Bullish on Bernie: The Bernie Sanders 2016 Thread II

[Fudbucker]

And yet she's still ahead, so what does that say about how important that is?

I guess it says the Dems don't care about honesty and trustworthiness, because Bernie wins those people by 50+ points.

"Beneath Secretary Clinton’s problematic favorability ratings lies a deep reservoir of public mistrust. When prospective voters are asked whether or not she is “honest and trustworthy,” their response is sobering; her rating on this dimension is a net negative 24 points, with 60 percent answering no and 36 percent answering yes. The contrast with Senator Sanders is striking in that it is precisely the opposite: a net positive of 24 percent, with 55 percent responding yes and 24 percent no..."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/h-a-goodman/sanders-won-michigan-because-hes-honest_b_9416226.html

Democrats look likely to nominate a person even they think isn't honest and trustworthy. It's one of the reasons I'm an independent and not a registered Democrat.

 

[Fudbucker]

I don't understand how it is possible that both Bernie is clobbering her, and she was blown out of the water by obama. You want to have your cake and eat it too.

She's winning bigger over sanders than obama won over her. This was previously pointed out to you, and you responded:

​

So which is it ???



Meh. She learned, that's why she's winning. By more than Obama was beating her.



No, the context is she's won big where it counts to reach the delegate count need to win the nomination.

This "supposed to be running the table" on him is as much straw.



You mean hypothetically outperforms. I'm not impressed with 6 month out hypothetical polls.

Of course not, because it's not Clinton who's outperforming them.

Your points make no sense, but you're one of the most partisan people here, so nothing Hillary does could make you see her in a negative light.

 

[TheL8Elvis]

Of course not, because it's not Clinton who's outperforming them.

No, becuase it's 6 months out and the candidates aren't settled.

Your points make no sense, but you're one of the most partisan people here, so nothing Hillary does could make you see her in a negative light.

Brilliant argument, thanks.

 

[varwoche]

She won Iowa, literally, by coin tosses.

Contrary to initial news coverage, this is false.

Coin-Toss Fact-Check: No, Coin Flips Did Not Win Iowa For Hillary Clinton

 

[luchog]

I haven't had the time to truly dig into the claims in the article, so take it how you will.

First, the superdelegates don't look like they're going to switch sides for Sanders. There have been a number of exchanges published since Monday that demonstrate that superdelegates in states that have overwhelmingly voted for Sanders are still adamant about supporting Clinton in direct opposition to the will of their electorate. There have been calls to oust them in the upcoming elections. A few have gotten quite dismissing about the popular votes in their states.

At this point, it's quite clear that even if Sanders does manage to pull a majority of pledged delegates, that is, if he wins the popular vote; the Democratic party establishment is still poised to hand the nomination to Clinton if at all possible.

Worse, this article insists that it's because of a tit-for-tat scheme hatched by the Clinton campaign before the race to the election started.

How Hillary Clinton Bought the Loyalty of 33 State Democratic Parties
Excerpt:

Collusion between the Clinton Campaign and the DNC allowed Hillary Clinton to buy the loyalty of 33 state Democratic parties last summer. Montana was one of those states. It sold itself for $64,100.

The Super Delegates now defying democracy with their insistent refusal to change their votes to Sanders in spite of a handful of overwhelming Clinton primary losses in their own states, were arguably part of that deal.

In August 2015, at the Democratic Party convention in Minneapolis, 33 democratic state parties made deals with the Hillary Clinton campaign and a joint fundraising entity called The Hillary Victory Fund. The deal allowed many of her core billionaire and inner circle individual donors to run the maximum amounts of money allowed through those state parties to the Hillary Victory Fund in New York and the DNC in Washington.

The idea was to increase how much one could personally donate to Hillary by taking advantage of the Supreme Court ruling 2014, McCutcheon v FEC, that knocked down a cap on aggregate limits as to how much a donor could give to a federal campaign in a year. It thus eliminated the ceiling on amounts spent by a single donor to a presidential candidate.

(...)

One could reasonably infer that the tacit agreement between the signatories was that the state parties and the Hillary Clinton Campaign would act in unity and mutual support. And that the super-delegates of these various partner states would either pledge loyalty to Clinton, or, at the least, not endorse Senator Sanders. Not only did Hillary’s multi-millionaire and billionaire supporters get to bypass individual campaign donation limits to state parties by using several state parties apparatus, but the Clinton campaign got the added bonus of buying that state’s super-delegates with the promise of contributions to that Democratic organization’s re-election fund.

If a presidential campaign from either party can convince various state parties to partner with it in such a way as to route around any existing rules on personal donor limits and at the same time promise money to that state’s potential candidates, then the deal can be sold as a way of making large monetary promises to candidates and Super-delegates respectable.

