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2020 Democratic Candidates Tracker Part III

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Cabbage said:
And I don't think that's necessarily the fault of Sanders. Do you think anyone can compromise with someone as obstinate as Mitch McConnell, for example? I don't.
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If Sanders had been successful at builing a nationwide coalition of voters who want the same things he wants, there would be no Mitch McConnell to contend with.
 
Cabbage said:
And I don't think that's necessarily the fault of Sanders. Do you think anyone can compromise with someone as obstinate as Mitch McConnell, for example? I don't.
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I don't think anyone is blaming Sanders for not compromising with McConnell.

I think the point is, Sanders has not been successful at building the kind of voting bloc that can effectively press his policy at the national level.

The abolitionists were never going to compromise with Jefferson Davis. They didn't have to, though, because they were able to grow their movement from an ineffectual minority to a majority that was willing and able to go to war to prevent Davis from getting his way.

I don't know that it's necessarily Bernie's fault that he hasn't been able to accomplish a minority-majority conversion at the national level. But the fact is... He hasn't.
 
Cabbage said:
The eventual winner should ideally have a majority of the voters and delegates hind them before the convention (not just a plurality).
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What do you recommend if that candidate simply does not exist? Sincere question.
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I don't really have an answer or a solution for that.

In a brokered convention, either Sanders wins, or he loses (and probably Biden wins).

If Sanders wins, a good chunk of the moderates will sit out on election day. If Sanders loses, BernieBros will once again complain about how they were robbed. And since BernieBros tend on average tend to be more irrational than other democrats (witness the percentage who said they wouldn't automatically support the eventual winner) the problem would be worse.

The one solution that would minimize the backlash would be to give it to Warren (she'd be slightly more appealing to moderates than Sanders, and might minimize the BernieBros whining "Waaahh! Nobody loves us progressives") But since she's likely to end up a distant 3rd in delegates (even if she makes it to the end) it wouldn't be fair to do so.

Yup.... Democrats are screwed. A field of over a dozen candidates (Many of whom had a decent track record) and they have to gravitate towards 2 senior citizens... one gaff prone, another an aging hippy with heart problems.
 
Cabbage said:
Anyone notice that the more Sanders feels he is certain to win, the more he speaks out about the Democratic Party being 'other', not one of his crowd?
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He has been seen as the other to the Democratic Party and enemy for a while now. Might as well lean into it.
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Uhhh... no. He may end up being the Democratic nominee. He will need all possible resources to battle Trump. Pissing off a good chunk of those resources is not the way to go.
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Yeah, it's OK only if you piss off the good chunk that supports Bernie. :rolleyes:
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First of all, your argument seems to come down to "whataboutism"... "Bernie and supporters were treated bad, so its ok for Bernie to treat others bad". Not exactly an argument that is very smart to make.

Secondly, we aren't talking about some individual posters on some on-line forum. We are talking about the activities of the party leaders. Sanders himself is painting things as an "us or them" in an attack against certain democrats. Maybe I overlooked it, but I don't recall either Hillary (in 2016) or any of the current Democratic front runners claiming that Democrats who support Sanders are somehow "not democrats".
 
Segnosaur said:
I don't really have an answer or a solution for that.

In a brokered convention, either Sanders wins, or he loses (and probably Biden wins).

If Sanders wins, a good chunk of the moderates will sit out on election day. If Sanders loses, BernieBros will once again complain about how they were robbed. And since BernieBros tend on average tend to be more irrational than other democrats (witness the percentage who said they wouldn't automatically support the eventual winner) the problem would be worse.

.
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The thing about the BernieBros, when we are talking about the more unhinged of the Sanders supporters that make a lot of noise and act like morons, not many of them were Democrats in the first place and would have never voted for a Democrat if Sanders weren't involved. Sanders' path to victory was never by traditional party unity. It was crossover appeal.

Consider Reagan in 1980. He ran towards right wing loons and disillusioned labor democrats and won comfortably even though there was a third party candidate (John Anderson) who was a moderate (by 1980 standards) Republican taking 7% of the vote.

Same idea with Sanders. Except the left and, well, that same disillusioned labor demographic.

The concern over Biden shouldn't be losing votes to his left that the Democrats would have never had anyway; it should be losing those disillusioned labor votes the same that Hillary did.
 
Segnosaur said:
First of all, your argument seems to come down to "whataboutism"... "Bernie and supporters were treated bad, so its ok for Bernie to treat others bad". Not exactly an argument that is very smart to make.

