By Gaius Publius, a professional writer living on the West Coast of the United States and frequent contributor to DownWithTyranny, digby, Truthout, and Naked Capitalism. Follow him on Twitter @Gaius_Publius, Tumblr and Facebook. Originally published at at Down With Tyranny. GP article here.
That’s not my headline at the top of this piece; it’s the Washington Post’s. The piece I’m about to quote tries to make a couple of points, one of which is that Clinton has now basically won the nomination with a lead that in “all likelihood” will be “insurmountable.” We’ll see about that after the last person votes — in June. Quoting Yogi Berra, the game isn’t over till it’s over. (For my take below on how Sanders wins, click here.)
But I’d like to look at the article’s other point, since the writer says something obvious to everyone in DC, but which no one says out loud. The Clinton campaign whether it succeeds or fails, is limping, and if it weren’t for its large early Deep South lead, in states no Democrat will win, she’d be losing to Sanders today. If you subtract the Deep South pledged delegates from both of their totals, Clinton is losing and Sanders is winning.
Not only that. Her overall lead is declining. Sanders will cut her current lead in half or better before this is over, if he doesn’t overtake her completely.
Clinton Has Gone From 30 Points Up to a Virtual Tie with 40% of the Contest Remaining
Now Dan Balz, who writes (my emphasis):
[H]er unexpectedly difficult nomination battle has taken a significant toll on her candidacy.
The damage to Clinton from her battle with Sanders is borne out in the latest NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll. The longer this race has gone on, the more she has shown vulnerabilities. The top-line number that caught the eyes of so many analysts shows her now in a dead heat with Sanders nationally — ahead of him by just two percentage points, 50 to 48 percent. [But see the Reuters poll at the top.]
Those numbers have no influence on the state-by-state results but offer a window into both the success of Sanders in generating enthusiasm and Clinton’s inability to capitalize on all her political advantages. Since October, when her candidacy began rising again after several months of controversy about her use of a private email server, she has been on a downward slide. Her lead over the senator from Vermont has dropped from what was then a 31-point advantage to the current two points.
Meanwhile, her negative ratings have been rising and now outweigh her positives by 24 points, according to the NBC-Wall Street Journal poll. That makes her seen no more favorably than Cruz is. Her only salvation is that Trump’s net negative is minus 41. Sanders, meanwhile, has a net positive of nine points — although it’s fair to say that one reason for that is that he has received far less in the way of attacks from Republicans or scrutiny from the media than Clinton has. [This last is standard Clinton camp spin; conventional explanation until shown otherwise]
Clinton’s image is at or near record lows among major demographic groups. Among men, she is at minus 40. Among women, she is at minus nine. Among whites, she is at minus 39. Among white women, she is at minus 25. Among white men, she is at minus 72. Her favorability among whites at this point in the election cycle is worse than President Obama’s ever has been, according to Bill McInturff, a Republican pollster who conducted the NBC-Wall Street Journal poll with Democratic pollster Peter Hart.
Minority voters have been the linchpin of Clinton’s nomination strategy and were a key to her success in New York. Among African Americans nationally, the NBC-Wall Street Journal poll shows her with a net positive of 51 points. But that’s down 13 points from her first-quarter average and is about at her lowest ever. Among Latinos, her net positive is just two points, down from plus 21 points during the first quarter.
Reince Priebus earlier described the Clinton candidacy as “in the ditch“:
“Much more comfortable [running against Clinton] and I think everyone that has analyzed this knows that Hillary Clinton is in the ditch. We don’t know how far in the ditch she’s going to go but she’s not doing well. She’s not even winning,” Priebus said.
“Not even winning” is an obvious reference to her decline in all national polls against Sanders. Priebus may be a Republican and no Clinton fan, but here he’s just echoing what everyone else in DC knows — “her image is underwater” and the campaign is “in the ditch.”
Bottom line — Sanders will almost certainly make sure that every state votes. If a frustrated and angry Hillary Clinton (and her harshest surrogates) go even more negative, she’ll drag her down own unfavorables even further, making Sanders’ case for him that he should be the candidate in November. Her favorability rating is minus-24 now, and Trump’s is minus-41, proving there’s room to the downside.
This isn’t about wishing for her failure. But it is about looking at the trends and seeing what they imply about the national situation in July. If that poll at the top of this post, and others like them, start showing separation, with Sanders trending up to +10% or more, and if Sanders fundraising continues to soar — watch out.
At that point, Sanders won’t have to tell the Democratic Party to “nominate Bernie.” He won’t have to say a word. The whole of the non-Republican country will say it for him: “Are you really going to nominate the least electable candidate?” And then what will happen? (Hint: If the in-the-tank superdelegates nominate Clinton anyway, the result is on them, and you can say so as often as you like.)
Interesting times, yes?
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How long will we have to wait for the Clintonites to howl that Bernie’s mere competition with Hillary “brought her down” and/or pushed her into that ditch.
3 . . . 2 . .
It’s already underway:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/22/us/politics/hillary-clinton-money.html
Party elites are clearly outraged at Sanders’ democratic approach to fundraising (as well as politics).
That story is funny. I read it and replaced the words “Hillary Clinton” and “Mrs. Clinton” with the words “Wall Street.” Reads about the same. ;)
The DemParty would rather lose with Clinton than win with Sanders. Just as the RepParty would rather lose with Cruz than win with Trump.
And since Trump is stronger against the RepParty than Sanders is against the DemParty, Trump will very likely be nominated while Sanders very likely won’t. So in a situation of Trump vs. Clinton, many people will face an agonizing choice.
Now . . . if the ReParty nominates Cruz or someother branded establishment ReParty member, then Clinton will likely win.
If she was a rationally thinking human being she would have taken the hint when she got beaten by Obama in ’08. Actually she should never have run in ’08. Her basic conundrum is: how can she claim to be an empowered strong woman when ALL of her power is derived from the fact she was married to a prez and stuck through him through all his problems with many “other women”. Plus, her personality, voice, cackle, even the mere sight of her is repulsive to many people. Another thing that will have to be dealt with during the general is: is she or is she not gay? Voters will certainly be curious about that.
I don’t care if she sleeps with other women – the fact that she’s in bed with Wall Street is way more troubling.
+1
+100
+1000
+100,000
+500,000
+$675,000
+$153,000,000
http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/05/politics/hillary-clinton-bill-clinton-paid-speeches/
Edmondo, this is the second priceless comment in just 2 days. 2 fer 2.
Indeed. Not that “bumper-sticker ready” marks the epitome of wit but that sentiment would make a good one!
+69
Just a thought – are there a lot of women in wall street? <-tongue is firmly planted in cheek.
Yeah, but think of how humiliated Bill the rapist will look in front of the international billionaire crowd. That’s worth a lot.
That’s the argument I can’t get my head around. You see the polling, the daily whatevers, the actual rise of what would be considered a liberal platform, coming from a person that is liked among the populace.
To that you say,”Bollocks”.
The hubris of these people isn’t all it is, can’t be.
I said before, Clinton should be backing Sanders, full force.
There is a possibility that Trump might win, in a Clinton/Trump match.
I’m almost at the point where I will support anything that has the best chance at obliterating the Clinton machine. If that’s Trump, so be it- almost…
Oh, that cackle – it’s like nails on a blackboard.
