, her crowd cheered the mention of his name. It was pretty gracious.

  314. 314.

    Anne Laurie

    @jl: Yeah, I actually think this was Sanders’ attempt at dialing it down. (For instance, he said ‘we will fight to see every American has health care’, but he didn’t actually use the conjuring phrase ‘single-payer’.) His body language was that of an old man resisting the weight of time & gravity… he didn’t seem as snarly, much less upbeat, as he usually is in front of an adoring crowd.

    He’ll take a while to come down from the “high” of all that adulation & media attention, but I think (hope) that President Obama and Nancy Pelosi are beginning to pierce the bubble. Bernie came a lot closer to the Big Brass Ring than anyone ever imagined, and it can’t be easy to admit the competition is all over except for divvying up the receipts.

    Fingers crossed, by this time next week Sanders will be telling us how his Youth Army will fight as shock troops against Donald Trump… even if he can’t quite bring himself to mention That HRC Woman.

  315. 315.

    TriassicSands

    @oldgold:

    No, BS you are not “pretty good at math.”

    Bernie could still win. All he has to do is convince enough of those corrupt Super Delegates to switch from Clinton to him and he’ll accomplish several things.

    First, he’ll pull off one of the most remarkable upsets in American political history.

    Second, he’ll prove that he was right, the system is corrupt.

    And third, he’ll demonstrate that he’s just as corrupt as the system he condemns, all in the name of getting what he wants.

    I feel almost sad for him when he says he’s won 22 primaries and caucuses. Doesn’t he know that there are more than 50 primaries and caucuses. Likewise when he cites the impressive number of votes he’s gotten, which just happen to be millions short of his opponent. Where in those statistics does he find the words “the overwhelming majority of Americans?” (Or Democrats, for that matter.)

  316. 316.

    gwangung

    @jl: A list of candidates. Structure to handle multiple candidates. Plans and operations to get those candidates elected…not just in deep blue districts where he knows people, but in purple and even slightly reddish districts.

  317. 317.

    jl

    @Miss Bianca: I can see how people feel that way. Sorry if people are upset by what they perceive as rude behavior or bad attitude. I don’t care about that kind of stuff in politics. Maybe that makes me a boor.

    I really don’t give a single tiny speck of dirt if HRC is gracious or nice enough to Sanders, or vice versa. Don’t care if they like each other or not. I care that they can make deal that gets out enough votes and do the work that is needed for a Democratic victory in November. I care if Sanders is making poor judgments about how to win in November, but I don’t know that he is, or that HRC is making better judgments than he is for the general. Fact is Sanders is they guy who got enough support to do a lot of good or a lot of damage to the Democrats in November, and this is where we are. I don’t particularly like it. But that is what it is.

  318. 318.

    tastytone

    @Anne Laurie:

    Leave us not to forget the Aging White Boomer Males who thought this was their chance to see 1972 all over again, but this time with them as winners.

    Please…I know at least 5 personally who want to replay ’68. With the younglings doing the actual bleeding, of course. I’ve tried to point out the irony of a hippy getting giddy about violent confrontation, and all I get is sanctimonious head-shaking.

  319. 319.

    cckids

    @jl: I’ve got no link; just saw it live 20-30 minutes ago. If I’m remembering properly, she was talking about building a ground game, using that massive email list to start getting down-ticket candidates elected, etc.

    She said some ex-Bernie staffers have started a “Never Trump” group, others have begun a “New Congress 2018” group. It’s about doing more than just giving the same speech over & over. Take that energy & enthusiasm he’s generating and build something with it. Organize some “Boot Camps” like the 2008 Obama campaign did.

    Something!!

  320. 320.

    divF

    @jl:

    political allies

    That is, in fact, what he has not gathered. He has not identified a significant group of people he wants to get elected to office, where his support might make a difference. He has made very few endorsements, nor is he using his resources to build up a field organization for his movement and his candidates.

    ETA: I see others have made the same points above.

  321. 321.

    ruemara

    @RSP: Thank you. Well said.

