If it's Bernie vs. trump, who will putin support?

[ecstatic]

The Mueller report concluded that Russia/putin wanted trump and Bernie. When trump won the gop nom and Hillary won the democratic nomination, they put all their energy behind trump. But what happens if it's trump vs Bernie? Isn't it entirely possible that putin will switch his support to Bernie, since trump is so toxic and ineffective? Meanwhile, Bernie has quietly and without any blowback voted in a way that is a lot more supportive of putin/Russia than his colleagues--for example, he's voted against the Magnitsky Act and Russian sanctions:

The Senate overwhelmingly voted Thursday to impose new sanctions on Russia, joining the House in approving the measure by veto-proof margins.

The vote on the bill — which would also add sanctions against North Korea and Iran — was 98-2, with only Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., dissenting. The House passed the measure on Tuesday by 419-3. Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/senate-joins-house-overwhelmingly-passing-new-russian-sanctions-n787291

Senate Democrats on Wednesday came up short in a vote to stop the Trump administration from easing sanctions on companies linked to Oleg Deripaska, a Russian billionaire with ties to Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin.

The only one to miss the vote was Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. He was meeting with women who had accused his 2016 presidential campaign of sexual misconduct, his spokesman, Josh Miller-Lewis, told CNBC. Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/16/senate-democrats-vote-to-block-trump-from-lifting-russia-sanctions-fails.html

Any thoughts? Is this concerning to anyone or are you happy to potentially have putin siding with the democrats next go 'round?

[redstatebluegirl]

1. He needs Bernie to be the nominee to make it easier for Trump.

Bernie will be a ripe target for the online trash.

[OhZone]

2. This

But semi-naked Bernie singing "this land is my land" in Cold War Moscow on his "honeymoon" couldn't possibly be used against him, right?

[Celerity]

17. the adverts just write themselves, Bernie would be LUCKY to crack 198 EV's, the Rethugs will go wild

and Middle America will be yanked back to the 1950's in terms of 'better dead than red' (Bernie partially brought that all on himself by falsely STILL self-labelling as a dem soc, when he is NOT, and has not been for 30 years).

I have no idea why people do not wake up to the pretty well-established proposition (by now surely I am not overstating this) that nominating Sanders as our nominee is a national suicide pact as it yields 4 more years of Trump, and either a 7-2 or 8-1 radically RW SCOTUS for a decade or two. Bloomberg (and maybe Schultz) will surely jump in and Bernie will be caught in a 3-way, £2 billion plus backed decimating, triangulated crossfire.

Link to tweet

[SFnomad]

3. The only reason Russia was behind BS was because Russia was against Secretary Clinton

They wanted BS because he was going to be a weaker candidate against tRump. I still believe that Russia (Putin) still has something (or several things) over on tRump and they've been blackmailing him to get what they want. And if BS somehow managed to win, he wasn't going to be near the adversary that Secretary Clinton would have been.

At this point, Russia doesn't care about BS ... they're just going to continue to use him to cause dissension within the Democratic Party.

[Skidmore]

11. Still is true. nt

[peggysue2]

15. This!

At this point, Russia doesn't care about BS ... they're just going to continue to use him to cause dissension within the Democratic Party.

On the nose, SFnomad.

[MineralMan]

4. Trump. Putin will support Trump.

He might support Sanders during the primaries, though.

[liberalnarb]

5. What if?

I'm supposed to be swayed by a hypothetical? Also, its pretty clear Putin supports trump. He said it explicitly in Helsinki. If he tried to swing the 2016 primary it wasn't because he liked Bernie. Its well known that Putin absolutely abhorred Hillary and preferred most anybody, including Bernie, to her.

[WeekiWater]

6. No one. It will already be a victory for him.

I've thought since the beginning his only true goal is to help destabilize the US. He is no fan of Trump. He is no fan of Sanders. He is a fan of the US pulling back on the world stage and destabilization here at home.

[BlueFlorida]

7. He has better leverage on Trump nt

[Skidmore]

12. This. nt

[thesquanderer]

8. So you don't believe Sanders' explanation?

From the article you linked to:

Sanders said he voted against the measure even though he strongly supports sanctions against Russia and North Korea. But he said he feared that new sanctions against Iran would weaken incentives for Tehran to stick with the nuclear weapons deal it agreed to with world powers in 2015.

A spokesperson for Paul said the senator supports sanctions only against North Korea.

[ecstatic]

9. If it were a 1 time thing, maybe I would. But there's a pattern

in his votes with respect to Russia and sanctions, and it goes back many, many years.

[Hortensis]

10. Ecstatic, I laughed until I saw your "Putin siding with Democrats"

as an end thought. WTF?

The U.S.'s Democratic Party poses the planet's largest threat to Putin's ambitions, both personal and for Russia.

That is a complete explanation for Putin's attempts to keep the Republicans in power.

I don't think you posted for this response, but you got it:

Russia's effort to convince Bernie Sanders voters to support Trump was 'central' to their strategy to beat Hillary Clinton, according to a new study
Business Insider Apr. 12, 2019

* Sen. Bernie Sanders was "central" to Russia's efforts to interfere in the 2016 election, according to a new study.
* The study suggests the Russians looked as Sanders as a tool to drive a wedge in the Democratic party more than was previously known.
* Of the Russian tweets the researchers analyzed, roughly 9,000 used the word "Bernie," which were "liked" 59,281 times and retweeted 61,804 times.

Russia's effort to convince supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders to vote for President Donald Trump over former Secretary Hillary Clinton was more expansive than previously known, according to a new study.

Researchers at Clemson University, at the request of The Washington Post, examined English-language tweets that came from Russia and found thousands that were designed to urge Sanders supporters to back Trump.

The tweets came from accounts masquerading as conservative Americans, with profiles that said things like, "Southern. Conservative Pro God. Anti Racism" and tweeted things like, "#BlackMenForBernie Leader Switches to Trump! I will Never Vote for Hillary, Welcome aboard the Trump Train." ...

"There is no question that Sanders was central to their strategy. He was clearly used as a mechanism to decrease voter turnout for Hillary Clinton," Darren Linvill, associate professor of communications and one of the researchers who worked on the study, told The Post.

Sanders was "just a tool" to the Russians, Linvill added, and "a wedge to drive into the Democratic Party."

https://www.businessinsider.com/bernie-sanders-central-to-russias-pro-trump-2016-strategy-study-2019-4

Here's something else: Observers say Russia never stopped using Sanders. Even though he's losing ground here, he's still useful to keep the U.S. in Repub/Russian hands.

[Gothmog]

13. Putin will use sanders to elect trump again

[Demsrule86]

14. Trump...Bernie is just the candidate who can be beaten by Trump.

[LongtimeAZDem]

16. If it's Bernie vs. trump, Putin has already won

[corbettkroehler]

18. All External Interference Is Bad, Period

I'm 100% Sanders and have no problem with the Mueller Report's conclusions regarding Putin's wishes regarding the election because Sanders would have won the general in a landslide, irrespective of Russian meddling.

Let's remember that Putin needed help from tRump's campaign to guide external efforts and made them effective. Sanders would have provided no such guidance in 2016 and would do no such thing in 2020.

tRump's the traitor.