Well, it does not look like Warren had the night I had hoped she would have, but I hope she stays in the race because I still want to vote for her. For all practical matters, the race is down to Bernie and Biden, and it would not surprise me if Bloomberg bows out because surely there has to be something better to blow his billions on, but honestly, he has so much money I might be wrong about that.
I know a lot of extremely online people thought that Bernie was going to run the map tonight, but honestly I didn’t find anything all too surprising about any of the results, with the notable exceptions of Warren doing so poorly in Mass. and Bloomberg winning American Samoa (WTF???) I’ve always thought Bernie’s support was super deep but not that broad, so it is not surprising to me that he lost a lot of southern states with more moderate Dems and a large AA population. I would not be too surprised if California tightens up in the next couple of weeks as votes are counted.
For four years now, I have been listening to people from deep blue states tell me that Bernie would have won WV in the general election, and I have tried in vain to tell that he would not have, but no one listens to people who actually live here, for whatever reason. This is not to say there are not a lot of very progressive voices in WV- there are quite a few of us who would gladly vote for Sanders and Warren in November, but we would be outweighed by the huge numbers of Trump voters. Bernie capitalized in 2016 in the primary here on four decades of Republican propaganda against Hillary Clinton. It was that simple. This is the state, remember, where a convicted felon who was INCARCERATED IN TEXAS beat Obama in ten counties.
Again, for all intents and purposes, this is now a two person race. Ignore the people who say the race was stolen or is rigged or any crap like that. They’re idiots and just sore their guy or gal lost. What happened today was that people lined up in record numbers and voted. And that will keep happening for another couple months until we have a winner. So if you are in a state that has not yet voted, just keep on keeping on and when it is your turn, if you like Bernie, vote for Bernie. If you like Biden, vote for Biden. I’m still gonna hold out for Liz because I think the race will be decided by May 12th when we finally get to vote, but if it isn’t I will choose then. I may still vote for her because I’m exhausted by the 12 dimensional chess and want to just vote for the person I like best, too.
So that is that. The race is wide opened, and all that has happened is that the field thinned out. We’ll see where it goes from here.
guachi
I thought Sanders was going to have a great Super Tuesday even accounting for a great SC for Biden as I didn’t think there was enough time between Saturday and Tuesday to make a difference. That and all of the early votes already cast. But… nope. I was wrong. Buttigieg and Klobuchar bought a clue and a lot of voters really don’t want Sanders, it seems.
If there had been a week between SC and Super Tuesday it would likely be a Biden blowout.
Sanders still has a great chance as Biden is a poor campaigner and we have 2/3 of the primary left. But Biden at least will start rolling in dough. I sent him $50 on Sunday.
hells littlest angel
I was hoping to get a bit more wear out of my “WE PERSIST” tee shirt, but what are you gonna do? Eight weeks until NY votes, so I guess I’ll go read old Old Handsome Joe posts from Wonkette in the meantime.
anarchoRex
Not the results I would’ve wanted, but we live to fight another day. Love the demographic breakdowns. The left-wing in this election is literally the future of the party.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@guachi:
He’s looked pretty good the last few days, I’ve thought. Maybe they brought in a nutritionist or something
NotMax
Posed and answered.
;)
NotMax
@Jim, Foolish Literalist
If he glows any redder he may spontaneously combust.
lamh36
Someone tweeted this and I can’t say I disagree
Joe Biden OWES his resurrection 80% to Clyburn and the African American voters in SC and across the Super Tuesday states. 5% he owes to Liz Warren for keeping her foot on Bloomberg’s neck and 15% rounded from the NEVER Bernie voters (I mean he won in Mass and winning so far in Maine, none of which can claim hugh AA voter populations). I mean Biden is projected to win voting he’s at 33.2% vs Sander’s 29.3% w.82% counted! Texas of all places. If that’s not cause “never Bernie” voters I don’t know what else
FlipYrWhig
pattonbt
@guachi: I think today shows how deep the hate of Bernie is in the full Democratic party tent. There is no middle ground with him – it’s love or loathe. I think Biden can sit on his laurels the rest of the way and the anti-Bernie vote would easily carry him across in the end. Bernie needed a large field today to get a decent enough lead, it didn’t happen.
guachi
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Biden’s seemingly so emotional I can see how doing poorly would affect him more than other candidates.
EDIT: I read this after I posted it and it reads worse than I intended. What I’m getting at is I think Biden can be affected by negative events more than other people. That isn’t a bad thing. His basic decency and empathy is a positive trait.
Mnemosyne
I’m sad that Warren wasn’t able to break out because I think she has the best plans of any of them, but I’m enjoying the Sanders meltdown more than I should. It’s pretty fun to watch the same people who 24 hours ago were gloating about making all of the “establishment Dems” bend to their will see the actual returns from real voters come in. Not polls, not Tweets, but actual human beings making a decision that has consequences.
And I will repeat what I’ve been saying for a few months: I would LOVE to see Warren as Secretary of the Treasury. I think she could implement a lot of her best plans from there, including student debt relief, plus all of the banksters would shit themselves. Let us make it so.
