Today's LA Times: Doyle McManus on a Bernie Sanders candidacy:

[CaliforniaPeggy]

~~snip~~

But does Sanders really think his untrammeled populism can win him the nomination, much less a general election?

“I'm running to win,” he insists. “It won't be just an educational campaign.”

When pressed, however, he acknowledges that he thinks even a losing campaign would be a good thing because of its potential to bring more attention to his ideas, widen the national debate and put pressure on Hillary Rodham Clinton or any other eventual Democratic nominee.

Win or lose, Sanders will fill a familiar role if he decides to run. Democratic presidential primaries almost always include at least one populist or quasi-populist candidate on the left. In 2008, it was John Edwards. In 2004, it was Howard Dean. In 1992, it was California's own Jerry Brown. And none of them won the nomination.

This year, there could be three candidates running to the left of Clinton. In addition to Sanders, there might be Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley (who says he's running, but hasn't succeeded in defining much of a theme yet) and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who spent most of the summer saying she wouldn't run, but recently modified that to “I don't think so.”

~~snip~~

The rest at the link:

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-mcmanus-column-sanders-democrats-2016-20141119-11-column.html

[TheNutcracker]

1. I think Bernie, Liz, or Martin can win. It's called 'new blood'

[KingCharlemagne]

2. If all 3 ran, though, and stayed in the race, they'd split the progressive vote

between them, allowing Hillary a better chance to win the nomination as the establishment -- think Hubert Humphrey '68 -- candidate.

[merrily]

3. Reality is a bear. The one or ones with the least funding will have to drop out early, ala

Lieberman, Kucinich, etc.

[KingCharlemagne]

4. In 2004, Kucinich stayed in the race quite late (even after Kerry had the

nomination locked up). He was running his campaign on a shoestring. (I happened to see him speak on the beach in Santa Monica. At the time I was a Deaniac -- this was before the Iowa caucuses -- but I was deeply, deeply impressed by Kucinich's soft-spoken and self-effacing persona. His anti-Bush and anti-war positions were nothing to sneeze at either and, of course, events subsequently vindicated him, not that the American people saw fit to reward that prescience, mind you.