# 2016 Bernie Sanders (D-VT) campaign for POTUS thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [April 28, 2015, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754 "2015-04-28T22:40:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 21
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2015, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/401 "2015-09-10T15:18:51Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > That said using Cruz whoops Sanders as far as your chart goes and Rubio, with one trivial bill enacted in 5 years is looking fairly good compared to Sanders’ 25 years of do-nothing. Cruz also played a major part in shutting down the US government. Does that count as “accomplishing something”? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2015, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/402 "2015-09-10T18:02:46Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > Cruz also played a major part in shutting down the US government. Does that count as “accomplishing something”? Yes. Accomplishing things does not mean things I think are worthwhile or good ideas. He advanced his agenda effectively. There is little in evidence of Sanders effectively advancing his agenda (or of impeding the opposite of his agenda) in 25 years of being in Congress excepting some decent work for veterans. The fact that Sanders’ agenda is closer to mine than is Cruz’s is immaterial to that analysis. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2015, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/403 "2015-09-10T18:06:17Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > He advanced his agenda effectively. No matter that there is no content to that agenda other than advancing his own public notoriety. Still, it did take some skillz, or at least ballz, for a freshman Senator to become the acting Speaker of the House, as he did. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_stamos_left_ear/32/3198_2.png) [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Stamos_Left_Ear)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2015, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/404 "2015-09-10T18:46:47Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Sanders didn’t, which is kind of the point of the thread. > > Regards, > Shodan Wrong. I provided a citation that you’re wrong. So you’re wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2015, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/405 "2015-09-11T13:03:44Z")
Are you saying that your cite shows that Sanders was just as effective as Obama in getting legislation thru Congress over the obstructions of the GOP? Because I don’t see it - whether or not you like Obamacare, I think most people would class it as more significant than renaming a post office and a COLA for veterans. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2015, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/406 "2015-09-11T16:07:43Z")
> [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > Wrong. I provided a citation that you’re wrong. So you’re wrong. Well you provided a citation, that much is accurate. But no, your cite does not show what you think it shows. It shows that he spent 25 years in Congress (longer than more productive critters like Boxer, Feinstein, Durbin, Collins … and in the ranks of the productive likes of Pelosi, Reid, Shelby, Waxman, Mikulski, Rockefeller, McCain, Mikulski, Harkin …) and (other than veteran affairs issues, which must be noted as a good thing) advanced issues related to his agenda and causes pretty much not at all. Yes it is acknowledged that most of the rest of Congress is also do-nothing, but a while Cruz (despicable jerk that he may be) can claim to have become the major power in the House in his first term, Sanders has little to show for a quarter century. And fun factoid … what did he spend most of energy sponsoring bills [about](http://ballotpedia.org/Bernie_Sanders)? Social Welfare? Finance? Environmental Protection? Health? Those accounted for 2, 27, 11, and 16 of the bills he sponsored respectively. Agriculture and Food bills was he failed on the most on, at 4174 bills. Yeah he not only failed to advance his agenda, it looks like he didn’t even seriously try. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2015, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/407 "2015-09-11T17:11:47Z")
[Nate Silver](http://www.dailynewsbin.com/news/nate-silver-gives-hillary-clinton-93-odds-of-beating-bernie-sanders/22313/) is calling the primary for Hillary as a 93% sure thing. Given his track record, I’m tending to think it will be as predicted. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2015, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/408 "2015-09-11T17:44:58Z")
Burn the heretics! ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2015, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/409 "2015-09-12T22:02:07Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > [Nate Silver](http://www.dailynewsbin.com/news/nate-silver-gives-hillary-clinton-93-odds-of-beating-bernie-sanders/22313/) is calling the primary for Hillary as a 93% sure thing. Given his track record, I’m tending to think it will be as predicted. That’s his opinion, not his data. BTW, does Hillary still have the biggest lead ever for a non incumbent frontrunner? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2015, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/410 "2015-09-12T23:50:44Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > That’s his opinion, not his data. He’s got some data – endorsements, money raised, and polling. And even if it was just his opinion, he’s got an awfully good track record – it would seem extremely unwise to bet against him, IMO. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2015, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/411 "2015-09-14T14:38:57Z")