..the ‘cackle in chief’ just doesn’t sound right..
cackler in chief?
Goes well with the pointy black hat and broom.
Debbie Wasserman-Shultz:
By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes. [Knocking]
Open locks,
Whoever knocks!
[Enter Hillary]
Hillary:
How now, you secret, black, and midnight dems!
What is’t you do?
I think a lot about a person’s character is revealed by their laugh; hers is mirthless and mean, perfectly consonant with her generally strident tone of voice. Obama may be as narcissistic and have run for the office as much for the sake of trophy-seeking, but at least his voice doesn’t grate.
oh really?
It grates on me, as does his condescending words, his face etc.. But that’s because of who he is. See he might objectively be judged as a fairly good looking guy but, who can’t even see that anymore given his evil. And the sad part is with Hillary we’re probably going to miss the O-bomber when he’s gone.
Clinton’s quite rational. She’s also smart, logical, and perceptive. On the other hand, she’s a devout Ayn Randian, carries a grudge, gets extremely angry, doesn’t have any idea of what the difference between truth and lies is, and has a sense of self-entitlement as wide as the Atlantic Ocean.
This is her election. She doesn’t care if she brings down the entire corrupt edifice of her own party, as reconfigured under the administration of her husband, as long as she gets the nomination. And if that puts the Dems out in the wilderness long enough for them to realize they need to return to being the party of the unions, the minorities, the working classes? Great.
But my bet is that first, for however long it takes, if they lose they’ll blame it on Sanders and all those groups they used to support, and now spit on.
Jos: Beautifully crafted comment.
Gaius is right about the numbers and the trends. But even if Hillary’s numbers plummet to catastrophic levels –to below Trump, which could happen if he cleans up his act as he is setting out to do right now — don’t hold your breath for the DNC to nominate the only obvious potential winner, Bernie Sanders. The Democratic machine hates Sanders even more than it hates Trump and the Republicans. They hate everything he stands for. He’s a socialist (of a mild sort). The Dems and Repubs are all plutocrats. They would rather see Trump win than Sanders. He asks too many inconvenient questions. Trump can be handled, like Reagan or Bush II.
It’s also worth noting that comparisons between Clinton and Sanders say nothing about the matchup between Clinton and whatever emerges from the GOP swamp. Approval ratings are more relevant, but are still an unreliable proxy, and even they show her competitive once the GOP candidates wreck the curve.
Picking Clinton, IOW, has no serious downside if you’re worried about beating a GOP Presidential candidate. However, there’s obvious downside to pissing off a well-connected major political and financial player with a long memory, as opposed to a candidate with few lucrative contacts whose second act after his big swing for the fences is a probably quiet retirement.
As several people have pointed out, a win with Sanders is the second (or third) best outcome for the establishment. So far, the best-case scenario is still in the bag if they stick with her, and in jeopardy if they don’t. It’s delusional to think Sanders has a chance with them, even moreso than the Clinton supporters in 2008 who thought they could engineer an upset over Obama with convention procedures.
Americans know that our political system is completely rotten. Just two days ago, NBC News published the results of a new national NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. It found the following: “Nearly seven-in-10 registered voters say they couldn’t see themselves supporting Republican frontrunner Donald Trump; 61 percent say they couldn’t back fellow Republican Ted Cruz; and 58 percent couldn’t see themselves voting for Democratic favorite Hillary Clinton.”
Above quote from: http://wallstreetonparade.com/2016/04/new-york-does-elections-like-it-does-wall-street-with-its-finger-on-the-scale/
New York Does Elections Like It Does Wall Street: With Its Finger on the Scale
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: April 20, 2016
Consistent with numerous other polls, the NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll also found that “just 19 percent of all respondents give Clinton high marks for being honest and trustworthy.”
So how did Hillary Clinton beat out the popular Senator Bernie Sanders in New York State where he was born and raised? Where he was drawing rallies of tens of thousands of supporters in the week before the primary? Where his ground game had the engaged support of thousands of members of the Working Families Party and Occupy Wall Street activists? The system was rigged to guarantee the outcome just as the revolving door between Wall Street and Washington guarantees that looting the little guy remains a lucrative business model on Wall Street.
…………
via Richard Charnin https://richardcharnin.wordpress.com
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sGxtIofohrj3POpwq-85Id2_fYKgvgoWbPZacZw0XlY/edit?pref=2&pli=1#gid=1476097125
Those states marked in yellow on the spreadsheet indicate Fraud. There are a lot of states that were stolen.
………
Maybe Sanders is saving up all this brilliant evidence from Richard Charnin and others to use in any contested fight for the nomination. I think it could be powerful leverage that could undo the blatant theft of votes, theft of democracy by Party leaders. Perhaps…
https://richardcharnin.wordpress.com/2016/04/20/ny-democratic-primary-more-frustration/
NY Democratic Primary: More Frustration
Richard Charnin
As always, the final CNN exit poll was forced to match the recorded vote.
http://www.cnn.com/election/primaries/polls/NY/Dem
View the Early Exit Poll vs. Final (matched to recorded vote) vs. True Vote
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sGxtIofohrj3POpwq-85Id2_fYKgvgoWbPZacZw0XlY/edit#gid=1433317684
snip
The UNADJUSTED exit poll indicated a close race. Hillary led by just 52-48%, an 11.8% discrepancy from the recorded vote. There were 1391 respondents and a 2.6% exit poll Margin of Error. Clinton led by a whopping 62-38% in the vote count with 33% of precincts reporting.
At 9:03 pm, there were 1307 exit poll respondents, Clinton led the actual count by 680-622 (52.0-47.6%). With just 84 additional respondents (1391 total), Clinton’s lead increased to 802-589 (57.7-42.3%). She had 122 additional respondents and Sanders had 33 fewer.
How can Clinton gain 122 of 84 respondents? How can Sanders’ total drop? They can’t. It is mathematically impossible. Therefore the final vote has to be impossible as well. . The exit poll was forced to match the recorded vote with impossible adjustments.
snip
In 2014, NY voter registration was 49D-24R-27I. The split was 85D-15I in the exit poll, which (as always) was forced to match the 57.9-42.1% recorded vote.
Assuming primary voting was proportional to registration, the split would have been 65D-35I and the race would have been a tie. If Clinton had 58% of Democrats, Sanders won the election by 52.5-47.5%.
snip
Assuming that Sanders’ 48% exit poll was accurate, he must have won the election due to thousands of suppressed votes. Sanders True Vote = 48% exit poll + suppressed vote.
Let’s assume that 5% of registered voters (400,000) were disenfranchised and Sanders had 75%. Then he had 52.9% assuming his 48% exit poll share.
snip
Sanders’ exit poll share declined in the recorded vote in 18 out of 19 primaries.
The probability: P=1-binomdist(17,19,.5,true) = 0.000038 = 1 in 26,000.
……….
