Bernie Sanders would have beaten Trump. Period.

[Bucky]

Another poster here in DU is arguing Sanders would have lost.

Evidence: arguments that begin with "it woulda been like" and outright assertions that "socialism is still unpopular in America"
In other words... no evidence. Just speculation without fact.

I'm arguing Sanders would have won.

Empirical date: actual polls showing Sanders winning decisively against Trump.

Sanders beat Trump by 10 points among independencts and would have taken the overall electorate 56-44 in a two way race.

Some people will argue that polls were inaccurate this year. But that's only true of state-by-state polls. Overall polling showed Clinton just slightly ahead of Trump in popular support--when you aggregate all the major national polls--and that is in fact what happened. She'll win the popular vote by about one million votes (better than Gore's margin of victory) or 8/10s of 1%. Trump did a little better, but not much better, than the aggregate of all major polls.

He "overcame" a 2-3% margin, but could not have beat a 12% point margin like Sanders had.

Am I making some assumptions too? Yes, to be honest, I am. But I make far far fewer than those made by people saying Bernie would have lost. The truth is we'll never know with absolute certainty. But any reasonable model will tell you Sanders at the minimum would have flipped those 2-3 razor-close rust belt states that gave Trump his fluke of a minority victory and deprived Clinton of her electoral plurality.

It's tough to write this, because the one thing we do NOT need at DU is a typical liberal circular firing squad. We need to spend our time and effort organizing and putting the word out on how to resist Trump's disastrous policy impulses and the corrupt mob of sycophants and opportunists that he's going to bring in to loot the country.

I won't sit back and let others spread bad info. I will speak up. But I will always be a voice saying we need to look forward and find the soft spots to kick their fascist asses.

[NCTraveler]

1. Sanders couldn't beat Clinton.

To claim he would have beat Trump, who had ten times the resources, is imaginary at best.

Going against Trump would have taken the rape essay off the table. That would have been a bonus for Sanders. Still, just spitting into the wind with this one.

Sanders would have been viewed as the political insider who never had a real job outside of government. Trump would have had a field day with him.

[MelissaB]

3. Let's not mention the "rigged primary" that cost us a lot of votes because people walked away

from the party when they saw how dirty/unfair it was. Yeah, a corporate dem with so much baggage, ties to wall street, NAFTA, the TPP, and those damn speeches she raked 250k in had NOTHING to do with her loss, either.

[NCTraveler]

6. Or the rigged general. lol.

Yeah. The speeches really did it.

[MelissaB]

7. Looks like you're missing the point again.

[NCTraveler]

13. No, I'm not.

Sanders couldn't get past the minor influence of the DNC yet predictions are being made about the general. My response was directly related to your reply. Directly. I get that its easier to just say "Looks like you're missing the point again."

Again?

[DirkGently]

58. Polls, not predictions.

Sanders was the stronger candidate vs. Trump, by a wide margin, in every poll.

Time to admit what a lot of people said all along: Clinton was unelectable. Trump got fewer votes than anyone who ran against Obama, and she still couldn't generate enough enthusiam.

All the institutional support and money was worth exactly nothing.

All the carping about "pie in the sky" "pipe dream" goals of progressives was baloney. Lofty goals are exactly what people vote for in presidential elections. "No we can't" was a cynical approach.

The fake, slightly obscene suggestion that black people would never vote for Sanders for some murky reason was a lie.

It wasn't Jill Stein's fault.

It wasn't because there are a zillion "racists" dying to vote for Trump.

Hillary Clinton was UNELECTABLE.

[beaglelover]

60. And the polls turned out to be SO accurate this election cycle, didn't they? Give me a fuckin'

break with the polls argument. Also, Bernie was NEVER seriously vetted by anyone. The Trump campaign would have DESTROYED him with his own baggage which never saw the light of day.

[DirkGently]

66. Polls gave Hillary a tiny lead at best.

Polls aren't invalid. But the in-the-tank cheerleaders pretended Clinton's 4 point lead was a lead pipe cinch. Not even in the same league as Sanders' typical 10 points over Trump.

Trump didn't even muster as many votes as Romney or McCain. Anyone but the most disliked politician in America could have won.

[Zen Democrat]

155. Hillary won the popular vote by enough to make the 4 point lead accurate.

They just collect the total vote in these polls, and not the state-by-state polls.

[NCTraveler]

61. I don't think Clinton was unelectable.

I don't even think anyone can make an educated argument for that case. There isn't one. She lost this election.

You stick with your polls. I understand your need to use them. Makes absolutely no sense for a litany of reasons, but that is on you.

[DirkGently]

68. She literally had the highest disapproval

ratings of anyone ever, did she not? All that history. All that maneuvering. The crazy conspiracies may have been nonsense, but her baggage was very real.

[NCTraveler]

73. Lets see.

Since this is the metric you are going with to prove she was unelectable, what were her and the Trumpsters final approve/disapprove numbers before the election. I think both were in shit territory. Again, Clinton was not unelectable. She lost this election.

"her baggage was very real."

True that. So was Trumps.

I'm noticing a lot of these one sided comments.

Lets just put your thoughts to sleep on this one.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/clinton_favorableunfavorable-1131.html

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/trump_favorableunfavorable-5493.html

So Trump was bigly unelectable, correct?

[DirkGently]

76. It is a fact she was unelectable.

Trump's numbers were actually crap. People actively avoided voting for Clinton because they could not stomach her. She would not have beaten McCain or Romney.

It is one-sided. She was a bad candidate that would not have won in 2008 or 2012 or ever.

[NCTraveler]

79. "It is a fact she was unelectable."

That statement cannot be trotted out as fact. It's not fact. She did lose this election.

Just for a little education, Trumps favorable/unfavorable numbers were worse than Clintons. That is truly the metric you attempted to use to prove your "facts".

"People actively avoided voting for Clinton because they could not stomach her."

More people voted for her than Trump. See. That is a fact.

That quote goes both ways. People actively avoided voting for Trump because they could not stomach him.

I know that doesn't fit the narrative you are attempting to build. Again, I'm noticing this trend of one line of sight.

[DirkGently]

81. McCain would have beaten her. Romney too.

A candidate that can't muster enough votes to win is unelectable.

And her whole approach and that of her supporters was a failure. Entitlement. Résumé. Time for a woman to win. The approval of various bosses and leaders obviously afraid to cross her.

But when it came to what she stood for, it was an easy read between the lines. "The elites know what they're doing." "Don't reach too high."

"No we can't."

Smug, lazy, and dependent on the notion that institutional approval is the sin qua non for leadership. Tracy Flick come to life.

That's not how presidential elections work. You don't get it because the teacher likes you.

You have to generate real enthusiam. You have to acknowledge that people want change.

She was not good enough, period.

[NCTraveler]

86. You are just all over the place.

I have disproven the original metric you used as proof, so you just go on. You use the word "fact" when making assumptions and over the top statements like they are sound judgement. Have at it.

"She was not good enough, period."

Now I get it.

[DirkGently]

91. You imagine you disproved Clinton was unelectable?

Because her world-record disapproval numbers were similar to Trump's? The argument is a spectacularly disliked candidate is the answer to another disliked candidate?

The facts are the facts. A ham sandwich could have beaten Trump. Hillary Clinton could not.

You want to run her again next time? What do you think would happen?

[bettyellen]

102. No, by your own metric Trump could never have won. Other than that you have personal

Opinions.

[DirkGently]

113. Disapproval was one index of Clinton's unelectability.

The premise that her unpopularity didn't matter kind of falls apart given her crushing defeat. Obviously hers mattered more than Trump's.

I get that people would like for her ignominious failure to be for some other reason than her unsuitability as a candidate.

But the fact that she lost to another bad candidate only proves she was even less electable than Donald J. Trump.

There's no weaseling around that fact.

[BlueProgressive]

167. If we're going to re-run candidates who lost the General Election,

Michael Dukakis and John Kerry are ahead of Hillary in the line....

[DirkGently]

170. Absolutely!

[Demsrule86]

234. How about this...I blame Bernie for her loss.

He drove up her negatives. You can see, there are other ways to look at this. I don't say Bernie set out to do this ...but the road to hell is paved with good intentions...and Bernies 'road' in the primary led straight to a Trump electoral college win. A giant FU goes out to all who did not support the Hillary Clinton who was the only one who could stop the GOP from dismantling the new deal and packing the courts. Now that being said...I don't care about Bernie anymore...he is back in the Senate doing whatever you do when you are completely powerless because the other side won. Time to move on and see if we can mitigate this disaster by taking the 2018 election...I would think you might agree that stopping Trump from dismantling Dodd, ending Medicare and Social Security registering Muslims, setting up internment camps, deporting untold millions of people, jailing gays, overturning Roe V Wade might be more useful than, the"I told you so thread".

[duffyduff]

175. She lost only the Electoral College. She did win the popular vote.

Sanders couldn't win squat.

[George II]

158. If Clinton was unelectable then Sanders was more unelectable. Period.

[DirkGently]

168. Except all the polls had him smashing Trump, of course.

She was a bad candidate. "It's her time / shut up libs" turned out not to be a compelling platform.

A ham sandwich could have beaten Trump. Hillary could not.

Period.

[George II]

173. The same pollsters had Clinton "smashing" Trump.

Is that an anti-Semitic comment/reference/slur, claiming in almost the same breath that Sanders could beat Trump that "a ham sandwich could have beaten Trump"?

[DirkGently]

177. No one ever had Clinton beating Trump like Sanders.

Sanders had a 10-point cushion to her max of what, four?

If you don't understand the ham sandwich reference, it comes from the joke that a prosecutor can indict anyone with a grand jury, or even "a ham sandwich." It was turned into a joke that anyone could beat Trump.

Anyone, it appears, besides Hillary Clinton.

[George II]

184. We don't elect Presidents with national votes. At one point (just before Comey interfered).....

....Clinton had almost a 200 Electoral Vote lead. Sanders?

By the way, for future reference and "jokes", the Jewish faith forbids Jews from eating ham and all cuts of pork, along with a number of other types of meat.

