Support NeoGAF

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

What in the world does this election have to do with Carter-Reagan.

Carter got a massive lead from the rally around the flag effect from the Iran Hostage Crisis and then lost his lead by fucking up the Iran Hostage Crisis.

Hillary vs. Bernie being like Carter vs. Kennedy seems... not at all accurate either.

 

[Macho Madness]

why is the white house on lockdown again

 

[Snowman Prophet of Doom]

"I condemn violent threats against any individual, and I can firmly say that anyone who supports such action completely misunderstands the issues that I'm fighting for. There's no place in this movement for such actions, and I extend my thanks to my supporters who have committed themselves to peacefully participating in the election process. With our combined, loud but calm voices, we can send a message that our revolution is against such threats and against the level of corporatism and influence that the powerful have over the less fortunate."

Boom. This would've been great PR, and I think everyone in this thread would've been pleasantly surprised by his response.

Unfortunately, no one was surprised that his condemnation of death threats got a sentence while his bitching about nothing took up most of the statement. Bad PR for him.

Hey, I never said Bernie was a PR master, but he really doesn't have to be, anymore, because he's not running a presidential campaign, anymore, but the last legs of a message campaign that can't technically acknowledge itself as such because, you know, people would be upset.

 

[Spoiled Milk]

Crab in here like a wrecking ball. Still laughing about Danganronpa, btw! There can be only one.

why is the white house on lockdown again

A guy ran in there with a gun.

 

[User 463088]

Sanders hasn't actually won many red states - only Idaho, Alaska, Wyoming, Utah, Kansas, Oklahoma and West Virginia. Altogether, they're responsible for less than 5% of the total delegate allocation. Him holding that the Southern red states are disproportionately represented and also not complaining about those seven red states is pretty consistent, because those states *don't* have any influence!

I'm sorry to hear about your ears. The NHS has some good advice.

So now population distribution (which plays a role in determining the number of delegates each state gets) is somehow a slight against Bernie Sanders? Red states already receive fewer delegates than they would be entitled to based solely on population. Hillary won the bigger red states, Bernie won the smaller one.

However, you have to admit that the optics alone of him throwing the entire south under the bus while NOT making the same argument about the red states he won was absolutely terrible.

 

[royalan]

Sanders hasn't actually won many red states - only Idaho, Alaska, Wyoming, Utah, Kansas, Oklahoma and West Virginia. Altogether, they're responsible for less than 5% of the total delegate allocation. Him holding that the Southern red states are disproportionately represented and also not complaining about those seven red states is pretty consistent, because those states *don't* have any influence!

I'm sorry to hear about your ears. The NHS has some good advice.

The number doesn't matter. The allocation of delegates does not matter to the argument. Bernie Sanders has won red states, very conservative red states. Point blank, period. And you cannot continue to make the argument that you got wholesale rejected in the south because of that region's conservatism, and then praise your performance in even more conservative states without people wondering what the difference is.

And you can pretend that I'm the only one calling this out if it suits your poorly-formed argument. But I just linked you to a letter sent by that region's party leaders asking Bernie Sanders to cool it with his rhetoric. Several black journalists have called out Bernie Sanders for his rhetoric. That criticism didn't just come out of thin air. I dunno, maybe we're all in Hillary's pocket or something.

 

[sphagnum]

Sanders has definitely dog whistled

Wasn't he giving that speech at a college? I'm pretty sure he just said that as a joke about students being smart. It wasn't meant to be "black people are dumb, you're a white state, you'll vote for me."

 

[pigeon]

If your basic viewpoint is that harassment and threats are obviously wrong, but there was bullshit that happened that people had a right to be mad about in a general kind of sense, how are you supposed to get that across, then?

That is frankly a lousy basic viewpoint, but even leaving that aside, it is clearly not obvious to your supporters that harassment and threats are wrong if they are engaging in harassment and threats!

Saying "well clearly I don't support that" when people who are zealous supporters of you are doing that thing is just winking at it. That is the specific situation where you need to be very explicit and very detailed about your criticism in order to show, not just your critics, but your supporters that you want them to stop doing that thing.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Sanders has definitely dog whistled

To a crowd that contained a large number of Sanders' own minority supporters. Yes, calling your own supporters smart is clearly much dog-whistling, you should obviously call them stupid, how could I not see that?

And regarding the voice votes in Nevada, louder =/= more votes, and voice voting is really unscientific and imprecise anyway. Complaining about that should be "caucuses are dumb" not "corruption"

With voice-voting, the louder side wins. That's the definition of voice-voting. It is bloody stupid, yes, I agree. However, the Sanders side petitioned to change the voting system (I think it was cosigned by some Clinton delegates too, but I'd need to confirm that), but the only person with the authority to accept those changes is Lange, who then turned them down, and then went on to ignore the louder side under voice-voting. That looks something very like corruption to me. (caucuses are dumb, though).