Secondly, we aren't talking about some individual posters on some on-line forum. We are talking about the activities of the party leaders. Sanders himself is painting things as an "us or them" in an attack against certain democrats. Maybe I overlooked it, but I don't recall either Hillary (in 2016) or any of the current Democratic front runners claiming that Democrats who support Sanders are somehow "not democrats".
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Bernie is attacking the very people whose help he will need to win in November if he gets the nomination. Not a bright move.
If the Berniebros think they can do what Trump did, basically take over the party and drive the moderates out, they have another thing coming.
 
Crossbow said:
Well it was quite unlikely that someone like Bloomberg would ever support someone like Sanders.

Therefore, for Bloomberg, the obvious choice for his support would be for Biden.

By the way, with all of this sudden Biden support, then I sure do hope that this becomes known as the moment where Trump actually does lose the presidential race.
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I can't see the future, of course, but Biden, with all his flaws,..and he is a long way from being my first choice ... has a much better chance of beating Trump then Sanders does.
 
Look at the bright side - our next President will feel right at home with the rest of the world leaders, like Pierre Trudeau, Silvio Berlusconi and Paul Keating.

Seriously - Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel, heck even Tony Blair won't turn 70 until 3 years into the next POTUS' term.
 
dudalb said:
Bernie is attacking the very people whose help he will need to win in November if he gets the nomination.
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And again this is my biggest issue. It's not even like he doesn't understand that openly insulting and being hostile to the very people he's demanding help him isn't a good idea, it's that he completely understands it's a bad idea but doesn't care because he thinks such piddling human concerns don't apply to him because he has "morals."
 
And this is why Republicans laugh at the Democrats screaming about them being "hypocrites."

"Yeah we support Trump out of one side of our mouth and evangelicals out of the other. That makes us hypocrites. You know what is also makes us? An organization with two morally opposed groups... both on our side."

Meanwhile the Dems are running cause purity tests an anyone who thinks health care and college should be subsidized at 99.99% instead of 100% free and driving them out of the club.
 
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Belz... said:
It's disappointing, is what it is. It's like 2016 didn't happen and the Democrats aren't in need of a fresh, powerful candidate.
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It seems like there's a lot of appetite on both sides of the aisle for a "fresh" candidate. Dunno about "powerful", but as far back as 2008 Democrats were choosing the fresh Obama over the experienced Clinton. Again in 2016, Clinton loses to the fresh Trump (as do all the tired old GOP candidates).

Bernie's message would have been fresh enough, I think, except that he's been around so long it's not actually fresh anymore.

But maybe "fresh" isn't the right word. Williamson and Mayor Pete both seemed pretty fresh, but not fresh enough. Or maybe it's that unlike Obama and Trump, they lack the "powerful" ingredient?
 
Warren is "reassessing" her campaign.
Time to get a betting pool started on how long until she quits. I think she will be gone by Friday.
 
dudalb said:
I can't see the future, of course, but Biden, with all his flaws,..and he is a long way from being my first choice ... has a much better chance of beating Trump then Sanders does.
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Thanks much and I quite agree.

I will most definitely support Biden and I sure hope he kicks Trump's stupid, greedy, lying ass from sea to shining sea. However, I was hoping that a younger person would have got a chance to take on Trump because we already have so many aged leaders (Trump, Pelosi, Sanders, McConnell, Supreme Court Justices, and so on) that we are well over-due for some new leadership.
 
SuburbanTurkey said:
Warren needs to drop out. She's a smart person, she understands quite well that her continued candidacy only weakens the chances that a progressive will secure the nomination.
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When a smart person does something that doesn't make sense to you (like Warren staying in the race despite not having a chance and hurting Bernie), don't assume that they're being stupid. Instead, consider that maybe you don't understand what their actual goal is.

I don't know what Warren's goal is, but it may not be making sure a progressive wins the nomination.
 
theprestige said:
It seems like there's a lot of appetite on both sides of the aisle for a "fresh" candidate. Dunno about "powerful", but as far back as 2008 Democrats were choosing the fresh Obama over the experienced Clinton. Again in 2016, Clinton loses to the fresh Trump (as do all the tired old GOP candidates).

Bernie's message would have been fresh enough, I think, except that he's been around so long it's not actually fresh anymore.

But maybe "fresh" isn't the right word. Williamson and Mayor Pete both seemed pretty fresh, but not fresh enough. Or maybe it's that unlike Obama and Trump, they lack the "powerful" ingredient?
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If Warren were twenty years younger and male I think she'd be unstoppable.
 
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