You got what you deserve, Republican Party...

[Weltall]

Getting to spar with you again is so much fun!

Her main "glaring flaw" is that she's a woman. My mom is convinced that most liberals supporting Bernie do so because of sexism, and I can't call her entirely wrong because, well, it's mostly men who are the most angry at Hillary, and consciously or unconsciously there probably is a connection there... and she also thinks a socialist could never win, but that's fairly obvious; "socialist" still polls INCREDIBLY badly in this country.

I guess there are some Sanders supporters who really don't like women, but probably not much more than there are misandrists supporting Clinton. Remember that the Bernie coalition started off as support for Elizabeth Warren. I have no doubt in my mind that should she have run instead of Sanders, her level of support would be on the same level (if not higher, she was not an independent). I mean, I'm a man, and I'm angry at Hillary, but her genitalia don't form the core of any reason why.

I don't really think the 's' word is such an obstacle anymore, thanks to right-wingers inadvertently devaluing the term so hard and often over the last eight years. Comparing Sanders to Stalin or Pol Pot falls flat within 30 seconds of listening to him talk. And, for all that, he outpolls Trump very comfortably. This sentiment is, in large part, the 'cucking' I mentioned previously: Dems are too afraid of Republicans (even when they are clearly falling apart at the seams, apparently) to effectively counter them. GOP gerrymandering and unlimited campaign money are some of the reason why the GOP dominates all lower levels of government, but the rest of the reason is because the Democrats lack backbone.

Living in Maine, your caveman retard governor notwithstanding, you don't really see a lot of that. Your Democrats are fairly safe. But, watch one run in Kentucky in 2014:



Alison Lundergan Grimes' strategy to unseat Mitch McConnell was "I'm not one of those liberals". As you might be aware, McConnell is now Senate ML. Why would any undecided or leaning voter find that message resonating? Why would any conservative voter opt to change their mind?

No spine. No principles. This is why Democrats control the White House and little else.

If Hillary was a man in this same position, he surely would have someone running against him to his right, but I do think that that person would not be doing as well as Bernie is; sexism has to be a part of why he has done so well... or at least unconscious gender bias, but that's the same thing in the end. Sure, "we want someone more liberal" is real, but it's not the only factor, I don't think.

The scenario you described already happened, with Obama.

Sanders people have done things dozens of times worse towards Clinton and you know it. You're making a mountain out of a molehill, while ignoring everything done by your side, and that's wrong. (Oh, and that's not really what John Lewis said.) And if we go back to '08 with this, the Hillary dead-enders who claimed "I'll never vote for Obama because of [thing X he did to the Clintons] eventually almost all came around and supported Obama, because that's what you do -- you vote for your party's nominee once they has been chosen unless you have an INCREDIBLY good reason to not do so, like, they are Donald Trump. But the Democratic Party has not nominated someone like Trump probably ever, so that's safe.

That is because Hillary supporters are Democratic partisans. A lot of Sanders supporters are new to the political process, for the first time having the sense that there was a point to it. They have little or no connection to the Party and no incentive to contribute to its success. I count myself among that number. The ones who will stick around are the ones who go along with the lesser of two profound evils. I don't think that's going to be the case this time, on either side of the political spectrum.

For instance on the "Bernie people are awful' front, though, back in March I went to the caucus here. Look up my thread on how THAT went, with the people behind be badmouthing Hillary for hours while we waited in line. Or more recently, last Friday and Saturday, I was a Hillary delegate at the Maine Democratic Convention. Now, Bernie won this state 2-to-1, so it was a very heavily Bernie-favoring crowd even though the race is over. So what happened? Well, at the convention, there were two big speeches, one for each candidate. Bernie had local ex-state government guy Troy Jackson and some person from Vermont, and Hillary had ex-Massachusetts congressman Barney Frank... and a bunch of people decided that it'd be a good idea to heckle Barnie, because he supports Hillary and is thus awful, a corporate shill, etc, etc. It was unbelievable, I've never seen anything like that! How could people be so rude that at the state convention you HECKLE a speaker just because they disagree with you, so much and so consistently that sometimes they cannot speak? Terrible behavior there, it really encapsulated the attitude I have seen from Bernie fans -- people too likely to be vocally obnoxious towards the other candidate, and irrationally angry at people who agree with you 95% of the time, threatening to help people who agree with you near-0% of the time win out of pointless spite. As Barney Frank said, he voted once for someone he thought was perfect... but by the time he stood for re-election, he realized that he didn't think he was perfect anymore (because no one can be perfect and get anything done in congress.). Heh... amusing stuff. :)

I guess it's a lot harder to heckle a candidate when he draws crowds ten times the size. Hillary supporters tend to do their dirty work on the internet. I went to Sanders' Kentucky rally last week in Lexington and I heard Hillary supporters trying to that. It's just that they were too few in size to matter.