    @Mnemosyne: Thank you, also. Very well said & the only way to achieve this voting revolution they wanted. With some hard work & dedication, not stage events.

    I honestly don’t know what Sanders said tonight, but my Twitter feed is full of angry HRC people, mocking from Black Twitter and Bernikazi’s swearing to fight til the last vegan, gluten-free kale bite from organic locally sourced farms harvested by Buddhist monks are consumed. But not voting, that’s so establishment.

  322. 322.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @jl: We want to start running against Trump without distractions, Bernie has had his input into the process. He should end it all after DC votes.

  323. 323.

    sharl

    @Anne Laurie:

    Leave us not to forget the Aging White Boomer Males who thought this was their chance to see 1972 all over again, but this time with them as winners. The worst of the misogyny & racism was from people old enough to have been ratfvcking Shirley Chisholm & Gloria Steinem…

    ~
    Giordano’s been beating this drum for months now, if not longer. I have no way of knowing directly how much of it is true, but he has noted that he knows some of these folks personally from his anti-nuke protesting days in New England back in the 80s/90s, as well as his from his alt-media journalism stints. Boxer maybe confirmed this sort of thing when she observed on Diane Rehm’s show that the assholes crowding the stage and disrupting her speech in Nevada were “not young”; I think she also said that most of the young Bernie supports were well behaved and toward the back of the room (away from the stage from which Boxer tried to speak).

    I seem to recall this same phenomenon playing out in the Ferguson MO and follow-on BLM protests across the country. It worried the black folks in those places when these oldish white rabble-rousers showed up and trash talked the cops. Of course these self-absorbed “freedom fighters” would leave unscathed in a few days, leaving behind worried black residents wondering if the cops were now riled up even more due to the extra aggravation from outsiders. There was no doubt who those cops would take out their frustrations on!

  325. 325.

    jl

    @gwangung: Rome wasn’t built in a day. How well do you think that would have worked if he hadn’t built a lot of national name recognition with a presidential campaign? If Maddow meant that, she wasn’t making much sense.

    I’m out. Too much bitter-winner bile in this thread that is just mean and self-indulgent. Again, I find it puzzling.

  327. 327.

    TriassicSands

    @Major Major Major Major:

    That’s great if they cheered. I hope your question is rhetorical, because the answer is pretty obvious. Or maybe you haven’t heard all the booing I’ve heard over the past few decades.

    And I’m sure Clinton was gracious. Winners almost always are. Offhand, I can only think of one exception and we’re going to be seeing and hearing a lot more from him between now and November.

  328. 328.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @Anne Laurie:

    Leave us not to forget the Aging White Boomer Males who thought this was their chance to see 19721968 all over again, but this time with them as winners.

  329. 329.

    jl

    @cckids: @cckids:

    Do you people actually listen to what the candidates say themselves, or do you just listen to pundits? Sanders has said several times that he concentrating 100 percent on getting the nomination until the primaries are over.

    I look for youtubes of HRC and Sanders talking, not jabber from their flunkies and pundits who are getting their info from wherever.
    Anyway, I hope the winners here learn how to tolerate their victory.

  330. 330.

    TriassicSands

    @AnderJ:

    The last time I checked it was Clinton 571/Sanders 48 (Super Delegates)

    Clinton had or has 1926 pledged delegates versus a total (pledged + SD) of 1663 or Sanders.

    He really has no legitimate claim to victory.

    I don’t know if those numbers are the very latest, but they give you an idea. There is no non-corrupt route to the nomination for Sanders.

  332. 332.

    jl

    @BillinGlendaleCA: For better or worse, it should be obvious now to all that Sanders doesn’t like the process. If I had more confidence that Hillary Clinton is a strong candidate and will run a strong campaign, I would probably agree. But I am doubtful. I am also doubtful of Sanders judgment, so I just hope for the best. I don’t see how Sanders thundering against Trump is a distraction, though. Depends on how he does it. We will see.

  333. 333.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @jl:

    Maybe that makes me a boor.

    That’s OK, as long as you don’t shit on the floor or chew the furniture.

  336. 336.