This information needs updating. It shows that there is already a very big difference between those states which have Caucuses with open public evidence of head/hand counts or paper ballots hand counted vs those in Primaries using the abusive evidence-free/evidence-hidden e-voting/e-scanning machines:
Democratic Primaries (and Caucuses)
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sGxtIofohrj3POpwq-85Id2_fYKgvgoWbPZacZw0XlY/edit?pref=2&pli=1
Sanders Average Vote Shares: 66% in 12 Caucuses
(My note: with Real Public Evidence);
41% in 20 Primaries
(Evidence Hidden or Removed with those voting machines for the purpose of stealing democracy)
………….
We need to correct this now. Because it may be now or never.
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Bernie-or-Extinction-by-Michael-Byron-Bernie-Sanders_Bernie-Sanders-2016-Presidential-Candidate_Bernie-Sanders-Presidential-Campaign_Civilization-160421-594.html
Bernie or Extinction.
By Michael Byron
I confess to feeling despair for the survival of human civilization, of humanity and all complex life on Earth. The proximate reason for this is the theft of the New York Democratic primary by Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. As for the fraud itself, it is a now familiar litany: Flipped registrations, machine switched votes, massive voter roll purges and much more. Consider just one illustrative example: Brooklyn. Brooklyn is run by the Kings County Democratic Party. A Chicago Mayor Dick Daley style political machine is in complete charge. Nothing happens there by accident. All “accidents” are carefully planned! And a lot of “accidents” occurred on primary election day there! Taken together these add up to election FRAUD.
Bev: I didn’t understand a lot of the numbers in your link, but I
certainly caught the drift, and appreciated your comment.
Really.
don’t think so, and Clinton v. GOP win depends on which party is more adept at election theft at this point.
i also think there is an internal battle going on among the plutocrats… there are those who want single payer health care for instance. we know that’s not hillary’s faction, so it could be trump’s pals. There must be a consensus among some of the uneasy rich that if they can’t resuscitate social equality they are history because they need society in order to function – they all know everything is dysfunctional now. The worst dysfunction is our deprivation: no health care, only welfare for insurance & drug companies; failing educational system; bankrupt retirement funds; no jobs; etc. The people are putting up better resistance to the takeover of the world by the neoliberals in Europe but only because they have vetted socialist societies. What Hillary and her pals concocted is an almost unbelievable disaster. Their solution seems to be more deprivation, more war, with no solution in sight for inequality. And lastly, Hillary does not even recognize the situation – she pretends things are just fine – all we have to do is protect our “rights” – are you for real, Hill?
There are lots of capitalist firms that would be better off with single payer, and lots of business people that would be happy to see McD’s, Wal-mart, etc. finally pay some of the true cost of their low wages, and to see the vig for Big Pharma and Big Health (Un)Care shrink.
Left: I’ve been preaching for years that single payer is the only option, plus
making medical education far less expensive. I went to school in the old
days before student loans and all that crap, and I wasn’t forced to increase
my income to pay off debts. Europe has the correct idea.
Right on, Susan. I’ve long said single payer will come from Republicans. Only Nixon could go to China.
Plus, if they repeal Obamacare, what else but single payer would they replace it with?
Yea but even if they would benefit from single payer and they might, it’s hard to say they’ll ever be on board for full employment. Slack in the labor market is how wages are kept low, you just keep the slack within a certain range that for us will guarantee there will be losers, and for them will guarantee there aren’t enough of them for violent revolution. Then you blame the losers such a system necessarily creates for their fate.
So the interest of some oligarchs might sometimes coincide with ours, but don’t count on it. And at a certain point I wonder how much good free healthcare will do if you bankrupt everyone with expensive rents or something instead (so many means of rent extraction, so little time!). Although it is a less inhumane way of keeping people enslaved than for their very healthcare.
Susan, I agree that not all plutocrats are mentally retarded ogres. And some may prefer a functioning social order over the immediate opportunity to suck the last blood out of the present one.
The Malignant Overlords— the Banksters, Frackers and War Party purveyors of weapons of Death— that have dominated US policy for decades have found the perfect candidate in Killary. She is a known commodity that will do their bidding instantly at the sound of a briefcase full of $100 dollar bills being opened. Many Overlords may have loyalty to the Republican party much as they do to the football team of their Alma Mater, but they can’t help but understand the value of having a President like Obama or Killary who present themselves as a progressive man or woman of the people while delivering policies that benefit only them.
Why should they back a social misfit like Ted Cruz whom everybody he has ever worked with hates? Or an unpredictable wild card like Trump who occasionally says things that send chills up their spine? Withdraw from NATO? A Defense Department organized to defend America rather than enforce subservience to the Empire and maximize costs of new weaponry? Build things in the US instead of using much cheaper slave labor overseas? What a frightening idea.
Much better to support a Trojan Horse “Democrat.” even if they have too many Jewish lawyers at their fund raising banquets.
No question she was the ideal candidate, or they’d not, through the magic of DNC/Beltway ‘consensus’ have anointed her the first woman President in 2016 back in 2008 – no doubt some cruddy deal done at that time.
How the key power players managed to delude themselves into believing their own manufactured narrative vis a vis pretty much everything this century could totally fall apart without consequences is indeed amazing – so much so that half of me thinks this seeming outbreak of ‘democracy’ is itself scripted, that is, there was a conscious decision taken to allow Sanders and ‘the people’ to be ‘given a hearing in the court of public opinion’ justified by the easy collective assumption Clinton would make short work of Sanders’ silly un-American ideas. That Clinton was an imperfect vehicle, a flawed instrument, obviously so to us, would surely have been evident to at least some people with considerable power, one of whom happens to hold a Go Directly To Jail card.
Set ’em up, Joe. Got a little story, you oughtta know….
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/04/22/backing-bernies-bold-vision-biden-knocks-hillarys-no-we-cant-mantra
I believe it has always been a mistake to confuse industrial capitalism with financial capitalism and to confuse competitive industries with monopolists. This is a common error on the left and right.
Many companies that are part of the productive economy would benefit from more competition in health care or a single payer system that frees them from the toll taking of the health care/insurance system.
Like it or not, admit or not, Democrats have become the lapdogs of the health industry (pharma and insurance), and to the financial services industries. Both of these industries extract a private tax from companies and workers that goes disproportionately to upper income people.
Socially progressive politics and identity politics have been monetized by these industries to get ObamaCare instead of a real health reform. That saved the health industry from its own death spiral, probably just temporarily, by forcing customers to buy it.
If she can get away with it, Hillary will soon begin selling us all on the “retirement crisis”, which will bring ObamaCare to the forced savings arena. Passive investment has been challenging the fee extraction of much of the financial services industry. Their salvation is to force American workers to save and have that pile managed by private equity managers who will not be compared to any standard benchmark, so you won’t know how poorly they are doing. Hillary currently has advisors who favor this type of program, but I doubt you will hear of it until she’s elected.
There’s one story that keeps repeating itself that will do her in. Every time Sanders is out at a public event drawing thousands, there’s a story about Hillary out at a private event drawing dozens. People know she’s not one of them, and she does nothing to hide it.
They no longer do anything to hide it, as it has proven to be a miserable failure in the face of Sanders. They still every once in a while trot out, say an appearance at a Girls Rock band (can’t remember name) though. We maybe political junkies, but there are large swaths that aren’t and are unaware.
