madfloridian
madfloridian's JournalTruthdig: Both parties to blame for Trump's proximity to the White House.
Actually this is a thoughtful article.
Both Parties Are to Blame for Donald Trump’s Proximity to the White House
Clad in his armor of hate, Trump is handily winning state after state in the Republican primary election, prompting many of us to wonder how he can possibly be so popular. A country where a black man won the popular vote two elections in a row now has enough voters either embracing Trump’s racism or so willing to look past it that he is likely to snag the Republican Party’s nomination. It seems unreal.
The article continues by saying that in some ways "his popularity is a predictable end result of the politics of resentment that the Republican Party has stoked for years in order to win votes."
The GOP establishment has built up ideas about cutting government spending to individuals while boosting businesses through claims (proved false time and again) that jobs and other benefits trickle down to ordinary Americans. It has nurtured a large segment of the American population in this way, relying on social hot-button issues such as abortion to override personal economic hardship and to direct votes toward the party. But Republicans didn’t count on a Trump candidacy offering voters the demagoguery minus spending cuts. This is on them.
The writer then turns to the Democrats' role.
A choice between Sanders and Trump offers white voters the chance to choose inclusiveness over demagoguery in its most reductive terms. Indeed, progressive whites, in conjunction with voters of color (who tend to be progressive), already outnumber white swing voters. So it should not surprise us that in a Sanders-Trump matchup, Sanders would probably win. In fact, the latest CNN poll finds that “Sanders—who enjoys the most positive favorable rating of any presidential candidate in the field, according to the poll—tops all three Republicans (Trump, Sen. Ted Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio] by wide margins.”
Yet the Democratic Party establishment has chosen to tilt toward Clinton, promising her the lion’s share of superdelegates. If Clinton wins the nomination based on her superdelegate count and then goes on to lose the White House to Trump or any of the other Republican candidates, then that’s on the Democratic Party.
Ultimately, the blame for the state of American electoral politics can be laid at the feet of both major parties.
DNC considers Bernie and us non-Democrats now, will we become real Dems in November....
when our votes and donations are needed?
My computer went down for 3 days, and it was so frustrating. But something interesting happened during that time. I am not usually a rebel per se, but being away from the political forums and not watching political TV did wonders in clearing my head.
It brought out the rebellious side of my nature, and it is sort of empowering.
Some random thoughts and comments.
I am finding I don't think of myself as a Democrat much anymore. I think that's been a long time coming, and it seems to be here now.
This primary has shown me too much of the ugly side of politics in which a party would deliberately set out to harm one who had voted with them more often than some with the D after their name.
I think what people don't realize is that this race is a turning point in our party, even if Bernie loses.
They have shut us out as not Democratic enough.
They made the primary about race from the start....they have pitted the races against each other.
That's shameful. It was shocking to see this play out as it has.
They have used the party as a weapon against Bernie and his supporters.
That's a terrible thing to do. And since the bylaws require the DNC chair and leaders to be neutral...it may even carry the taint of illegality to a degree.
If Hillary wins that way, I don't really call it a win.
You can not squeeze party loyalty out of those you have insulted for months.
More thoughts:
The nation is getting a lesson in Democratic Socialism. The words may not strike fear anymore.
In 2008 Obama lost 21 states. Hillary stayed in until June.
This primary Bernie supporters gave him close to 45 million in February alone.
I think I just read Bernie took in 6 million on Monday alone.
That's amazing.
That's enough to continue to get his message out no matter what happens.
They are getting a lesson about how Democrats used to be.
Once you say someone is not a Democrat and shut them out...things change. It was tough being a Deaniac but we turned to Kerry and worked hard for him.
This primary has changed things. DWS publicly said Bernie was not a Democrat, she has gone against the neutrality rules that govern the DNC. We have been considered no longer Democrats, yet expected to be there at the end with money and votes.
I was proud of how how Bernie did Super Tuesday. He's running a surprisingly strong campaign. With him all the way.
So what do you think about Bill Clinton posing with man with ballot?
Just wondering. Saw this at twitter.
https://twitter.com/BernieTeachers
Michael Tomasky warns Bernie to get in line and quit attacking Hillary as she will win.
I find myself increasingly disappointed with many journalists and news moderators who have taken sides so openly in this primary.
Time for Bernie Sanders to Get in Line. Time to ratchet back his attacks on the presumptive nominee.
Does Super Tuesday change anything on the Democratic side? Bernie Sanders got enough wins, and delegates, to keep at it. So that won’t change—and I want to say clearly that it should not change. But this is what should change: From here on in, Sanders ought to lay off the attacks on Hillary Clinton, the Goldman Sachs speeches and all the rest. Eventually, he’s going to lose. She’s going to win. He can do it in a way that burnishes hi Fs standing in the party he’s decided to be a member of and that makes him a pivotally powerful senator during a potential Clinton presidency. Or he can do it in a way that damages her reputation and ultimately his own.
Most of the individual results, for all the hype, don’t really mean that much. Sanders won Vermont. Given. Sanders won Minnesota and Colorado, which are both important states, but they’re weird caucuses. Oklahoma was an interesting win, but the black percentage of the vote is small there compared to deep South states, and anyway it’s as red as a state gets. Wesley Clark won Oklahoma in 2004.
A number of Clinton’s wins don’t really matter much either, again, because they’re red general election states. Texas, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas; who cares how much she won by? Georgia is a slightly different story, because Georgia is inching its way toward purple-dom, and she can at least make Donald Trump spend money there this fall.
Sanders should keep running. He has the money, so why not? He draws the crowds. And his presence keeps Clinton on her toes, keeps her from sail-trimming and tacking back to the center too early. So he should stay in as long as he wants to stay and keep up the pressure on the issues.