Cacti
Bernie has been using the Democratic Party to run against the Democratic Party for 5-years now. Democrats finally had enough and delivered him a well deserved middle finger.
Mnemosyne
@lamh36:
I’m a little amazed at how many voters across the spectrum were waiting for South Carolina’s results before they made their decision. I did it myself — which is why I voted for Biden here in CA — but it really was like we were all waiting for the signal to come out of the woodwork.
And, yes, Clyburn was the guy who fired the starter pistol.
Mnemosyne
@FlipYrWhig:
Oh, fine, go ahead and be right. ?
And of course the Bros are blaming Warren for everything. OF COURSE THEY ARE.
guachi
@Cacti: I checked the exit polls because I suspect you are correct.
Change in Biden’s share of the vote between Democrats and independents:
Alabama: 0
California: 0
Colorado: +12
Massachusetts: +2
Minnesota: +8
North Carolina: +18
Oklahoma: +25
Tennessee: +15
Texas: +12
Virginia: +15
Vermont: +4
Strangely varied from 0 to +25. And in California there was zero change for ANY candidate between Democrats and independents.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@guachi: I got what you meant, and it strikes me as perfectly plausible
@pattonbt: did you happen to catch how Bernie and his top surrogates spent the last forty-eight hours dismissing and denigrating the people who voted for Biden in South Carolina? “Corporatists” “not representative” “lobbyists”. This was not a new pattern. Do you think that might have anything to do with the way a lot of lifelong Democrats feel about the man who spent most of 2017 bellowing to his cultists the the Democratic Pahwty is a fayl-yuh?
Kent
The upcoming big states look more friendly to Biden than Sanders. Florida and Georgia are Biden country. My state of WA votes next week and will likely go Sanders unless things really shift, because of all the uber-lefties up in Seattle. But after that the landscape looks pretty friendly for Biden.
Martin
Well, that’s fairly reciprocal, isn’t it. Bernie is more than happy to twist the knife into the Democratic establishment.
FlipYrWhig
@Kent: Didn’t WA last time vote Sanders in the caucus but Clinton in the primary?
Kent
@lamh36: I’ve been watching politics since the 1980 Carter-Reagan race when I was in High School and I have never in my life seen anything like this Clyburn effect. It is just breathtaking. They will be writing about this for decades. In 2050 whoever is the new version of Tweetie will be reminiscing fondly about the days that “Boss Clyburn” was able to swing 10 states with a single endorsement speech.
Jay Noble
Not listening to the folks who live there . . . New York City told us about Trump. For years and years.
RobertDSC-Mac Mini
I will always be proud of my vote for Warren. I think she would have made a fantastic President. That said, I am ready to vote for Joe should he be the nominee. I detest Sanders with all of my being.
FlipYrWhig
@pattonbt: Yup. It feels to me like after Sanders won Nevada–his first substantial win, remember–a lot of people at all levels, from regular voters to office holders, just had a collective OH HELL NO moment.
lamh36
California will be interesting when it’s all settled. Bernie was the projected vote winner, but the delegate math will be interesting.
Someone tweeted
So results may shift.
Either way it’s pretty likely that Bernie won’t come out of Cali with the ENTIRE delegate haul it seems. A majority but not all.
Tonight was NOT a great night for Bernie at all. Not only that, but bout the only demo he increased from 32016 is his numbers with young Hispanic voters, but even with that number…Biden still projected to win in Texas!
And majority of Biden’s win in these states over Bernie is because of SAME DAY voting. And that more than anything reflects the “never Trump, but hell no not Bernie” voting pool
who would have thought it just over a week ago
pattonbt
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I didn’t need to see the last 48 hours – the last five years have provided more than enough to know the man. The Democratic party should have never let him run on their primary ticket in 2016 – he’s not a Democrat, never has been and never will be (he’ll go right back to Independent once he officially loses the Democratic primary).
Sab
@hells littlest angel: Well now what? I am signed up to canvass for Warren for the next few weeks. Lotta work, but I hate to bail on her and them. And I have wanted to vote for her for at least 10 years.
That said, I am hugely relieved at the way this is going.
Also too, there are a lot of important down ballot races.
FlipYrWhig
@Mnemosyne: ;)
DB11
@lamh36: It’s unbelievable how influential that endorsement actually was. And this after so many pundits wrote off the value of endorsements entirely in this digital age.
We seem to almost forget that Biden was being written off the week before, the obituaries were being rolled out and the post-mortems posted on why his campaign had failed.
I’m hard-pressed to think of a candidate owing more to a single individual in completely flipping the calculus of a race — virtually overnight.
Sure gives Clyburn huge leverage if Biden somehow manages to close the deal.
pattonbt
@Martin: fair is fair. I hold no grudge for Sanders to hate the Democratic party. After all, he isn’t a Democrat. But he sure does like using their apparatus to his own advantage at the expense of actual Democrats.