He’s a better prognosticator than anyone else around, but even good prognosticators are wrong more often than not without data. And endorsement data, unlike polling trends, is not a mathematical model. Silver is choosing to predict that endorsements+big leads among minority voters\> winning IA and NH. No one in the Democratic party since the modern primary system began has had virtually no endorsements and appeal only to white voters, yet won IA and NH. Why does Silver think minority voters won’t bolt Clinton the way they did in 2008? Because Sanders is white? I disagree. African-American voters have no hostility to Sanders, only indifference. When South Carolinian African-Americans read “Sanders trounces Clinton!” they are going to want to check this guy out. And nothing they see is going to make them not want to support him. I predict that in SC, Clinton will still win a majority of African-American voters, but she will lose enough that it will be a close race. And close won’t cut it if it’s a delegate race. She needs big margins in states with minority voters. Assuming she can even keep minority voter support once Sanders becomes more well known. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2015, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/412 "2015-09-14T18:47:13Z")
[Sanders speaks at Liberty University.](http://www.salon.com/2015/09/14/fired_up_bernie_sanders_establishes_common_biblical_ground_with_students_at_conservative_liberty_university/) > [@](#): > > Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders spoke at Liberty University, the conservative Christian institution founded by the Reverend Jerry Falwell, and he wasted no time in making it clear that on issues like abortion and same-sex marriage, they will always “disagree” — but that there’s one issue on which he believes they can find some common ground. > > “Let me respectfully suggest that there are other issues out there that are of enormous consequence to our country and in fact to the entire world that maybe, just maybe, we do not disagree on,” he said. “Maybe, just maybe, we can try to work together in trying to resolve them.” The issue in question is one familiar to anyone following Sanders’ campaign — the concentration of wealth among “the top 1 percent of the 1 percent.” > > “It would be hard to make the case that we are a just society or anything resembling a just society today,” he said. “In the United States of America today, there is massive injustice in terms of income and wealth inequality. Injustice is rampant.” > > Many of these points were met with applause from the largely conservative audience during the speech itself — especially when he quoted directly from the Bible — but the relationship became a little strained during the question-and-answer session. One student asked about the Vermont senator’s statements about children being the most vulnerable members of society, and how he would reconcile that with the belief that “children in the womb need our protection even more.” ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2015, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/413 "2015-09-14T19:17:03Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > He’s a better prognosticator than anyone else around, but even good prognosticators are wrong more often than not without data. And endorsement data, unlike polling trends, is not a mathematical model. > > Silver is choosing to predict that endorsements+big leads among minority voters\> winning IA and NH. No one in the Democratic party since the modern primary system began has had virtually no endorsements and appeal only to white voters, yet won IA and NH. Why does Silver think minority voters won’t bolt Clinton the way they did in 2008? Because Sanders is white? I disagree. African-American voters have no hostility to Sanders, only indifference. When South Carolinian African-Americans read “Sanders trounces Clinton!” they are going to want to check this guy out. And nothing they see is going to make them not want to support him. I predict that in SC, Clinton will still win a majority of African-American voters, but she will lose enough that it will be a close race. And close won’t cut it if it’s a delegate race. She needs big margins in states with minority voters. Assuming she can even keep minority voter support once Sanders becomes more well known. That’s fine, but I’m going to treat your predictions like any other random internet predictions, and I’ll treat Silver’s predictions as though they come from someone with Nate Silver’s track record. ---
**Author:** ![emcee2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7bcc69/32.png) [@emcee2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emcee2k)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2015, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/414 "2015-09-14T22:56:26Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > [Nate Silver](http://www.dailynewsbin.com/news/nate-silver-gives-hillary-clinton-93-odds-of-beating-bernie-sanders/22313/) is calling the primary for Hillary as a 93% sure thing. Given his track record, I’m tending to think it will be as predicted. 15 to 1 against Sanders isn’t the same 93% for Clinton. There are other candidates (and a potential candidate). ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2015, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/415 "2015-09-14T22:58:41Z")
Sanders’ lead over Clinton in NH rises to double digits in the average: [http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general\_election\_trump\_vs\_clinton-5491.html](http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_clinton-5491.html) And 22 points in the latest poll. Two straight polls show him leading Clinton in IA. [http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ia/iowa\_democratic\_presidential\_caucus-3195.html](http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ia/iowa_democratic_presidential_caucus-3195.html) And in SC, he’s moved to within 23. Big lead, to be sure, but Clinton is still falling and wins in IA and NH would cut that lead down a lot. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2015, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/416 "2015-09-15T00:01:13Z")