 

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

Everything's going to be fine once Bernie Stans remember that Trump thinks global warming is a conspiracy created by the Chinese.

 

[AntraxSuicide]

Hey, I never said Bernie was a PR master, but he really doesn't have to be, anymore, because he's not running a presidential campaign, anymore, but the last legs of a message campaign that can't technically acknowledge itself as such because, you know, people would be upset.

I simply do not believe that he himself is aware that he's a message candidate. At all. He's running this thing like he's got a legit shot, and he's burning every bridge he can to do it. If he can't condemn violent threats without pivoting to "Fuck the DNC" for even a paragraph, then he deserves his scorn. Certainly no one will care about his message when it's so tainted like this. Several of my friends and I are at the point where we view Ron Paul and his ilk more favorably!

 

[Box of Kittens]

Sanders hasn't actually won many red states - only Idaho, Alaska, Wyoming, Utah, Kansas, Oklahoma and West Virginia. Altogether, they're responsible for less than 5% of the total delegate allocation. Him holding that the Southern red states are disproportionately represented and also not complaining about those seven red states is pretty consistent, because those states *don't* have any influence!

I'm sorry to hear about your ears. The NHS has some good advice.

But saying that Southern red states are disproportionately represented is kind of a troublesome stance. Even though the states themselves may be red, the days of Southern Democrats being more conservative are pretty much over, because those Democrats are now Republicans. Decreasing the influence of Southern states on the primary is effectively decreasing the influence of black Democrats, and there's not really any way around that regardless of one's intentions. More generally, I think the Democratic primary process does a good job of fairly representing the various parts of the Democratic coalition, both geographically and demographically.

 

[JP_]

No matter what happened at the convention, there's absolutely no justification for the threatening voicemails and Sanders should have absolutely condemned them more completely. People can still take issue with how the convention was handled, though.

It's not.
No idea where people keep getting that idea from.

It's not a "who can yell louder" contest.

Voice vote is not a "instead of holding a vote, we just count delegates and presume to know how they'd vote on rules," either.

Voice votes are only used when it's a clear majority -- when it is not absolutely clear which side won, more precise measures are used instead.

The votes up for debate weren't about delegate distribution, but about rules for the convention and as far as I know delegates are free to vote how they like on rules. With 1,693 delegates for Clinton and 1,662 for Sanders, it would have taken less than 1% of Clinton delegates to swing the vote. So even if it was proper to extrapolate votes based on delegate count instead of actually voting, I don't think it's accurate to say the vote was clear. The rules offered the chair a clear way to count votes and she didn't use it. In fact, they did use a more precise way to vote on those rules initially, which seems to suggest they actually did want a proper vote -- they used a ballot the first time around. The issue? On the printed schedule, that vote was scheduled for 10am but they finished counting ballots at 9:30am, before all the delegates were finished registering (and before the vote was supposed to take place according to the schedule). People objected to that (Which is pretty reasonable, no? Hold the vote when it's scheduled so the voters that are meant to vote can actually vote isn't a crazy idea.), resulting in the infamous voice vote.

The Nevada rules give her complete discretion, which is why Politifact correctly determines she didn't break any rules. It's how she used her discretion people take issue with.

 

[Holmes]

Everything's going to be fine once Bernie Stans remember that Trump thinks global warming is a conspiracy created by the Chinese.

This is why I'm hoping for some ~*~unity~*~ among Democrats after the primary. Because I like Sanders a lot more when he's not trying to go for the whole purity thing because he comes across as kind of a dick and I like Clinton more when she's not having to defend herself against friendly fire because she comes across as trying a little too hard for no reason.

 

[Crocodile]

If your basic viewpoint is that harassment and threats are obviously wrong, but there was bullshit that happened that people had a right to be mad about in a general kind of sense, how are you supposed to get that across, then? I guess he could have issued separate statements, but even that would have been received negatively by people of the kind that populate threads like this, so there really would have been no benefit to him to do so. It was basically a no-win situation for him, no matter what he did, so why not just focus on the things he wanted to focus on? He's not messaging to be president, anymore, but messaging to keep the general spirit of his movement - that the status quo is wrong, and is engineered to the benefit of a select few - alive.

Rhetorically? I'm not sure you can.

edit: Again, I don't care about his statement.

If you absolutely, positively have to put them in the same statement, you write it something like this:

"I have some concerns about how the Nevada Democratic convention went down procedurally last weekend but let me be unequivocally clear - there is nothing that happened there or could have happened there that justifies the sort of violence, harassment, doxing, I saw and heard about. I appreciate the passion of my supporters but this is an unacceptable way to express frustration. Anyone who does so clearly doesn't understand my message. I know it is only a small contingent of my supporters but you have brought shame upon your colleagues, my campaign and me. I hope and implore those who have taken such actions will reflect on the errors of their ways, actively try to make amends and never do anything of this sort in the future. I also hope nobody takes inspirations from these actions as well. Regardless of our differences, all parts of the Democratic Party aim for the same goal of empowerment of the downtrodden be they the poor, the middle-class, minorities of all types, etc. Let's discuss our differences peacefully and together come up with a put together a strong lan for America's future!"