    AnderJ

    As I thought… Hillary currently has 1,926 pledged delegates (not counting superdelegates), sanders 1,663 delegates (pledged delegates plus superdelegates). Currently Hillary doesn’t need superdelegates at all to put her over the top. Even if only Sanders’ superdelegates would vote, she’d win. The whole whining about the superdelegates is a ruse. But then again… Everybody knew that.

  337. 337.

    Anne Laurie

    @sharl:

    I seem to recall this same phenomenon playing out in the Ferguson MO and follow-on BLM protests across the country. It worried the black folks in those places when these oldish white rabble-rousers showed up and trash talked the cops. Of course these self-absorbed “freedom fighters” would leave unscathed in a few days, leaving behind worried black residents wondering if the cops were now riled up even more due to the extra aggravation from outsiders. There was no doubt who those cops would take out their frustrations on!

    Bingo. Dudes, there’s a wide variety of boner bills easily available from any reputable practitioner, and you don’t need to worry about them invalidating your security screenings either. Stop using other peoples’ suffering to get your… spirits… up!

  338. 338.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @tastytone: You don’t understand, they’ll do it smarter this time(they’ll do exactly the same thing) and they’ll WIN! You olds are to risk adverse, too gun shy…

  340. 340.

    cckids

    @jl: I’ve listened to Bernie. I’ve heard the same speech every damn time, with no growth towards a viable policy, but lots more aggrandizement of himself & his movement. As someone said upthread, he is tremendously impressed with how many caucuses & primaries he’s won, how many people have voted for him, with no (apparent) realization that, no matter the numbers, he’s still coming in second.

  341. 341.

    Amir Khalid

    @TriassicSands:
    When California is called for her later tonight, she will have gained well over 200 pledged delegates just from that state, more than enough for the majority, and that will really be game over for Bernie.

  342. 342.

    burnspbesq

    Hmph. Sanders won Inyo County by eight votes (461-453). I would never have guessed there were 900 Democrats in Inyo County.

  343. 343.

    TriassicSands

    @AnderJ:

    And just imagine the “optics” if a white man stole the nomination from the first woman ever to legitimately win (according to the rules in place) a major party’s nomination. Trump might get more women’s votes than Sanders if that happened.

  344. 344.

    jl

    @Anne Laurie:

    I just can’t quit this thread. Barney Frank had some humorous words to say about political opponents after a hard fought election: no matter how much they make a display of coming together and smiling and being friends, the truth is that fora long while, they cannot stand each other and are royally pissed, whether they win or lose. That is probably true.

    I will watch HRC’s victory speech and watch her closely when she says nice things about Sanders. Maybe I’ll catch sight of tooth splinter flying out from some molar that has cracked.

  345. 345.

    scav

    @TriassicSands: And, for the record, Fuji film along with Kodachoma and Ektachome were all gracious as well. Agfa might have done a little side-eye but very covertly.

  347. 347.

    Eljai

    @Anne Laurie: @jl
    @jl: It’s interesting. I was thinking of the statement released by Obama earlier in the evening:

    The President looks forward to continuing the conversation with Senator Sanders about how to build on the extraordinary work he has done to engage millions of Democratic voters, and to build on that enthusiasm in the weeks and months ahead.

    I admit I’ve been short on patience with Bernie lately and his seeming willingness to follow a scorched earth path. Still, I want to believe that Bernie is not just in it for himself. I voted for Hillary, but I liked that Sanders pushed the progressive envelope and I really want there to be a way for us all to work together. And the Sanders supporters that I know personally are very reasonable. I work with a man who’s been a loyal Bernie fan, but he told me he voted for Hillary today because he knows she’ll be the nominee, he’s sick of the media narrative, and he wanted to show that he’s got her back.

  348. 348.

    gwangung

    @jl:

    Rome wasn’t built in a day. How well do you think that would have worked if he hadn’t built a lot of national name recognition with a presidential campaign?

    Much better.

    Don’t excuse his selfish focus on just himself. That’s a poor excuse for a leader. If he can’t be bothered to actually BUILD a movement, then don’t say it’s a movement.