Ian @ 10:07 am
I can think of the perfect Girls Rock Band for this election, but I wouldn’t hold my breath for them to endorse $hillary. (;
Sing along…Smash The Control Machine…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rt_7jaX8CsY
and Rise Rebel Resist
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z4_QifBW18
This argument assumes that the idea is to elect someone by popular vote, or failing that by consideration of the people’s will, and that notion gets more tenuous by the minute.
Winning a general election of by and for the people is like distant mountains, impressive, lending an air of dignity (ironically made up of many individual sacrifices and acts of bravery in the face of events that are anything but serene), but elusive and far removed from what’s actually happening and why.
I have a hard time visualizing the DNC being in any way concerned with who is more electable or even getting one party or another into office in a process that has so little to do with people’s choice and so much to do with maintaining the elite’s status quo.
That said, what Sanders is doing, BECAUSE he is so honest, so popular by obvious majority, and yet his efforts so futile, is hard to beat for pulling back the curtain on our political reality.
I imagine, btw, this is taking quite a toll on Sanders.
Saw his last speeches in NY. Same speech. Crowd looked to be trying. He was low energy. He needs new material. His supporters have made a multitude of issues available to him but he won’t budge. I thought the Delaware shell companies were effective data but he won’t touch her. I don’t care if it’s taking a toll on him. His supporters seem to be taking this more seriously than him and really trying to push him over the hump, but as Clinton stated after her 2008 loss ‘I’ll be fine’. Sanders will go back to his well paying job, great benefits and is in line for committee advancement if Ds can get the Senate.
That’s probably true as the day-to-day grind of campaigning gets to him. But trump and clinton aren’t young, either.
In a way, i get the feeling sanders is also having the time of his life. I’m curious what that does to his thinking. He can’t just go back to VT and be happy with passing helpful amendments to bills that are mostly crap. He’s more empowered than he’s ever been in his career or even his life.
Sanders could a lot worse than donning the mantle of “Conscience of the Nation.”
Yes indeed. There is a lot of pent up frustration that will carry Sanders forward should he want to shine the light in dark places. He won’t have much help from the media however.
Agree 100%. Very well said.
Something not noted in the article but seems relevant here is that Bill cannot seem to keep his foot out of his mouth. Yesterday he blamed millennials for the lack of wage inflation in recent years. Keeping in mind that many of them weren’t old enough to vote in the 2010 mid-terms even if they wanted to, the unbroken wage curve of the last thirty years puts this lie to rest alone.
He is not making any friends either.
I’m wondering if he secretly wants her to lose.
Are you kidding? That predator wants to find another lonely intern in the Oval Office.
No, he’s just that bitterly entitled. Do you not see how rich and powerful they are even out of office? How dare he be denied. They are the same… when the peasants are pleasant, they don’t mind temporarily having to slum, but if they are even mildly questioned, their body language, voice, etc change. Watch their hands clench, jaws tighten, they both lean back. The strain to maintain and can never do it.
Eh… the oldest millenials are in their mid-30s. (Hi!)
Blaming us for our own getting-screwed-by-the-labor-market is still despicable, but a whole lot of us were voting six years ago…
That said I don’t think these are gaffes on his part, but rather Camp Clinton is beginning Operation Rightward Shift. The campaign is pivoting on that foot in Bill’s mouth.
this is what the Intel CEO said–it’s a “meritocracy”, and PC sales are down, ergo the PC sales division is responsible, so they are getting the layoffs. Never mind that the market moved away from PCs and he did not jump on that bandwagon. It’s a deflection all weak assholes use, and Bill is coming under heavy fire for his policies and their results, so he’s blaming right and left.
If the DNC give the nomination to HRC (which of course is extremely likely despite the poll numbers above) then they are signing their own death warrant.
There is a small risk to them that Bernie would run 3rd party (he could cite all the obvious shenanigans of the DNC and HRC as justification, and he could raise the money).
If Trump is the Republican nominee, we know he isn’t afraid to go after Hillary and Bill on their many scandals, and they can’t easily go after him on financial or morality scandal reasons — and he has no political baggage like NAFTA or the anti-black crime bill to defend.
Most likely HRC would win (just) but she will be thoroughly tarnished and battered by the Trump campaign, and will be inaugurated as the least-liked, least-trusted President in recent history. The Sanders supporters will detest her and we know the Repubs hate her with a passion, and will pursue various investigations. (The Clinton Slush Foundation clearly has a few unexploded bombs waiting to be found.)
The country will be in political gridlock for another 4 years. The DNC will have lost all credibility and good will, and a third party will come about. And none too soon.
HRC and Bill are the Macbeths of US politics. They should have quit with their hundreds of millions while they were ahead. Hillary may win the election but she’ll lose the war. They will have so many scandals to deal with they won’t know what hit them.
Impeachment could be an option. But I expect HRC/DNC would cover all bases by choosing a VP candidate acceptable to oligarchic interests to cover all eventualities.
Or HRC chooses a “poison pill” defence — she has Sanders as VP in the knowledge that the Repubs would much rather have Hillary as Prez than Bernie!
Unrealistic no doubt but hey, JFK chose (or was forced to choose?) LBJ and they apparently hated each other’s guts.
But would Sanders want the VP job? In a Clinton admin?
From an old Tom Lehrer song about LBJ’s VP Hubert Humphrey:
“Whatever became of Hubert?
Has anyone heard a thing?
Once he shone on his own
now he sits home alone
and waits for the phone to ring.”
“Once a fiery liberal spirit,
ah but now when he speaks
he must clear it.
Second fiddle’s a hard part I know
when they won’t even give you a bow….”
Republicans hate Trump and fear their voters. The VP wont protect Hillary, and any VP candidate will be covered in Hillary’s negatives. The VP can can easily be impeached and removed. High crimes and misdemeanors means being unpopular enough to be ousted by Congress. No one entered a booth and voted for the VP. Partisans would whine, but no one will actually care.
The Republicans much like Hillary supporters actually believe they will produce peace and prosperity. The GOP loves the idea of President Ryan.
A GOP majority House would impeach her before she was sworn in. Look at what the GOP is doing about a supreme court vacancy, add classified emails to that, and they’ll move heaven and earth in their haste to impeach.
Given a GOP Senate, impeached and tried by March.
Maybe Brazil is a dress rehearsal.
With a viable Third Candidate, the election could go to the House. Then, all bets are off.
1998 Minnesota gubernatorial election might be relevant.
Two putrid major party candidates were nominated, and Jessie Ventura became governor. It wasn’t just celebrity- he was a much better option compared to Skip Humphrey and Norm (f’n) Coleman.
Thank you for an actual case.
At the state level a plurality can win, as in the case of Ventura, and later Pawlenty. (Thanks to Ventura’s holding office as a third party candidate before, third party candidates were funded enough to make a strong showing in subsequent gubernatorial elections.). Nationally a strong third party candidate has always been a spoiler. This is how Clinton I came to office. Ironic (?) if that were also the case for Clinton II.
What would this procedure be?
Under what circumstances would the House be involved in a post-impeachment scenario–wouldn’t the VP take over automatically?
The Speaker is third in line. If the VP is also removed from office, or if there is no VP, which is possible, then the Speaker becomes Pres. This may be Ryan’s best shot.