[Hillary is no lock, Bernie is no fluke: The Democratic race is wide open](http://www.salon.com/2015/09/14/hillary_is_no_lock_bernie_is_no_fluke_the_democratic_race_is_wide_open/) > [@](#): > > The view that Hillary Clinton is the obvious frontrunner is no longer defensible. Poll after poll shows that Bernie Sanders is either gaining ground or leading outright. The latest CBS/YouGov poll is particularly alarming if you’re a Clinton supporter. Clinton is trailing Sanders by 10 points in Iowa and 22 points in New Hampshire, although Clinton maintains a sizable (if diminished) lead in South Carolina. > > The most recent polls are indicative of a broader trend in the Democratic race. Clinton’s numbers have been slipping for several months, and it’s clear by now that Clinton is not the unassailable candidate many hoped she would be. Hillary’s strategy so far has been to tiptoe around Sanders, hoping his political star fades. But that strategy isn’t working. If anything, that sense of entitlement is part of the reason Sanders has ascended the way he has. > > Clinton has to take Sanders seriously now, or risk alienating more of the Democratic base. This idea that Sanders is a fluke, a minor nuisance to be avoided, is a myth. Sanders’s appeal is self-evident and unlikely to pass away anytime soon. People are enthusiastic about his candidacy because he’s challenging the sort of institutional inertia that Clinton, fairly or not, represents. As an establishment figure, Clinton is the status quo. Whatever one thinks of Sanders, he is not part of the Washington consensus – and that matters a great deal in this race. > > Democratic insiders like Joe Trippi, former campaign manager for Howard Dean, are still skeptical of Sanders’s staying power. Rejecting comparisons to Sanders’s rise and Dean’s insurgent 2004 campaign, Trippi articulated what I imagine many at the DNC are thinking: “The one thing I can tell you for sure is until the establishment starts attacking the living daylights out of him [Sanders], he’s no threat. The second he becomes a threat, you will know.” > > Trippi’s statement implies two things, both of which we already knew: (1) Clinton represents the establishment and Sanders does not and (2) the establishment does not yet consider Sanders a legitimate candidate. Judging by their unwillingness to engage Sanders, I suspect the Clinton campaign shares the belief that Sanders is unserious – and that’s part of their problem. If Hillary’s team isn’t worried by now, their heads are buried deep in the sand. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2015, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/417 "2015-09-16T14:34:59Z")
[A Pro-Clinton Super PAC Is Going Negative On Bernie Sanders: The group links Sanders to Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and the United Kingdom’s new Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn.](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-jeremy-corbyn_55f73339e4b00e2cd5e79e11) > [@](#): > > . . . The email, sent to a Huffington Post reporter in response to an article about Corbyn and Sanders without any agreement that it would be off the record, was meant to flag Corbyn’s “most extreme comments.” Among those was the suggestion that the assassination of Osama bin Laden was “a tragedy,” since there was no attempt to arrest the former al Qaeda leader and put him on trial. The email also cites Corbyn’s comment that he’d invite his “friends” from Hezbollah to come to the U.K. to discuss peace in the Middle East and an editorial in which he said that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s “attempt to encircle Russia is one of the big threats of our time.” > > The email uses those comments to pivot to “similarities” between Corbyn and Sanders, who have engaged in a mild cross-Atlantic love-fest of late, given that they are both insurgent populists challenging their political parties’ establishments. Corbyn has said he is following Sanders’ campaign “with great interest,” and Sanders said he was “delighted” that the Labour Party elected Corbyn as its leader. > > The “similarities” between the two, according to the email, include Sanders’ introduction of legislation to terminate the United States’ nuclear weapons program, comments that NATO’s expansion into former Soviet states is dangerous because it could provoke Russia, opposition to more U.S. funds for NATO, and saying he “was concerned” that proposed new NATO members had shipped arms to Iran and North Korea. > > The more serious stretch comes as the email highlights how Sanders helped negotiate a program with Venezuela’s national oil company in 2006 that provided discounted heating oil assistance to low-income Vermonters. The senator said it was “not a partisan issue,” in the state, which was the sixth to make the deal. His support for the program was apparently enough to merit a mention, since Corbyn has written that the late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez’s “electoral democratic credentials are beyond reproach.” ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2015, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/418 "2015-09-16T15:00:47Z")
The danger in that kind of campaigning is that as in 2008, it’s fair game for Republicans to use her attacks against the eventual winner and the attacks have a bipartisan sheen to them. It didn’t work on Obama, but Sanders is no Obama. If he’s pegged as an extreme leftist he’ll lose 40 states. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2015, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/419 "2015-09-16T15:24:25Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The danger in that kind of campaigning is that as in 2008, it’s fair game for Republicans to use her attacks against the eventual winner and the attacks have a bipartisan sheen to them. > > It didn’t work on Obama, but Sanders is no Obama. If he’s pegged as an extreme leftist he’ll lose 40 states. Depends on his opponent. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2015, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754/420 "2015-09-16T15:29:37Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > It didn’t work on Obama, but Sanders is no Obama. If he’s pegged as an extreme leftist he’ll . . . . . . turn out many who have never voted before – to vote against him, but also to vote **for** him. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754.md?page=20) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/2016-bernie-sanders-d-vt-campaign-for-potus-thread/718754.md?page=22)