Politico: 'The Worst Possible Scenario': Never Trumpers Wonder What to Do About Bernie

[TomCADem]

We see a lot of concern on this Board about Bernie supporters repeatedly threatening to vote for Trump of for the Green Party. We see polls of Bernie supporters who say they would choose Trump over Biden. Of course, that does not really make any sense, unless you accept the idea that Trump and Bernie have a lot of similarities, but that has been covered elsewhere.

However, there is not much discussion of the folks who are often quoted attacking Trump such as George Will or Ana Navaro, who criticize Trump, even though they are Republicans. What we lose in BS supporters who hate the Democratic party voting for Trump we gain in people who are seeking a sane President who abides by the law even though they may not agree with the Democratic party platform.

It is pretty clear that BS will try to sabotage Democratic chances to win the Presidency and Congress like he did 2016. That being said, we should also now understand that there is nothing to be gained by capitulating to BS. Are we really going to agree to have Cornell West on the DNC platform committee so that he can then have a bigger platform to once again campaign for Jill Stein.

We need to campaign for the good of the 99 percent, rather than 1 man's bruised ego. I think a majority of Americans want rule of law and competent government first and foremost, rather than some who claims that they alone can fix everything.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/03/03/never-trump-maybe-bernie-118981

It’s been a rough four years for Never Trumpers, the cadre of Republican and former-Republican commentators, strategists and veterans of the conservative movement who tried and failed to thwart the president’s rise to power in 2016.

First, after failing to beat Donald Trump in the primaries and the convention, they cast about for a third-party candidate to represent their tribe, backing the longshot bid of independent Evan McMullin—or writing in a candidate like Mitt Romney or, for some, actually voting for Hillary Clinton. Then, once President Trump assumed office, they pinned their hopes on the moderating, mainstreaming effect of the Republican Senate. They rooted for the administration’s “adults in the room.” When all that failed, some began to come to grips with the idea that they’d just have to vote for whomever the Democratic Party nominated for president in 2020. Surely that person couldn’t be worse for America than Trump, right?

Now, with the Democrats quite possibly heading toward nominating an avowed socialist for president, horrified Never Trumpers are facing yet another crisis beyond their imaginings. This past weekend, they faced it together, assembling Saturday at the National Press Club for the first-ever “Summit on Principled Conservatism.” The forum’s speakers included Never Trump figures Bill Kristol, Mona Charen, Rick Wilson, Mindy Finn, Amanda Carpenter, Tara Setmayer, Tim Miller, David Frum and Tom Nichols. Not long ago, this group would have met at the weekend’s Conservative Political Action Conference, a gathering of thousands of fervent Republicans that ended Saturday in nearby National Harbor, Maryland. These days, however, CPAC has become a showcase for the Trumpist wing of the party—as Trump counselor Kellyanne Conway put it a few years back, CPAC has become TPAC.

* * *

Now their iceberg seems to be melting down. Heading into Super Tuesday, the delegate leader in the 2020 Democratic field—and, depending on what happens in California and elsewhere, the potential runaway frontrunner—is Bernie Sanders, the most left-wing major-party candidate in modern American history. The prospect of choosing between Sanders and Trump is, for this group of influencers who were once regarded as major players in the Republican Party, a looming civic crisis. “It’s sort of like choosing between death by hanging versus death by gunshot,” Sykes told me.

[DarthDem]

1. Yeah, this . . . article hasn't aged all that well

It's more than a month old.

[The Magistrate]

5. The Point Stands, Sir

The course of events has spared them the choice, but any significant concessions to 'Bernie' at the convention, even any major role in the campaigning season, will cost some portion of such voters, and bring no benefit in exchange. Sanders cannot control his more fervent supporters. If he makes any serious attempt to swing them behind Mr. Biden, they will turn on him as a sell-out who caved in to the 'Democratic Establishment' and the big corporations. The energy of this election comes from middle of the road types grown disgusted by the cheap thug Trump, and the passion of rank and file Democrats who hate the cheap thug like poison. Sanders repels the former group, and enrages the latter group.


"The defeat and overthrow of a hated enemy is something to be for."