[DirkGently]

190. Clinton got crushed in the EC.

I love your idea that the ham sandwich joke mentioned in approval of Bernie Sanders is anti-Semitic because ham is not Kosher. I'm sure you do not mention non-Kosher meats at any time in your daily life.



I first heard it from a law professor and former NY prosecutor whose religious affiliation you will never guess!

[George II]

203. When it's all said and done, she will have lost by about 40-50 votes. That's not being "crushed".

What that means that if about 25 going the other way she would have won.

Why are so many members of "Democratic" Underground so eager and willing to denigrate our candidate this year?

[DirkGently]

209. She simply was a bad choice.

Why are the people who most viciously argued for her candidacy unwilling to admit they were wrong?

[George II]

213. Don't know, perhaps you should ask the Sanders supporters?

[DirkGently]

216. Says the poster arguing ham sandwiches are anti-Semitic?

Go on. Pull the other one.

[George II]

229. I never argued the simply "ham sandwiches" are anti-Semitic. Context is everything!

[BainsBane]

224. And we know polls are so accurate

and none of those polls reflected the mountains of opp research the GOP would have used against Trump. It's easy to have high approval ratings when you don't any serious criticism.

That so many Sanders supporters wanted polls to replace the votes of actual citizens shows the extent to which they value corporate media over citizen rights.

[George II]

199. "Disapproval" wasn't on the ballot. If it was she would have won by a landslide.

[DirkGently]

202. Something sure kept people from voting for her.

Trump's numbers were actually pretty terrible. Clinton's turnout would not have beaten McCain or Romney.

You could call it "disinterest" or something if it feels better I guess.

[George II]

204. Better than a million people voted for her over Trump.

[DirkGently]

215. Not enough in the states Sanders won.

Clinton ignored or presumed she would win the rust belt states. She got hammered in all of them.

You can't win the Presidency appealing to just the people predisposed to support you. The Clinton campaign didn't bother to speak to the people hurting the most. She thought -- along with most of us -- that Trump was simply too terrible to win.

She did a bad job. She was a bad candidate. The fault is not with the "basket of deplorables" or with sexism or racism or Jill Stein.

She wasn't good enough.

[George II]

230. Nor can you win the nomination "appealing to just the people predisposed to support you".

Once again, if she wasn't "good enough" then Sanders was about 3 million votes less "good enough".

[WhiteTara]

201. No she did not.

[DirkGently]

206. She did set a personal 30-year worst

Check out what the paper pushing hardest for her said:

A Record number of Americans now dislike Hillary Clinton

As of today, though, Americans' views of her just hit a record low.

A new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows 41 percent of Americans have a favorable impression of Clinton, while 56 percent have an unfavorable one.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/08/31/a-record-number-of-americans-now-dislike-hillary-clinton/

True that Trump's disapproval was even higher, but apparently a highly disliked candidate was not the answer to a very highly disliked candidate.

[WhiteTara]

208. Especially to sexist misogynist men.

Of course, her unfavorables were due to the fact that she is a woman. Better to have a president who grabs vaginas than to have a president with a vagina.

[DirkGently]

210. Well the misogyinst's unfavorables were even higher.

Are you arguing that Trump's unfavorables were just and Hillary's were not?

Even if that were true, Hillary was clearly not the "pragmatic" choice to run, as she lost to the least-liked candidate in history.

[Plucketeer]

112. Yes you are.

We have hard evidence that the deck was stacked against Bernie before he ever threw his hat in the ring. The planned coronation was confident Sanders never had a chance because they'd sealed up the primaries before the starting bell went off. It AMAZES me how folks can just look right over the crowds Bernie drew wherever he showed up. Crowds and enthusiasm that Dame Hillary couldn't even dream of.
And the queen of Payday lending. What a stellar pick to orchestrate the bungled run. I donated a fair amount to Dippy-Whackerman-Shultz's opponent, but not enough to overcome the blood-sucking rip-off lobby that bought her another term. She really needs to be a manager at one of those loan shark outlets where she could put that s*it-eatin' grin to good use while taking advantage of folks who's backs are against the wall. Or, maybe Trump could appoint her as Treasury secretary.

[LiberalFighter]

69. If Sanders couldn't win the primaries which were to his advantage

then how was he suppose to beat Trump? If Sanders had played by the Republican rules for their primaries he would had been demolished.

[FrenchieCat]

149. Yeah...

those Caucuses were rigged as they didn't represent any popular vote in any state in which they were held...

So now that all of that is said and done, when does the Revolution aka Civil War starts?

I would like to know the plan, since the Revolution didn't start at the ballot box on Tuesday....

How many have to suffer an perish before it starts and ends?

Do we have enough weapons to go up against the Tramp Government and his Deplorables?
Just askin'....
Cause I don't want to miss it!

[Demsrule86]

151. Bernie had less votes

It is not unfair. What is unfair is that Bernie spent months running down the Democratic Party and Hillary. He refused to concede in a timely fashion...pretty much ruined our convention. I don't doubt Bernie had good intentions but in the end, we lost because he chose to mount a divisive primary in a year we needed to win...now all those who refuse to vote for her will get what you didn't vote or voted for if you went Trump or a third party instead of voting...register Muslims...that is his new idea...oh and put judges in that want to jail LGBTQ. Now with the courts gone and the GOP controlling everything those of us that warned that Bernie was digging a hole we could not climb out of were correct.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

226. Good point! We'll see in 4 years whether Bernie can beat Donald Chump...

Last edited Sun Nov 20, 2016, 02:15 PM - Edit history (1)

Indeed, I expect Bernie will DEMOLISH him in 2020! And with Keith Ellison installed as the DNC Chair, next time, the primaries won't be rigged in favor of the establishment candidate. But, we can't dwell on what might have been... we need to now look forward.

Bernie & Elizabeth 2020!!!

[Demsrule86]

235. You are suggesting we should run and 80 year old socialist candidate against

Trump? Seriously...no.

[Demsrule86]

233. So dirty...people voted and he lost...the horror.

Of Course did give Trump and important talking point...rigged election...one among many.

[OhZone]

5. This -

Clinton, at least, got the popular vote. In a sane world, that would be a win anyway.

Don't think there isn't lots of obvious and or secret hate for Communists (even if he isn't) and Jews, as much as women, in this year of hate. Very sad. I like Bernie but he would face this -

[NCTraveler]

8. Somehow, Bernie would have resonated with him.

[ThirdEye]

26. Bernie didn't have to resonate with that guy

Bernie didn't have to resonate with that guy. He would have continued to resonate with people sick of establishment politics.

Strawman arguments will continue to be thrown around, but Bernie possibly winning is not a function of him winning over hardcore Trump supporters. It would indeed be a function of voter enthusiasm. The numbers say it all: a large chunk of the population were excited by Trump, despite him being a monster, and a large chunk who would normally vote liberal were not excited about Clinton. They stayed home, so we lost.

[NCTraveler]

30. "sick of establishment politics. "

How long has he been an elected official. Painting him as an ineffective insider would have been the easiest move Trump made. That one is just too simple.

"The numbers say it all: a large chunk of the population were excited by Trump,"

You haven't seen the numbers. They say the exact opposite. Truly. The exact opposite.

[ThirdEye]

36. Well I'll give you one thing

Many people were excited about not voting for Hillary. So there's that in Trump's court.

Yes, certainly a huge number of people who are conservative didn't want to vote Trump and many probably stayed home or voted third party. After all he did get less than Romney. But, the massive gap he faced was filled in by idiots enthusiastically trying to throw a brick through the window regardless of the damage it would due.

Please, provide me a link to your numbers - I'm interested in learning.

[NCTraveler]

38. You made the claim.

The way it normally works is that you back it up. If you aren't interested in knowing how few Trump supporters trusted or liked him, simply don't make that claim.

"Many people were excited about not voting for Hillary."

Correct. That was never in dispute nor was it a part of your original argument about the enthusiasm for Trump.

Who got out the vote more? Clinton or Trump? This whole enthusiasm argument is a bunch of bunk. We had two pretty unpopular candidates running.

[ThirdEye]

87. I'm confused

I'm not trying to play that game where I demand proof from you and provide none of my own. I'm honestly interested in the numbers you said made the opposite of my point. If you don't feel like sharing them, that's fine - I'm just genuinely interested in them.

[Bucky]

178. You say he was establishment, but his votes came from people fed up with the system

You continue to ignore the empirical evidence that he always did better, far far better, against Trump than Clinton.

For most of the year, Clinton led Trump in polls by 2-4 points. There were two times Clinton had briefly strong leads against Trump. Her post convention bump and her surge in mid-October when the "grab 'em by the pussy" video came out. Each time, within a couple of weeks, Trump whittled her lead down to just 2-4 points in national polls--exactly where she was against him in the summer before her nomination.

The final result was Clinton beat Trump by about 1/2 a percentage point. So the polls, while not perfect, were pretty consistent and not wildly inaccurate. In fact, a 5 point polling gap is technically within the typical 3% margin of error--if Clinton drops her 3 points and Trump gains his 3 points. Those same polls in the summer showed Sanders beating Trump by 10-15 points. Trump's ability to close that gap is just not plausible.

[NCTraveler]

194. I'm not sure how to respond to...

Talk about Sanders v Trump in polls. Some still don't get the medias game. Said polls are insignificant for many reasons. They are conducted simply to create an emotional response from those who don't get what polling shows.

Trump would have had zero problem painting Sanders as an ineffective insider. No problem at all. For the record, I think Sanders might have won. I'm simply mocking the absolutism and "facts" some are bringing to the table.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

45. Bernie IS establshiment. nt

[ThirdEye]

72. Being elected doesn't make you establishment

Bernie has consistently shown himself to not follow the corporate establishment.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

80. Holding office for over 30 years does.

"Corporate establishment" is made up bullshit. When people hear "establishment", they think people who have been in office a long time, which Bernie has.

Bernie is the definition of establishment.

With that said, establishment is not a bad word.

[Wilms]

88. When I think of "establishment", I think of Podesta's email.

But, that's just me.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

93. When I think establishment, I think of old white guys in Washington.

Most people do.

[Ligyron]

132. yeah, and now American elected another one.

[bettyellen]

106. Don't forget Planned Parenthood!! Anyone working for the common good for years is SHITE!?!?!

[Wilms]

108. "Shite". What a silly word.