  349. 349.

    WarMunchkin

    When Trump clinched the nomination for the Republican side, I felt embarassed as an American – that this idiot could be one bad economic week from the Presidency.

    I feel a related embarrassment, that Bernie Sanders, having decisively lost this race, persuaded us into blackmailing ourselves – either make the convention about Bernie Sanders, and not about Hillary Clinton, or else.

  350. 350.

    dogwood

    @Major Major Major Major:
    I read this blog when it was a right-wing blog. And I read it because I thought Cole was a decent guy. Couldn’t figure out why he was a republican. Watching him change his political affiliation starting about the time of the Terry Schiavo debacle was pretty interesting. Cole might have changed parties, but he hasn’t changed fundamentally all that much.

  351. 351.

    AnderJ

    @Amir Khalid: Don’t think the call will come very late tonight. CNN reports 45% of the vote: H 58.6%; B: 40.4%. So (assuming these numbers to hold stable until 50% of the vote is counted) for Sanders to catch up, he has to mirror the current score and get 58.6% of all votes remaining to be counted. Given the polls prior to the vote, that seems like an impossible hill to climb. It might get closer, but Sanders overtaking Hillary (or even getting close) seems very unlikely to happen.

  352. 352.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @scav: Then again, I’ve not used slide film since the 1980’s, the wife always used negative in her camera(she worked in a photo processing store) and I went digital in 1998.

  353. 353.

    TriassicSands

    @Amir Khalid:

    The game has been over for Bernie for quite awhile, but there seems to a group delusion going on that he can still “win.” Sadly, he did nothing to quell or at least begin to deflate that delusion tonight.

    @Major Major Major Major:

    If that’s true, then, great. I think booing is a waste of time, and generally immature. (I haven’t watched any of the victory speeches this year before Sanders’ speech tonight — I was hoping for a little more from Sanders, so I clicked on the BJ link.)

    There is much to be said for being either a gracious winner or a gracious loser. But losers have a harder job. And it’s even harder for supporters.

  356. 356.

    TriassicSands

    @AnderJ:

    There won’t be any flipping though…

    Oh, there might be. A few of Sanders’ Super Delegates might switch to Clinton.

    (And there will be the inevitable call to make the nomination unanimous — that may be interesting, if a bit sad.)

  358. 358.

    joel hanes

    @ruemara:

    this is a lot of wishful thinking

    I appreciate you telling me this.
    You’re probably right — it’s not like I have any actual knowledge or expertise.
    Still, I’ve watched e.g. Grassley dutifully follow his party’s primary voters to the right and then hard right; and it occurs to me that career politicians tend to morph as the winds of power/money in DC and their home state change.

  359. 359.

    Gretchen

    @Jonathan Holland Becnel: The moment I was most disappointed with Bernie was when he asked the crowd how many of them had been to a Democratic committee meeting, and it was something like 3%, and he took that as an indictment of the Democratic Party. If he wanted to make real change, he would have told his supporters that that needs to change. If they want to make real change, they need to get involved. Go to meetings, make phone calls, stuff envelopes. Going to a rally doesn’t change a single vote. I was very disappointed in him when he had the chance to tell his supporters how to organize to create real change, he instead sneered at the organizing necessary to make that change happen.

  360. 360.

    Cacti

    CA 50% counted with Bernie still trailing 392k votes. More than half of the remaining precincts are in the big 5 SoCal counties (LA, San Bernardino, Orange, Riverside, and San Diego) where he’s getting blown out across the board.

    How much longer until the librul media calls this one?

  361. 361.

    TriassicSands

    @cckids:

    I’m glad there wasn’t. Good for her supporters.

    @dogwood:

    Wrong? How can I be wrong when all I said was I wouldn’t be surprised. I didn’t say there was undoubtedly booing. Ah, but this is the Internet, where there’s a potential argument lurking behind every word.

  363. 363.

    Cacti

    Here’s a funny one re: Trump’s delusions about putting California into play.

    He now trails the vote total of the second place Dem candidate.

  365. 365.