Kent
Yeah, there was some weird shit like that. The caucus is gone now. It’s only a primary state. I don’t remember the exact details, the caucus was just for presidential delegates but the primary also had all the state-wide and local primary candidates so they had both. We moved back to WA from TX in June 2016 so I primary voted in TX and general election voted in WA.
My first real introduction to politics was in 1984 when I was a volunteer for the Gary Hart campaign in college and worked on the WA caucuses which Hart won. Then couldn’t keep his pants zipped up and we got Mondale. Sigh.
Mnemosyne
@guachi:
Rumor has it that Clyburn read Biden the riot act about his campaigning so far and gave Biden a bunch of advice.
In retrospect (of 24 hours ago), it was super smart of Biden to bring Buttigieg, Klobuchar, and O’Rourke up on stage with him last night to show off the party’s rising stars and emphasize that Democrats will be united as a team for the general election. Since everything seems to have flipped very quickly, I think that show of unity helped a lot.
Martin
@lamh36: BTW, those numbers are pretty normal. In 2018 we had millions to count after election night.
CA’s attitude on accurate, cheap, fast, pick two is to go for cheap and accurate, rather than cheap and fast.
Mnemosyne
@guachi:
That CA number may change because we have a lot of mail-in ballots and we count very slowly. I don’t think I’m the only person who turned their mail-in ballot in on Monday night because I was waiting to see how SC turned out, so there’s a pretty big backlog that won’t be captured by any exit polls.
Eolirin
@Mnemosyne: More importantly, rumor has it that Biden was amenable to listening.
Lacuna Synecdoche
I’m holding out for Liz too. I can’t believe we’re talking about nominating people who have already lived past their life expectancy (76 for men in the US) for the most stressful job in the world.
I think the odds of at least one of the male front-runners having a health crisis before the election are better than even. And while I don’t think it’s likely, I think the risk of both Sanders and Biden having a health crisis is unacceptably high.
I want Warren to remain in the race until the convention, if for no other reason than as a stopgap in case a clusterfuck of health crises takes out the rest of the field – which is a very real possibility in this environment.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Eolirin: I’ve always worried about Biden being surrounded by a bunch of cronies who’ve been telling him for forty years that he should be president, and who for those same forty years have been looking at themselves in the mirror and tell themselves they’re agin well. Maybe it took Clyburn, and the results of IA and NH, to break through that bubble
Kent
Gotta say, after tonight I’m finally feeling like I’m able to un-clench and start to maybe smile a bit.
Our biggest secret weapon of all has not even been unleashed yet. I fully expect Obama to spend the ENTIRE general election campaign campaigning like a mad man for Biden if he wins. Drawing HUGE crowds everywhere. We have the best campaigner in the past 50 or 100 years tanned and rested and ready to save the country. I know Obama loves this country and his heart must ache to see Trump unraveling every single thing he did out of sheer spite. I expect Obama to be fully unleashed once this primary campaign is settled. Especially if it is Biden.
Mnemosyne
@lamh36:
I didn’t drop my mail-in ballot off until last night, and people could still drop them off until 8 pm tonight. Plus there are people who dropped them in the nearest mailbox.
I suspect that those late-arriving mail-in ballots are not going to break in a way that is helpful to Sanders. ?
Martin
@Kent: I don’t think Clyburn deserves all the credit here. For SC, absolutely. I still contend that Obama put word out on Sunday that the party needed to come together around Biden and that’s why we’ve seen the coordinated endorsements.
Large donors have been saying they’re waiting for a frontrunner and by all accounts they’ve be waiting for Obama to make that call and he did on Sat/Sun.
Mnemosyne
@Martin:
Journalists who don’t like it can pass the time by watching the webcams of the counting that LA County puts on their website. ?
lamh36
Oh and less anyone tell ya that Black folks didn’t get out and vote in Texas today. Or that numbers were low. The Texas SoS has been closing a lot of polling sites in predominantly Black and Brown areas in Texas, particularily Harris count where the population is like 40% Black and Brown. There were people standiing in line for 5 1/2 hrs to vote. and there was increasing number of same day voting. So it’s not as simple as saying they didn’t get out an vote. Simply not true, long lines and less polling places will suppress votes..periods. And that exactly what Texas GOP did.
And Biden STILL manages to come out ahead of Bernie based on the same day voters. Can you imagine how big that number may have been if folks in those areas DIDN’T have to wait 5 damn hours to cast their vote?
Fair Economist
@Mnemosyne: I agree. Dems want somebody who can unify. Biden showed he could with the triple endorsement stunt, and that pulled the voters in.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Martin: I don’t think Obama needed to tell Buttigieg and especially Klobuchar they were done. Neither one had any traction nationally and AK was probably running out of money. I think Bernie probably helped AK decide by going to campaign in her home state. I do wonder if they had any campaign debt that Obama offered to help with. I remember that was a major point in his negations with Clinton in ’08
guachi
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: According to Klobuchar there was no coordination on dropping out.
Also, Bloomberg looking to fall just shy of statewide 15% threshold in Texas, which is probably good news for Sanders.
prostratedragon
@Mnemosyne: Oooo, neat!