I think that our sociopathic elite are looking to finalize the end of democracy by finishing off the TPP, TTIP and TiSA within her first term. Then all chance of a peaceful resolution are out the door and Supranational Government is established. Hillary is end game in this stage of society.
You may be onto something here. The wheels really do seem to be coming off. If the major systemic reactions to neoliberalism as embodied in Trump and Sanders do not produce a result that leads to some sort of acceptable homeostasis the current game is up. Something new has to emerge to control the forces at play. The long powerful illusions of American exceptionalism and ideological purity are failing–we just don’t really have much of a shared ethos anymore. Without some major swing of the pendulum in the direction of reform, I don’t see it holding up much longer. Even the average Joe is catching on.
Like edmondo said yesterday, if Hillary win looks inevitable then we ALL must vote Republican Congress to ensure her impeachment. Do. Her. In.
No need to vote repub. Chances of the hapless dems flipping control of either house are nil.
Especially if Clinton is at the top of the ticket. No coattails there.
Warren 2020?
Gabbard. Warren had her time in the sun.
Warren? Warren was a R into her middle 40s. I don’t see how that and having no opinion in a primary where the two are extremely different is going to sell.
I will be shocked if Warren is not offered the VP spot by Clinton. I do not know if she would take it but it is the perfect play by Clinton’s team. She can pull over the Bernie supporters that are do not hold Ma against Warren.
Clinton will also have a great narrative in our identity politics driven world.
Convincing Warren to take on the VP position will also neuter her politically. Its a win win for Corporate Democrats.
I just hope that Warren has some backbone but something had to be promised her for Warren to not come out and endorse Sanders.
“This isn’t about wishing for her failure”
Speak for yourself Gaius!
If she gets the nomination Trump will have a great time working her over and he may even turn into our next president. It will be HUGE
I feel the Bern but if it is Trump and Shillary I’m going for Trump
In my view, Trump “trumps” Hillary in a Trump vs Hillary election.
After his treatment by the Republican Elite, Trump will not feel loyalty to the Republican party and will not be beholden to them for staffing and intellectual guidance as was George W. Bush.
He has a far more open mind regarding the need for overseas military operations than “Hawk Hillary” and perhaps will not see every foreign “deal” as requiring a military intervention..
He also might be more skeptical of the value of the financial industry to America’s well-being than Hillary.
And with Trump disdainful of both the Democratic and Republican elite, he might actually help the great unwashed who are largely ignored by both party leaders except at election time.
He won’t build the wall.
If Trump were truly interested in restricting the flow of low wage immigrants he would push to enforce E-verify and employer sanctions, which would raise the price of low wage labor and would actually bring money into the US Treasury while avoiding the expense of a wall,.
After all, Trump’s properties are more profitable with cheaper labor.
But I’d much rather have Bernie, someone who has been in public service for many years and yet has profited so little from the experience he had credit card debt to help with his daughter’s and niece’s weddings.
I look to who each candidate picks as ‘advisors’ for various subjects. No one can be a genius polymath politician; at least I’ve not spotted one. So, ‘advisors’ are needed to make the wheels go around. For example, when Lil’ Barry chose the Neo Cabal for his advisors early on, I knew he was a crook.
As everyone here knows by now; watch what ‘they’ do, not what ‘they’ say.
Important point. Trump’s foreign policy advisors:
Boston Globe
[
Democracy Now!
American Conservative (!!)
Joseph Schmitz is also linked to anti-Indian and anti-Muslim efforts.
Trump Foreign Policy Advisor Tied to Montana Anti-Tribal Efforts
IREHR (Institute for Research & Education on Human Rights)
April 19, 2016
Trump Advisor Joseph Schmitz Promotes Anti-Indian and Anti-Muslim Bigotry, Calls for End to the Vote for People Receiving Public Assistance
Trump surrounds himself w/loons. I’m in CA so I get to vote for Stein but if I was in a swing state I would lean Trump. Four years of orange tinted embarrassing hell rather than 8 years of savvy entrenched hell.
With Clinton all of the deck chairs are assigned. With Trump, the chairs get scrambled and it will be an opportunity for the majority but I don’t see anyone in the pipeline. Sanders candidacy advantage is he’s on tape on issues for so many years.
If Clinton v. Trump is the finality I think voting for Trump creates the best path for 3rd party emergence on the left. At that point (after a floozy democratic primary and all of their past injustices) the Democrats will need to be hammered down, humiliated, and put in their place. As they occupy so little of the left these days, weakening them creates an even greater “space” on the spectrum for others to occupy. The Republicans certainly are not going to move over.
Vote Trump, but keep the progressive revolution momentum alive and organized.
I really want a new progressive party with the finch as its mascot.
Given that the USA (certainly) and possibly the world will go to hell if either HRC or Trump wins, I’d choose Trump if only for the novelty and to teach the frigging Clintons they can’t buy and steal an election.
Trump will scare the shit out of the rest of the world but he seems a bit less likely to start more wars in Syria, the Ukraine, and elsewhere.
Fair point. ROTW was over the Moon about Obama, and then look what happened. In looney bin moron colonies like The Guardian they’re still aswoon over Bush in blackface. They would have a falling down fit over us electing Trump, but with no more real insight than they showed in 2008. I still can’t see myself actually pulling the lever for Trump, or voting for any Republicans because Bern in Hellary, Clintons! I just want my third party option now, please, ready or not.
3rd party emergence on the left: this would be something in addition to the Greens and Working Families?
$hillary milhous Clinton (if she does not walk away from the nomination process) will be remembered as the “my turn” president who was a one term president and the last democratic party president…
Are the democratic party apparatchiks so blind they can not see they could lose wholesale in 2018 and never recover ?
Actually…maybe the theft of the nomination will be a good thing…will expose the democratic party and what it is today, helping push the door open for “other”(non-republican) opportunities…
There are a few issues at play.
-The Clintonistas need Hillary. Who would hire Begala, Brazille, and Carville based on their career outside of being attached to the 1992 election? Any prominent Democrat from the last ten years has worn out their welcome. They need Hillary. Obama will be an ignored figure.
-Buyers remorse with Obama who ushered in the destruction of the Democratic congress and party at the local level.
-Clinton myths. The Clintons are brilliant politicians who won in an era of GOP dominationfor example ignoring the Democrats controlled Congress an much of the state and local governments before Clinton ran everything into the ground.
-I dont want to limit it to Clintonistas, but Sanders despite numerous Infrastructure and financial challenges has mounted a challenge Hillary Clinton. All the money spent on Democratic strategists was essentially wasted. If Sanders had a little more money at the beginning this could be a very different race, but Sanders didn’t need David Brock or to pay Dick Morris $5 million. The whole kabuki theatre of politics is at risk. Sanders much like the 50 state strategy undermine the need for the “Democratic strategist.”
president who was a one term president
if she is elected, fwiw I don’t think she’ll last a complete term
Vote trump for a cleansing fire. Post trump the rebuilding can begin.
Nothing else will clean house.