    TriassicSands

    @BillinGlendaleCA:

    It would be great if Sanders would do the same in 2016. It’s not impossible. Since he won’t be surrounded by his most avid supporters, he could do so without be torn apart.

    Professional politicians (professional in the best sense of the word) who care about their futures know when to make-up — no matter how much it hurts. Sometimes losing doesn’t bring out the best in people.

    When I said it might be sad, I was referring to a Sanders refusal to either make the motion or at least second it. Worse still would be for him to oppose it. Ultimately, he can’t force his supporters to do anything.

  366. 366.

    WarMunchkin

    @Gretchen: So, question:

    Lots of people here are talking about making calls and stuffing envelopes or knocking on doors. Is there any quantitative data about what actual effect that has on people’s votes? Is it conventional wisdom that canvassing/phonebanking wins elections or is there a causal relationship proven somewhere?

  367. 367.

    Major Major Major Major

    @WarMunchkin: It’s been a while, but when I worked for Obama in 2008 there were some “doors to votes” conversion ratios bandied about. It’s said that a good ground game can make a point and a half, two points of difference. As for the citations on these, shrug.

  368. 368.

    Eljai

    @AnderJ: I’ll join you! I just checked Alameda County — this includes Berkeley — pretty much Berniac Central — and with 70% of precincts reporting, Hillary is leading Sanders by around 18,600 votes.

  369. 369.

    Splitting Image

    Clinton’s lead has held steady at c. 400,000 votes for awhile now, so it looks like some of the polls were correct. Clinton banked a big lead in mail-in votes and the people who voted today split about 50-50.

    I also notice that Sanders has pulled ahead of Donald Trump in total votes. California is natural Trump territory, so I think he’ll need to put some more resources there to put him over the top.

  370. 370.

    Cacti

    @Splitting Image:

    I also notice that Sanders has pulled ahead of Donald Trump in total votes. California is natural Trump territory, so I think he’ll need to put some more resources there to put him over the top.

    I too, hope that candidate Trump spends a great deal of time and money on turning California red.

    It would be very yuge and classy.

  373. 373.

    AnderJ

    @Splitting Image: Your statement is still holding up. With 69% of the votes counted, Clinton still leads 400,000 votes. After yesterday’s debacle, AP probably doens’t want to call this race too soon though

  375. 375.

    Carolinus

    @Adam L Silverman:

    What did she say about Muslims?

    Gabbard likes to criticize her own party on Right-wing media about foreign policy and about not capitulating to the GOP’s language litmus tests (ex: “Islamic extremism”). She voted for the GOP’s reactionary bill meant to bring the Syrian refuge process to a stand-still. She also has an odd habit of praising Putin’s Syria actions and also comparing them favorably to the the administration’s actions.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/10/15/rep-tulsi-gabbard-the-democrat-that-republicans-love-and-the-dnc-cant-control/

    Especially with regard to foreign policy, Gabbard often sounds more like a hawkish Republican than a potential future Democratic leader. She has blasted President Obama for failing to talk about Islamic extremism. …

    Gabbard has been glorified in the conservative media. Her criticism of Obama’s failure to cite “Islamic extremism” earned her appearances on Fox News, and in April, the conservative National Review wrote a glowing profile about the “beautiful, tough young” Democrat “who’s challenging Obama’s foreign policy” …

    http://hawaiitribune-herald.com/news/local-news/gabbard-supports-gop-bill-syrian-refugees

    Gabbard supports GOP bill on Syrian refugees

    One of Hawaii’s four Democratic representatives in Congress went against party conventions in the wake of continuing tensions over the Syrian civil war and Syrian refugees following last week’s terrorist attacks in Paris.

  376. 376.

    columbusqueen

    Bernie really is looking like Gollum right now, isn’t he? “My precioussss. . .”

  377. 377.

    Terry chay

    @AnderJ: it’s not even close. There was a lot of overlap in 2008, but in 2016, Sanders has so few supers delegates that Clinon’s pledged count has been greater than Sanders pledged plus supers since she won Super Tuesday.

  378. 378.