"From Bernie’s perspective, dropping out of a race once you have no chance of winning is peculiar behavior that can only be explained by the work of a hidden hand. For most politicians, though, it is actually standard operating procedure. Only Sanders seems to think the normal thing to do once voters have made clear they don’t want to nominate you is to continue campaigning anyway."





"When things are not called by their right names, what is said cannot make sense. When what is said does not make sense, what is planned cannot succeed. When plans do not succeed, people become uneasy. When people are uneasy, punishments do not fit crimes. When punishments do not fit crimes, people cannot know where to put hand or foot."

[relayerbob]

6. and even at that time, it was a dollar short and a day late

[Eliot Rosewater]

2. Yep...happening again

[Me.]

3. It Will Never Come To That Choice

I don't think BS will be around much longer, he looks like he's barely holding on. They cleaned him up for an interview today but he's been a mess lately which may indicate mental confusion or other problems.

[TomCADem]

4. I Agree. I Think BS Will Continue to Attack Biden...

...all the way through the convention and that he will start talking about trying to convince pledged delegates and superdelegates to vote for him even though this would be yet another flip flop on his many stances on this:

Link to tweet

?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1234133534723407872&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.democraticunderground.com%2F1287673562

[The Magistrate]

9. Sanders, Sir, Embodies A Peculiar Form Of Identit Politics

Both he and his supporters are more concerned with the identity they present, to themselves and to others, than anything else.

Sanders in his colossal egotism conflates support for certain policy goals with desire for him to be the leader of a movement to achieve those goals.

This is nonesense.

Even leaving aside the fact that most of those goals are general among Democratic voters and enjoy broad support among Democratic office-holders and Party officials, virtually no one, not even among Sanders' supporters, thinks he can actually achieve them should he come to hold the highest office in the land.

Expressions of support for Sanders are made as a marker of political orientation. Expressing support for Sanders says 'I'm not a moderate, I'm well to the left of most people', and as with most such things, serves to identify a 'cool' group separate from the general run of 'squares'. People doing this do not even particularly want to prevail, in the sense of being in the majority. It is axiomatic that a majority can never be 'cool', the feeling of being 'hip' and part of an 'in-crowd' depends on being outnumbered by the host of the unwashed and unenlightened. The point is not to achieve any political goal, to secure any discrete reform, it is simply to be sure one is perceived as a particular, and special, kind of person.

People who have an actual interest in achieving the goals widespread among Democrats, the goals of all left and progressive and liberal persons in general, recognize readily Sanders is far too flawed as a politician, and as a personality, to make any progress towards their goals. They know Sanders has not achieved any measurable advance towards them in his long Congressional career. They know Sanders' claim to hold patents and copyrights on these goals is nonesense, because they know their own desires pre-date Sanders, and exist in their hearts and minds without the slightest reference to him or influence by him.

In short, while Sanders imagines himself to be the indispensable man, an overwhelming majority of Democratic voters are clear in their minds that Sanders is quite dispensable, and are determined to see him disposed of, as soon as possible.





"From Bernie’s perspective, dropping out of a race once you have no chance of winning is peculiar behavior that can only be explained by the work of a hidden hand. For most politicians, though, it is actually standard operating procedure. Only Sanders seems to think the normal thing to do once voters have made clear they don’t want to nominate you is to continue campaigning anyway."





"When things are not called by their right names, what is said cannot make sense. When what is said does not make sense, what is planned cannot succeed. When plans do not succeed, people become uneasy. When people are uneasy, punishments do not fit crimes. When punishments do not fit crimes, people cannot know where to put hand or foot."

[betsuni]

14. +1

[BidenBacker]

7. Mixed feelings

I'm glad this article in now just a moot academic description of now null-and-void what-ifs. I'm also glad that these Never Trumpers will find it easy to vote for Biden because we can surely use every vote we can get. But OTOH many of the very same Republicans listed in this old article as well as numerous others who I won't name helped to slowly turn the GOP into what it has become.

The fact that they are now horrified at and are running away from the Frankenstein monster that came outta the Pubbie castle does not totally absolve them from the fact that while they themselves did not perform the operation that brought him to life they sure as hell helped stock the laboratory with the equipment and supplies that were needed.