And you tried stuffing it in my mouth. Terrible form.

[bettyellen]

111. How's thirty years in govt and fixed nothing! Wants HUGE tax increases!

I could go in but it seems like some fell under a spell and think this year was about the TPP.

[Wilms]

122. Believe me. I know you could go on.

Perhaps you'll do some reading instead.

Bernie Sanders was the roll call amendment king from 1995 to 2007

A campaign ad for Sander said, "Bernie Sanders passed more roll call amendments in a Republican Congress than any other member."

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/mar/24/bernie-s/bernie-sanders-was-roll-call-amendment-king-1995-2/

Bernie Gets It Done: Sanders' Record of Pushing Through Major Reforms Will Surprise You

The implication was that progressive Bernie Sanders is too far to the left to accomplish anything—all of his ideas are pie-in-the-sky. You have to be able to find the bipartisan, “warm, purple space” as Clinton said earlier this year, to get anything done. Slate's Jamelle Bouie was super-impressed by this rationale, saying Clinton has “skilled use of bureaucratic power.”

The problem with this narrative is that it is completely false. Not only has Sanders gotten a lot more things done than Clinton did in her own short legislative career, he's actually one of the most effective members of Congress, passing bills, both big and small, that have reshaped American policy on key issues like poverty, the environment and health care.

http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/bernie-gets-it-done-sanders-record-pushing-through-major-reforms-will-surprise-you

But you bought into the nonsense that this is not so. Now, who gave us Trump??

[bettyellen]

126. I've seen literally hundred of Cut and pastes on sanders- but taxes and

Selfishness ruled the day, and an east coast liberal doesn't stand a chance with these selfish pricks.


I like Sanders, but Hillary beat him by a large margin, so he failed job one.

[Wilms]

128. Then why are you trotting out falsehoods?

That is so messed up.

Thank you for the Democratic Party's most unpopular candidate, ever.

[MADem]

115. The only regular paychecks Bernie ever got for a sustained period of time were government ones.

He couldn't hold down a job in the private sector long enough for anyone to remember working with him.

He is the ultimate establishment guy--surviving off a government paycheck. That wasn't his only problem, though, to be fair. His early strategy was to focus on white guys--it would have been a better strategy had he been a Republican, but that kind of thing tends to piss off women and minorities. He tried to pivot after he made comments about the white guys, but that attitude stuck to him like gum to a shoe.


http://www.salon.com/2016/03/09/why_bernies_on_shaky_ground_white_men_are_leading_him_to_victory_as_he_remains_a_tough_sell_with_other_voters/

But if so, nominating a candidate whose base looks a lot more like the Republicans than the Democrats is a problem. The grim reality is that, in a general election, white men will vote for the Republican. Nominating a candidate whose strongest base of support comes from the same demographic that will never vote for a Democrat should give us all pause. It goes against all the lessons we learned from Barack Obama about coalition building and how Democrats win because of their diverse voting base.

If he'd been competing with Trump for the white male vote, I suspect Trump would have won...and the rest of America would have stayed home.

The only difference in the result would have been that Trump would have won the popular vote, too.

[hueymahl]

135. Why is corporate establishment "made up bullshit"

Any sane observer can recognize a candidate that favors big business vs one that does not.

In the comparison of Bernie to Hillary, Hillary is the corporate establishment candidate, there really is no argument.

In the comparison of Hillary to Trump, Hillary is still the corporate establishment candidate (though I will agree you could argue both sides).

[lunamagica]

9. Exactly. They think that trump would have treated Sanders

they way Hillary did.

If you thought the emails were bad, just imagine trump calling Sanders a communist pervert Jew who worships Fidel Castro.

Then imaging his surrogates running with it

[mcar]

29. Yep

[nashville_brook]

62. it's not about how the Rs would have treated Sanders, it's that

Sanders has the momentum in states that mattered (that damn blue wall) and would not have folded and blamed everything on the Rs being mean.

[lunamagica]

70. She got four million more votes than he did!

[LiberalFighter]

71. Some people don't have a clue what would had been thrown at Sanders.

Mainly because their involvement has been very limited.

[Zen Democrat]

160. Guess what, opposition research was of zero impact this election.

Why would people worry about Bernie being a New Deal Democrat who has called himself a Social Democrat, when they elected a fascist, misogynistic sexual predator, liar, bigot, Russian mole, and authoritarian.

This was the year when labels were discarded for the message. And there's the rub. Hillary had no message that she could deliver on the stump or in the debates. The "go to my website" didn't cut it. Bernie would have beat Trump like cake batter.

[LenaBaby61]

165. This was the year when labels were discarded for the message.

You mean this is true for GOP types it would have been.

Bernie would have been savaged just as badly as Hillary IMHO.

[Maven]

205. Plus a fucking million. nt

[Bucky]

15. Do I really have to point out the logical flaws in your argument?

Trump did not have ten times the resources as Bernie. Bernie almost matched Clinton in fundraising before the nomination without ever going to Wall Street (the affiliation which damaged her in the crucial Great Lakes states).

Surely you're not implying that Clinton wouldn't have supported Sanders as vigorously as Sanders supported Clinton.

I'm not sure what makes you think Bernie would not be equally anti-rape as Clinton.

Painting Sanders as an insider makes as much sense as Clinton's efforts to claim she was an outsider because she was female. Sorry, your arguments don't pass the sniff test.

[NCTraveler]

27. "Do I really have to point out the logical flaws in your argument?"

Logical doesn't mean what you think it does considering what you wrote following that sentence.

"Trump did not have ten times the resources as Bernie."

I was referencing Clinton, but yes, Sanders as well. The media, shady groups presenting themselves as the media, WikiLeaks, etc.

"without ever going to Wall Street "

Yes. Ties to wall street really damaged her in her run against Trump. That simply isn't believable.

"I'm not sure what makes you think Bernie would not be equally anti-rape as Clinton. "

No clue what you are talking about. When did I say Bernie was pro-rape. Dear God. Anything to make an argument.

"Painting Sanders as an insider makes as much sense as Clinton's efforts to claim she was an outsider because she was female."

How long has Sanders been an elected official? This would have been the easiest connection for Trump to make. No clue why you even thought about pulling out "female". Guess you go with what you got.

[DirkGently]

63. Yep. An outsider with difficult aspirations was what voters wanted.

We GOT a guy the institutions wouldn't back, whose ideas were on the wild side.

We just got the wrong one.

[ThirdEye]

31. Imaginary? Like Trump's chances?

The reality is, Bernie's movement was well established and moving along full stream ahead right up until his primary loss. The issue was the beginning of the primary season: Hillary was chosen by the establishment and no one wanted oppose her. The democratic party sealed our fate that day because there's simply too many people in this country with an unreasonable hatred of the Clintons. I'm not justifying it, I'm saying it exists.

If Bernie had been given a fair chance by the media and the Democratic party hadn't already gone all in for Clinton before things started at all, he might have won the primary.

If he won the primary, he would have destroyed Trump. He had a populist message, a track record of consistency, spoke of "us" not "him", focused on corporate control of politics: all things that would have played big this year.

I think people are just so embarrassed at the loss, they're unwilling to accept that we missed our chance.

[R B Garr]

32. Yup, and someone posted an article here with the reasons that Sanders was popular:

He hadn't been attacked.

That's about it.

So polling about him being able to beat anyone will always be flawed and skewed because of that. He really did have a cake walk. When he was challenged during a debate to substantiate his attacks against Hillary, he couldn't do it. It destroyed his credibility.

Trump is a putdown artist and would have eviscerated crazy Bernie (note: crazy Bernie is Trump's nickname for Sanders, not mine.) Trump already had his way with Bernie when Bernie bit on the debate challenge between Trump/Bernie. Trump got to call Bernie a loser because he was losing the primary and Trump didn't debate losers. That was Trump's only goal was to mock him and call him a loser.

[ThirdEye]

40. Not attacked?

First of all, being prepared for the attacks didn't help Clinton seal the deal now did it?

The problem is that Clinton couldn't match Trump's name calling with a message that drew people out of their homes on 11/8. Bernie had a message, and he was sharing it in a very inspiring way.

But I'm interested in this idea that Bernie wasn't vetted or that he had not been attacked. He certainly was attacked by the left, like right here at DU by some particularly nasty users who probably blame everyone else for the loss. What exactly were we going to learn about Bernie that was so bad? Remember, apparently someone as horrifying as Trump can win if you have the right message.

The loser schtick is BS, Trump calls anyone he doesn't love a loser. He's hot or cold. Don't pretend he wasn't doing the exact same thing to everyone else, whether it was his party, the media, or our candidates.

[R B Garr]

50. Welcome to DU

It's laughable you think that Reagan Democrats would have voted for a socialist.

The margins in those states were razor thin anyways, and the third party protest votes accounted for much of it.

Bernie lost big league with minorities, so he lost the primary. So much for his message. His message was largely to attack Clinton and Trump even thanked him for all the ammo against her. So his message was damaging to Democrats. There was also an organized effort by the alt-left to stay home, so it wasn't just a random event or Clinton failure that more people didn't turn out. It was part of the phony "revolution", so quit blaming planned efforts on the electorate in general.

[ThirdEye]

136. I respect your perspective

I respect your perspective, but when you call it a phony revolution, and put the blame on people who we were responsible for
convincing, I think it's failing to recognize our own complicity in the outcome.

Also I'm not new to DU, check my profile.

[closeupready]

33. More silly season nonsense.

[NCTraveler]

39. Agree.

"Bernie Sanders would have beaten Trump. Period."

[closeupready]

78. Not playing your games.

Bye.

[NCTraveler]

176. Ok. No games, though.

My reply was on par to that with which I was replying to. You are right. I should have stuck with MO's advice.

[NurseJackie]

83. Ding! (That's correct.)

[cwydro]

89. Thank you.

Well said.

[SoCalDem]

147. In a fair contest, perhaps he could have

In an open-seat election,. there are usually MANY "real" candidates, so the best ideas often do win out. (trump excluded).

But when Hillary started out with mega "super" delegates, and Bernie was the only other real competitor, it's easy to see how she prevailed.