Easy-Peasy!

Sanders hasn't actually won many red states - only Idaho, Alaska, Wyoming, Utah, Kansas, Oklahoma and West Virginia. Altogether, they're responsible for less than 5% of the total delegate allocation. Him holding that the Southern red states are disproportionately represented and also not complaining about those seven red states is pretty consistent, because those states *don't* have any influence!

I'm sorry to hear about your ears. The NHS has some good advice.

Are you being obtuse or being mean? There isn't anything to even complain about - calling those states conservative or Red becomes irrelevant because of the "Red" states he has won. It immediately undercuts his argument. It's a dog-whistle (intentional or not) because the primary difference between the "Red" states he has won and the "Red" states he has lost is diversity (Black people especially). When you actually look at the data and what is happening, it reads and sounds like Sanders is shitting on black people. Sanders hasn't won a single mainland state that is as diverse or more diverse than the country as a whole. A Democratic nominee who can't win states with large and diverse populations kind of doesn't deserve to the the Democratic nominee.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

But saying that Southern red states are disproportionately represented is kind of a troublesome stance. Even though the states themselves may be red, the days of Southern Democrats being more conservative are pretty much over, because those Democrats are now Republicans. Decreasing the influence of Southern states on the primary is effectively decreasing the influence of black Democrats, and there's not really any way around that regardless of one's intentions. More generally, I think the Democratic primary process does a good job of fairly representing the various parts of the Democratic coalition, both geographically and demographically.

I actually agree with this. If anything, I think that red states are underrepresented in the Democratic primaries, because you get bonus delegates for having a Democratic governor and the like which for some of the low population blue states mean they get way overrepresented compared to Texas. As far as I'm concerned, a state's proportion of the Democratic vote in the last presidential should be their share of the delegates (or even better, just popular vote, no delegates). I'm just pointing out Sanders isn't dog-whistling.

 

[royalan]

But saying that Southern red states are disproportionately represented is kind of a troublesome stance. Even though the states themselves may be red, the days of Southern Democrats being more conservative are pretty much over, because those Democrats are now Republicans. Decreasing the influence of Southern states on the primary is effectively decreasing the influence of black Democrats, and there's not really any way around that regardless of one's intentions. More generally, I think the Democratic primary process does a good job of fairly representing the various parts of the Democratic coalition, both geographically and demographically.

 

[kirblar]

Sanders has definitely dog whistled



And regarding the voice votes in Nevada, louder =/= more votes, and voice voting is really unscientific and imprecise anyway. Complaining about that should be "caucuses are dumb" not "corruption"

His whole "We see economics, not race" is a gigantic appeal to white racism.

 

[Dorpheus]

This article, for example, points out the video where Lange clearly ignores the much louder vote (and I think objectively we can all agree that she did side with the quieter vote, yes?). Politifact explains this away as "Clinton had more delegates so Lange was right to do this"; which is true, but delegates aren't all bound to vote the same way because this was on an issue for the Nevada State Democratic Party and not anything (directly) to do with the primary. It's not uncommon for cross-candidate votes to occur (for example, many Clinton delegates at the Maine convention joined the Sanders supporters in voting to abolish superdelegates for that state). Given this, overturning a clear voice vote against her is just blatantly wrong; and it set the tone for the entire rest of the event.

This is something I've seen repeated again and again. We can't make this judgement, as video and audio evidence isn't objectively representative of the event, especially when crowds of any size are involved. By it's nature, it's subjectively representative- the only viewpoint you get in any video is based on where the camera and microphone are located, where what direction they're pointed, and what sort of camera and microphone equipment you're using in the first place.

The video tells us nothing about what the actual vocal votes were like. All it tells us is what it sounded like if you had that exact microphone for an ear and were standing in that exact spot. It's extremely unlikely that the noise you hear in any video is what it sounded like where Lange was located.

 

[User 463088]

If you absolutely, positively have to put them in the same statement, you write it something like this:

"I have some concerns about how the Nevada Democratic convention went down procedurally last weekend but let me be unequivocally clear - there is nothing that happened there or could have happened there that justifies the sort of violence, harassment, doxing, I saw and heard about. I appreciate the passion of my supporters but this is an unacceptable way to express frustration. Anyone who does so clearly doesn't understand my message. I know it is only a small contingent of my supporters but you have brought shame upon your colleagues, my campaign and me. I hope and implore those who have taken such actions will reflect on the errors of their ways, actively try to make amends and never do anything of this sort in the future. I also hope nobody takes inspirations from these actions as well. Regardless of our differences, all parts of the Democratic Party aim for the same goal of empowerment of the downtrodden be they the poor, the middle-class, minorities of all types, etc. Let's discuss our differences peacefully and together come up with a put together a strong lan for America's future!"