Now, admittedly this is Counterpunch, a far-left somewhat extremist source. However, the mechanics of the deal are easily verified elsewhere:
http://www.nytimes.com/politics/fir...ictory-fund-pacts-with-clinton-campaign/?_r=0
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/...tners-with-Hillary-Clinton-through-Dark-Money
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hillary-clinton-donors_us_5627a946e4b02f6a900ed79a
https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...535cea-d68f-11e5-b195-2e29a4e13425_story.html

IF the article is accurate as written -- and that is still a very big IF -- it's fairly conclusive evidence that this primary election is bought and paid for. I do know that the backlash against the superdelegates among the far left is getting serious; and should Sanders end up winning the popular vote and a majority of pledged delegates, the superdelegates handing the nomination to Clinton would further alienate the progressive left (many of whom are already insisting that they'd rather endure a Trump presidency than vote for Clinton under those circumstances), and practically ensure a GOP victory in the general. It certainly makes it look like not only Clinton; but the entire DNC establishment is up for sale.

At the very least, it does show that Clinton is far more beholden to the 1% lobbyists than she is to the people. You don't give that much money to someone you don't believe has your interests at heart, and who is not expected to support you in return.


Cue Clinton supporters claiming "conspiracy theory" in 3... 2... 1...

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Contrary to initial news coverage, this is false.

Such a classic example of how people remember the false story they initially believed despite having seen the factually corrected story.

It's not like the correction was debated or disproved. The coin toss as a deciding factor was clearly a false story. And that evidence and discussion has been posted more than once here, maybe even 4-5 times.

 

[Childlike Empress]

Cue Clinton supporters claiming "conspiracy theory" in 3... 2... 1...

I beat you to an hour posting it, thinking the general primary thread was more appropriate, and it took a usual suspect 13 minutes to read the rather long article, "fact check", look up the author (an actress he apparently thinks I should have heard about), and claim "conspiracy theory".

I agree that this needs serious fact-checking, and if it stands up to scrutiny, serious exposure.

 

[Fudbucker]

Such a classic example of how people remember the false story they initially believed despite having seen the factually corrected story.

It's not like the correction was debated or disproved. The coin toss as a deciding factor was clearly a false story. And that evidence and discussion has been posted more than once here, maybe even 4-5 times.

You mean like your claim about how Bernie was projected to win Ohio?

Instead of coin tosses substitute "won Iowa by less than half a percent". Same difference.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

...Cue Clinton supporters claiming "conspiracy theory" in 3... 2... 1...

You mean claiming that's what you're saying? Because otherwise what conspiracy are you imagining will be asserted?

Your article by the way, is nothing more than speculation and labeling things with loaded words like deal and bought when no such evidence was presented.

These superdelegates have every reason to prefer Clinton over Sanders. I know the Sanders people don't like it, don't think it's fair, but the superdelegates are in Clinton's demographic. They know her, know her actual record not the false-narrative marketed record, and they know Sanders.

There is no reason to think they would naturally support Sanders the same way many switched to support Obama in 2008.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

You mean like your claim about how Bernie was projected to win Ohio?

Instead of coin tosses substitute "won Iowa by less than half a percent". Same difference.

The two states Clinton was supposed to lose but didn't: Missouri and Illinois. She won Ohio by a larger margin than predicted.

You are making a bigger deal out of which states were which when you know she did better than the polls predicted on March 15th.

 

[Childlike Empress]

These superdelegates have every reason to prefer Clinton over Sanders. I know the Sanders people don't like it, don't think it's fair, but the superdelegates are in Clinton's demographic. They know her, know her actual record not the false-narrative marketed record, and they know Sanders.

There is no reason to think they would naturally support Sanders the same way many switched to support Obama in 2008.

So from where did they get that they are in the same demographic as Obama in 2008? I thought the hopey-changey guy came out of nowhere?

 

[Fudbucker]

The two states Clinton was supposed to lose but didn't: Missouri and Illinois. She won Ohio by a larger margin than predicted.

You are making a bigger deal out of which states were which when you know she did better than the polls predicted on March 15th.

Wrong again. Clinton was projected to win Missouri: http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/election-2016/primary-forecast/missouri-democratic/
She underperformed there, winning (again) by less than half a percent: https://www.google.com/search?q=mis...hrome&ie=UTF-8#eob=m.04ych/D/2/short/m.04ych/

Clinton was projected to win Illinois. She had an 88% chance of winning.http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/election-2016/primary-forecast/illinois-democratic/

She won by less than 2 points.

Where are you getting your information?

 

[Childlike Empress]

Where are you getting your information?

"Hillary Victory Fund"?

 

[jhunter1163]

It's not a contradiction. Hillary is a terrible candidate BECAUSE she is disliked and distrusted by so many people. If she were running for dog-catcher, it wouldn't matter what her national polling is, but she's running for national office, so it does matter. The exit polling simply confirms what we already know from national polling: people don't like her.

It's not just the natural contempt people feel for politicians. They really don't like Hillary. Obama's favorability numbers are about even. Kasich is +7. Biden is +10. Since the primaries started, Clinton has consistently been underwater by double digits, sometimes 20 points. There are only two politicians left that are despised by that much: Cruz and Trump. Good company to be in, huh?