An old dream of mine is the 24-hour, multinational nuclear disarmament/dismantling channel.
Morzer
One of Biden’s most underrated strengths is that he doesn’t scare the horses. Sanders certainly does – as does Warren to some degree. There’s much more of a market than the leftier people want to believe for getting back to “normalcy and decency”, not just in the Democratic party and the Never Trumper Republicans, but in America as a whole. That’s largely why Trump is so scared of facing Biden, because the contrast is a very clear one. Now, you can certainly argue about what normalcy and decency mean, you can re-litigate Biden’s career, but one thing you cannot credibly argue is that Trump has any share of the qualities that people like in Biden.
Mary G
I think there was a critical mass of Democratic voters dithering and saying “You decide,” “No, you decide.” The main emotion was “Who is the one most likely to get rid of Twitler?”
Clyburn stepped out front and told people that Biden was the One and people said “Thank Dog someone who’s been in the party forever and is a genuine Democrat Party leader has taken the lead. Biden it is.”
I am terribly sad that more liberal younger people without penises were rejected, but I respect the will of the majority. We still normalized so many firsts – multiple women running, multiple POC running, the first Jewish candidate to be in contention, and the first gay candidate to win a state. This year was a step on the continuum that will get us there someday. I hope to live to see it.
SectionH
@lamh36: Yes he does. I kinda like it
Still waiting on many more local results in here in almost Southern-est California. Yes, we do our homework, and vote for every seat on the ballot. That’s why I love vote-by-mail, because we can check out All the Candidates.
If I couldn’t vote for Kamala (well, this time… ) I did get to vote for my preferred candidate. But, damn if I didn’t get to vote for a lot of women (and a couple of men) who I am so looking forward to voting for in Nov as well.
opiejeanne
@FlipYrWhig: I caucused for Hillary in WA in 2016. Bernie won the state by a huge margin, but when they ran the primary (which didn’t count) Hillary cleaned his clock, very thoroughly. it was called a “beauty contest” primary. Thank God we dropped the damned caucus system because I never want to do that again. It started out fun and fascinating, and ended up dealing with terrible Bros who invaded the next levels, shouting down anyone who spoke for any other candidate. They didn’t have credentials, they didn’t belong in the auditorium, but they just walked in and started causing trouble. Men, ages 25-35.
opiejeanne
@lamh36: I’m hoping that California surprises us, either with Biden winning it or splitting it with Bernie.
I don’t understand Bernie’s appeal with Hispanic voters. I don’t get it at all.
Suzy
@Mnemosyne: not only did he bring them on stage, but he praised them in the most beautiful, sincere, genuine way. He was happy of course and it helped him politically, but it was the authenticity of his praise that was pretty outstanding. And I think that it helped make the supporters of those candidates feel a little better, and ready to vote for him. Joe Biden’s humanity and profound decency may be why he will become President of the United States. The man is a healer. And maybe more than anything else, healing is what America needs right now.
Martin
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I don’t think that affected them dropping out. I think it affected them immediately endorsing.
It’s the endorsing that is suspiciously coordinated, including Reid and Beto.
Martin
So, regarding the reporting numbers in CA – those are only partial results. Nobody is reporting full results and can’t until Saturday at the earliest.
JaySinWA
I experienced that “weird shit” up close and personal. Good riddance to the caucus. It was always susceptible to a minority takeover and in 2016 it was. The primary results proved that. IIRC a lot of the gung ho Bernie folks couldn’t muster their precinct delegates to the WA convention. A lot of people fumbling the ball with half understood rules about how the process was supposed to work. The mess they created killed WA’s caucus for good, at least I hope so
@opiejeanne:
Tell it, sister.
bluehill
@Suzy: That’s why I don’t think Biden needs to be an inspiration candidate a la Obama, he needs to be what he has always been a decent, compassionate person. I think (I hope) that’s what the silent majority wants in 2020 after the last 3 years.
Suzy
@Kent: The Biden presidency could restore the Obama legacy. Knowing how close friends Obama and Biden are, it’s like a political fairy tale.
Mnemosyne
@Mary G:
I’m still holding out hope for a Biden/Harris ticket if he’s the nominee. I think that would drive a lot of turnout, and it would be such a FUN campaign. Lots of joking and laughter, very little yelling or finger-wagging.
low-tech cyclist
Biden? Sanders?
Giant meteor.
Morzer
@opiejeanne: Maybe they long for a literacy program accompanied by a dictatorship of the proletariat?
Eljai
@Mary G: I like your analysis.
Martin
Here’s some numbers from my county in 2018 (percentage of registered voters):
So, very few early votes. That’s early votes on vote machines. The vote by mail is mostly drop-off rather than mail in, so maybe ballot completed same day or day before, but also maybe weeks before.
The only counts we’re getting tonight are the 25.2% and the 1.5%. The 44.2% will start getting counted after those are done, and will continue at least through saturday due to postmark deadlines. Some are still in the mail.