Clinton vs Trump: it’s hard to believe an establishment candidate could beat a populous candidate given the mood so many Americans are in. Yet it’s also hard to believe that the Oligarchy will allow free elections anywhere in the western world when the threat of change exists. Trump will not win a rigged election. Even if democracy has one last gasp before death and Trump does win a free election, how does he avoid being assassinated? Those in charge have destroyed countries, murdered hundreds of thousands of people and allied themselves with ISIS and neo-nazi Ukrainians. You think they’d allow one man to break up their tea party just as NATO is massing its forces on the Russian border? That’d be like a Wehrmacht general calling off Operation Barbarossa in June 1941.
I could be wrong on all points, however I can’t help but believe we’ve past the event horizon on the option of peaceful reform here in the West.
Trump’s kevlar hair will shield him from assassination
No need for assassination, if Trump is elected there will be race between the blue and red factions to see who can file the Articles of Impeachment first. You don’t think with his history they won’t be able to find something impeachable in his past? Doesn’t even have to be real, just enough to provide cover.
I hope fellow Bernie supporters will keep their eyes [and their votes] on the down-ticket races.
Whether Trump or Hillary is president, decent values will need as strong support in Congress as possible. There are good folks running with a “D” next to their name, many in close races that could oust a Republican. It would be a shame for our hatred of Hillary to allow the forces of evil to buttress her policies in Congress as well.
Just because you enter the voting booth doesn’t mean you have to vote for either of the clowns at the top of the ticket. Go, vote for those who are decent, and vote Green, Working Families or whatever for the top spot.
I know most of us are searching for a way to demonstrate to the DNC et al. that they kick hippies at their peril. A large number of votes in the Green, Working Families, or other party column could show that.
IMO, far more impressive would be a huge rally–and I mean HUGE, like millions–in Philadelphia refusing to accept Hillary as the nominee. Make it clear to the Dems that if they nominate Hillary, millions of people will actively work to tank her candidacy. In a way, by voting for Bernie in the millions so far, that’s exactly what we’ve been doing up until now. But, going forward, no one will watch her debate, no one will attend her rallies, and we will actively vote against anyone she supports downticket.
I would like to see Bernie supporters start to organize this now. This is supposed to be a political revolution. Bernie keeps saying he can’t do it alone. It’s time for all of us to step up to the plate. Imagine the visuals if we get millions of people in the streets, all of whom make it clear that they will not accept the establishment candidate. Additionally, each person attending could carry a petition signed by thousands of others who couldn’t attend the protest. Make it clear that we are tired of having our votes stolen and we’re tired of business as usual.
I like this approach. And the sooner it evolves from a Bernie Sanders campaign to a genuine independent movement the better. And that includes dumping the “Democratic” party label.
Like the mass protests against the Iraq War the MSM will not cover this type of event fairly.
Thanks, Pavel. The more I think about this–making it clear that Democrats will be nothing more than a rump party if they nominate Hillary–the more I see this as the way to stop playing someone else’s game, as I mentioned in a comment yesterday (when you play someone else’s game, you always lose). We need to show that we are ready for big, ambitious programs by showing that we are going to continue to demonstrate in large numbers until we get the government we want.
A massive protest against Former First Lady Hillary R Clinton’s nomination is a terrific idea!
However, remember the astonishingly low level of news coverage of the massive DC and NYC anti-invasion protests before our wonderful Iraq adventure.
However, if first you don’t succeed, try, try again!
My thoughts are already turning to logistics: Can we get enough of us there that it becomes impossible to access the convention site?
The idea is not to get arrested by blocking access–at least not for the superdelegates, who we want to flip to Bernie, and the masses of Bernie’s elected delegates! Imagine how satisfying it would be to hoist the superdelegates on their own petard!
I think if we start the idea now, vans and buses can be organized, places to stay, signed petitions for those who can’t attend, etc. Bernie is truly a once-in-a-lifetime candidate (certainly for those of us who are older). I just can’t see giving up without bringing all of our numbers to bear.
Dear grayslady,
david lamy is 63, and while Norwegian exercise physiologists calculate my fitness age as 18, I am not going to take on the police.
Before opening my mouth I should see where exactly in Philly the convention is situated. But my logistical musing is that the orange fence corrals that are reserved for demonstrators is a one way ticket to making no impact. However, millions could snarl a city…
david,
The convention center is very near the center city area. More daunting perhaps is that part of Philly is squeezed between 2 rivers. There is simply no logistical way to stage a protest of more than a few thousand, at best. And that’s without all the pre-security measures the city has likely put in place, as well as DHS. Heck, the total population of Philly is only 1.5 million. Now if they were the bulk of the protesters, then it might be a plan.
Bernie spoke to 7000 people at Temple Univ. alone. Having looked at the map, I think there is a lot of potential. Very easy to clog up the city. Maybe even line the river, spread into Delaware and New Jersey.
Yes, indeed. I’m not demeaning the idea of the protest, just the potential size realistically. Now, staging a crowd in Camden and marching across the Ben Franklin Bridge would accommodate a much larger protest and would be outside of the highest security zone. Also, blocking traffic on the Franklin Bridge would inevitably lead to MSM coverage.
Thank you Archie and grayslady for the latest comments.
I feel that the powers that be would love to have us stage ourselves in Camden!
What happened in my original response is I accidentally deleted this: Would it be impossible to access the convention center without seeing protesters lining the streets?
What is important though is that it is time for us to take to the streets! Let our legacy be the institution of a free, equitable and just society where all are accountable to the rule of law and to common welfare.
If others are interested in further discussion, for me, email
d a vid-l amy @ member . f s f . org deleting the spaces.
excellent idea!
grayslady,I want to take what you say here and go forward with it. Keep talking.
If Hillary manages to win the nomination it will be a Pyrrhic victory.
I have to keep reminding people that Bernie is not The Savior and no one can save us now. Remember that Obama was thought to be that, but he turned into another messenger of the MIC. The TBTF Empire is doomed to dig its own grave and take the rest of the world with it. This ship is going down and there is not the slightest “hope” for “progressive” “change” to prevent it.
Yep. There is a huge irreparable tear in the hull and the ship is no longer listing, it’s gone vertical. At this point it’s a matter of trying to limit the predation of the sharks and trying to find the last bits of humanity to appreciate like a sunrise while clinging to the side of a raft boat.
Why do people insist on saying “deep south?”
Wouldn’t “ex-slave states” be more preferable?
No, because that takes in states like Missouri, Tennessee, Maryland and Virginia.
I would insist on saying “Deep South” because the whole idea is to move our society beyond a very wrong era. That won’t happen if we keep using words and phrases that remind or inflame old wounds. Observe children: none of them are born racist — it is entirely learned. And racism is something that we would like to collectively forget.
How about we call it the formerly Democratic South? Just to confuse people…
Good point.
Assuming its Trump vs. Clinton the UUGE net unfavorability ratings of both of them will, most likely, lead to a general dominated by 2 opposing forces:
o Republicans & Repub leaning independents staying at home or voting for Hillary.
o Democrats (Sanders supporters) & Dem leaning independents staying at home or voting Trump.
If this does happen I would say that the result becomes uncertain in the strictest sense i.e. impossible rationally to assign any probability either way, Fivethiryeight might as well go on holiday for the duration.
I was originally intending to position this comment in reply to Kokuanraani @ 9:45 but grayslady beat me to it with the excellent idea of a massive protest in Philadelphia.