Think about it: do you think Bernie would still be in it if Hillary was a good candidate? Would he be getting 80% of the trustworthy vote? Would a 74 year old man be clobbering her on the youth vote? Some of this is because Bernie has turned out to be a pretty good politician, but most of it is disgust with Hillary: her coziness with Wall Street, her scandals, her past votes and lies about dodging sniper fire. She hasn't put Bernie away, and if she were any good, Bernie would never have gotten out of the starting gate, much less be in a position to actually win the nomination in April.

The main reason that Sanders is doing better against the GOP than Clinton is that the GOP is concentrating their fire on Clinton. They're not bothering with the socialist for the most part because they assume (likely correctly) that the Democratic primary voters will take care of him for them. There's no sense in wasting resources trashing someone who has maybe a 5% chance of being the nominee. Better to save your cash for attacking Clinton.

 

[wareyin]

All you really have to do is listen to the people that vote for her to find the answer. It's quite clearly a false sense of practicality. Despite the fact that Sanders quite clearly leads the independent vote by large numbers, they seem to think that fear of "socialism" will somehow scare off independent voters. The fact that there is incontrovertible evidence to the contrary doesn't seem to matter. As long as the opinion manufacturers continue to repeat themselves often enough, the illusion holds.

So... basically it's the usual reason, despite the fact that this reason is completely unfounded. Establishment politics at its worst. Unfortunately, it is also a well proven method of losing in the general election (see: John Kerry for details -- Dean would have likely won the G.E. that year if he had gotten that far).

Also known as the politics of fear (of losing), democrat style.

With Clinton you also have the feminist reactionary vote. If she was male and all else exactly the same, she would have already lost.

To make sure I'm understanding you, you are claiming that Clinton is a terrible candidate because people are voting for her because they expect that she will do better than Sanders in the national? If so, that's pretty much the opposite of a terrible candidate. Further, Sanders may look better 6 months out when there have been no negative ads run about him, but clearly that would not be the case down the line.

 

[Childlike Empress]

The main reason that Sanders is doing better against the GOP than Clinton is that the GOP is concentrating their fire on Clinton. They're not bothering with the socialist for the most part because they assume (likely correctly) that the Democratic primary voters will take care of him for them. There's no sense in wasting resources trashing someone who has maybe a 5% chance of being the nominee. Better to save your cash for attacking Clinton.

The "GOP" is obviously concentrating their fire on Trump at this point.

 

[Fudbucker]

The main reason that Sanders is doing better against the GOP than Clinton is that the GOP is concentrating their fire on Clinton. They're not bothering with the socialist for the most part because they assume (likely correctly) that the Democratic primary voters will take care of him for them. There's no sense in wasting resources trashing someone who has maybe a 5% chance of being the nominee. Better to save your cash for attacking Clinton.

And there is a lot of truth to this, and I think people see Hillary as the pragmatic choice, and are absolutely terrified of who the GOP might nominate.

I get it. Dem voters want to win the White House at all costs, and for good reason. As a liberal I see a chance to reshape SCOTUS for decades. Economies come and go but civil rights are forever, and I won't vote for someone that might roll back all the progress that's been made.

I just don't like who the standard bearer will (probably) be. I don't like being put into a position of having to vote for a candidate that is dishonest and untrustworthy because the GOP is so much worse. I think it's a sad indictment of both parties.

 

[Fudbucker]

The "GOP" is obviously concentrating their fire on Trump at this point.

But they blast Clinton at the debates and in interviews every chance they get. She really is the GOP boogeyman(woman). Bernie is seen as a protest candidate with no real chance.

 

[Childlike Empress]

The two answers to my question why the shillaries are putting so much effort into convincing us that Hillary really is winning this:

It's not enough to win, you have to make sure your opponent is thoroughly destroyed and humiliated in the process. That's how you build consensus and cooperation.

It's denial of the obvious: Hillary is a terrible politician, disliked, distrusted and plagued by scandals and controversies.

I tend to agree more with Fudbucker (and his elaboration in following posts). This fight just wasn't supposed to happen. Hillary should have as much opposition in 2016 as Obama had in 2012 inside the Democratic party if it were for the "Hillary Victory Fund".

There's a deep insecurity haunting her fangirls (hehe, yep, I said it) that maybe she will lose it again, for the final time, just like against the ******. Frantically projecting this insecurity onto the (on this forum) democratic majority who wants Bernie to win, against the fact that with maybe one or two exceptions, all in that group are quite clear that there is only a small chance that he will make it to the nominee (although "small" not being anywhere near as unlikely as "winning the lottery", which it should have been according to the "Hillary Victory Fund").

 

[luchog]

To make sure I'm understanding you, you are claiming that Clinton is a terrible candidate because people are voting for her because they expect that she will do better than Sanders in the national? If so, that's pretty much the opposite of a terrible candidate.

Erm, no, that is a terrible candidate. When your primary purpose for voting for a candidate comes down to "I agree with Bernie, but don't want to risk a Trump presidency, so I'm voting for the establishment candidate instead, even though she is less likely to have my best interests at heart," that does not say good things about the candidate you're voting for. Lesser evil is still evil.

And it completely ignores the fact that Sanders has been consistently polling stronger against Trump than Clinton has.