The question is that due to Bernie or Trump being a dumpster fire of a dumbass. Hold a gun to my head and I'd say the latter.
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PoliGAF 2017 |OT3| 13 Treasons Why
- Thread starter RustyNails
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The question is that due to Bernie or Trump being a dumpster fire of a dumbass. Hold a gun to my head and I'd say the latter.
First 100 hours is a great gimmick for this. $15 minimum wage, required tax return disclosure + some kind of ethics/nepotism law, and some kind of Medicare for all proposal would all be easy to posture around.
But can all of that be attributed to him? Or the giant tire fire that is the Trump Administration?
I mean, looking at around, I don't see a lot of candidates these days crediting Bernie Sanders. But a lot are talking about how the threat of Trump has energized the base.
We had a unique election where both were incredibly unpopular. The lesson isn't "popularity doesn't matter and we should go with less popular people on purpose," the lesson is "voting against the other candidate is still enough to get a lot of people out to the polls"
The primaries were a different beast. On the left, it was one of THE most well known politicians against a nobody. On the right, it was a guy that managed to capture all the news cycles and unleash a latent-ish white nationalism that the GOP had tried to pretend they hadn't created.
Abinash117
Member
I think this is pretty spot on, reminds of this article( which is part of a book).
http://www.matthewg.org/ideologicalrepublicans.pdf
whyamihere
Banned
Sure. But like, it's still an odd thing to say? These candidates did better than Hillary did, %-wise. They might have lost (and not all of them?), but. They're making gains in the demographics that we'd need to make gains in to win back some of the Obama coalition from 12. I don't see what the problem is.
I think it can both, but that wasn't the argument you were making. It's a weird attack.
Basileus777
Member
Trump is almost certainly a bigger factor, but it's still poor reasoning to use those races as an attack on Bernie. Unless you have a preconception and are looking for excuses to validate it.
Avon Barksdale
Member
I have no regrets supporting and voting for Hillary Clinton.
whyamihere
Banned
I mean, I would hope if you went back in time, you wouldn't do it again, given how we know how this timeline ends up.
Bonen no Max'd
Banned
Fun fact: both of the flipped state legislative seats were Bernie people.
Likewise. I wish she hadn't have run, but I don't regret voting for her, given the options.
They're also both Bernie Country (Northeast, non-urban) if I'm not mistaken?
Same.
jack_package_200
Banned
Guess which dem voted nay
#soprogressive
whyamihere
Banned
I can't even see the image and I'm going to assume it's Tulsi.
omg you and your purity tests
The lesson I take from last year isn't "let's go with the most unpopular on purpose," that would obviously be silly. But the beginning and ending of this conversation isn't a politician's favorability numbers. Believing that is the same thing that had a lot of Bernie voters scratching their heads last year wondering why Hillary Clinton was kicking his ass in state after state. B-but, nobody likes her!
Trump had impossibly low favorables for a winner, but that didn't matter because he correctly predicted the oncoming white backlash and rode that wave to victory. External factors will always matter more than how somebody polls.
whyamihere
Banned
Well, because Hillary had better/even favorables for Dem voters. Most Democrats liked Hillary! She did better with Democrats, so it's not actual surprise that she won the Democratic nomination fair and square.
Sucked about everyone else though.
VendettaRed07
Member
Putting the blame on Obama for Hillary's loss is honestly completely ridiculous.
He did everything you could ask an outgoing president to do for another candidate and more.
If Obama has any regrets it likely isn't doing enough to help Hillary win.. it would have been making her SoS to begin with. I think in hindsight he would have just elevated someone else or given the job to Kerry right away.
She can talk now if she wants but less internal blame game would be nice. Some accountability would be appreciated. Blame Russia or Comey even but stay back from throwing Obama under the bus.
He did everything you could ask an outgoing president to do for another candidate and more.
If Obama has any regrets it likely isn't doing enough to help Hillary win.. it would have been making her SoS to begin with. I think in hindsight he would have just elevated someone else or given the job to Kerry right away.
She can talk now if she wants but less internal blame game would be nice. Some accountability would be appreciated. Blame Russia or Comey even but stay back from throwing Obama under the bus.
I feel like I should point out that voters in Montana apparently said they voted R because of Bernie's endorsement.
More likely than not it's Trump's stupidity that's affecting these races, there's not enough data to say it's Bernie.
Autodidact
Banned
Speaking of Tulsi, have there been any rumors about primary challengers? I hate seeing such a safe seat occupied by such a conservative Dem.
whyamihere
Banned
I'm more talking about how weird it is to say, Bernie's people aren't winning these voters!!! When 1) They are? 2) Even if they're losing, they're doing better %-wise than Hillary did. It's an odd complaint.
shinra-bansho
Member
Nothing is ever fair to Bernie.
Also why would I list the seemingly altruistic and party building things that the bitch eating crackers is doing. That's silly.
Also why would I list the seemingly altruistic and party building things that the bitch eating crackers is doing. That's silly.