    Terry chay

    @sharl: Rolling Stone called at least three of the people who sent death threats to NV state chair and was able to confirm from their social network postings that they are authentic Sanders suppoerters. Not saying that hey didn’t go for Paul in 12 or 08, but they’re the real deal right now.

  379. 379.

    NotMax

    @Mnemosyne

    I tried, but am constitutionally incapable of listening to more than about 10 seconds of rap or hip-hop without gagging. Had to shut it off or else face a major clean-up of the desktop and keyboard.

  380. 380.

    Terry chay

    @jl: she said it. It was part of their live broadcast so there is no link.

    Examples of a true “bottom up” movement would be verbal, financial and logistical support for doe ticket candidates. He’s done done of the first (on the condition they endorse him(*), has done a negligible token amount of the second and zero of the third. They’re threatening to keep the third indefinitely (better read the fine print, after 2016, the database goes to the DNC because it was entered into their analytics system). He also wouldn’t be closing offices left and right and laying off staff. Really though, the burden is on the affirmative as every action he’s done makes sense as a candidate running for president, not for one building a movement that will last past June.

    BTW. I thought the speech is as gracious as could be expected. People forget that it took Hillary 4 days to concede and she also happens to be a much more authentic politician (sorry her first instinct is not to burn bridges which was how she was able to win all the supers who “stabbed her in the back” by flipping to Obama). You really can’t blame the guy for his supporters booing Hillary (Hillary handled it better in 2008 and her supporters were far worse than the Berniacs today, but again this is why she WON this time). He was very careful to use words like taking the “campaign fight” to DC and the “movement” to Philadelphia.

    Smart people should read this as a clear opening. No, your not going to get Hillary’s 18-million cracks in the glass ceiling speech with Bill and her campaigning hard as fuck to get Obama elected, but this guy clearly wants to keep his Senate committee assignments in 2017. That’s leverage and that’s all that Hillary, Podesta, and Obama need to hear.

    (*) for instance, when Jane Kim wasn’t able to get D party endorsement for my state rep seat because they went with a different district super, she endorsed him and got his endorsement)

  381. 381.

    Applejinx

    @dogwood:

    There never has been a “movement”. It’s resentment, anger, bitterness and plenty of conspiracy theories that has been the core of the Sanders’ campaign.

    This is a little shocking. Do you know anything about economics at all? It seems like you’re spinning it as ‘resentment, anger and bitterness for no reason from entitled millennial bros’ or something. Obviously there are all those things, but for very good reason, and right now I think Hillary Clinton is in a far better position to address the sources of these problems. And that’s main street. That’s the failure of our system, as all capital is captured by billionaires and corporations fighting each other to be the top rich person.

    I’ll grant conspiracy theories as I’ve seen people behaving like Hils wanted the AP to pre-announce that she won. It is of course starkly obvious that she did not, and it’s also obvious why: we have to do the best we can to establish a narrative of legitimacy. And that is why people should lay off demanding Bernie drop out: he said he’d take it to the convention, he’s pulling more than forty percent of the Dem vote overall (who would have believed that a year ago?) and he deserves what he will get: representation for his stump speech values, leverage in getting lip service for those values, and not to be President.

  382. 382.

    Applejinx

    If Hillary doesn’t take advantage of what’s basically been an epic focus group testing and shoving of the Overton window, next time the Democrats will lose to the hippies. But I think she’s going to, and when you allow Bernie to be a cranky old politician with just as many personality problems as ALL politicians, when you allow him to skulk back to Vermont where we’ll keep him as a pet in honor of how close he came, then you can see the value of the exercise.

    And you’d have to be way dumber than Hillary Clinton to conclude, ‘nearly half the Democratic base flipped out and tried to throw out the system and start over, for NO REASON’. Anybody who has been studying economics in the last ten years can plainly see in the work of people like Piketty, Mark Blyth, even Douglas Rushkoff, exactly what’s happened. The politician who harnesses this desperation and actually manages to do something productive about it will be a historic figure indeed.