Why Michael how very kind of you to say that Bernie can continue on.
But it’s time to start pulling back on the food fight. Sanders got into this race thinking: I’m not gonna win, but I’m gonna push this party to the populist-left and put issues on the table that I want to see put on the table. You could tell this way back when he said “enough with the damn emails.” Then he came oh-so-close in Iowa and rolled in New Hampshire, and that’s when he started to think he might actually win this thing—to the astonishing extent that he reportedly didn’t even write a concession speech in Nevada.
There's more condescending lecturing at the link.
Who does he think he is? Why is he chastising only one candidate?
He is making it sound "okay" for Bernie to continue on...but only if he doesn't say unkind things about the presumptive nominee..
In my opinion that is probably one of the worst ideas Tomasky has come up with ever.
I'm feeling less and less like a member of the party. If our leaders and journalists and online anchors are picking our presumptive nominee....then why bother to vote?
Bill Clinton was campaigning right near polling place entry. Video leaves no doubt.
Several Bernie Sanders supporters were told they could not hold their signs near the polling station, but Bill Clinton and others were pushing the crowd to vote for Hillary Clinton much closer to the Buttonwood Park Warmer Center, which is a polling station for Ward 5E and 5F. The entrance to the warming center was just to the left of President Clinton in this photo. Not sure how anyone could have voted for about 20 minutes.
Here is the video of the visit:
https://www.facebook.com/NewBedfordGu...
Here is the MA law:
"Within 150 feet of a polling place…no person shall solicit votes for or against, or otherwise promote or oppose, any person or political party or position on a ballot question, to be voted on at the current election. No campaign material intended to influence the vote of a voter in the ongoing election, including campaign literature, buttons, signs, and ballot stickers, may be posted, exhibited, circulated, or distributed in the polling place, in the building where it is located, on the building walls, on the premises where the building stands, or within 150 feet of an entrance door to the building. ( 950 CMR 53.03(18); 54.04.22)"
Obama lost 21 states. Hillary stayed in until June.
Bernie supporters gave him close to 45 million in February alone. Does that sound like a failing campaign?
I think I just read Bernie took in 6 million yesterday alone.
That's amazing.
That's enough to continue to get his message out no matter what happens.
NYT says campaign report indicates Bill Clinton went inside the polling place with mayor.
Bill Clinton Gets a Little Too Close to Voters in BostonSome poll workers in Boston did a double-take on Tuesday at the unusual sight of a former president of the United States campaigning inside polling places.
Bill Clinton, an inveterate campaigner who has always loved Election Day, was ranging over the state trying to pump up voters to cast their ballots for his wife, Hillary Clinton.
“We had to remind some of our poll workers that even a president can’t go inside and work a polling place,” William F. Galvin, the Massachusetts secretary of state, said in an interview.
A pool report from Mr. Clinton’s visit to Boston’s West Roxbury neighborhood on Tuesday morning said that he went inside the polling place with the city’s mayor, Martin J. Walsh. Mr. Clinton stopped at a bake sale at the entrance and then shook hands with poll workers.
When one woman asked for a photo, Mr. Clinton said, “As long as we’re not violating any election laws,” the pool report said.
Tough on crime a main policy of Clintons. Hypocritical for them to attack Bernie on his vote.
It was their baby, so to speak. They pushed "tough on crime" as one of their legacies. They were proud of it.
Now Hillary's folks are criticizing Bernie because he finally grudgingly voted for it. How low can you go to go after a candidate because he voted for the policy they pushed so hard.
Bernie did it while speaking loudly in opposition. Many other Democrats voted it for it as well. The Clintons had power even then.
The hypocrisy of these attacks on Bernie overwhelms my poor brain.
hy·poc·ri·sy
həˈpäkrəsē/
noun
noun: hypocrisy; plural noun: hypocrisies
the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one's own behavior does not conform; pretense.
synonyms: dissimulation, false virtue, cant, posturing, affectation, speciousness, empty talk, insincerity, falseness, deceit, dishonesty, mendacity, pretense, duplicity; More
sanctimoniousness, sanctimony, pietism, piousness;
informalphoniness, fraud
"must politics be the perennial benchmark of hypocrisy?"
antonyms: sincerity
https://www.google.com/search?q=hypocrisy&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
His words about it were strong and powerful. This WAS the policy of the CLINTONS. It's pathetic for them to attack him.
1991 Bernie Sanders on Crime, Punishment, and Poverty. Urges end to harsh policies.
Bernie Sanders on Crime, Punishment, and Poverty (10/22/1991) Published on Jul 8, 2015
Rep. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) delivers a fiery speech on the issue of crime and the root of the problem: poverty. Urges an end to harsh retributive policies around crime and punishment that disproportionately affect the impoverished.
I agree with this diary at at Daily Kos.
Stop saying that Bernie Sanders was for the crime bill. He spoke over and over and over again against it.
Here he is, calling it what it really was, a punishment bill, that came after poor people and Black folk.
When he eventually supported a version of it, he openly stated that he only did so because of the new laws protecting women in the bill, but be clear, he always opposed it, and did so with great passion.
SO Harry Reid wants Obama to nominate GOP governor for Supreme Court?
Isn't that one of main talking points on why we would harm our country so much if we ever fail to vote for the Democrat who is running for President.
We hear it over and over again..."but what about the Supreme Court?". It's a major talking point for electing Democrats no matter their policies.
Harry Reid wants President Obama to nominate the governor of his state.
That is WHY I voted through the years for the Democratic nominee....to get the right people on the Supreme Court.
Obama offers Supreme Court hints; top Democrat suggests Republican governor
Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid suggested a Republican, Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval, as a potential nominee. A source confirmed to CNN that the White House is vetting Sandoval.
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