Why (or why not) to vote for Bernie Sanders

380 :slight_smile:

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EDIT: I am making this a wiki so if any of these numbers turn out to be wrong anyone can correct them.

By my calculations, and speaking in terms of pledged delegates Bernie Sanders [With massive wins in Hawaii, Alaska, and Washington!] should now have 1,024 pledged delegates. So in comparison with Hillary (using my close but probably not 100% accurate calculations/numbers):

Bernie Sanders:

  • Pledged before today’s primaries - 920
  • Pledged after today’s primaries - 1,025 ± 1
  • Net gain - 105 ± 1

Hillary Clinton:

  • Pledged before today’s primaries - 1,223
  • Pledged after today’s primaries - 1,260
  • Net gain - 37

What all of this means is that Bernie sanders decreased Clinton’s lead over him in pledged delegates:

  • Clinton’s lead over Sanders before today’s primaries - 303
  • Clinton’s lead over Sanders after today’s primaries - 235 ± 1
  • Net loss in Clinton’s lead - 68 ± 1
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Looking at fivethirtyeight (who haven’t deigned yesterday’s caucuses worth a mention, just like most of the media):

If the national polling was about even, Sanders should have been winning those states yesterday by 15-25%. He won them all by 40-50% (ditto Utah, Idaho).

Five states in a row he’s massively over-performed the results he would initially have been aiming at. If he can keep doing that…

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Well, I just wrote to them (and Congressman McDermott) to ask them to respect the wishes of their electorate.

I think there’s a petition to ask them to do that, too. >200K signatures so far.

http://pac.petitions.moveon.org/sign/superdelegates-dont-deny

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Maybe the Clinton supporters should vote for Sanders if the important thing is that any Democrat wins.

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There’s no maybe about it.

No if, either, given the sheer crazy on the GOP side.

Here’s an optimistic opinion:

No no no no no.

Johnson is a deficit hawk.
Wants to eliminate corporate tax.
He’s against hate crime legislation.
Built private prisons.
He wants to abolish the Department of Education, and is in favor of vouchers.
He’s against taxing carbon emissions.
He supports NAFTA.
He started a SuperPAC, and he wants no limits on campaign donations.
He believes you can’t legislate guns in any way.
He’s against government involvement in health care, and voted to cut Medicare.
Vetoed a minimum wage raise from $4.65 to $5.25 in 2011.
Wants to privatize Social Security and raise the retirement age.
Wants to eliminate the IRS.
Opposes net neutrality.

So how again is he like Bernie Sanders? They’re both humans, probably?

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Or they could vote for the Green party candidate and choose both socialism and social libertarianism. Bernie Sanders has far more in common with them than Gary Johnson.

But after a quick look these guys seem to be all about persuading people to vote Libertarian as the lesser of three evils. So more of the same then.

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If Clinton gets the nomination, former Sanders people have three ways to go:

  • Voters who mostly want to disrupt the status quo will vote for Trump.
  • Voters who mostly care about social issues will vote for Clinton.
  • Voters who mostly wanted to stick it to Wall Street will stay home.

Libertarians are nowhere near winning any of these votes.

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If he doesn’t get the nom, I will be watching the Green Party vote with interest.

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Or write him in. I’m going to write him in. You should write him in. If they forget to put Bernie Sanders name on your ballot in the general election, remind them by writing his name in.

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@TailOfTruth lists a fourth way to go.

Fifth way to go: Vote Green.

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I don’t know how seriously to take Politico’s suggestion that Clinton should pick Franken as her running mate, and I know Veep isn’t worth a bucket of warm piss, but if she is the candidate, she is really going to have to think how she’s going to get the ~40% of the party that supports the guy well to her left back on side.

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I think that the older the presidential candidate is, the more important the vice presidential candidate is. Hilary is 68, and Bernie is 74. Neither is a spring chicken, and it’s a difficult and stressful job. I’d like the see the VP candidate be someone who can actually take over, and do a good job, just in case. (See: Sarah Palin versus Joe Biden.)

Whether Al Franken could do it, I’m not sure, I don’t know enough. From what I do know, I like him, though.

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Yeah, which is partly why I’m not very enthusiastic about suggestions like Julian Castro. Demographically useful, perhaps, but very thin resume.

I don’t claim to be an expert in politics, but the Dems seem a bit lacking in experienced high profile candidates from a generation after Clinton/Sanders/Warren. OTOH, if Ryan, Rubio, Jindal et al were meant to be the next generation, so are the GOP.

But hell, Gerry Ford became veep and then president without being elected to either position. Who knows what’ll happen?

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Other than a nod to Minnesota’s historical rejection of far-right politics (residents of White Bear Lake and exurbs of St. Cloud, notwithstanding), he’s no more enticing a selection than anyone else mentioned as a possibility.

Besides, he’s supposed to run for president, get elected and fail miserably amid scandals after about 100 days in office resulting in his resignation, not be Veep on someone else’s ticket. :pouting_cat:

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Kinda OT, but when we were cleaning out my grandparents’ house after they both passed, I found a polaroid of Gerry Ford. I said “what the hell?” and most everyone got a disgusted look on their face, except for one uncle. He asked to have it, and no one objected. My grandfather was a good person, overall, but politically, fuuuuu.

GenX politicians are pretty disappointing overall, but I think all of us are (pretty disappointing GenXers, that is). I don’t know where we go from here, draft Rachel Maddow? (2/3 joking).

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Well, this is interesting.

The Sanders campaign submitted a check at 3 p.m. on March 16th, the deadline to do so, according to signatures on a party document.

March 16th was also the day for the party to certify its list of candidates for the June 14 primary to the D.C. Board of Elections.

But the party did not forward Sanders’s name until it sent an e-mail at 1:31 p.m. the next day, March 17th.

A D.C. Democratic activist challenged Sanders’s status as a legitimate candidate because of the delay and that has forced the Board of Elections to take up the matter later this week, according to D.C. Democratic Party Chair Anita Bonds.

Seems like a stupid way to antagonize people you’d like to vote for the party in Nov when I’d be beyond amazed if Clinton wasn’t going to win DC by a landslide anyway.

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