My thoughts are impelled by casting a vote in the NY Democratic Presidential Primary. I wrote on the 20th of how in Orange County the ballots required selecting six delegates to the Democratic National Convention and Former First Lady Hillary Clinton had six delegates by her name, Senator Sanders had four. This posed a dilemma: I voted for Sanders and his four delegates, but do I vote for two Clinton delegates or write in myself and a friend as Sander’s delegates? I quickly ascertained that a write in option was impossible. The ballot itself said to refer to the sleeve (this sleeve obscures your ballot when you feed it into the optical scan machine) for voting instructions. Well the instructions were generic to any election and did not address my wish to not vote for any delegates that were pledged to our Former First Lady.
So in my case I cast an undervote selecting only four delegates. What became of my ballot after its digestion by the optical scanner? My thoughts about this follow so please hang in a bit longer!
I am a proud dues paying member of the Free Software Foundation. Its founder, Richard M Stallman, gives convincing arguments about the need for hand-counted paper ballots to ensure a fair election. He is not the only eminent computer scientist to have this position.
At the very minimum, Boards of Elections should publicly post the decision algorithms voting machines use for each election, but honestly, the simplest solution is the hand counted paper ballot. There is some country to our immediate north with single-payer health care that uses paper ballots for elections, but perhaps they are not as efficient as us.
This is another protest that must get organized: the one for hand-counted paper ballots for all elections within the United States of America.
Even though I know they could also be faked, the fact that there is no way to see how the machine is ‘reading’ my ballot has always bugged me the few times I have used a scantron ballot here in NY. Of course this concern would be eliminated if the ballots were hand counted. But until that day I have no reason to believe the counts were accurate. And with the difference between the exit polls and the results in NY, that specifically includes the latest election here.
Hand counts are a must.
The chance that Bernie will be the nominee is about zero. Barring an unforeseen deus ex machina from the Justice Dept. it will be Clinton, and even given the unforeseen scenario the party brass would be as likely to draft Biden or something similar as let Bernie win.
This seems to be an unreasonably pessimistic viewpoint. I stand behind my long held belief that if dems want the presidency then they’d best get behind bernie because even the gods will be unable to propel his primary opponent to victory in the general.
The question is, which do they want more, the White House or to keep the party in the hands of their country club pals? Since the vast majority of party operatives are in the same orbit as HRC I tend to think it’s the latter. This is America after all and anyone even a smidgen to the left of Barack Obama is considered out of bounds.
Barring the unforeseen it will be Clinton. As bad as she is she would still beat Trump in the general and probably Cruz. The other wild card is if the GOP manages to nominate someone other than those two, in which case HRC and the Dem party will be in trouble.
I just want them to wake up one morning and say “I’m a republican, and it’s ok.”. One long term problem of lumping republicans into the evil camp has been a reluctance of some republicans to be able to come out and be themselves for fear of ostracism. One benefit of course would be a less harsh republican party. And are you sure she will beat trump in the general? She should be running against trump in the republican primary. And considering the track record of the foreseen (polls,etc…) , “barring the unforeseen” is about as likely as keeping the tide from going out. Bernie by a length in the last furlong.
I’d love that too. Unfortunately the Democratic Party is now where former Republicans go to continue their career. While I may consider Lincoln Chaffee largely to the left of Clinton’s real position, the fact is that neither that former Republican or Clinton and their positions are welcome in the Grand Old Party anymore. Hell they are eating people we considered to be far right even a decade ago for lunch. And the exiles don’t seem to be willing to form the Reformed Republican Party as long as the Clintons/DLC/Third Way/New Dems welcome them so eagerly into the Democratic Party.
Yes, Clinton will beat Trump in the general (barring the unforeseen). He’s even more widely loathed than she is and current polling shows him with a yuuuuuge deficit to make up.
The unforeseen might include the GOP somehow nominating someone other than Trump. Cruz is also widely despised and would probably lose to Clinton, although he might stand a slightly better chance than Trump. A Romney/Kasich/Ryan/McCain type would be a solid favorite against her but first the GOP has to figure out how to finesse such an outcome.
The unforeseen might also include serious allegations stemming from the e-mail investigation. Obviously there is no way for us to know what might be in those thousands of e-mails so anything we say here is sheer speculation, but my best guess is that Clinton will not face serious consequences in regard to that. I wouldn’t be wishing upon a star for that one if I were you, but you never know what might happen.
Where did you get your crystal ball from? Give me some numbers why clinton will beat trump with certainty.? At best hillary has a chance to beat trump but it certainly does not fall into the category of likely.. Could the unforeseen be total abandonment by sanders supporters? Major hurricanes revealing weak support structure? Market crash? oil skyrocketing to $140/bbl? As I said the unforeseen of course will happen, and the hillary titanic will have zero maneuverability, even now they can’t take criticism. The emails may not get her indicted, but what if it just disgusts people? Cruz/hillary and we could get pres. stein, that would be unforeseen. You can lie, cheat, steal, and propagandize your way to a hillary nomination and she will face a great chance of losing, while sanders wins in almost any scenario if he can get past the upper crust of the democrat party.
Look up the popular poll aggregators — RealClearPolitics or Huffpost-Pollster — and look up both the general election hypothetical matchups and favorability ratings of the candidates. Trump’s got a yuuuuuge problem; almost everybody has already formed an opinion about him and it’s overwhelmingly negative. Clinton’s favorables are poor, too, but quite a bit better than Trump’s, and she wins all the hypothetical matchups as well.
Most Sanders supporters will vote for Clinton. The number who will not is probably not terribly different from the number of Republicans who would rather vote for Clinton than Trump. Please keep in mind that as disliked as Clinton is, Trump is disliked even more.
When I speak of the unforeseen I’m trying to keep to the at least minimally plausible. It’s possible that Clinton will treat Bernie so poorly at the convention that she will cause a major schism, but she’s not that stupid and I don’t consider it likely. It’s possible that the e-mails contain something truly deplorable, but most politicians aren’t stupid enough to put such things in writing, and even if she did she still has the firewall of Barack Obama and Loretta Lynch. The GOP might pull a fast one and nominate someone who could dispatch Clinton, but they have a potential civil war problem of their own if they try that. So any of those things could happen, but I try to keep my expectations realistic. That’s just me.
“sanders wins in almost any scenario if he can get past the upper crust of the democrat party.”
Yes, but one of my points all along is that the upper crust would rather lose an election than cede any power at all to someone as left as Bernie.
Bernie still has a chance, but it’s tiny. The real progress is still down the road. The tide is turning but the interests are extremely entrenched and it’s going to take some time.
The sample at our large Sanders readership says your assumption is wrong: the overwhelming majority of Sanders voters will not vote for Clinton, particularly after the series of dirty election tricks, with New York as a particularly appalling spectacle. They will stay home, vote for Trump, write in Sanders, or vote for Jill Stein. And you discount the percentage that will vote Republican to punish the Democratic party. I know, for instance, of grad of a top school who is the son of Mexican farm workers who will vote for Trump if Sanders is not in the general. That is how deep the antipathy for Clinton is among Sanders voters.
I would never ever vote for Clinton.