Our system is unfortunately "rigged" to favor one who is pre-ordained/one with big bucks/one whose "turn" it is..

Gore's turn..but the one with the buzz was able to sneak the win out (unfairly, but still a win)

Dean had the spark, but boring ole Kerry ended up getting the nod.. as exciting as 3 day old oatmeal.

Hillary v Obama..the one with the spark won the primaries and became president

Charisma & enthusiasm are important

[INdemo]

171. Lame excuse.Look Hillary Clinton had her wings clipped by the GOP Fascists

16 years ago. Then she thought she could walk in in 2008. Bill wanted Hillary to primary Obama in 2012.
The GOP had all the goods,the game plan and followed it to the T..kinda like the underdog in the Championship game that shocked all the fans.Well this was that championship game.

Lets go back a moment though to 2004 also..Who was the DNC chairman in then? well a guy by the name of Terry McAuliffe ( a Bill and Hillary Clinton supporter.)
In the 2004 General Election John Kerry won Ohio and the Presidency. There were thousands of votes missing that would have put Kerry of the top. As DNC Chairman Mr.McAuliffe failed to challenge the results why? Because he was setting Hillary up for 2008 and we know how well that worked out.


http://freepress.org/departments/display/19/2007/2920
(Ohio Secretary of State confirms 2004 election could have been stolen)

So how long do we have to go on reading all these OP BS about how Bernie was the reason Hillary lost or how Sanders couldnt beat Clinton BS.

Bernie Sanders ran against Hillary,the DNC,Debbie Wasserman Shultz and the Corporate media that just loved Hillary back in the primary.
Chris Mathews called Bernie Sanders a Socialist and on two occasions called him a communist. Tweety was not alone because other Corporate media script readers said the same thing about Bernie Sanders.

So can we move on now and change the subject?

I do want to change the subject but I wont allow BS like this to go unchallenged.

[duffyduff]

174. Yep. It is pretty obvious.

A lot of the Sanders support unfortunately was based on sexist attitudes that have been a problem with the left since the New Left men of the 1960s.

Sanders had many of those same traits.

[Cobalt Violet]

2. yes!

we lost because we had a bad candidate.

[geek tragedy]

10. we had two very suboptimal candidates. Can you name the last time a Democrat over 60 won?

Here, let me answer that for you: Woodrow Wilson

[Bucky]

186. coming in from outside the White House, they've all been 50 or younger

FDR and Carter were both just 50 when elected. Clinton, Kennedy, and Obama were in their 40s.

Hillary Clinton and Al Gore both broke that rule and still won the popular vote, so mad creds to them. The age rule is interesting but not absolute. Bernie, while PDO, still appealed to the younger demographic that is required for Democratic victories.

[OhZone]

12. Firstly - we won the popular vote -

Secondly she was doing very well, until the FBI broke the law to help Trump.

And also, don't think the Russians wouldn't have found ways to hack and hurt Bernie too.

But I'm done with the shoulda woulda coulda - We still need to fight Orange Hitler.

[ThirdEye]

43. If you don't learn from history, you'll repeat it

If you don't learn from history, you'll repeat it. I will not accept the idea that we can't figure out where we went wrong.

We don't need to win the hearts and minds of more people, we need to get them out to the voting booths. So a little bit of introspection is in order.

[MADem]

129. Maybe we need to make it a federal crime for an FBI director to "opine" on open investigations,

to include releasing gossippy, unclear letters to Congress. Maybe we need to allocate more funds to cyberwarfare, so Putin doesn't know what his good buddy Tantrum Trump is doing before he even does.

But hey, ISIS is thrilled--they're using Hair Furor as a recruiting tool.

We might want to learn that from current events.

[ThirdEye]

134. 100% agree

[lunamagica]

14. who received four million more votes than Sanders

[OhZone]

21. Yup nt

[ThirdEye]

46. No one is saying he didn't lose

What some, such as myself, would argue is that the beginning of the primary season was setup to prevent anyone but Hillary from winning - and not because she was such a solid and perfect candidate everyone wanted. Simply because the party elite wanted that more than anything.

remember, Bernie went from 2-5% to possibly primary victor over the course of a month or two, stunning everyone in the media and many Hillary supporters.

That's why you had gems in DU projecting awful personality traits on Bernie to dismiss him: racist, misogynist, corrupt, selfish, narcissistic, and more. His actions after the primary were a total repudiation of every lie.

(at worst Bernie is a curmudgeon)

[lunamagica]

77. The point is that if he couldn't even beat her, how could he beat trump

If you thought Hillary was harsh on Sanders, then you were not prepared to the tsunami proportion attacks trump and the GOP would have thrown at him.

Sanders was never close. Four million votes are A LOT. He stayed in the race way to long after int was obvious he could not win

He was NEVER close

[Ligyron]

140. I agree.

In spite of everything everybody is saying on both sides here, Bernie would have won.

Clinton certainly didn't.

I just hope she keeps running up the score in the popular vote 'cause that's all we have now.

[mcar]

34. We did not have a bad candidate

She was running against Drumpf, the media, and the FBI. And she still won the popular vote.

[geek tragedy]

4. "Actual polls showing Sanders winning decisively against Trump"

After our convention, there were also plenty of "actual polls showing Clinton winning decisively against Trump."

Didn't mean shit when it came to Clinton, means even less when it comes to Sanders.

Taking this loss as an "I told you so" doesn't improve our lot

[OhZone]

16. Actually most of the polls had her winning -

up to election day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So either a lot of Trump supporters were lying, or there was election fraud

Or both.

[geek tragedy]

17. or, there was a group of likely Trump voters that were much harder to poll than Clinton/Sanders

supporters.

That would be my guess--Trump supporters were just less likely to respond to polls.

[ThirdEye]

48. Or maybe...

...there were a surprising number of people excited to vote Trump and came out and a surprising number of people who {sigh} figured Clinton was the lesser of two evils and stayed home.

Maybe? I mean, that's what the numbers look like.

She lost to Donald Trump.

[geek tragedy]

56. I think there was definitely some of the former, for the latter point

I would say she was like Gore in 2000--a retread technocratic caretaker running in an election where the country was ready for something new. And like Gore she had some self-inflicted wounds exacerbated by gung-ho FBI guys running to the press demanding a special prosecutor etc.

There was a similar clearing of the field in 2000 as well.

We made a lot of the same mistakes we did back then.

[ThirdEye]

67. Fair point to make, I didn't compare to Gore until just now.

[geek tragedy]

75. it's always dangerous after 8 years of a Democratic president.

Voters are looking for something new/a change of pace, our base gets complacent, and the Democrats have a tendency to clear the primary field for an extreme "more of the same" candidate.

With that said, we still won the popular vote in 2000 and 2016, but we didn't get enough of them where we needed them.

[Pacifist Patriot]

11. I honestly believe it cannot be argued successfully either way.

We simply will never know because the dynamics of the race would have been wildly different and either side can legitimately point to reasons why he might have performed better or worse.

I will say that he would not have been saddled with the disgusting level of sexism Secretary Clinton had to overcome. That's a compelling reason to believe he may have done better, but I don't know if it rises to the level of overcoming Trump's success. Given the campaign's gleeful abandon in putting forth fiction as fact, I believe Sanders would have endured different attacks, but they'd have been brutal regardless.

[BeyondGeography]

18. In the spirit of opinion and lessons learned, Warren was our best choice

And Bernie only ran because Warren didn't run.

Biden also could have won, but Warren was a better fit for a change election.

Cheryl Mills was right; Hillary should have passed. Trump was the only Republican she could have defeated and she was routed in terms of EV's. The result spoke to the real challenges of her candidacy that were evident all along.

End result (hopefully): we'll never see the field cleared for a candidate like it was for Hillary again. We had a limited range of choices and the best people didn't participate.

[Cattledog]

19. It's over... time to work on ending the disaster facing the country.

[ThirdEye]

49. It is...

... and it's time to figure out what went wrong so we don't do it again.

[WhiteTara]

20. The bad info is that Bernie would have won. nt

[calguy]

22. Bernie would have been destroyed

GOP would have portrayed him as the Hippie Jewish Socialist who was a complete loser until he became a politician and got nothin done in congress.
None of which is true, BTW, but it would have been believed. Bernie would have been the modern day Dukakis candidate.

[DirkGently]

74. But the racist conman billionaire won.

In-group logic was the whole problem here. The "most qualified candidate ever,"'with all the money and all the .orgs and all the papers behind her was crushed into salsa.

An agitating, wild hopes and dreams outsider won.

Elections are not job interviews. They are about enthusiasm and the desire for change.

[OrwellwasRight]

222. 1

We know people don't vote for "policies." They vote for personalties. They don't vote for statistics, they vote for narratives.

[lillypaddle]

23. Dear Skinner,

Could you kindly restore the rule against fighting the primary?

Thanks in advance,

Lillypaddle

[greatauntoftriplets]

24. Second that.

This is getting ridiculous. It's beginning to sound like the primary wars again.

[mcar]

35. rec 1000 times

for some reason the system won't accept my plus symbol.

[ThirdEye]

52. Yeah...

... let's go back to when DU thought that Hillary had no chance of losing because of the echo chamber we comfortably kept ourselves confined within.

We're not fighting the primary, we're advocating for the idea that our party let the better candidate lose because they had chosen their candidate ahead of time. Something we don't want to repeat!

[Starry Messenger]

105. God yes.

[still_one]

109. No kidding. At a minimum polls found 10% of the Sanders supporters would not vote for Hillary

Some polls indicated as much as 50% of the Sanders supporters wouldn't vote for Hillary

and that is the difference.

Hillary supporters would have voted for Sanders if he was the nominee, but the reverse wasn't true, and that is why this rehash of the primaries is garbage, it promotes division, and is counter productive.

In Michigan, trump won by .3%. Jill Stein received 1.1% of the vote.

Russ Feingold, who Sanders actively supported lost as did every swing state Senator against the establishment incumbent

I am really disgusted by these false narratives, and that the Admins decided it is a good thing to rehash the hatefest that went on at DU during the primaries.