Oh, and there was this sad frat boy while I was outside in line, rolling by and yelling TRUMP 2016. Except, there was a red light, so his car (he was in the back seat) couldn't move. Watching him slump in his seat as his window rolled up was THE image of the campaign season for me.

Oh yeah, and our local House of Representatives member, Chellie Pingreee, also was heckled by people angry that she has endorsed Hillary. How could any so-called "progressive" support Clinton? I must heckle them until they come to their senses! Get over yourself, there are plenty of great reasons to support Hillary.

That would be energy best spent helping your candidate win, I agree.

Naturally, there was no heckling of any Bernie supporter's speech. I have never heard anyone insult Bernie like the things people say about Hillary to Hillary supporters.

You must never visit Daily Kos anymore, then.

No, that's a reaction to how much he dislikes Trump. The Kochs have been notably silent in the Republican presidential race this year because they didn't like any of the top candidates. At this point, I expect them to mostly ignore the presidential race and spend their money on trying to help lower-level Republicans win, to hold Congress in a likely Hillary Clinton administration. So we've got a lot of work to do to win Congress too, if we want anything to get done in the next term!

Yeah, he dislikes Trump, but what is there about Clinton for the Koch brothers to dislike, really? They are representative of what Sanders claims is wrong with American politics, but there isn't that much ideological conflict between them and Clinton.

That is absolutely false. The hate is extremely disproportionate! I've experienced it both in person and online, and it's bad. It's so bad that we have so-called liberals repeating right-wing talking points about Hillary, which is just absurd. There are some Hillary fans disappointed by Bernie's negative turns, and I am disappointed by his constant intonations that she's probably corrupt but I can't prove it so I won't actually say it (so don't, if you have no proof and it's not true!), and by him not giving up now that he has lost and we need to unite to start working to defeat probably the most dangerous person to run for President in a very long time, but I still like him on a policy level, certainly, and I imagine most Hillary supporters would agree there. Both are great on policy though; 93% similar voting records in congress and all that.

You want to talk about right wing talking points? These are some I've heard from Hillary supporters, directed at Sanders:

He's a socialist!
He's going to raise your taxes!
He is soft on foreign policy (apparently, thinking before you start a war makes you 'soft')
Everything will get more expensive if the minimum wage goes up
Sanders supporters just want free stuff
Unicorns and rainbows

etc. like, are you on Kos or Free Republic? Hard to tell at times.

Bernie supporters use RWTP to impugn Clinton's character. Clinton supporters use RWTP to impugn Sanders' policies. I find that to be a lot more distasteful.

She'll do much more for this than Bernie would. Bernie's problem is that he's too absolute, you've got to be fully with him for him to support you . So, he has done almost no fundraising for Democratic house or senate campaign committees this year, while Hillary has raised a lot of money for the DNC and lower-level committees, to get some of the money we will need to compete in November. With Bernie as the nominee, where does the money to win tough senate races come from? He won't help them, they aren't pure enough for him. So we lose those races, along with the Presidency, and give Republicans a trifecta? Awesome.

Bernie is raising money solely from individual contributions. Clinton can easily raise money for others, because the majority of that cash is coming from connected and very wealthy people or SuperPACs. Furthermore, why waste his energy raising funds for Democrats like Alison Grimes above, who have no chance of winning?

And as for "energy and excitement", if that was real then Bernie would be winning the nomination.

There are obstacles energy and excitement can't overcome, such as closed primaries, people being de-registered to vote (this happened to me), votes being lost or miscounted, tremendously biased coverage in the media, and all the other tricks in a career politician's sleeve.

No, it's "change, but at a pace that actually will happen."

How is Clinton going to accomplish anything with a GOP senate, representing an electorate that loathes her on a personal level? Even if she's sincere about half the promises she makes, it won't matter. It's going to be like Obama's first term, only much worse.

Money is certainly a huge, huge problem, yes. Citizen's United was an anti-Hillary group in 2008, remember, and the lasting impact of that decision that allowed an infinite flood of money into politics is horrible and sad. There were big problems before that, but that decision made things much worse. But even so, the Democrats have a very favorable map, and it should be easy for Hillary to win this election. All credible polling shows Hillary with big leads, and Trump's record-breaking negatives combined with Obama's rising popularity numbers should be enough to overcome Hillary's own negative numbers, and break that final glass ceiling. Here's hoping.

Great, I love getting to choose between which candidate I dislike less. CU was anti-Hillary in 2008, but she can't not love it now, it is largely why she is winning.

But, thanks to the electoral college and living in a non-swing state, I don't have to make that choice.


I saw a saying that fits well. "Hillary Clinton is the best candidate for the government we have. Bernie Sanders is the best candidate for the government we need."