Easy-Peasy!



Are you being obtuse or being mean? There isn't anything to even complain about - calling those states conservative or Red becomes irrelevant because of the "Red" states he has won. It immediately undercuts his argument. It's a dog-whistle (intentional or not) because the primary difference between the "Red" states he has won and the "Red" states he has lost is diversity (Black people especially). When you actually look at the data and what is happening, it reads and sounds like Sanders is shitting on black people. Sanders hasn't won a single mainland state that is as diverse or more diverse than the country as a whole. A Democratic nominee who can't win states with large and diverse populations kind of doesn't deserve to the the Democratic nominee.

Also, to piggyback onto your point here:

Even if he didn't mean it as a dog whistle (which....I'm not going to comment on that other than to say he knows what he meant and why he said it...) the fact that people DID take offense is enough of a reason to dial it the fuck down.

But, of course, that's not how the Bernie campaign has been. If someone is offended or upset by something they've done, they immediately and unequivocally begin blaming the person who's upset. If they'd just get on Bernie's ideologically pure level, then no one's feelings would be hurt!

 

[JP_]

His whole "We see economics, not race" is a gigantic appeal to white racism.

“When you’re white you don’t know what it’s like to be living in a ghetto, you don’t know what it’s like to be poor,” said Sanders. “You don’t know what it’s like to be hassled when you walk down the street, or dragged out of a car.”

Yeah, white racists loved it when he said that.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Are you being obtuse or being mean? There isn't anything to even complain about - calling those states conservative or Red becomes irrelevant because of the "Red" states he has won. It immediately undercuts his argument. It's a dog-whistle (intentional or not) because the primary difference between the "Red" states he has won and the "Red" states he has lost is diversity (Black people especially). When you actually look at the data and what is happening, it reads and sounds like Sanders is shitting on black people. Sanders hasn't won a single mainland state that is as diverse or more diverse than the country as a whole. A Democratic nominee who can't win states with large and diverse populations kind of doesn't deserve to the the Democratic nominee.

The letter from the Southern Democrats mostly referred to Sanders' statements in the interview with Larry Wilmore. Sanders said:

“I think that having so many Southern states go first kind of distorts reality,” Sanders replied, saying he performs better in more "progressive" parts of the country.

This is a true statement. If you plot "state Republican vote in presidential election" against "Clinton success", the correlation is significant. Of course, Sanders has also won some red states, yes. But *typically* he has done less well in them, and he has highlighted the conservatism of these states as an explanation for that.

Now, he's not right. He's losing red states he did lose because many red states have a relatively high black population and because he has poor name recognition among black Americans and doesn't have the background of Clinton; if you plot "black population" against "Clinton success", the correlation is even more significant. But he's not going to say that live on air: it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy if you say "I can't appeal to X demographic" - Sanders obviously wants to appeal to minority voters, which is why he's put out such a comprehensive minority rights program and reached out to activists like Erica Garner. So he does as best he can, and offers another explanation, which is at face value plausible and in no way at all blames black voters.

That's not, in the slightest, dog-whistling, and everyone trying to arguing it is in this thread is both demeaning themselves and making the prospect of party unity less likely.

 

[Andrin]

To a crowd that contained a large number of Sanders' own minority supporters. Yes, calling your own supporters smart is clearly much dog-whistling, you should obviously call them stupid, how could I not see that?

He said that during a rally immediately after Hillary beat him by a landslide in South Carolina. And he made no acknowledgements toward that fact during the entire speech. No congratulations to Hillary for winning, no gratitude towards his campaigners in SC for their job, nothing. His silence on that combined with the comments about people being "too smart" to not vote for him in a solid blue state that has a sizeable white majority spoke volumes, intentional or not.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

This is something I've seen repeated again and again. We can't make this judgement, as video and audio evidence isn't objectively representative of the event, especially when crowds of any size are involved. By it's nature, it's subjectively representative- the only viewpoint you get in any video is based on where the camera and microphone are located, where what direction they're pointed, and what sort of camera and microphone equipment you're using in the first place.

The video tells us nothing about what the actual vocal votes were like. All it tells us is what it sounded like if you had that exact microphone for an ear and were standing in that exact spot. It's extremely unlikely that the noise you hear in any video is what it sounded like where Lange was located.

So, there's a wide array of these videos from various different positions in the hall which broadly corroborate each other, but even if this was true, it begs the question as to why Lange didn't accept moving to paper ballot in the first place to avoid the possibility of this occurring.