    I think mounting evidence shows that Bernie would never have been able to do productive things about it, even though he accurately decries the problems ad infinitum. That’s why it’s good he lost (which he has, though not by an overall blowout nationwide).

    I think Hillary would not know to deal with this stuff if not for Bernie’s run, and I don’t think she’d be at all motivated to do a damn thing about it if not for the documented voter base responding to those issues: I’ve physically been at several Bernie rallies, and have seen others on video, and only a fool would claim he makes it about him. He hammers the same talking points literally forever, until it’s a running gag, and you’d have to be literally working for the other side to (like wingnuts talking about terrorists) claim it’s all for mindless hating of our freedoms.

    I knew there’d be some curb stomping in a thread like this: love you guys anyway but my heart will hurt less when ya move on to winning the general. I won’t kick up a fuss about the curb stomping, I know you folks far too well for that ;)

    Only thing I’ll fuss about is: if you think this has always been because we want to run our fingers through the cranky old bugger’s mad-scientist hair, well, my God. Go back to literally any speech the guy’s ever made and try to read for comprehension this time. These issues are not going to go away because they can’t. The path to Clinton’s total victory and taking the Senate and House is to do better than Bernie ever could, at addressing it.

    Admittedly not a high bar BUT! At least he would try. That’s all we ask, and it seems like a big ask.

  386. 386.

    Applejinx

    @Xboxershorts: Thank you. We’ve got to come together and own all three branches of government plus get some Supreme Court Justices in place and this ain’t a game, so things have to be done right.

  387. 387.

    D58826

    @gf120581: There is an article on the NYtimes that makes the same point. He is becoming a grumpy old revolutionary who is in danger of pissing away all that he has accomplished.

  390. 390.

    Barbara

    @AnderJ: If he really believed California would be a blow out he must have an image of California as being not much more than the Bay Area. Of course California has many, many progressive and liberal white people but California became reliably blue only in the 1980s because of its increasing ethnic diversity. Why are people of color basically invisible to Sanders and his team? It’s not like they would never have been receptive if they had been cultivated.

  391. 391.

    nastybrutishntall

    @Adam L Silverman: It’s always going to be tough forensics, disentangling the candidate from their staff. But if the candidate selects the staff and retains them, then we’re all clear where the buck, eventually, stops.
    What has me excited about Hillary is the difference in her operation between 08 and 16. It shows personal growth, humbling, and maturity. She chose the better team = she has the better judgment. In the end, Bernie’s campaign’s problems = problems with Bernie. If it’s got drama and self-serving backstabbing, that’s what Bernie chose to surround himself with. Period.

  392. 392.

    nastybrutishntall

    @jl: Can you imagine Obama letting his crowd boo his DEMOCRATIC opponent? Right. That’s why we are making bitter faces here. Because Bernie is nothing but bitter aftertaste.

  393. 393.

    sharl

    @Terry chay:

    Rolling Stone called at least three of the people who sent death threats to NV state chair and was able to confirm from their social network postings that they are authentic Sanders suppoerters. Not saying that hey didn’t go for Paul in 12 or 08, but they’re the real deal right now.

    ~
    I read that RS thing too, along with another one (Jezebel maybe?). I believe these articles – they were adequately researched, a task made easy by the angry brainiacs who made their caller/contact ID info available to the woman they were threatening. I don’t recall the articles saying whether these people were actually there in Nevada, or were calling/messaging in from far away, though I suspect the latter. Among the people I follow on twitter – lots of leftie Millennials – are a number of youngsters who have anger management issues, and I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if some of them made these kind of threatening contacts by phone or text message. They’re out there…

    But those who actually showed up, crowded the stage, and threw a lot of hostility toward Boxer? They could also have been Berniacs rather than just hell-raisers with time on their hands, but it’s Boxer’s comment about their age (“not young”) that got me all curious. She could have just been spinning things in her interview with Rehm, to play conciliator and provide Sanders a face-saving way to come to terms with HRC’s win and become an ally, if not a full-fledged team member. I dunno…

    {Been rolling this around in my head, finally remembered to respond before the comment window slams shut.}

Comments are closed.