You mispelled “independents.” That’s where Clinton will lose heavy ground. Her performance in closed primaries show she’s locked down the Dem vote. It’s everyone else she should worry about.
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Except that people who can afford to directly hand that over (or raise it for) a candidate, implying a PERSONAL relationship with said politician. You think that most politicians care about the $30 handed over by random voters? Just because each amount is a similar percentage of income, someone who has $30 mill can lose $30K in the couch and be none the worse for the loss. A family making $30K for a year, that $30 means a hell of a lot more.[quote=“Mister44, post:16, topic:76779”]
If the person is rich enough, then no, $30k isn’t impacting the person doing the donating, which I think was what Chesterfield was referring to.
[/quote]
You’re correct on that… fair enough.
But that has a bigger impact on politics, which is sort of the bottom line here.
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Because anyone can do that.
If you’re going to get a well connected movie star who actually knows people who have that kind of money, and would spend it to be around him, then use his clout to full potential. He isn’t a professional fund raiser, he is a supporter throwing one shindig. You can only fit X amount of people at the banquet hall. May as well fill them with as many $30K donors.
Look I don’t even like Hillary, but I don’t exactly blame them for fund raising this way. It is nothing new.
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Howso? Are you alleging that they forced people to endorse Hillary? It’s not in delegate allocation because if anything Sanders is getting a higher percentage of delegates than votes.
I think that’s the biggest benefit of the fundraiser.
A few extra ads isn’t going to make much difference to the Presidential candidates, the voters are completely bombarded anyways.
The money that goes to the DNC is the money that actually makes a difference. In downticket races where the candidates have poor visibility giving a candidate the ability to assemble a staff and run more ads can make the difference.
Wasserman Schultz has made it clear that the super delegates are expected to be good soldiers and offset any lead that Sanders might arrive at the convention with:
“Unpledged delegates exist really to make sure that party leaders and elected officials don’t have to be in a position where they are running against grassroots activists,” Wasserman Schultz calmly explained.
[Source]
A party chair has a lot of carrots and sticks to offer the people who get to be super delegates, and Wasserman Schultz is not going to risk a repeat of 2008, when the super delegates switched from her anointed one to Obama.
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, formerly a vice chair with the DNC, has quit in part because Wasserman Schultz has displayed such obvious bias toward Clinton (e.g. monkeying with the debate schedule to give Sanders less exposure).
And yes, I understand why the party establishment isn’t inclined to support someone who hasn’t been a part of the machine as long as they have. But once they let Sanders join and run the chair and leadership is expected to be neutral, even if what they thought would be a symbolic run gained more popular appeal than anyone expected.
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There are Dem voters in those states. The margins are just tighter there. But yes, Clinton also has a problem nationwide with independent/unaffiliated voters who don’t like her or trust her.
They should be counting their blessings that he hasn’t (yet) done a Corbyn.
I’m pretty happy that one of the people Sanders endorsed this week was my potential next congresscritter. Hopefully she’ll replace the retiring waste of space we have right now.
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He’s already doing a Corbyn, because they were complacent enough to let him run as a Dem at all (I’m sure they thought Clinton would totally destroy a cranky old socialist, so why not?). Once the coronation is over, I hope Sanders will continue to work with progressive Dems from a place outside the DNC to get downticket officials like Jayapal and Canova elected so the party can be renewed from within. Combined with a lot of Third Way Boomers aging out, the party might still have a shot at changing and addressing the serious issues that people under 35 are facing in the future.
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Reporting live from
the Bureau of Conflicted Internal States:
George Clooney admits money he raised for Hillary Clinton is ‘obscene’
Clooney: ‘It’s ridiculous we should have this kind of money in politics’
and
Bernie Sanders praises Hollywood star’s ‘integrity and honesty on this issue’
I still maintain that Clinton looks worse in many ways than Trump. For instance, she is an ultra hawk. This isn’t to say that Trump looks like good presidential material, from any angle. And anyone, hell, anything including non-sentient and even demon-possessed objects, would be better than Cruz.
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Hmm, I’ll agree that quote is bad, though the full quote looks more confusing than anything:
Unpledged delegates exist really to make sure that party leaders and
elected officials don’t have to be in a position where they are running
against grassroots activists. We are, as a Democratic Party, really
highlight and emphasize inclusiveness and diversity at our convention,
and so we want to give every opportunity to grass-roots activists and
diverse committed Democrats to be able to participate, attend and be a
delegate at the convention. And so we separate out those unpledged
delegates to make sure that there isn’t competition between them.
I’m pretty certain she was trying to walk back her first sentence 
I will agree the DNC probably is trying to sway things to Hillary and do see the super-delegates as a form of defence against fringe candidates, Trump is a great example.