 

[aspiegamer]

This was obviously not the only issue that came up, but even if had been, she is still bound to go with the louder vote. That is how voice-voting works, and that was what was agreed upon prior to the event.

No. That is not how it works. Voice voting is based on the (unreasonable and entirely theoretical) principle that everyone makes an equal amount of noise when they say "yea" or "nay." Especially not bound to that.

I know there's already been a pile-on for this, but I wanted to comment as well because of how blatantly ignorant it is and a PERFECT example of how some Sanders supporters don't understand this process. Using it as an attack line is even more preposterous. It is not a competition of who is loudest. That's not democracy, christ. How is that in any way democracy? Who can scream louder? You think our country was in part founded on the principle that the people who yell louder should get whatever they want? How about the Sanders supporters who are screaming "FRAUD!" in other states? Why are their complaints valid? Those were actual vote number counts. Should Sanders' votes count extra per person because, like, you know that deep down they're totally yelling and screaming while casting their ballot?

And, ooooooh, let's just say the fact-checkers are wrong! How original. Objective analysis? Biased! Who screams louder? Democracy! ...Come on now. A "revolution" is the who is screaming louder but also is the majority of the population who do the same. A minority screaming and demanding things versus a majority who is completely content and feels no need to scream is a hijacking.

Voice votes are only used when it's a clear majority -- when it is not absolutely clear which side won, more precise measures are used instead.

This is an extremely accurate statement. The chair is able to process whether one area screaming louder and give an actual quantitative analysis of the results.

It's pretty easy for a chair to tell whether or not a voice vote hits 2/3s.

There's also this. 2/3rds of the entire floor is an easy call.

Now, he's not right. He's losing red states he did lose because many red states have a relatively high black population and because he has poor name recognition among black Americans.

You're literally blaming the minorities for being ignorant.

 

[theprodigy]

I actually agree with this. If anything, I think that red states are underrepresented in the Democratic primaries, because you get bonus delegates for having a Democratic governor and the like which for some of the low population blue states mean they get way overrepresented compared to Texas. As far as I'm concerned, a state's proportion of the Democratic vote in the last presidential should be their share of the delegates (or even better, just popular vote, no delegates). I'm just pointing out Sanders isn't dog-whistling.

You're thinking of the Republicans, actually.

For the Democrats, delegates are allocated based on two factors which are weighed equally:
1. number of electoral votes in the current year (somehow The Green Papers missed this and used an average of the past 3 cycles, lol)
2. number of votes the Democratic nominee received in the last 3 elections

So red states are somewhat over-represented relative to the number of Democrats in those states...but not by much, and there's an argument to be made that those in red states do deserve more representation (and blue states tending to go later on the cycle and getting bonus delegates for doing so kind of negates this anyway).

 

[User 463088]

That's not, in the slightest, dog-whistling, and everyone trying to arguing it is in this thread is both demeaning themselves and making the prospect of party unity less likely.

Maybe don't try and explain away the way some people, many people of the people of color, felt by the words Bernie elected to use.

We don't get to tell other people what they should or shouldn't be offended by, mate.

 

[metalslimer]

If its not dog whistling, it's complete and utter stupidity

 

[Jack Remington]

Oh well I could also add that his campaign has caused a lot of left leaning media outlets to go fucking insane expose themselves as about as intellectually bankrupt as Fox News (I'm looking at you Cenk and TYT) but that's not actually his fault.

I'm glad this happened. I had a problem with Salon for a long time, and now a lot of my friends are starting to agree with me.

 

[Armaros]

To a crowd that contained a large number of Sanders' own minority supporters. Yes, calling your own supporters smart is clearly much dog-whistling, you should obviously call them stupid, how could I not see that?



With voice-voting, the louder side wins. That's the definition of voice-voting. It is bloody stupid, yes, I agree. However, the Sanders side petitioned to change the voting system (I think it was cosigned by some Clinton delegates too, but I'd need to confirm that), but the only person with the authority to accept those changes is Lange, who then turned them down, and then went on to ignore the louder side under voice-voting. That looks something very like corruption to me. (caucuses are dumb, though).

He said that just after being completely blown out of the park in SC. What's the main difference been Minnesota and SC democrats?

 

[Holmes]

"Black people aren't voting for Sanders because of low name recognition" is probably my least favorite meme of this election so far. Why not just get on with it and call them low information? The primaries have been going on for over 3 months, and they've been paying attention. She still get 75%+ of the black vote in every state.

 

[Spoiled Milk]

Crab's right on this one! People in this thread are just blinded by seething hatred for Bernie Sanders. One time he said that frontloading the primaries with Southern states distorts reality. That's true. Give the guy a break.

 

[Armaros]

Crab's right on this one! People in this thread are just blinded by seething hatred for Bernie Sanders. One time he said that frontloading the primaries with Southern states distorts reality. That's true. Give the guy a break.

