right on.
Okay, so he’s raising/spending more money according to some measure that is deemed important. But here’s my question: is he raising more votes?
Not that I would mind voting for him if he became the party’s candidate, but since when did “raising more money” become the metric of choice?
You don’t see how it could be a measure of popular support, people putting their own money behind him?
Oh sure… among a self-selected group! But until (number of donaters) == (number of voters) is true, then… no, not really the same.
It’s significant because it’s a metric of how enthusiastic his supporters are. Putting your money where your mouth is to support your preferred candidate (when you’re not wealthy enough to just buy a candidate like Wall Street or the Koch brothers can) says that you’re not just voting against a greater evil or just along party lines. And it says something more when Clinton doesn’t need to take in small donations like Sanders because she welcomes big money from wealthy donors (who can’t possibly think they’re just giving away money without some amount of consideration for their contribution if she becomes president).
It’s not necessarily what gets someone elected, but it helps make a stark contrast when Clinton is trying to pretend she’s progressive and holds many of the same viewpoints as Sanders in order to minimize his appeal.
As a foreigner, what is the closest one can get to donate to Sanders?
Vague question, I know.
I think even conversation on the topic can help, particularly if you persuade others to do the same.
I wish Bernie had 5 million donors, but it’s actually 5 million donations from about 1.5 million donors, which is still about twice the number of donors as Clinton has. According to the linked Post story, more than half of Clinton’s donors have contributed the maximum for the primaries, while only 3% of Bernie’s have. On that front, the news is quite good. Now, if he can only win some big states.
Our family has sent small amounts about every few weeks, looks like a lot of Americans are doing just that.
If you are not from the U.S., you aren’t able to donate (sadly). However, you are able to buy stuff from his store. This money directly supports him. It is not a “donation,” because you are getting something from him in return for giving him money. Thank you for being interested in US politics and Bernie Sanders. He is a great candidate.
The “superdelegates” are not as undemocratic as they are portrayed. There are just a little over 700 of them out of more than 4500 total delegates available. The “superdelegates” are just picked in a different way than elected delegates.
Superdelegates are no more or less democratic than the whole process. When you vote in a primary or a caucus (don’t get me started on caucuses) you’re not voting for a nominee, but for a delegate to vote for that nominee. 4500 delegates are selected at the grassroots level specifically, but depending on state laws many of them don’t have to vote the way the primary election went. Others are required to follow the primary voters on the first ballot at the convention, but after that they’re free to vote any way they like.
Of the superdelegates 435 are members of the Democratic National Committee who are elected by Democratic voters in primaries, then in county committees then in state party committees. These are local Democratic party members who run the party. A friend of mine from the next town over was a local committeewoman, then a county committeewoman, then state, then national.
260 more are national and statewide elected folks like members of Congress and governors who also have faced the Democratic voters in a primary, and then all voters in their district or state in a general election.
That means all but 20 of these folks are people who faced the Democratic Party voters in a primary within the last three years. The other 20 are ex-presidents, ex-vice presidents and ex-Congressional leaders.
It’s not just a media consensus. He’s straight-up losing, underperforming his pledged-delegate targets, and doesn’t have a clear path to the nomination, especially given his inability to garner significant minority support.
He’s a nice guy who has important things to say, but that also describes a lot of other people I don’t want sitting behind the desk in the Oval Office. I’d certainly vote for him if the alternative were any of the Republicans, especially in an election where the Supreme Court looms this large. But he’s not very knowledgeable about foreign policy, and his domestic policy plans–while they have laudable goals–are only about two steps removed from Trumpian “This will work because deals.” He would not be a good president, and there’s a significant chance he’d be a bad one.
As opposed to…pro-establishment hillary? Why? You know very well that the current status quo will continue with her, that the poor will continue to get poorer etc…
Is this just wishful thinking on your (and for many others’) part,
that things will get better because reasons?
Or nihilism?
I like his foreign policy. He’s not going to just bomb some random country willy-nilly. He’s not going to create more veterans than is necessary and he’s going to insist that we actually support them when they come home, rather than just nominally until it comes time to push a veterans bill through congress. Everyone else, including Hillary, is a warhawk.
His domestic policy isn’t that close to Trump. He’s actually put out a plan and is realistic about needing congressional support to follow through with it, whereas Trump has just said he’d fix things.
Unless you live under a rock somewhere in the Kalahari, your future is involved with US politics. The difference is that over 6 billion of the people affected don’t get to vote.
You can send me money; a portion of it will then be donated to the Sanders campaign.
Freakonomics has a chapter on this.
Basically spending money doesn’t guarantee you a win, but how much money is raised and spent IS a good indicator of who may win.
I think this quote sums it up:
What Levitt’s study suggests is that money doesn’t necessarily cause a candidate to win — but, rather, that the kind of candidate who’s attractive to voters also ends up attracting a lot of money. So winning an election and raising money do go together, just as rain and umbrellas go together. But umbrellas don’t cause the rain. And it doesn’t seem as if money really causes electoral victories either, at least not nearly to the extent that the conventional wisdom says. For every well-funded candidate who seems to confirm that money buys elections (paging Michael Bloomberg), you can find counterexamples like Meg Whitman, Linda McMahon, Steve Forbes, and Tom Golisano.
He won Kansas, which elected like the Anti-Sanders not that long ago…
Somewhere, Cowicide is looking down from heaven smiling.
I know I’m not changing any minds. Which is fine–you should absolutely vote for the guy if you think he’s the best choice.
I just don’t.