I feel the same way and I think this is important thing people ignore in this discussion. Sanders may be more popular than actual democrats in the party but there are serious signs that he's unable (or unwilling) to turn it into victories for the party at large. And frankly, to me, that's all that matters right now. This isn't Dragon Ball and Sanders isn't Goku come to save the day after everyone else gets knocked down. I don't give a shit what his powerlevel is.
jack_package_200
Banned
It would be an ideal target for something like the Justice Dems to go after.
whyamihere
Banned
I mean, I literally listed the things that Hillary is doing that I'm happy with, so if this is about me, I'm confused.
I, at least, am not doing that.
I blame Obama for two things:
a) The DNC falling into disrepair. This is not controversial
b) Helping clear the path for Hillary to avoid a contested nomination, which opened the door for the High Sanders.
Bonen no Max'd
Banned
The New York one was in the NYC metro, idk about New Hampshire.
jack_package_200
Banned
This is a big one. DWS was an amazingly poor fit for DNC chair and they should not have dropped Dean's 50 state strategy
whyamihere
Banned
NYC was Long Island, New Hampshire was exurban town.
If an issue you have with 2016 is that Obama cleared the field which lead to the unfortunate rise (which you imply?) of Sanders, I feel like you're learning the wrong lessons from 2016.
I don't regret voting for Hillary, either. She wasn't an Obama, but I truly believe that she was the best Democrats could put up in 2016.
I honestly don't think Bernie would have won. The demographics he couldn't pull together in the primaries wouldn't have come together in the general in greater numbers than they did for Hillary. And I don't think his message would have been more attractive to the Independents that ended up swinging R.
Also, he writes rape fanfiction. To this day I still cringe thinking about what Republicans would have done with that.
I honestly don't think Bernie would have won. The demographics he couldn't pull together in the primaries wouldn't have come together in the general in greater numbers than they did for Hillary. And I don't think his message would have been more attractive to the Independents that ended up swinging R.
Also, he writes rape fanfiction. To this day I still cringe thinking about what Republicans would have done with that.
shinra-bansho
Member
Not everything is about you. Sometimes it's just general snark.
Also the Resistance is a dumb buzzword.
The left would be better at branding if all the soulless marketers weren't Republicans.
Also the Resistance is a dumb buzzword.
The left would be better at branding if all the soulless marketers weren't Republicans.
whyamihere
Banned
who has actually said in this discussion that Bernie would've won.
Sometimes it's hard to tell without quoting. And no, I don't think everything is about me, but that seemed pointed towards someone.
Sometimes it's hard to tell without quoting. And no, I don't think everything is about me, but that seemed pointed towards someone.
Bonen no Max'd
Banned
woah it's getting dirtbag left in here
VendettaRed07
Member
That's what I gathered from Hillary's statement and it just annoyed me.
I agree with both of these things. He did make mistakes there. But seriously whatever Obama did wrong pales in comparison to the things the Clinton's have done that no one else made them do that platooned their image and popularity
whyamihere
Banned
Resistance is dumb but that's what we're going with and it's stupid.
Basileus777
Member
A Bernie that could have beaten Clinton could have won, but that wasn't the reality we ever lived in. It's kind of a pointless hypothetical given that he would have had to have been a much better candidate to even get the nomination.
For all the talk of clearing the field, I don't know that anyone would have beaten Hillary in any scenario.
shinra-bansho
Member
I don't know who that is, and I don't care to find out.
whyamihere
Banned
I think a bigger field would've been messier, and could've ended up with scenarios that wouldn't necessarily happen in a 1v1 environment. But who knows. I ain't no psychic.
Basileus777
Member
Huh? People attacked the DLC and triangulation for many many years. Bill Clinton didn't get off blame free when Gore lost either.
No regrets. Would do it again in a heartbeat but I'd tell her in 2009 to use state email and ditch the wall street speeches once leaving office
Democrats have lost over 900 legislative seats under the Obama administration.
Now, that's not all his fault. But his neglect of the party itself definitely played a role, and that's more harm than Hillary Clinton has done or could ever do.
Host Samurai
Member
Hypothetically, if Bernie won, he would be obstructed by the GOP for every move till at least 2018 and would most likely be a 2 termer.
Honest question: how much of that job rests on the president? I feel like the president is busy being president.
The Resistance is so "even Hogwarts fell" stupid I can't believe it stuck.
Its awful. Oh well.
Yes, I believe Sanders to be like an unwanted algae bloom. By having a coronation instead of an actual contested primary it left a lot of unused oxygen open which allowed the Sanders phenomenon to occur to the degree it did, which was far, far worse than having team players from within the party rising up and challenging (and possibly beating) her.
There were a lot of other candidates who would have been better than Hillary! None of them were in the race.
Party management is part of the job description. He chose to try and consolidate power and resources in OFA instead of within the party.
Megan McArdle's pre-election take of "The best outcome for Dems as a party long term is for Hillary Clinton to lose, because even though it's going to suck, it's going to suck less than having a competent Republican sweep in 2020" is looking really, really prescient right now.
neurosisxeno
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