Martin
@Mnemosyne: I agree.
opiejeanne
@JaySinWA: We went through two levels, then neither of us was chosen to move up to the county level. But, when the state convention was just about to happen I started getting emails insisting that I was a delegate and needed to turn up, at the very least as an alternate. I wasn’t an alternate, and these were the Hillary people who were frantic. They finally found someone who didn’t have plans for that weekend.
There were signs all over downtown Woodinville for the Republican caucus on Saturday. I don’t know why they are caucusing unless it’s to choose delegates to go to the convention. Trump is the only name on that side of the ballot. I wonder why William Weld isn’t on the ballot.
opiejeanne
@Morzer: Heh. You are a funny… guy?
opiejeanne
@Mnemosyne: Me too. That would be a great ticket.
Morzer
@opiejeanne: My pronouns are pro and noun.
JWR
Over at LG&M, Paul Campos has this to say:
Hmm. And I left Campos’ second sentence in there, well, just because. ;)
Sister Golden Bear
@Mnemosyne: Not only were people able to drop off mail-in ballots until 8 p.m., but if they actually mailed them (CA makes them postage-paid), ballots that were postmarked the 3rd and arrive by the 6th are also counted.
Probably a smaller number than dropped-off mail-in ballots (since CA provides lots of drop-off locations), but probably also not favorable to Sanders.
Mary G
@Mnemosyne: Oh, I am hoping like hell for that. Kamala and Joe would help heal my heartbreak, and a debate where she terrorizes Mike Dense would be epic.
Mandalay
This is an example of Bloomberg wilting when under no pressure at all:
Asking Bloomberg whether he’s going to drop out is a softball question that he should have knocked out of the park, telling reporters some nonsense about how trouncing the opposition in American Samoa is a sign of glorious things to come.
Instead, he got defensive, grumpy and petty. Like Trump, he’s not accustomed to being treated (in his mind) disrespectfully, but unlike Trump, he just caved. What a wimp.
Morzer
https://mobile.twitter.com/howardfineman/status/1235035020881952769
JaySinWA
@opiejeanne: I didn’t know the Republicans still caucused. Dazed and confused, I hope. I expect Weld didn’t file on time or budget for it.
I missed the Hillary support being as disorganised as the Bernistas, I only remember reading about them.
Dan B
@FlipYrWhig: The caucuses in WA were grabbed by aggressive Bernie supporters in 2016. People who attended had horror stories. The primary did go to Clinton. The latest polling, as I recall, was leaning towards Sanders but it won’t be from former radical me. If we don’t get the neo-fascists out of the other Washington there will be a lot of radicals living behind concertina wire.
Morzer
JaySinWA
@JaySinWA: Them being the Bernie supporters that I remember reading about.
I was only around for the first round. Most of the Bernie supporters at the caucus where I was were women, young and old.
opiejeanne
@JaySinWA: I don’t know if it was disorganization on the part of the Hillary people. I think someone had an emergency, couldn’t go for some reason, and they started working through the list of people who had applied to go to the state convention. I was a little surprised by it.
Morzer
One curious thing about the California result is that Bernie apparently had a huge lead with Asian voters. Not sure what brought that about, unless there’s a much larger population of residual Maoists and juche folks than I had expected in Cali.
Sab
@JaySinWA: Bernie Bros on line are nothing like the Bernie supporters I meet in the real world. Many of the real world ones are actual leftish Democrats. The ones I talked to in phone banks were pretty much like the online guys. Interesting dynamic. Bernie Bros seem to be all white males. Bernie supporters are the usual racial and gender mix, but tending to be young.
JWR
@Sister Golden Bear:
I mailed off my “I voted for Liz!” ballot Tuesday afternoon.
opiejeanne
@JaySinWA: The Bernie delegates that we met at both levels were nice people. There was an old guy who turned up dressed like Bernie. knowing that he resembled him.
Sab
I am not utterly unhappy with Super Tuesday results. My candidate didn’t do well, but we coalesced around a candidate that I don’t have to hold my nose to support.
Still, I have commited myself to canvas for Warren, at a time of year where I am being pulled in six different directions. I think I’ll go this weekend, and see what she does. If she stays in, so will I.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Where’s Michael Moore to tell me “South Carolina doesn’t represent the Democratic Party”.
Where’s Susan Sarandon’s husband to tell me “winning South Carolina is like winning Guam”.
Origuy
It would be interesting to see if the Asian vote could be broken down further. It might show a lot of support from the subcontinent. Bernie’s campaign co-chairman is Silicon Valley Congressman Ro Khanna, of Punjabi ancestry. He’s been a very visible supporter of Sanders.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
@opiejeanne: Wow! What was Larry David like in person?
Martin
@Morzer: Biden +7 in a poll that dropped yesterday. Was Bernie +9 the week before.
I’m guessing Biden wins it by 12 or better after today. Add 10 points if Bloomberg drops out this week.
Eljai
@Morzer: Sanders spent a ton of cash in Michigan in order to win by a slim margin and then split the delegates with Hillary, while Hillary was racking up bigger delegate counts in Mississippi. But the Michigan win was unexpected for Sanders so I guess that makes it legendary.