So does NH and Iowa. Two of the whitest states in the nationx

 

[kirblar]

“When you’re white you don’t know what it’s like to be living in a ghetto, you don’t know what it’s like to be poor,” said Sanders. “You don’t know what it’s like to be hassled when you walk down the street, or dragged out of a car.”

Yeah, white racists loved it when he said that.

"When you’re white ......you don’t know what it’s like to be poor"

Think about the implications of this phrasing.

 

[AntraxSuicide]

You're literally blaming the minorities for being ignorant.

"Black people aren't voting for Sanders because of low name recognition" is probably my least favorite meme of this election so far. Why not just get on with it and call them low information? The primaries have been going on for over 3 months, and they've been paying attention. She still get 75%+ of the black vote in every state.

Yeah, people seriously don't get it. Black people know who Sanders is. They just don't prefer him by a wide margin. Stop with the low-information garbage.

 

[JP_]

This is an extremely accurate statement. The chair is able to process whether one area screaming louder and give an actual quantitative analysis of the results.

Somehow I think it'd be hard to determine the difference of 16 or so votes when the room was that loud. Yes, that's all it would take to swing that vote. When it's that close, a voice vote is useless and I think it's completely reasonable to suggest she should have opted for a rising vote or another ballot vote to get an actual vote count.

There's also this. 2/3rds of the entire floor is an easy call.

Nope. Two thirds is required for an amendment, but the vote in question was a simple majority.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

No. That is not how it works. Voice voting is based on the (unreasonable and entirely theoretical) principle that everyone makes an equal amount of noise when they say "yea" or "nay." Especially not bound to that.

I know there's already been a pile-on for this, but I wanted to comment as well because of how blatantly ignorant it is and a PERFECT example of how some Sanders supporters don't understand this process. Using it as an attack line is even more preposterous. It is not a competition of who is loudest. That's not democracy, christ. How is that in any way democracy? Who can scream louder? You think our country was in part founded on the principle that the people who yell louder should get whatever they want? How about the Sanders supporters who are screaming "FRAUD!" in other states? Why are their complaints valid? Those were actual vote number counts. Should Sanders' votes count extra per person because, like, you know that deep down they're totally yelling and screaming while casting their ballot?

Yes, voice-voting is based on the premise that everyone makes an equal amount of noise. Given this, if a greater number of people back one option, it will have more noise. Now, this premise is obviously often wrong. This is why voice-voting is a terrible system, and should never be used. However, if you are going to use voice-voting, which was Roberta Lange's decision and nobody else's, you can't just reject this premise. You can't say "well, I guess X group of voters is just shouting louder, and Y group of voters actually won"; because you have no way of determining that objectively. If you reject that premise, you are, bluntly, just saying that you can do whatever the fuck you want. Someone votes something you don't like? Oh, golly gosh, they were actually less of them, guess we won after all!

I hate voice-voting. I don't think it should have been used. But given she chose to use it... she has to stick with it. That's how procedural justice works.

And, ooooooh, let's just say the fact-checkers are wrong! How original. Objective analysis? Biased! Who screams louder? Democracy! ...Come on now. A "revolution" is the who is screaming louder but also is the majority of the population who do the same. A minority screaming and demanding things versus a majority who is completely content and feels no need to scream is a hijacking.This is an extremely accurate statement. The chair is able to process whether one area screaming louder and give an actual quantitative analysis of the results.

Fact-checkers often are wrong. I've cited an argument as to why in this specific occasion they're wrong. Rather than just repeating "fact-checker, must be right!", you could do me the basic courtesy of establishing exactly which points I've made are incorrect, which you largely have failed to do.

There's also this. 2/3rds of the entire floor is an easy call.

That vote was not a two-thirds vote. It was a majority accession vote under section VII.c of the constitution of the Nevada Democratic Party, available online. 2/3rds is for amendments after accession; the whole point was that some delegates (mostly Sanders voters, but likely any Clinton voters with any basic democratic fibre which thankfully is a fair few) were trying to prevent accession.

You're literally blaming the minorities for being ignorant.

No. I'm blaming decades of systematic racism that have tried to keep black Americans out of the political system by denying them economic security, information, and means of political mobilization.

 

[Armaros]

So minorities are so downtrodden they can't even truly know the second person running for the Democrstic nomination and that's why Bernie is losing among minorities, not that they are rejecting Bernie.

Even this late in the campagin.

 

[Deleted member 231381]

You're thinking of the Republicans, actually.

For the Democrats, delegates are allocated based on two factors which are weighed equally:
1. number of electoral votes in the current year (somehow The Green Papers missed this and used an average of the past 3 cycles, lol)
2. number of votes the Democratic nominee received in the last 3 elections

So red states are somewhat over-represented relative to the number of Democrats in those states...but not by much, and there's an argument to be made that those in red states do deserve more representation (and blue states tending to go later on the cycle and getting bonus delegates for doing so kind of negates this anyway).

