Maybe I am reading this wrong, but I think he is thinking that the superdelegates will flip to give him the nomination even as he loses in pledged delegates and popular vote.
Note what he not saying. He is not saying that they should and will flip because he will pull off a pledged delegate and popular vote win. He is no fool and he knows the math. He knows that, sure, there are individual states coming up that he can win in, but given the margins that Clinton has won by in delegate rich states, that he has no path forward to winning enough pledged delegates, let alone the overall popular vote. He is actually making the argument that the superdelegates should look at the number of states he wins, that he has won Michigan (which is a swing state and matters!) and the national polls show him doing better against Trump, and for the good of keeping the White House out of GOP hands, ignore the pledged delegate and popular vote totals and flip to him.
Don’t you normally criticize me for ‘just asking questions’ when I accuse a political candidate of potentially doing something unethical, and here you are doing the same thing.
He sounds like he is saying now that the southern states have voted, bernie will win in many western and plains states,allowing him to catch-up in pledged delegates and that the supers will switch due to electability.
Especially when he refused to be called a Democrat for all his years in Congress. So the Democratic party elite (which is what Superdelegates are supposed to be) are supposed to jump on his bandwagon over Clinton? This guy is tone deaf on the topic of loyalty.
I’ve had friends like this “yeah, I know I wasn’t there for you when your mother died, and when you had that big moving party when you bought your first house I was busy. And I missed your wedding - you know - there was a paintball tournament. And I’ve never bought Girl Scout Cookies or wrapping paper from your kids. But we’ve been friends for years - I come to your parties. And I’m here now and I’m awesome, can I borrow your car?”
I’d be surprised if Sanders really believes that. He has to put forth some kind of scenario in which his campaign amounts to more than a pyrrhic gesture, and as you say, he knows he’s pretty much forked as far as the pledge delegates are concerned. The idea of superdelegates coming around to him gives his supporters hope in an election landscape that, even after his upset win in Michigan, Sanders has to know is not favorable to him.
This is only true if you assume that Clinton is going to win all of the states she’s projected to win. Why would Sanders assume that, especially after Michigan? Why should anyone? Hell, the guys at 538 seem to think that if Bernie can repeat his Michigan performance, he may yet win it.
Look, I know you want Hillary to win, and she probably will win - but she hasn’t won it yet. Chutzpah is thinking that she’s entitled to win a race without having to actually beat her opponents.
The problem is he is encouraging his supporters to take a “we were screwed, we won’t support Clinton” view of the election. Which is already an issue. There is a certain blackmail going around from Sanders supporters on my facebook feed - “I’ll never vote for Clinton” - and should the party not throw its support behind Sanders and Sanders continues with this sort of talk, he’s encouraging them to believe they were betrayed.
His voters are often young and idealistic. Which is great - I am so proud of my daughter for being involved - even though she is too young to vote…but don’t take young idealistic people who want to participate in our political system and turn them into embittered non-voters in a single election cycle.
Its also - once again - disrespectful to the African American voting block that has supported Clinton fairly overwhelmingly. “White people know whats best for you, so even though it was your support which drove Clinton to winning the popular vote, the overwhelmingly white Superdelegates are going to pick someone else.” And middle aged and older women - who also support Clinton by pretty large margins.
I don’t see where he’s saying this at all. Can you highlight the part where he’s saying he’s going to lose the pledged delegate and popular vote totals?
No chutzpah is thinking that if the popular vote and delegate count is close - but you still lose - Superdelegates should throw the results your way.
If he wins the popular vote or the delegate count - that would be great - and I really hope the Superdelegates would switch to reflect the will of the people.
DSeid, why can’t you let this play out? You’re the only person I’ve heard of with SDS (Sanders Derangement Syndrome), TDS is running wild but it’s clear that Sanders is behind and for him to win will require a groundswell of support for him and dismissal of Hillary. If that happens the Supes become a factor, if not, there’s no point discussing it. This is just not the free-for-all that’s happening on the other side.
Other than DSeid’s misleading summary, is there any indication that Sanders expects or wants the superdelegates to back him even if he loses the popular vote and pledge delegate counts?
eta: The problem for Sanders, of course, is that his slim chance of winning the pledged delegate count might all be for naught, because the vast majority of the superdelegates have already backed Clinton. So if someone asks him what he plans to do about that, what else do you expect him to say, other than, “I think they’ll flip once they rethink my electibility?”
By my math, Merneith, it seems has to average 57% wins from here on out to gain back the over 200 delegates he’s down. Even if he repeats his upset, that’s not winning by enough. And your linked 538 article doesn’t say it would.
Sanders is probably going to lose. Of course he’s not going to say that. His job right now is to keep supporters energized, and one way to do that is to describe scenarios under which a victory is possible.
If you’re upset that he’s doing that, there’s a really good chance that you weren’t going to support him anyway.
I read the same implications in Sander’s words. And I think he needs to be careful, the Sanders supporters I know are sensitive to dog whistles.
I’m also not convinced Trump will take the nomination. He isn’t getting a majority of voters, just the most on a crowded field - once the Republican field is winnows and delegates supporting candidates no longer in the race switch allegiance - there becomes a possibility of a contested convention - where Cruz would come out on top. I’m not excited about the election of the unlikeable lizard people (I like Hillary’s politics better than Sanders, but she does have a likeability problem), but Cruz reads as mainstream enough to make Sanders look extreme.
You think this op is JAQing? He is expressly NOT discussing any possibility of catching up in pledged delegates and exclusively arguing that supers will switch because he is winning states and is, in current head to head polls against Trump, more electable.