JaySinWA
@opiejeanne:
@Sab: Yes, I haven’t jousted with twitter Bernistas, the few that I met IRL were not obnoxious. The caucus seemed to be set up to draw in new people with little experience and make sure they didn’t want to come back. So lots of confused people trying to make things work.
“you mean one of us has to go to the state convention? Not me.”
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Hard to believe Bernie did so poorly when he had the full backing of The Young Turks, Daily Kos and The Intercept.
JaySinWA
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Tis a mystory for the ages.
Martin
@Origuy: ‘asian’ is pretty much fucking useless as a category. There is almost no common characteristic between Indian, Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, Filipino, South Korean, etc. So many of these voters are first generation Americans with wildly different experiences. Chinese immigrants tend to be fairly well-off, Vietnamese were almost all refugees.
(11 million Californians are immigrants)
Sab
@Sab: Also downticket. This is a primary. Lots of local positions. Plus statewide judges. Do your research. Don’t vote for a Dem president candidate and a RWNJ judge because you hadn’t done your research.
Also locally for me, we have our countywide Metroparks levy. Metroparks are what make this town livable.
Karen
@Cacti: Well said. I like Bernie but Bernie is about Bernie. Am disheartened that Warren was not given the call-out stage she deserves but American public wants a rumble between two old white guys with no vision. That is how TV fries a brain. Stumbled across Barbara Streisand comment in variety — excellent — and scrolled down to comments. Just wow. Don’t usually go there or here but the vitriol made my heart stop. Hadn’t realized how nasty the human race has gotten.
SectionH
@Martin: our nearest polling place is our Clubhouse, so um, we’re kinda spoiled. But we always make time to check out all the candidates. I liked it better when we lived in North Co, SD… never mind. [No, we used to actually mail our ballots when we lived there.]
Down in the actual city, which is So Blue, Mr S & I spend the hours to check the candidates out, Maybe we’re really weird, but we do. Yeah, Compleat Juicers, I guess, but the important thing is we can sit down with the ballot and do relatively due diligence. There’ve been election mornings (this one for sure) when we both googling ppl like mad*. Sometimes it’s easiest to see who is endorsing whom – srsly. And then vote against…
*vote for 6 at most. JFC… we did find 6 out of the 20. It took hours. Mr S is very Very earnest. And I generally stand by my Snap takes, and I’m easily as right as he is…
We shall see, Hobbitses…
Our Toni, who’s my candidate to replace DiFi, is already pres Pro Temp of the CA State Senate…
I cheated a bit about one of the “local” races and basically voted for a woman Toni endorsed. Sue me.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Bernie spending election night watching….. [checks notes] …. Fox News (photo)
His obsession with winning white working class voters is disturbing and ultimately his downfall, as he pursued them to the exclusion of reliable Dems (Blacks) and new Dems (suburban women).
opiejeanne
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Haha! He was one of those old guys who thinks he’s cute, and this one was. The kind that thinks flirting with the nurses when he’s in the hospital is charming, at age 89. My dad was one of those guys.
DB11
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: The Berners are loud at DK and place a disproportionate number of diaries on the recommended list, but the front page was pretty much Warren all the way.
…and my impression is that there’s far deeper support for both Warren and Biden amongst the commenters than for Sanders.
Martin
@SectionH: Get to know your local party rep. They’re usually the ones running around checking the voter rolls. Ask them if they send out a set of candidate recommendations for down ballot races. We get one before every election – basically every candidate they recommend, often times with notes why.
Sab
@Martin: You forgot to mention Israelis, Palestinians, Jordaneans and Lebanese. Also Syrians and Iraqis. Plus my in-laws in China and Korea.
Asia is the biggest continent in the World, and it is quite diverse. All over the board politically, at home and as immigrants elsewhere
ETA I am talkibg down to you. I know you know that.
Sab
@Martin: In Ohio we have very important judge choices. People need to be aware.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Dow futures up 502 points on news the Bernie-virus has been contained. (no, really) (graph)
Chyron HR
Was Bernie’s ENTIRE campaign strategy to have the majority of voters that hate him split their votes 5 ways so he could win? Did nobody suggest to him that the “shitlibs” could all just vote for one of his opponents instead, or does that kind of talk get you the guillotine in Bernieworld?
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Don’t fuck with
Carrie MathisonJill Biden (photo)Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: And this photo.
Seriously, why hasn’t anyone photoshopped Symone Sanders into Okoye’s uniform yet?
Eljai
@Chyron HR: The Sanders campaign thought Biden and Kamala would split the Black vote in SC and he would cruise to a win there. I guess that strategy backfired.
Barb 2
@FlipYrWhig: yes WA did indeed vote overwhelmingly for Clinton in the primary. Sanders cult members gamed the Caucasus. I watched the caucus manipulation first hand. I think someone else said that Jane loves the caucuses because the results can be “fixed”. I hate caucuses. The vote totals from Nevada are a joke. Where are the 75,000 pre caucus day votes?
anyway I had a long talk with my brother-in-law – he was talking to college students who don’t have the time to study up on the candidates. I told him to tell these guys to choose only one topic – Climate Change. Which candidates left standing when N.Y. votes has a real environmentally sound plan for the future.