No, Democrats do also have bonus delegates for Democratic states because governors and so on are superdelegates. It's not as big a disparity as the Republicans which is IIRC an extra three(?) delegates for being a Republican state, but it is still there. You can't win those delegates in the Democratic primaries given that they're superdelegates, but they still officially represent their state.

 

[royalan]

The letter from the Southern Democrats mostly referred to Sanders' statements in the interview with Larry Wilmore. Sanders said:



This is a true statement. If you plot "state Republican vote in presidential election" against "Clinton success", the correlation is significant. Of course, Sanders has also won some red states, yes. But *typically* he has done less well in them, and he has highlighted the conservatism of these states as an explanation for that.

Now, he's not right. He's losing red states he did lose because many red states have a relatively high black population and because he has poor name recognition among black Americans and doesn't have the background of Clinton; if you plot "black population" against "Clinton success", the correlation is even more significant. But he's not going to say that live on air: it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy if you say "I can't appeal to X demographic" - Sanders obviously wants to appeal to minority voters, which is why he's put out such a comprehensive minority rights program and reached out to activists like Erica Garner. So he does as best he can, and offers another explanation, which is at face value plausible and in no way at all blames black voters.

That's not, in the slightest, dog-whistling, and everyone trying to arguing it is in this thread is both demeaning themselves and making the prospect of party unity less likely.

1) I don't think it's unimportant that his comprehensive minority rights program only really materialized after Black Lives Matter stormed his stage and directly confronted him at multiple events. Nor did he seem to care about it enough to modulate his message and approach when it came to appealing directly to those voters.

2) "But he's not going to say that live on air" is not an excuse for his blatant dog-whistling. Sure, he has poor name-recognition among black people and he doesn't have the reach of Hillary Clinton (I'd argue all of these things are his own fault, but that's neither here nor there), and these may not be things he wants to publicly admit while competing against her. The point is there are plenty of ways he could address his deficiency with minority voters that doesn't lead to what many, many people have questioned as dog-whistle rhetoric. You can address your poor performance with certain segments of the electorate without maligning that group. This was a reality Hillary herself had to face early in the race when confronted about her poor performance with young voters. "Well, young people may not be for me. But I'm going to be for them." Boom. Easy. And I'll point out that every time Hillary has veered from that message and into a tone that is even slightly dismissive of young voters, she and her campaign have been rightly called out. Bernie doubles down.

 

[User 463088]

Crab's right on this one! People in this thread are just blinded by seething hatred for Bernie Sanders. One time he said that frontloading the primaries with Southern states distorts reality. That's true. Give the guy a break.

He's not right on this. And it wasn't a one time thing Bernie said. he doubled down on it at the debate as well.

SANDERS: Look, let me acknowledge what is absolutely true. Secretary Clinton cleaned our clock in the Deep South. No question about it. We got murdered there. That is the most conservative part of this great country. That’s the fact.

But you know what? We’re out of the Deep South now. And we’re moving up. We got here. We’re going to California. We got a number of large states there. And having won seven out of the last eight caucuses and primaries, having a level of excitement and energy among working people and low-income people doing better against Donald Trump and the other Republicans in poll after poll than Secretary Clinton is, yeah, I believe that we’re going to win this nomination, and I believe we’re going to obliterate Donald Trump or whoever the Republican candidate is.

And, when he was going on about winning 7 of the last 8...4 of those were "Red States"

Also, Bernie hasn't won a single state worth more than 16 electoral votes. The biggest swing state he won was Colorado worth 9 EV.

 

[JP_]

So minorities are so downtrodden they can't even truly know the second person running for the Democrstic nomination and that's why Bernie is losing among minorities, not that they are rejecting Bernie.

Even this late in the campagin.

He's only losing against older minorities. I'd love to see a discussion on why that might be the case.

This somewhat goes against the narrative I see on GAF where everybody supporting Sanders is an uneducated closet racist white guy. http://www.gallup.com/poll/191465/millennials-sanders-dislike-election-process.aspx

Among people aged 20-36, Sanders has higher favorability among basically every demographic. Not just men, women too. Not just whites, but also blacks and hispanics. Not just people with little education -- Sanders does better on all levels of education. Moderate or liberal, doesn't matter, young people prefer Sanders across the board.

 

[The Technomancer]

I mean, its almost certainly true that people are less familiar with Sanders than Clinton. But that includes just as great a proportion of white people

 

[Dorpheus]

So, there's a wide array of these videos from various different positions in the hall which broadly corroborate each other, but even if this was true, it begs the question as to why Lange didn't accept moving to paper ballot in the first place to avoid the possibility of this occurring.

These videos are largely from Sanders supporters, who would naturally be grouped together. Capturing accurate audio is a complicated matter, especially with the quality of microphone most cell phones have. In my experience with audio recording this is extremely unlikely to be truly representative.