I am not saying that such is unethical. Indeed that is to no small degree by design what the supers are supposed to do, look out for the greater good of the party and decide on that basis independent of the pledged delegate and popular vote. Many of us are not crazy about the process being that way but that is the way it is set up. Playing by the rules is not unethical even if the rules are not how we want them to be. It would be within the rules and would therefore be ethical.
It is just a bit crazy. (And it be would be crazy for them to go for Clinton if Sanders somehow won 60% of the delegates and popular vote from here and ended with a narrow majority in both, because it would not be good for the party.)
TP, color me confused. To you discussing the Democratic side rather than obsessing over all things Trump, is having Sanders Derangement Syndrome?
Yes, I care about what happens on the Democratic side and how it happens. If Sanders really believes what I understand him to be saying, then he is motivated to undermine Clinton as best as he can to the very end (so long as it does not harm his own brand) and can do harm to how she performs in the general.
And no Merneith it is not “only true if you assume that Clinton is going to win all of the states she’s projected to win” … take next Tuesday for example. If polling is somehow way way off in all the open primary states and he narrowly wins Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, and North Carolina, but loses the closed primary in Florida by polling prediction margins, then he ends up falling farther in a delegate hole, while winning 4 out of 5 states that she was “expected” to win. A big loss in a populous and delegate rich state is worth more than several narrow wins in smaller states. Delegate and popular vote math both are not the same as “winning states.”
Can’t you just switch the names and say the same thing? It’s a primary, each candidate wants the nomination, each thinks they can attain it and would be a better candidate in the general than the other.
This race could turn around. I don’t ascribe a high probability to that, but not one ridiculously low either. I personally don’t think Bernie should stick around much longer if he continues to fall behind in the delegate count, but as long as he notches wins, and could take the lead with decent majorities in the remaining states he really should stay in. Maybe I don’t have the numbers right, but I believe if he can win 60% of the remaining delegates he’ll have the lead in pledged delegates, and at that point it would be reasonable for the Super Dels to reconsider they’re position.
Would you really think any differently if the positions were reversed?
You do know I’m just ribbing you with stuff like that, right?
Framing Sanders’s campaign as undermining Clinton is reprehensible and inaccurate, just as it would be reprehensible and inaccurate to frame Clinton’s 2008 campaign in the same way. It is completely legitimate to offer vigorous debate with one’s opponent. Sanders has been very good about not going after Clinton for stupid shit like her husband’s skeevy affairs and the like. He’s focused on issues; he’s fought possibly the most principled campaign in modern electoral history. If Clinton doesn’t like that, that’s too bad for her.
Well it does impact what he does going forward. Tuesday 792 more pledged delegates will be decided. Now if he wins those, heck not even 60/40, even 56/44 (getting closer to the margins he needs to win from thence on) yeah sure, it is possible. But alternatively, given current polling has him losing by 20 to 30, say he defies expectations and loses by an average of 10. That (defying expectations) puts him 79 more delegates in the hole, closing in on 300 behind. With that many fewer delegates left in play. At that point continuing to portray Clinton as dishonest and beholden to Wall Street, fanning the fires of those who support him who will need some encouragement to work past their Bernie or nothing and Hillary is an evil expletive … is harmful to the greater good.
LOHD Clinton was never that far behind and was pressured to quit once she was behind more 100 … and she still had the hope that Michigan and Florida would still be able to count somehow.
The *purpose *of superdelegates is to be the party insider (small) hand on the helm. The citizens have their (larger) hand on the helm via the primaries and pledged delegates. The super’s are there to tweak things when the primary voters, or just bad luck, produce a crazy or indecisive result. The intent is to have all this enshrined in well-known and well-understood rules. So that charges of skullduggery won’t have an actual factual basis on the occasions the supers do lean against a popular vote plurality that’s inconclusively strong per the rules.
Anyone who says supers ought not get a vote (or equivalently that they must conform to the popular vote) is simply asking for a rule change that benefits one side or the other. Or one view of how candidates ought to be selected. So far that pure-primary votes approach has not carried the day.
It is Sanders’ job now to keep talking about how he could win. The OP’s quote tells us he thinks he’s down to not getting a majority, maybe not even getting a plurality, and then persuading the supers that he’s the best choice to win the general.
If indeed he came up short and the polling showed he was *clearly *the best choice to beat the R nominee chosen the week prior, it would in fact be sound politics and totally within the rules and adult expectations, for the super’s to go for Sanders. And equally, if the polling *clearly *supported Clinton, the supers should too.
The more lopsided the delegate count is between Clinton and Sanders, the more hard-over the other way the polls will need to be before the super’s ought to, per their mission statement, swap sides to lean against the delegate count to nominate the candidate with the better chance.
There comes a mathematical point where even if all the supers leaned to Sanders that wouldn’t overcome Clinton’s lead in pledged delegates. Or vice versa. It seems implausible we’ll get that far one-sided, but it can happen. By design. When the People speak with one voice, it rules. When the People mostly mumble, it’s up to the pros to decide what the smartest move is.
Sanders is hoping the People mumble enough, and real polling shows him doing better against the R than Clinton, to let him be the winner. Or at least so he says.
As I said above, I think he needs 57% of the remaining delegates. There’s 2761 delegates left and he’d need to get 1586 of them to end in a tie. So he needs much bigger upsets than Michigan in a lot of places to make it close. If he pulls off Michigan style upsets everywhere on Tuesday and basically splits the delegates 50-50 with Clinton, then the needed percentage still goes up. He’d need 60% of the remaining delegates to tie at that point.
Mostly true. But to be fair, he has his rabid internet fans to post all the lies and half-lies about Hillary. Sanders himself doesnt have to utter a word and still gets to have a very negative campaign. In fact, 99% of the negative Dem campaigning I have seen on FB and the like has been Sanders supporters attacking Clinton, often using the same lies and half-lies the GOP has been using.