He is around enough young folk that is what he will tell them when he reminds them to vote. He hadn’t thought of that.
Morzer
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: There’s also a video clip of the Good Sanders moving at speed to shut down a protester. (What exactly are the protesters protesting about?)
SectionH
@Martin: Well Yeah…back in the day, in North County, it was Francine Busby. I love Susan Davis (our rep, sadly retiring).
It’s OK. I thought it was a bit weird – on the first page of the ballot, but it was a fight between the Committee and the Outsiders. IT was incredibly stupid that that was in the middle of the front page of the actual ballot. So Mr S suggested “internal Dem politics” and “ppl with agendas.” I quickly added “Buzz Words” and “in-fighting” as what I got from things the candidate wrote, and noted good words – and then voted for statements that checked boxes, like transit issues… or didn’t.
It’s based on being very old and seeing a lot of this shit before…
I am NOT amused by Housing issues as California candidates present them. I’ve yet to see any who have a clue beyond a couple of good ppl here. I spent 30 years in affordable housing, and don’t get me started.
In our own voting, we first checked out the League of Women Voters site. That let us eliminate 4 candidates who couldn’t be arsed to reply.
Analyze… it takes time, but I’m pretty happy with our basic algorithms. At least locally.
Barb 2
@opiejeanne: These Bernie cult members you saw were probably from out of state. I’m from a small rural district and we all know each other plus all the political players. These guys stood out like sore thumbs.
I was so angry at what I witness. Thing is that these Bernie Bros were trained agitators. Most people don’t notice and can easily be bullied. I was able to forcefully stand up to them because of my own training (therapist group dynamics).
This happened all over the state plus other caucus states.
caucuses and the electoral college have got to go.
Brachiator
@pattonbt:
I don’t hate Bernie. I just think that he is an empty suit. And for some reason, no one would acknowledge a fundamental truth about his campaign: that he was a political carpetbagger using the Democratic Party to fuel his presidential ambitions.
But you know what? It is not necessarily over for Sanders. There are more primaries to go, and if he can convince people to vote for him, he might still succeed.
I will still see him as a political grifter more like Trump than other candidates. But people have a right to be fooled. That comes with having a democracy. And I think that he is a better human being than Trump could ever be.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Morzer: I have the video clip. Love how it ends with Sanders in that catcher’s crouch, watching for more trouble, checking that broken nail.
What exactly are the protesters protesting about?
Factory farming, specifically dairy. Same group who invaded Bernie’s stage topless in Nevada.
Bruce K
What guts me is that the qualifications for “getting elected President” and “performing the duties of the President” are diverging so dramatically – Douglas Adams was bloody prescient forty years ago in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy when he wrote that “anyone capable of getting elected President should on no account be allowed to do the job.”
Well, maybe not quite – Obama did a pretty decent job, after all. And for all I think that Warren would be the best person in the current Democratic field to actually do the job of President of the United States, the cynic in me keeps banging on that this is a war, and that the priority has to be dethroning Trump and breaking the GOP’s hold on power. If we can’t accomplish that, then nothing else matters, because America will be lost.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Bruce K: I think that we need a healer more than a crusader right now. We’ve gone backwards so badly that just getting back to where we were will be an enormous step forward.
Brachiator
@Martin:
This is very true.
Somewhat true, but your point about how these groups have varied experiences complicates this greatly. There are people of Chinese, Japanese and Filipino descent whose families have been here for generations.
Some little tidbits from a recent Pew study of Asian Americans:
Chinese American median household income is somewhat less than that of Japanese Americans.
Brachiator
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
These people have a strong Internet presence, but it doesn’t translate well anywhere else.
ETA: One of the Young Turks, Cenk Uygur, is running for Katie Hill’s seat in California’s 25th House District. He is only pulling around 5 percent of the vote there.
If the voting pattern continues as is, there will be a runoff between Democrat Christy Smith and GOP candidate Mike Garcia.
Morzer
https://www.vox.com/2020/3/3/21161603/bernie-sanders-beat-elizabeth-warren-in-massachusetts
Interesting piece about Warren’s loss in Massachusetts – essentially, women like her a lot, men, not so much. Also, not much connection with voters without college degrees. Finally, lots of people don’t want Warren to run for the presidency in the first place – because they want her to stick around as their Senator.
Butter Emails
@lamh36:
These types of waits are BS. They are literally poll taxes. It takes me 5 minutes to vote. Using what the minimum wage should be that amounts to $1.25 for me and $75 for the people standing in line in Texas.