The latter is something that was absolutely a bad decision on Lange's part- the primary had already become too heated to risk the optics of this whole situation. Everyone looks bad here. Most people only focus on the wrongs that "the other side" committed. It's a shame, as we're all progressives trying to make our country a better place to live.

There's clearly a need for better organized primaries, even if it is still reflecting the will of the people.

 

[theprodigy]

No, Democrats do also have bonus delegates for Democratic states because governors and so on are superdelegates. It's not as big a disparity as the Republicans which is IIRC an extra three(?) delegates for being a Republican state, but it is still there. You can't win those delegates in the Democratic primaries given that they're superdelegates, but they still officially represent their state.

Well yes, but I'm looking at the pledged delegates for this given that superdelegates end up following the pledged delegate leader anyway.

And even if we did count them, I don't think it's enough to counteract the fact that half the base formula favors red states.

 

[Armaros]

He's only losing against older minorities. I'd love to see a discussion on why that might be the case.

He is losing among the post-college educated, the very poor and the older.

And this is in votes, the only real poll that matters in thisnprimary. She won all of those in places like NY.

 

[Tamanon]

He's only losing against older minorities. I'd love to see a discussion on why that might be the case.

Keep in mind, that's just favorability ratings, not direct support ratings or election results.

 

[AntraxSuicide]

So minorities are so downtrodden they can't even truly know the second person running for the Democrstic nomination and that's why Bernie is losing among minorities, not that they are rejecting Bernie.

Even this late in the campagin.

Yeah, Crab, you're literally doubling-down on "minorities are low information." You blame the system for that, but it's still calling them dumb. This is blatantly false, and insulting as hell.

He's only losing against older minorities. I'd love to see a discussion on why that might be the case.

Favorability isn't votes. I used to view Sanders favorably, and would probably still say so if polled, but I would never have voted for him. He still lost young black voters in several states, just by smaller margins.

 

[Spoiled Milk]

Black voters know who Bernie Sanders is but they have KNOWN the Clintons for decades. 66% of Americans thought race relations were positive at the end of the Clinton presidency. It has dipped below 50%. They remember Bill Clinton. And Hillary doing all the right moves has maintained it but yes, there is definitely name recognition of the Clinton family. Stop denying this statement!

What is even the point of this whole worthless discussion? To try to snag Sanders for dog whistling? Do you all seriously believe that?

 

[Crocodile]

I see we have a thread in OT about "mansplaining". What's the racial equivalent? Because we got some of that going on in here.

The letter from the Southern Democrats mostly referred to Sanders' statements in the interview with Larry Wilmore. Sanders said:

This is a true statement. If you plot "state Republican vote in presidential election" against "Clinton success", the correlation is significant. Of course, Sanders has also won some red states, yes. But *typically* he has done less well in them, and he has highlighted the conservatism of these states as an explanation for that.

Now, he's not right. He's losing red states he did lose because many red states have a relatively high black population and because he has poor name recognition among black Americans and doesn't have the background of Clinton; if you plot "black population" against "Clinton success", the correlation is even more significant. But he's not going to say that live on air: it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy if you say "I can't appeal to X demographic" - Sanders obviously wants to appeal to minority voters, which is why he's put out such a comprehensive minority rights program and reached out to activists like Erica Garner. So he does as best he can, and offers another explanation, which is at face value plausible and in no way at all blames black voters.

That's not, in the slightest, dog-whistling, and everyone trying to arguing it is in this thread is both demeaning themselves and making the prospect of party unity less likely.

A) I know what argument he made. The fact that it crumbles under the least amount of scrutiny means its a shit argument not worth acknowledging. If you understand the real reason why he lost in those states then you should understand why shitting on those states is a bad look.

B) Why is it always our fucking fault for being idiots and never Sanders fault for never engaging in the Black community before his run, even in his home state if the Vermont State leaders are correct, or choosing the worst Black surrogates possible or having a campaign message that is so laser focused for so much of the time on economics above all else or wanting to primary or move away from the policies (in spirit at least) of the SUPER POPULAR among Black people sitting president, etc? Adults take responsibility for their shortcoming - why is Sanders so bad at doing so? Even if you want to argue "he has to spin it because he's losing" he's doing a bad job at spinning because he keeps stepping on toes when he does it.

C) I legit don't think I have enough roll-eyes gifs for the last sentence.........

Crab's right on this one! People in this thread are just blinded by seething hatred for Bernie Sanders. One time he said that frontloading the primaries with Southern states distorts reality. That's true. Give the guy a break.

If he said it once and then backtracked that would be one thing. He has said it multiple times and never taken it back (to my knowledge).

He's only losing against older minorities. I'd love to see a discussion on why that might be the case.

I could have sworn we went over how those are favorability ratings and not support or votes when you brought that up last time.