[Bucky]

197. I'm trying to stick to facts and analysis. This isn't a hate thing.

Anyway, your argument that a critical number of Sanders supporters couldn't support Clinton (and that Clinton supporters would have entirely supported Sanders) sort of underscores my main thesis.

For the record, I don't enjoy criticizing Hillary Clinton as a politician. I greatly admire her politically and personally. I just don't think she was the best candidate we had. And in a "postmortem" forum I think we owe it to our 2020 campaign--and to the country that may be literally bleeding in the streets after four years of Trump--to come to grips with what happened.

[still_one]

211. Facts, yeah right. Feingold lost, republican incumbents won. She also won the popular vote

Those that voted third, party, definitely changed the election results. The FBI also had their part, as did the news media with their big lies, and Facebook's fake news stories that they refused to removed because they didn't want to offend the right:

http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-didnt-block-fake-news-because-of-conservative-right-wing-sites-report-2016-11

The demographic that was behind Sanders were the millennials. For those in that group who refused to vote for Hillary in the general election, they should hang their heads in shame, because they are partly to blame for the racist, sexist, bigot that is the president "elect".

Rehashing the primaries is bullshit. I have had it with DU so have fun

[Bucky]

214. I just don't think you'll get far by castigating voters we failed to win over

Anger is better directed at the corrupt bunch occupying the White House the next four years.

I don't think you should give up on DU. Maybe just avoid the Postmortem forum.

GD should be a place where we can do things like discuss how to organize and resist. We have a zillion fights to fight, starting with Trump apparently wanting to go forward with his plan to register all Muslim Americans. It's a scary season. You'll be needed.

[MelissaB]

163. Yeah, I'd love to be told to get in line or sit down and shut up one more time.

The Democratic party made mistakes and so did DU. Are we supposed to ignore that?

[Bucky]

188. This discussion board is called "2016 Postmortem". I'm sad if my arguments annoy you.

You aren't obliged to read them if they do. But don't criticize the autopsy because you don't like the lab results.

[SunSeeker]

192. Yes, excellent suggestion!

[0rganism]

25. hypothetical, questionable at best

the "socialism" label may or may not have hurt him, but the "Jew" label almost certainly would have been a problem.

after last Tuesday i have little use for polls and even less faith in my fellow Americans to "do the right things." it's going to be a long 8 years.

[mcar]

28. Wrong. Period.

Such polls are meaningless. The GOP had a huge trove of oppo research on Sanders. You have no idea what the effect of that would have been - and neither do the polls.

[frazzled]

37. http://www.newsweek.com/myths-cost-democrats-presidential-election-521044

Read it, and then read it again, and then read it a third time if necessary in order to disabuse yourself of the delusions, counterfactual myths, and outright misinformation you are still carrying around. No, there is no way Bernie Sanders ever in a million years would have won.

Each of your points has been torn apart in this hard hitting Eichenwald article.

[LisaM]

57. This article is spot on.

It's ridiculous to think that Sanders wouldn't have been ripped to shreds. Hillary treated him with freaking kid gloves (because she is nice, among other things), and let him have unprecedented say on the platform. She also beat him by three million votes.

[sheshe2]

124. 1000.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

41. Wrong. Period.

[Coyotl]

42. Easy to say at this point, but he couldn't win even with only Dems voting.

I thought we quit refighting the primaries????

[FarPoint]

44. Exactly....

We got beat by faux propaganda, and a media that never confronted tRump....

[ThirdEye]

55. It's true

Despite my other posts focusing on Bernie being the better candidate, I will absolutely admit that the media failed at it's job and the rise of fake social media news screwed over everyone.

[cynatnite]

47. Maybe, maybe not. It's only speculation and wishful thinking now. n/t

[Bobbie Jo]

51. No way.

Your "I told you so" and a quarter won't even buy a cup of coffee.

As long as we're at it, if Bernie/Stein voters would have shown up we wouldn't even be having this discussion.

Period.

[INdemo]

53. Yes he would have because millennials that wanted change voted for Trump

and Hillary failed to attract them to her cause..there were millennials that just stayed away from the polls because they disliked Hillary
The Clinton campaign felt they did not necessarily need the Sanders supporters because they felt that Latino's and the African Americans would put her over the top while Reince Priebus was smiling as he thought you just keep thinking that Hillary.
The Hillary campaign, then towards the end of her campaign, made a huge push for the Sanders supporters but it was too late.
Very incompetent Campaign team was a big reason Hillary lost. How can anyone actually say she lost becasue of Bernie Sanders challenge in the primary ..which in the words of the rural voter is pure Bull Shit,

Bernie Sanders actually forced Hillary to the left and that got her thousands of votes but voters didnt think she was sincere about progressive issues.


There were a hell-of-a-lot of Sanders supporters who were very pissed off because of how DWS and the DNC treated them and probably still are.

[Ligyron]

146. That's right.

I've talked to quite a few millennials who saw what the DNC did to Bernie and refused to vote for Clinton because of it.

I know, because I had a bunch give me their info and I did the paperwork so they could vote by mail. Many are too busy working two jobs to take the time away from work to even vote.

After the crap DWS and the DNC pulled with Sanders, we'll be lucky if they vote Democrat again ever and I've heard more than one tell me it's third party from now on with them. Great, good job Dems!

Maybe we can talk them down, you know how the youth are but still...

[Paladin]

54. Nope. Not a chance. (nt)

[beaglelover]

59. Dream on. He couldn't even beat Hillary in the primaries (oh, I know, they were

apparently RIGGED in her favor, LOL). And we've all seen how accurate the polls were this primary and election season. We'll never know if Bernie could have beaten Trump or not. Hillary beat Trump, but lost the election due to our antiquated Electoral College system which must be enhanced or eliminated.

[Fast Walker 52]

64. two words: Marxist Baggage

He would have been slaughtered on that, believe me. Plus his tax plan.

He probably would have lost far worse than Hillary.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

65. I don't disagree. nt

[NurseJackie]

82. On Fantasy Island ... but not in real life.

You guys are too much.

[grossproffit]

84. He would have lost. If the polls were wrong about Hillary, then they were wrong about him.

[Grey Lemercier]

85. NO, his tax increases would have wiped Bernie OUT

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12512610708

a taste

I took the median (NOT average, so no artificially high number due to the 1%'ers blowing up the average) 2015 USA household income 54,462

I set it for a married couple with a child

and this is what you get






Under Bernie they would pay 10,000 usd MORE per year than Trump


for a 125,000 usd a year upper middle class family (million of voters, just millions)

they would pay 23 THOUSAND DOLLARS a year more under Bernie than under Trump


PLUS , Bernie plan PENALISES you for kids

GAME OVER

[Wilms]

103. You've not considered health care expense, nor college...

...nor many people's interest in being fair minded.

But for others...

[Grey Lemercier]

133. if you think universal healthcare (single payer, expanded medicare for all, etc)

and or/ free tertiary tuition would have gotten passed in a Republican dominated House and Senate (let's even spot you a Dem 53-47 Senate)

I have some tropical beachfront real estate to sell you in Scunthorpe.


Obamacare blew up any chance at single payer. I never understood why people thought a mandated PRIVATE insurance (for profit) scheme would somehow (when it crashed and burned) lead to a rush for even more (as in complete) government intervention.

Our universities here in the UK are far far from free now, as we are hell bent on going down the american model for that (ugh). The NGHS is under constant attack from the fucking Tory scum too.


If you want basically free world class health care, superb tuition free tertiary education, I strongly urge you to learn Swedish or Danish (Norwegian works too) and talk a Scandi firm into hiring you (or marry/domestic partner a resident in one of those countries).

It isnt happening in 'Murica, Trumpland or not.

[Wilms]

148. Now hang on a second.

I did not say single payer "would have gotten passed in a Republican dominated House and Senate".

Nor did I suggest that I "thought a mandated PRIVATE insurance (for profit) scheme would somehow (when it crashed and burned) lead to a rush for even more (as in complete) government intervention."

But I was supportive of Sanders, and considered that a victory for him might well come with coattails and a mandate.

[Grey Lemercier]

157. I didnt mean to suggest you held those beliefs, I apologise

if it came off that way. I was speaking of countless statements I have heard over the years. Again, no attack or offence meant.

[Wilms]

162. We're good.

That second one...about ACA failure paving the way for Single Payer won't pan out directly. The Repubs have tried to repeal dozens of times. Now they will. But they'll be left holding the bag. So it will be interesting to see how that much plays out.

[bettyellen]

107. Game over is right.

[ErikJ]

90. Amen! Sanders had the energy and excitement behind him

[still_one]

92. bullshit. Clinton supporters would have supported Sanders if he was the nominee. The

polls in October indicated only 55% of Sanders supporters would vote for Hillary

In Michigan trump won by .3%. Jill Stein received 1.1% of the vote

Bernie sure didn't help Russ Feingold at all, so don't start another false narrative of how Sanders would have won. He lost the primary. In fact the primaries were effectively over by New York, but the Sanders supporters and campaign continued to push the division.

While the FBI was instrumental in this loss, along with the news media, a hell of Sanders supporters that did not vote for Hillary were also responsible.

Monday morning quarterbacks.

I have had it with DU. The administration wants to rehash the primaries

Have fun

[NBachers]

94. When someone says .Period. that means they really really mean it. Period.

[sfwriter]

95. The broad strategy is what we lost...

I think something was lost when the Clinton campaign beat Sanders. Clinton ran with her entire baggage train (undeserved, I agree) but with Sanders full support. To me the big loss was a rejection of his political framing. I think the framing of this election as a broad class issue, Sanders position as an outsider, and the popularity of his general message would have ALL been pluses. There would have been no 11th hour Comeygate to contend with, and I feel pretty sure he would have pulled mainstream Democrats along.

That said, his negatives were never plumbed. Would we have seen a Russia / Wikileaks campaign against him? Probably. There is no way to say definitively either way, but rejecting the hypothesis outright seems to be the wrong move.

I think the rejection of the left-wing of the party weakened it. I think the broad witch hunt by both sides, Sanders and Clinton, to prove how evil the other was damaged the party as well. So did the presumption of DNC leadership, interpreted as interference by the Sanders camp. They had their thumb on the scale from day one.