I have often heard many of these folks talk at length about how dangerous Trump is which is a step in the right direction but I have yet to hear even a single one of them take any responsibility at all for setting the stage and putting things into motion. It sure would be nice to hear some of them accepting some portion of the blame. And if not we'll just have to be satisfied with their vote if not their apology.

[TomCADem]

13. Ironically, Romney Really Set Republicans on This Path...

...when he decided to embrace the GOP's racist base by pushing self-deportation in 2012. After that, rather than try to expand their constituency, Republican politicians found that they could capture primaries by doubling down on xenophobia and racism.

On the left, I think the biggest fear with Bernie is that he inspires copycats who embrace the idea of attacking the Democratic Party. While it might be personally beneficial, it results in an extreme and fractured party made up of individuals who cannot think of movement that is bigger then their own self-interests. Bernie is like the Ted Cruz of the left in that he elevates himself at the expense of his colleagues, though Bernie takes it a step further by repeatedly renouncing then rejoining the Democratic party,

So, while we can call out Republicans for helping create the setting for a populist run by Trump, many progressives are drawn to Bernie's populist attacks on Democrats.

[ballack]

8. Unfortunately

As a Bernie Sanders supporter in 2016 and 2020, I know that some, although I have no idea how many Bernie supporters, will pull a Suzanne Sarandon and stay home, vote for a fringe candidate who has zero chance of winning even one district, or vote for Trump. The longer Bernie pretends he has a "narrow path to the nomination", which is pure BS, the more his disenchanted hard core supporters are likely to do that. It is time for Bernie to put the country ahead of his anger and frustration of not winning the nomination again. Please, stop the bullshit and put all your energy toward defeating the greatest threat to the nation and world since Adolph Hitler.

[Eliot Rosewater]

10. Biden accuser has zero credibility. Continuing to mention it as some do, is an agenda.

[BidenBacker]

11. Sure hope the vast majority of Sanders supporters are just like you

The way I see it Trump supporters and Sanders supporters are much alike in one regard but are very different in one fundamental and crucially important way.

For 40 years now we've all been living under the thumb of repressive Reaganomics. As we all know Democratic social and economic policies benefit the vast majority of Americans while Republican policies favor only the few. Trump supporters are those who have bought into this Ronnie bullshit for over a full generation now, stupidly believing that if you give enough to the wealthy eventually a little of it will trickle down to them. Wrong as wrong can be...so now as a result of decades of this nonsense many of them are quite predictably desperate and in dire economic straits. Since they've been brainwashed year after year after year into loathing the left for many of them voting Democratic is anathema to the dogma that has been drilled into their brains. So when they abandoned the "normal" GOP rather than give the Dems a shot they instead turned to Trump in the futile hope that "he alone can fix it". They are finding out just how wrong they were and yet their hatred of liberals will prevent them from ever voting blue no matter how much they themselves get hurt. In fact, it often seems that even as they suffer badly at the hands of the man they made POTUS their only solace is that he attacks the liberals they so despise.

Bernie's folks are similar in their recognition that trickle-down has been an abject failure. But the huge difference between them and Trumptards is that since they are Democrats they care about what is happening to millions of their fellow Americans just as much if not more than their own personal situations. Many BS supporters are actually relatively well off but are still pissed off because so many others are hurting. Contrast this to Trumpists who mostly only care about themselves and their immediate families and perhaps a small circle of close friends. After that to hell with everybody else.

That is the fundamental difference between the two groups that we should try to keep in mind. If Sanders supporters come to their senses and start thinking as you do and stop attacking our best hope of getting rid of Trump then I'm pretty sure Biden folks will welcome them with open arms. Because while we disagree on how exactly we should get to where we wanna go there is very little disagreement on what we want as a group once we finally get there.

[Jake Stern]

12. Bernie needs to go far far away

but I’ll be damned if I spend my precious time and energy sympathizing with or even listening to a gaggle of arch-conservative assholes who helped whelp and nurture the beast known as the current GOP.

Their spots haven’t changed, they just want Trump out of the way so they can get back to fucking us over in a more “compassionate” way.