The super delegates switched to Obama because he dominated the primaries, I think it’s very doubtful that the super-delegates overturn the pledged delegates in this case either, I think they’re mostly there as a form of endorsement for the party insiders to indicate who they think the better candidate is.
I suspect the party thinks of them as a form of security blanket since they want a fail-safe in case a Trump candidate does come up. However I’m not sure it’s a practical idea because people are dubious about denying the nomination to Trump when it’s pretty clear he wouldn’t have won a 1 on 1 race with most of the candidates.
So I suspect you’re correct that the DNC is trying to undermine Sanders but I’m not sure it’s about him ignoring the machine since they never screwed around with Obama the same way (he wasn’t anti-establishment but he was up against Hillary). I think they really are skeptical about him as a candidate.
He looks like a strong candidate because no one has really attacked him yet, Clinton can’t attack him because she’d have to do so from the right and the Republicans haven’t attacked him because they want him to win (or at least damage Hillary). When they do I think the attacks on his competency are going to be a lot harder as will the discussions of how much his plans cost in terms of tactics.
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Bernie’s a straight dealer who isn’t above being both sincere and stunningly satirical all at once. He probably expects his supporters, and others, to realize the contradiction lies not in his statement, but in his subject, and who the subject campaigned for.
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I’m sure they are skeptical about Sanders as a candidate, which is also why they let him run against their Chosen One in the primaries. They didn’t reckon that his opposition to the party establishment’s Third Way neoliberalism would connect with more than 20% of Dem primary voters, but they were mistaken and had to scramble.
Obama, for all the hopey-changey stuff, was really a Chicago School centrist the party establishment could do business with, plus he brought the cachet of being the first African-American President. Despite the rancour of the “PUMAs” the establishment saw the benefits of a show of party unity at the convention.
In the face of Clinton being buried in 2008, the super delegates were allowed to support someone who was close enough to the establishment consensus to be acceptable. Since Sanders is not, Wasserman Schultz had to make it clear that they’d be used to block him if things were too close by July.
I don’t think the Republicans will have a chance to attack Sanders directly, although in the general they’ll pretend that Clinton is seriously considering implementing some of his evil Commie policies. In any case, they have problems of their own with Trump.
I think she’s a warhawk and a neoliberal sellout to her big donors, but if I was in a swing state I’d be forced to vote for her over Trump and/or Cruz. Barring a Sanders miracle, it’ll just be one of those crappy election seasons where the best we can hope for is a slightly more conservative version of the Obama years (maybe without American troops back in Iraq).
Don’t make the mistake of assuming this is just about one presidential election.
Bernie’s main job here is to get these talking points on the agenda, and he’s doing a fabulous job.
Hillary or Bernie, take these lessons into 2018, into 2020, and beyond.
This may not be the election that ushers in the revolution, but it might very well be the spark that ignites the fire a few years down the line.
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From the Meet the Press transcript, here’s what Clooney said:
[W]e need to take the senate back because we need to confirm the Supreme Court justice because that fifth vote on the Supreme Court can overturn Citizens United and get this obscene, ridiculous amount of money out so I never have to do a fundraiser again. And that’s why I’m doing it.
Given that context, Sanders’ response makes perfect sense.
Now, if you really want to feel conflicted, here is Debbie Wasserman-Scwartz from the same transcript:
We agree as a party that there is an obscene amount of money in politics. And that’s why our members, I’m a co-sponsor, along with many of my colleagues of a constitutional amendment that would overturn Citizens United.
(And yes, she really did co-sponsor that proposed Constitutional Amendment)
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Indeed. I voted for the first time in 2000. Nader. In Ohio. Although I like some of his politics, Sanders has got to do a lot more to convince me that he is viable as president. Not making that mistake again.
Exactly how would they have stopped him from running?
The Republican party sure as hell didn’t want Ted Cruz to run and he’s the next likeliest nominee behind Trump. Do you think the Republican party so much less corrupt than the Democrats because the RNC’s two least favourite candidates are dominating the primary.
[quote=“gracchus, post:34, topic:76779”]In the face of Clinton being buried in 2008, the super delegates were
allowed to support someone who was close enough to the establishment
consensus to be acceptable. Since Sanders is not, Wasserman Schultz had
to make it clear that they’d be used to block him if things were too
close by July.
[/quote]
Wasserman has done nothing of the sort, she just tried to give a justification for why the superdelegates existed.
Your talk of superdelegates being told who to vote for sounds a lot like a conspiracy theory. They’re just people who hold positions at different levels of the Democratic party, if they were being forced to vote a certain way they’d sure as hell complain about it.
But not anyone did. He didn’t, for example.
Sure. He could have. Uh huh.