I was mad enough NOT to campaign for her, though I gladly voted for her. Perhaps, if I had seen her chances as more dire or a sense of real contrition on the part of the DNC, I could have been coaxed back, but I wasn't. They projected an air of assured self confidence until about 8 PM on election night. You can only go this badly wrong if you have fundamentally missed something.

I agree with your post that the circular firing squad is not the solution, but we do need to look this failure in the eye. A Sanders counterfactual is very instructive in that sense.


-SFwriter

[secondwind]

96. That is my thinking also.. n/t

[zonkers]

97. Bernie was on the rise when his wings got plucked. He would have kept rural WI, MICH, PA blue.

[Demsrule86]

154. He couldn't win a primary.

He wouldn't win a general.

[bettyellen]

98. Nope, he never faced actual opposition so this is fan fiction.

They have enough hatred of career politicians and intellectuals that they didn't need to paint him as anti American and extremely radical on abortion.

He was DOA. Most people don't love or hate candidates with the extreme emotion Berners did. Too many Berners were looking like lunatics toward the end there.

[Tarheel_Dem]

99. We "Democrats" chose our nominee, and we "Democrats" will deal with the outcome. Get over it.

[mahina]

100. He would have gotten creamed. Tragically, because I supported Now support him, but he would not

Have won.
http://www.newsweek.com/myths-cost-democrats-presidential-election-521044

2. The Myth That Sanders Would Have Won Against Trump
(summing up this para to keep in 4 para rule, Clinton didn't hit Bernie hard because she didn't want to alienate his voters.)

So what would have happened when Sanders hit a real opponent, someone who did not care about alienating the young college voters in his base? I have seen the opposition book assembled by Republicans for Sanders, and it was brutal. The Republicans would have torn him apart. And while Sanders supporters might delude themselves into believing that they could have defended him against all of this, there is a name for politicians who play defense all the time: losers. Here are a few tastes of what was in store for Sanders, straight out of the Republican playbook: He thinks rape is A-OK. In 1972, when he was 31, Sanders wrote a fictitious essay in which he described a woman enjoying being raped by three men. Yes, there is an explanation for it—a long, complicated one, just like the one that would make clear why the Clinton emails story was nonsense. And we all know how well that worked out.

Then there’s the fact that Sanders was on unemployment until his mid-30s, and that he stole electricity from a neighbor after failing to pay his bills, and that he co-sponsored a bill to ship Vermont’s nuclear waste to a poor Hispanic community in Texas, where it could be dumped. You can just see the words “environmental racist” on Republican billboards. And if you can’t, I already did. They were in the Republican opposition research book as a proposal on how to frame the nuclear waste issue.

Also on the list: Sanders violated campaign finance laws, criticized Clinton for supporting the 1994 crime bill that he voted for, and he voted against the Amber Alert system. His pitch for universal health care would have been used against him too, since it was tried in his home state of Vermont and collapsed due to excessive costs. Worst of all, the Republicans also had video of Sanders at a 1985 rally thrown by the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua where half a million people chanted, “Here, there, everywhere/the Yankee will die,’’ while President Daniel Ortega condemned “state terrorism” by America. Sanders said, on camera, supporting the Sandinistas was “patriotic.”
The Republicans had at least four other damning Sanders videos (I don’t know what they showed), and the opposition research folder was almost 2-feet thick. (The section calling him a communist with connections to Castro alone would have cost him Florida.) In other words, the belief that Sanders would have walked into the White House based on polls taken before anyone really attacked him is a delusion built on a scaffolding of political ignorance.

Which leads back to the main point: Awash in false conspiracy theories and petulant immaturity, liberals put Trump in the White House. Trump won slightly fewer votes than Romney did in 2012—60.5 million compared with 60.9 million. On the other hand, almost 5 million Obama voters either stayed home or cast their votes for someone else. More than twice as many millennials—a group heavily invested in the “Sanders was cheated out of the nomination” fantasy—voted third-party. The laughably unqualified Jill Stein of the Green Party got 1.3 million votes; those voters almost certainly opposed Trump; if just the Stein voters in Michigan had cast their ballot for Clinton, she probably would have won the state. And there is no telling how many disaffected Sanders voters cast their ballot for Trump. Of course, there will still be those voters who snarl, “She didn’t earn my vote,” as if somehow their narcissism should override all other considerations in the election. That, however, is not what an election is about. Voters are charged with choosing the best person to lead the country, not the one who appeals the most to their egos.
---
Check out #1 in the article too, about the DNC and emails supporting Clinton as a 'fix'. Eye-opening, very much.

Eichenwald alone is reason to subscribe and support Newsweek. If you haven't read his earlier piece that I posted before DU went down, here's some great journalism in 144 characters.

Newsweek's Kurt Eichenwald's findings from 6 months long investigation on twitter. Brilliant.

https://storify.com/alexandraerin/kurt-eichenwald-s-trump-findings


1.Trump lied to Congress that he was not meeting with any Indian casino executives when documents and sworn statements show he was.


2.Trump testified under oath that he is willing to claim success on something even when he knows his claim is false.

3. Deutsche Bank concluded Trump net worth at $788 million when he was publicly claiming (and told bank) he was worth multiple billions.

4. Trump said under oath that he determines his net worth based on how he feels.

5. While Trump suggests he has an MBA from prestigious Wharton graduate school, only attended undergraduate program for 2 years. Has no MBA
....

21. Trump admitted under oath that, when he claimed he was $9.5 bill in debt in his books, it was a lie and he knew it.

23. List of Trump failures: TrumpMortgage, TrumpFinancial, Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts, Trump Shuttle,

24. ..Trump Vodka, Trump Steaks, Trump Taj, Trump Castle, Trump Plaza, Trump Dubai, Trump University, Trump Toronto, Trump Hollywood..(2/3)

25. I could go on many more tweets listing Trump's business failures. It'd be easier to list the Trump businesses that haven't failed. (3/3)

32. I wrote about Trump 4 New York Times. First time we spoke, he lied to me in his first sentence. He told three more lies in 5 min call.

37. Asked under oath identities of professors at Trump U (there were none) Trump said “I know names, but I don't know the identities.”

49. An investigation of Trump’s partners reveals an enterprise with deep ties to global financiers, foreign politicians and even criminals.

50. Trump’s business interests run in direct conflict with the national security interests of the United States. http://europe.n

52. Trump receives $8 million a year from South Korea business w/ interests in nukes. He has called for SK to have nukes.

56. Turkey’s president has told associates he will not allow US to use an airbase key to the battle against ISIS if Trump is president.

It gets worse.

I posted the storified form this person made so Eichenwald's original tweets can be read in order, minus the 'you lie' 'killary' etc. diversions. If you're a twitter reader, https://mobile.twitter.com/kurteichenwald

Please share this in your circles, and soon.

[MADem]

101. Sorry--that's utter nonsense. He couldn't beat Clinton, how could he beat Trump?

His baggage was MASSIVE. Clinton didn't use it--you think Trump would have been so circumspect? The kibbutz shit ALONE, where Joe Stalin was a figure of adulation, they sang the Internationale, and raised the Red Flag would have been milked like a mooing cow. His "honeymoon in the USSR" would have been played for all it is worth.

They'd turn his "alternative lifestyle" from "youthful indiscretion" where he was having a kid out of wedlock, sketchy on the child support, stealing electricity, and writing disturbing sexually charged what-was-that?-Fiction? into an outright assault on family values. He'd become that pervy old uncle--lock up the kids, here comes Bernie!

Then there's his wife, who, they would say, singlehandedly managed to destroy a college due to her financial malfeasance and scampered away with a huge (or is it YUUUUUGE) golden parachute.

You can say but-but-but-Trump-did-it-TOOOOOO but Trump did it in a suit. They don't look at things fairly or logically. By the time they got finished with him, you'd hate him too.

He had no ground game. NONE. He had that droning boring stump speech (I got to the point where I knew it by heart--he'd take out bits and put bits in, but they were the same damn bits, pretty much) and that's pretty much it. People were already sick to death of it by July and his crowds at his rallies reflected that.

Once Larry David started mocking him as a querulous, whining Seinfeld-type character, he was toast.

He would be painted as an aging hippie who was fixated on screwing in his youth, who never held a real job, who has only received a regular paycheck from either state or federal government.


Many "Bernie Bros" -- particularly the more aggressive types on the internet -- were actually shit-stirring Libertarians and Trump Humpers. They were getting into the Bernie Game early--as far back as the NH primary, blurring the lines and creating a "Poor White Man Can't Catch a Break" meme.

Clinton BEAT TRUMP in the popular vote. Don't forget that. Trump has no mandate. And Bernie? He never had a real shot. Not even close.

[lunamagica]

118. Spot on. Beautifully explained

[R B Garr]

121. Thank you, and those are the parts that are true!

Let alone the fact that it doesn't matter what is true or not, they will manufacture the rest like they always do. Bernie was a dream for their brand of political humiliation.

[MADem]

131. There's MUCH more dirt on Sanders, but it serves no real purpose to drag it up.

Suffice it to say he has more than a few "Not his finest hour" moments.

Those were just the highlights (or lowlights) that seeped to a small extent into the news--but didn't really permeate the discussion. No secrets spilled, there. They would have, though (and much more, too) had he gotten any traction to be competitive enough to win the primary.

[Ligyron]

152. So, what we had no decent candidate to run?

Bernie was the only serious challenge because all the other D candidate backed off Clinton 'cause it was "her turn". O'malley, Biden, etc.

We needed a more contested primary.

Look at the friggin' GrOPers, 17 candidates,in-fighting, bad blood between many - yet they managed somehow to win.

Whatever it was we were doing - it sure didn't work where it counted.

[Omaha Steve]

183. The kibbutz shit ALONE?

To the jury. I only posted counterpoints without malice.

OS


Didn't Russia support Trump and he won?

Hillary Clinton called him Putin's puppet at the third presidential debate!


His baggage was MASSIVE.

Apparently hers was too.


They'd turn his "alternative lifestyle" from "youthful indiscretion"

Yet the ----- grabber won. Roughly 53% of white women voted for Trump on Tuesday, CNN reported.


He had no ground game. NONE.