I don’t know what my limit on links is here, but here’s a good one to start with:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2016/no_trump_no_show_for_33_of_gop_voters
Bottom line is, more GOP voters say they will not vote for Trump than Dem voters say they will not vote for Clinton. Other polling reveals basically the same thing.
I’m not sure why you are citing personal anecdotes and a blog comment section as evidence of anything, since obviously neither are remotely representative of a large voting population.
Yes, the Clinton’s are opportunists and machiavellian political operators. We’ve known this for decades and so has the larger public. They’re still going to vote for her over Trump, who is more despised than she is. That’s just what the polling shows I’m afraid. She’s not winning any elections here but a little blog is not the whole country.
As I’ve said from the start, there are still ways that it could slip away from her, but none of them appear to be high probability. And believe me when I tell you that I take zero pleasure in the thought of HRC as President. But one has to be realistic. I’ll add, don’t let what I’m saying dissuade anybody from voting in a primary if they have the opportunity and desire to do so, the game now would be to get as many delegates into the convention as possible as leverage on events there, not the tiny chance that Bernie can still outright win this thing. This is an intelligent, educated, and adult readership here that I think can handle the facts without discouragement.
Have to agree with Yves – Dems are in for a mighty shock if they believe most current Sanders supporters will fall into line rather than sit it out:
For Sanders to even be where he is represents a major strategic error by senior Dems in not recognizing the political reality of the public mood and not moving to squash him early; or he is roughly where some other senior strategists wanted, perhaps unknown to Bernie i.e., Sanders provides a good show proving democracy still ‘works’, that progressives voices are heard, that the Party is open and change will come when it comes with Madame Clinton; or possibly a combo of both, with Sanders undertaking his part with a totally unexpected degree of relish that has infuriated Clinton. In other words, either fallibility is fully at play here, in which case a Sanders victory is not such an unimaginable stretch – or Sanders has some important support we don’t know about.
To my mind, progressives should go for it now with as much focus, clarity of purpose and gusto as eclipses all prior efforts. However it got here, the chance has been presented, his name is on the ballot, and he articulates the priority of addressing 3 of the great issues of the day: peace versus war; working stiff versus Wall Street; re-vamped social safety net. Big change is possible when the people know what they want, and what they want is not remotely extravagant, greedy or anything – just a decent arrangement for all.
Hillary wears high collars to cover a neck swollen by goiter, says eminent endocrinologist Dr Paglia.
Easy to see how this ends up. Every day, Hillary lies flat on a pallet behind her desk, using a visor with a 45-degree mirror to survey supplicants from her prone position. All visitors see is a formless, supine lump under a gray blanket emblazoned with the presidential seal, as bulging blue eyes regard them through the blunt, periscope-like prosthetic.
Hillary’s voice, reduced to a ragged whisper, is unintelligible. Seated beside her, Huma Abedin inclines an ear and then announces what the president said.
Televised appearances are problematical. A camera is fitted into the Oval Office ceiling, but lifelike gestures are impossible with arms pinned down by gravity. Hidden behind an outsized collar, the goiter-swollen neck — now wider than the president’s forehead — creates the disturbing illusion of a tiny, baby-sized head, haloed by the visible shadow of the indented pallet beneath it.
Of course, the determined but indistinct mosquito buzz of her voice — ruined on the campaign trail — must be redubbed by a voiceover actor, whose identity is marked classified.
Hillary becomes the first president to deliver the State of the Union speech remotely, via a giant screen. Near its droning conclusion, a disgruntled backbencher sprints down the aisle and hurls a sledgehammer, darkening millions of TV monitors across America.
“Bill”, watching from his home in Chappaqua, laughs and cops a brumski from his well-endowed companion of the evening. B-r-r-r-r-r-r-r!!!!
Hmmm. This is verging on Fellini’s “Satyricon” territory. Not saying that’s off topic here.
Adding: I saw Hillary speak several times in the early 80’s and she was smart, shrewd, forceful, engaging, and right on a lot of her points. However, time and circumstances seem to have changed the balance. There’s an old adage about age and treachery overcoming youth and skill. I always thought that meant 2 or more actors – the youthful actor and a treacherous old actor(s). Now I see that it can mean 1 actor over time; their youthful idealism destroyed by their own selling out for “sensible” reasons. Hillary’s life begins to look like a tragedy. That doesn’t mean I’ll vote for her out of sympathy. She has made her choices.
typo : “early 90’s” in place of “early 80’s’. In the early 90’s I thought she was much better than Bill. Now I see them as currently too flawed for national office and for what the times demand
you make an excellent point, flora, but i think it’s age and treachery overcomes youth and speed, skill still prevails generally. The treachery is born from realizing you no longer have speed, but you have knowledge, and speaking as an aged athlete, it works up to a point, then you hang up your cleats, some people just don’t know when to do that. Aging is such a beautiful part if life when you see it, the flower to the seed. One is now, the other the future.
I’m going to be laughing for days. Thanks.
Sanders running as an independent.
Sawant’s idea:
http://www.socialistalternative.org/2016/04/17/kshama-sawant-petitioning-bernie-run-independent/
[If electing a Republican is really Bernie’s main concern, there is no reason he could not at least run in the 40+ states where it’s absolutely clear the Democratic or Republican candidate will win, while not putting his name on the 5-10 closely contested “swing states.” This could still allow for a historic campaign if linked to building a new party for the 99% and laying the foundation for an ongoing mass political movement to run hundreds of left candidates for all levels of government, independent of corporate cash.]
This would work. I don’t care about the D party so someone else could list the drawbacks. It satisfies Sanders position of protecting Clinton but the movement continues. How does he turn it down?
Sanders isn’t protecting clinton, quite the contrary, he is the honorable senator from vermont, regarding his colleague the honorable (ex) senator from NY, politeness can be ruthless when applied in a certain way, and also strategically appropriate. Whatever movement you’re talking about doesn’t require sanders in order to continue on. the air is electrified and he finds himself a lightning rod.
Couldn’t finish reading comments – lots of goodies. Just wanted to register the thought that, apart from Bernie being by miles the best candidate in a legitimate vote, he will be denied illegitimately and the question for progressives is, what, do nothing? No. Write in his no matter how you’ve registered and ensure the tally is honest and the chain-of-possession verified.
This year some very big things are going to happen, and some of them are going to surprise/shock us. This is not over. Don’t let it be over.
I wonder why the Sanders campaign doesn’t bring up the fact that in ’08, Obama lost NY to Hillary Clinton by a wider margin than Sanders just did. (Leaving aside the, ahem, “voting issues”). And that at this same point in the race, Obama had fewer delegates than Sanders does right now. Also, in the end, it was the super-delegates switching their votes at the convention that won Obama the nomination.
It’s obvious why the media won’t reminisce about the ’08 election, but why won’t Sanders bring it up?
Sanders remains focused on the issues. Maybe he is right. Talking about the many election irregularity issues would immediately dissipate the focus, energy and educating functions of his key messages. The media blackout continues, so people are only learning more about him shortly before each primary/caucus. If the conversation were to shift to disputes about the tempting election irregularities–horrific as they are–the clarity of what he stands for would be lost.
At least Sanders is telling supporters he needs them to be observers at the polls. This recent interview with Harvey Wasserman touches on just a few of the kinds of problems.