Butter Emails
@pattonbt:
This seems like a poor read. Polls show that most Democrats like Bernie. I’m not Bernie’s biggest fan, but I certainly don’t hate or even dislike him. I just think he’ll lose, find a certain subset of his fans toxic, and do hold it against him that he’s actually hired some of those toxic fans to be part of his campaign leadership.
satby
This line made me laugh, because that certainly was true for me trying to enlighten people telling me all about South Bend and a certain guy:
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Butter Emails: I find it interesting that there’s a lot of hot takes on how Warren’s “school marm” persona is offputting, but not so much about how much people hate having fingers wagged in their faces.
Bruce K
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: Yeah, we absolutely need a healer. But the nation is suffering from a cancer in the form of the 21st-century GOP, and if you have cancer, the first step in healing is to cut out or kill the cancer.
Barbara
My biggest concern with Sanders is not policy oriented, but that he would try remake the Democratic Party in his image, and not take advantage of Castro, Klobuchar and so on in making appointments and so on. I really don’t like a lot of his core team.
Barbara
@Butter Emails: Agreed. I don’t hate Sanders but I don’t think he is an effective leader at all.
debbie
@Mnemosyne:
He really needs to keep that up, though. The clip I saw of him on whatever Sunday talk show it was showed the Bumbling Joe. He cannot afford to fall back to that, EVER.
topclimber
Off to work so no time to read all the posts.
Sad to see Liz do so badly, but I can take it. What I find hard to stomach is Bloomberg buying viability in many more states than she did. I don’t think Joe will be anywhere near the corporate scourge we need and that Warren sure would be. To know that so many Dems are willing to rally around a mega billionaire and Wall Street cheerleader like Mayor Mike is piling on.
I see little happening in in a Biden administration that will change the underlying dynamics that keep Republicans in power and future Trumps a real possibility. Please prove me wrong, Joe. Whatever good happens on this front, I expect Sen. Warren to be in the middle of it, persisting.
I will hope Biden beats Bernie and Trump and we have a reasonable recovery to 2016 status over the next four year. In 2024 perhaps a new generation of candidates emerges with more awareness of how much our system must evolve to truly engage existential issues like climate change and worker impoverishment. Hopefully they do not turn everyone else off like Bernie or have to cope with the misogyny that kept Liz from having a shot.
topclimber
Quick edit of previous comment. Misogyny is strong, but more so because it made so many who do not fall heavily into this category fear running a woman candidate. Another gift from Trump.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Bruce K: I was drawing a contrast between perceptions of Biden and Warren. Healer vs crusader.
Moving away from Bernie makes cutting out the cancer more likely. Bernie wouldn’t have coattails; he would leave too many Rethugs in place in Congress.
Or maybe I’m just high on liking the odds for us to boot Tillis to the curb. Let’s go, VoteVets!
Uncle Cosmo
I have seen a single endorsement alter the political landscape like an earthquake. A bit before your time: in the 1978 Democratic primary for Governor of MD. Quick summary (here’s the relevant Wiki entry):
(I met candidate Hughes at the assembly area for the 1978 Dundalk [MD] 4th of July parade. [Politicians always brought up the rear; I was marching with a young Delegate running for the State Senate.] Big guy, well over 6′, wandering around looking about as lost as pre-SC Joe Biden. I asked if he needed help. He stuck out his hand & said, “I’m Harry Hughes,” & was surprised when I replied, “I know.” His contingent wasn’t sure what they should be doing, & I told him not to worry, the Parade people had been doing this for many years & they’d get him sorted out in good order, which they did.)
The common element IMO is a large number of voters unhappy with the obvious options but unwilling to “waste” their vote, waiting for a signal from a respected source.
Anonymous At Work
Key stat for West Virginia Democratic Primary was that Obama won it 59-41 over a prisoner from another state, in prison in another state. Most of Bernie’s 22 wins in 2016 were caucuses or deep red anti-Clinton voters.
catclub
I would really really like to see Obama as a senior adviser to president Biden – like chief of staff. Make more heads explode.
PenAndKey
@catclub: Works for me. As far as I know the only roles he couldn’t fill are any in the presidential line of succession. As much as I think he deserves his post-presidency life I’d be ecstatic if he took a leadership role in any future Democratic administration.
leeleeFL
@NotMax: I am wondering WHO this was? Help?
emjayay
@Martin: I’d like to see the numbers on that. I live in an at least 50% Asian neighborhood in Brooklyn. The vast majority are Chinese, and most are working or middle class.
Also, this commenting system sucks.
James E Powell
@catclub:
That’s no position for a former president. It’s got to be Chief Justice or Speaker.
opiejeanne
@Barb 2: This happened in Redmond, right next to the big Microsoft campus. I don’t know if they were from out of state.
Falconer
@FlipYrWhig:
Not as much as I will when the orange gibbon slices and dices Biden in the debates, destroys his reputation with the fake Burisma scandal and gets a second term.
Especially after some not insignificant portion of the Bernie Bros go out and vote Green or some other third party…
misterpuff
@bluehill: It’s kinda cool that we (the Dems) have the silent majority now (although obviously not that silent with the pink hats, Metoo and the 2018 blue wave). And we will roar in November.
The other side are the radicals in the American body politic.