Got 43% of the D vote vs a 4th time Clinton candidacy and super delegates. Think what he could have done with the D machine behind him.


Then there's his wife, who, they would say, single handedly managed to destroy a college

A as in Singular. Look at all the things Trump destroyed too. Trump’s 1995 tax records that showed business losses of $916 million. Didn't seem to stop him from winning.


fixated on screwing in his youth

Just like winner Trump with all his mistresses.


And Bernie? He never had a real shot. Not even close.

Apparently he isn't the only D with that problem.

[SHRED]

104. I respectfully disagree

I respectfully disagree that Bernie would have had a better chance at beating you-know-who.
Bernie took a stand against consolidated corporate power including the media. Orange man just bashed the media as a political tool. The media knew who they wanted. They knew DT was a fake populist and that Sanders was the real populist.
Hillary was a much less threat to this consolidated power. She embraced it in many respects.
With all this in mind I believe Bernie would have been trashed in the corporate media to a far greater degree than Hillary
Trump is a media sweetheart. He is their product and had a show of his own for years on TV. A showman who draws ratings Ratings are key. Trump wins no matter what.
That's my take.

[bettyellen]

110. Nope- taxes, abortion, 30 years and accomplished nothing.

[Lunabell]

114. I 100% agree

The people who voted for trump were the working class. Bernie would have trounced trump.

[wysi]

116. Not a chance

Hillary didn't even use a shred of the material she could have used - and that the republicans would have used - to destroy him.

[hrmjustin]

117. Sanders might have won but he also could have lost.

Sanders never had a billion dollars thrown at him to destroy him. Sanders could have gotten more of those third party voters but he would have lost some Clinton voters. The campaign would have been different so anything I'd possible but I feel Sanders would have had issues himself.

But would have could have should have is interesting but a Nazi is going to be our president.

Say goodbye to your rights!

[Thinkingabout]

119. In order for Sanders to run as the DNC nominee, he did not win in the primaries, he would

not have won the GE either, he simply did not get the votes. If he was so good he would have delivered the needed votes and HRC would have won.

[Ligyron]

164. But if more candidates had entered and run in the D primary things may have turned out

much differently. Bernie was the only one to seriously try.

The rest backed off Hills outta respect and the leanings (that's a kind word) of the DNC.

Those clowns in the DNC need to go and I hope we can all agree on that.

The desire to present a solid blue wall of support from all the Dem leaders for HRC from the starting gate was perhaps a mistake. I guess figuring the opposition and hatred of her by the RW media, GOP and most voters in the red states would bash her enough once things got going so we needed unanimity?

Didn't work.

No more of this "inevitability" for any candidate from now on.

[Thinkingabout]

182. It could also be said if more would have entered there would be less votes for Sanders,

If there were more candidate's running on the primary I doubt they would have been as easy on Sanders and Hillary. There would have been more subject brought up and difficult to defend. You could say Sanders would have won the primary if Hillary not have run but then the other candidates would have beer Sanders. It was not going to be Sanders.

[wisteria]

120. I doubt it, but, we don't need this now.

[leftofcool]

123. Hello, the primary is over or didn't you get the memo?

[ErikJ]

139. This is a lesson for the FUTURE.

So we dont make the same mistake again.

[B Calm]

142. Hello, the election is over too! Time to talk about what went wrong!

Didn't you see the news?

[kstewart33]

239. Not if it means ripping the DU community apart.

It does not matter whether Bernie could of/might have/would have defeated Trump.

He was not the nominee. He never had a chance of being the nominee. End of story.

Mistakes made in the general election? That should be the focus of any 'mistakes made' discussion.

[DawgHouse]

125. He would have lost the popular vote AND the EC.

[OKNancy]

127. No he wouldn't Period

If you think this past election was about income inequality and all that stuff, you are very mistaken. It had nothing to do with trade deals or a disaffected class... All income groups below $50,000 voted for Hillary.

This election was all about a rejection of liberal attitudes toward race and gender politics. It was about white nationalism.

Now if some Bernie people refused to vote for Hillary, then fuck them. They can gloat but it doesn't make what they believe true.

Oh and eta: Newsweek reporter Kurt E. published an article about this. He also pointed out that Sanders was never a target of the Republicans or other entities that perfered Trump. He wrote that there was a huge dossier on Sanders and they were prepared to smear him ruthlessly.

[ismnotwasm]

130. Bullshit. Period.

[world wide wally]

137. I love Bernie too, but if he really is Superman, he would have beaten Hillary in the primaries.

Face it.. here's the real reason we lost.

Americans are stupid!

[B Calm]

138. One thing for certain, Hillary couldn't beat him!

[jalan48]

141. I agree. This wasn't the year for a Wall Street Democrat.

I think the Democratic Party leadership has spent too many years in a bubble. Even with Obama's efforts there are still many Americans either out of work or working at minimum wage jobs. Minimum wage jobs mean no future, just treading water. Democrat's need to talk about programs and policies for all our citizens, not just select groups.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

143. you mean like his protege Teachout won in ny?

or how russ feingold won in wisconsin?

[Lulu KC]

144. I do not know if you are correct or not

but I am glad he and Elizabeth Warren are right where they are now.

[ErikJ]

145. Its obvious. Massive electric rallies. Signs everywhere.

We were kicked in the gut when he lost the primary, partly cuz we knew GOP would win.

[deurbano]

150. Not according to Theda Skocpol (Harvardd sociologist/political scientist)

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/theda-skocpol-responds-to-judis

Theda Skocpol responds to John Judis's article on why Trump won ...

<<John, your piece is an elegant example of a genre of post-election autopsy that works no better, I fear, than those polling models. You offer speculative interpretations of exit poll responses (known to be problematic data) presented as margins for various voter blocs in an aggregate national election. A lot of creative argument that HRC was a poor candidate because voters did not hear the economic message you wish she had delivered. Two problems: national polls showed that voters said she was better than Trump on plans for the economy. That is a small problem, however, because virtually no real policy discussion occurred in this election. Second, huger problem: HRC actually won the national aggregate election you are imagining in the TPM piece by a whopping 2.5 million or more votes. If America were what you measure here, she would be President-Elect.

The problem is that the United States is a federation that conducts fifty separate winner take all plurality elections for president. There too, she lost by a hair in half a dozen states. But the problem was Trump ran up huge margins in nonmetro rural, small town and some outer-suburban areas. Factory workers, even former ones are few and far between there. Previous work shows that Trump voters are NOT disproportionately affected by trade disruptions, factory closings, etc. What is more likely is that these nonmetro areas had organized networks – NRA, Christian Right, some RNC and Koch network/AFP presence – that amplified the right media attacks on HRC nonstop and persuaded many non-college women and some college women in those areas to go for Trump because of the Supreme Court.

You say Trump had no organization. True enough for his own campaign. HRC had the typical well-funded presidential-moment machine, an excellent one. We on the center left seem to treat these presidential machines as organization, and they are, but they are not as effective as longstanding natural organized networks. To get some of those working for him, Trump made deals to get the NRA , Christian right and GOP federated operations on his side. They have real, extensive reach into nonmetro areas. But off the coasts, Democrats no longer have such reach beyond what a presidential campaign does on its own. Public sector and private sector unions have been decimated. And most of the rest of the Democratic-aligned infrastructure is metro based and focused. That infrastructure is also fragmented into hundreds of little issue and identity organizations run by professionals.

HRC’s narrow loss was grounded in this absent non-metro infrastructure – and Dem Party losses in elections overall even more so. Obama overcame that deficit. But he is a once in half century figure. How can anyone blame the HRC campaign for failing to equal Obama’s margins among minorities? No Democrat would have done so. For sure, Bernie would not have done so....


...You just have to get out and drive around America and listen and look to know this is the world that went for Trump and against HRC (and would have gone against Bernie even more). I analyzed the polls from the primaries, by the way: Bernie’s support was young, liberal whites. especially men. In most states, he did not attract extra working class support at all, outside of cities and university communities....>>

[DirkGently]

153. Neoliberalism is not "pragmatic."

All the cash and institutional support and insider power brokering in the world can't win an election, if your candidate doesn't fire people up.

We had that, and we threw it away.

[turbinetree]

159. I second your motion.............

you cannot ever beat a 30 plus year propaganda machine

[DirkGently]

161. Clinton's baggage was both real and manufactured.

She wasn't the villain Republicans frothed about, but her ambition and machination was always transparent. She and her people were always one beat too clever for their own good.

[turbinetree]

231. Again, I second your motion

She was relying to much on polls, in my opinion

Yesterday I had to go into the Social Security Administration and as I was sitting there I saw two pictures on the wall, one was a man that was black, and the other that was white

And then I saw the two pictures again and I saw a fascist and then the other one was bigot, and then I got pissed off again.

And the MSM is trying there damnedest to "normalize" this BS. They turned this past election into a personality campaign instead of a policy driven campaign and now they are trying to report what 62 million saw, from the very beginning

[Equinox Moon]

156. This was the year of Anti-Establishment & angry people

Bernie was the one for that. He also had people really excited and rally turn-out was significant. All that mattered.

Hillary did win the primary, but Bernie would have won the general.

Hillary came around because of Bernie, too bad that message was not sold to America through ads.

[still_one]

200. Gee, Feingold didn't win, nor did those Swing state Senate Democrats against the

establishment incumbent republican win, and that includes those candidates that Sanders actively campaigned with.

In spite of the FBI interference, at least 10% of Sanders supporters refused to vote for Hillary in the primaries, and some polls have even higher numbers.

If Sanders won the nomination, Clinton supporters would have been there for him in the general, especially with Trump, the reverse was not true, and that made all the difference.

If Sanders had won the nomination, and 10% of the Hillary supporters refused to vote for him, he would have lost also

Incidentally, some polls indicated that it could have been up to 50% of Sanders supporters who didn't vote for Hillary.

Either way, thanks to the third parties, and those Sanders supporters who refused to vote for Hillary. They were as much responsible for trump's win as the FBI's interference, and the media falsehood about that "reopened FBI investigation", or the LIE that an "indictment was pending with the Clinton Foundation"

and since this had a cast of many, let's not forget the fake news that Facebook, and other social media outlets refused to block because they didn't want to anger the right wing.

http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-didnt-block-fake-news-because-of-conservative-right-wing-sites-report-2016-11

This is about it for me. I have pretty much had it with DU since the admins in their infinite wisdom think it is valuable to rehash the primaries.

Frankly, that isn't how you unite people to work together, all that accomplishes is Monday morning quarterbacking, and recriminations.

[Equinox Moon]

219. I appreciate your comments

This is a very emotional time for many of us and I think trying to learn from what happened helps each of us reconcile it for ourselves. That is my own process anyway.

The whole thing is messy and ugly. Period.

You don't have to leave DU, just stay off of threads that don't work for you. I avoid many threads, yet there are plenty that I look at and engage with.

[Cryptoad]

166. we gonna rehash this shit here on DU for next four years?

[B Calm]

169. If need be. Hopefully the party will drop the neoliberalist part and

start paying attention to the rust belt.

[BlueProgressive]

179. For at least the next four weeks, anyway.

[duffyduff]

172. What a delusional post.

It isn't even worth taking apart this OP that is TOTAL BULLSHIT.

It ignores the simple truth that if by some miracle Sanders, who was NOT A VIABLE CANDIDATE for president, had been nominated, Michael Bloomberg would have most certainly joined the race and won the election.

Sanders would have been slaughtered by Bloomberg and Trump.

Just playing those videos of Sanders bragging about how wonderful Castro was for Cuba IN THE MIDDLE OF THE COLD WAR would be enough to sink him into oblivion.

What many "progressive" dudes are saying is women have no business running for president. All they are good for is spreading their legs and popping out babies. They are no better than the morons who voted for Trump.

[still_one]

180. Hillary supporters would have supported Sanders if he was the nominal. At least 10%, and by

some estimates up to 50% of Sanders supporters refused to vote for Hillary

As far as I am concerned, that speaks volumes

[BlueProgressive]

181. 'Michael Bloomberg would have won' ?

Talk about "delusional" "not viable" "TOTAL BULLSHIT"....

[treestar]

185. He would not have

And there is no way to tell what would have happened. This is merely what you wish to believe.

[SunSeeker]

187. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

As stated in the HuffPo article you link to regarding the "actual polls [the Gravis poll] showing Sanders winning":

Prior to FBI Director James Comey’s announcement that the agency was reopening the investigation of Clinton’s emails at the end of October, Clinton even led Trump by as much as 13 percentage points ― more than Sanders’ margin of victory in the Gravis poll.

Then there is the matter of the general election scrutiny and Republican attacks Sanders would have endured if he were the nominee. No poll can account for how the candidacy of a self-described democratic socialist promising to raise taxes for middle-class voters would fare under those circumstances. Clinton believed Sanders would almost certainly not have survived such an onslaught, she told a room full of campaign donors in February.

And to throw even more uncertainty into the mix, former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg had threatened to run if Sanders and Trump were the final two candidates. How Sanders would have fared under those circumstances can never be known.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/2016-election-poll-bernie-sanders-trump_us_58260f7ee4b0c4b63b0c6928

If you won't "let others spread bad info," I suggest you start with yourself. Posts like yours serve no purpose other than creating the "typical liberal circular firing squad," which you accurately state "we do NOT need at DU."

[guillaumeb]

189. "Would have" and "might have" are not synonymous.

I would prefer to ask why 41% of voters felt no need to vote. Some may not have voted because of suppression, some voted for Stein, but many simply felt there was no point in voting. If the Democratic Party can convince many of the 41% to actually vote the gerrymandering and suppression would vanish in a wave of voters.

But simply pushing GOP-lite policies is not the answer.

[Pisces]

191. No, but Biden would have. He is authentic and

From the rust belt. Bernie did not reach the minority groups, in particular older African American women. Biden would have killed it,
But he wasn't given the chance to run in order to give it Hillary.

Biden had no baggage or skeletons!!
This analysis doesn't help anyone.
We have to move forward and get it together for the midterms and 2020!!!!!

[Bucky]

195. Biden would've been amazing, agreed. I disagree that Sanders couldn't have won black voters over

it would have taken efforts and outreach, but it's unrealistic to think he would have written off our key demographic base, African American voters, or that our key demographic base would have sat out an election like that. Bases always rally if treated right. And Sanders is a smart enough and passionate about inclusion and equality enough to have done right by all our people.

I don't think it's accurate to say Biden has no skeletons or baggage. The hypocrisy would not have stopped the Republicans from making a drumbeat out of some the personality quirks we love (or choose to ignore) about Joe. I say this as someone who supported him 100% in 2008 and in 1988 to boot--he can be a little grabby around the ladies. I think it's harmless but there's a few pics out there of women looking distinctly uncomfortable with his 'glad handing' demeanor. Like with the inconsequential emails, they'd make it into a thing.

I also disagree that this analysis doesn't help anyone. There are several posters in this thread who need to hear (or read) about why we kinda-sorta lost (tho actually won, but just in a way that didn't matter) this election.

We lost-ish because we abandoned the working class for Wall Street. We need to see that there were better alternatives... better than Bernie even. But she has to get reelected in 2018 first.

[gollygee]

193. Polls also showed Hillary would win.

I don't know. There are a lot more really racist people in the US than I was aware. I heard people I knew, friends and family, eat up a lot of Trump's garbage - people I didn't know felt that way. I was naive due to being white and not being on the receiving end of it. I think he played to people's white nationalism, and it's a serious issue. It isn't a side issue. We have a much bigger problem with racism in this country than i was aware of, and I always thought it was a big problem.

[MyNameGoesHere]

196. Damn and all he had to do was win a fucking primary

I bet if I inserted a pink unicorn as the hypothetical candidate the geniuses would ejaculate the same stupid what ifs.

Ancient quotation from MyNameGoesHere: "If grasshoppers had machine guns, birds wouldn't fuck with em" It seems reasonable right?

[SidDithers]

198. ...

Sid

[greatauntoftriplets]

207. Is that a serious post?

Can't wait until Skinner reinstates the pre-election revised rules.

[Maven]

212. This is so delusional I don't know where to begin.

MADem's post above says it all, so I'll just cosign and leave it at that.

[TDale313]

217. I firmly believe he would have won.

I supported him in the Primaries, because I felt he'd be our strongest General Election candidate. Polling bore this out. I supported Hillary in the General even though I am in a solidly blue state because a)she was by far the better option and b)I wanted to send the message that Trump was completely unacceptable. But many of us were concerned about her chances in the General. Cenk put it well. The electorate wanted to put a brick through the establishments window. They preferred Bernie's brick, but if Trump's was the only option they'd take his. Polling showing Bernie up over Trump by double digits on Election Day bear this out.

Here's part of why I think Bernie could have won the General- where Hillary lost this? Independents in the rust belt. I can give you two states Bernie could easily have won and did better than Hillary in primaries. Wisconsin and Michigan. Assuming he adds those states and holds what she did win? We have President Sanders- the most progressive President in most of our lifetimes. Instead we have President Trump.

This, to me, is one of the biggest tragedies of this election. The heartbreaking lost opportunity.

[Auntie Bush]

218. If sanders hadn't run and bad mouthed Hillary...she'd be our president today.

[lunasun]

228. That too

[JonLP24]

220. I agree with you Bucky

[BainsBane]

221. Eichenwald dispelled that crap

http://www.newsweek.com/myths-cost-democrats-presidential-election-521044

That you are citing polls that proved to be a complete miss is par for the course. The concept that polls numbers are affected by actual campaigns and attacks on candidates obviously doesn't occur to you. But Eichenwald lays it out quite clearly.

No one can win a GE if he can't win a primary, if he can't win the majority of votes in the party for which he is seeking the nomination, and if the base doesn't support him. The base in the Democratic party is women and people of color. He never won the majority of them over. Now I understand some consider our votes second class compared to the more important white male votes, but they can take that shit to the GOP where it belongs. '

Thanks for making sure we remember why we found Bernie so unacceptable during the primary.

Also read this: https://medium.com/@adrianjanchondo/owning-our-shit-df551475fce7#.j76w0tdgn

[SammyWinstonJack]

223. I believe that too be true.

[otohara]

225. LOCK HER UP, LOCK HER UP, LOCK HER UP, LOCK HER UP!

If you think her army would have supported the man who allowed the ugly chants coming from his bullies that filtered over to the Trump camp, you're sadly mistaken.

He is dead to many of us.

[Demsrule86]

236. I blame Sander's behavior during the primary for our loss...I don't say

he did it on purpose, but he is the Nader of 2016. He is dead to me also.

[JTFrog]

237. I can't help but think he did it on purpose.

Even though I know that's my emotions speaking right now. Everything is still so raw.

It's not like we didn't go through this shit with Kennedy and Carter. It's not like we didn't all predict that he would splinter the party. He played a very dangerous game and we are all going to pay the price for a long time.

[otohara]

241. He's Gloating - Mission Accomplished

I agree, he did it on purpose to blow up the party he despises. He's enjoying this loss way too much on his gloating book tour...still yammering on about the Democratic liberal elite even though he is one. (not a Democrat tho)

He taught a generation to hate the Democratic party and this nonsense about the primary being rigged is ingrained in their conspiracy laden heads.

[Historic NY]

227. FORGET the polls they were "engineered to be wrong"

they gave a false sense of security when there really wasn't any.

[Demsrule86]

232. He couldn't even win a primary.

But Bernie sure helped Trump beat Clinton. He should never have run...but a big who cares about Roe V Wade, the courts, LGBTQ, contraception, medicare, social security, ACA...why Bernie so important and all. I don't say he did it on purpose but Bernie really hurt the progressive cause.

[otohara]

238. Take A Look At Bernie's ColoradoCare - Failed 80/20

that's how much Coloradans thought of Bernie Sanders plan.

Had there been a primary in Colorado vs those shitty voter suppression caucuses - Hillary would have trounced the Bern.
Only 127,000 people participated in stupid caucuses.

[Vinca]

240. I agree with you. This was an "outsider" year. BUT -

it's over and done with and I think it's nonproductive to keep rehashing it. We are where we are and we have to figure out how the hell to move forward.