That’s some bullshitted revisionism.
Though I don’t disagree, I do think this applies more to specific charges than to the vague ‘throw it against the wall and see what sticks’ accusations Sanders has been making. Basically they center around his claim that ‘if you take Wall Street money you are Wall Street’s puppet.’
Of course an immediate and obvious question arises from this. For those who believe Sanders’ claim is true: do you characterize Barack Obama as being Wall Street’s puppet? (Since he took more money from Wall Street in his bid to become President than Clinton has taken in hers…?)
For stats on what Obama took versus what Clinton has taken: PolitiFact | Hillary Clinton: Barack Obama set new Wall Street fundraising record when he first ran for president
No it’s not. Of course I’m not saying that Carter alone is what caused Reagan, but Leon Panetta among other has explained how poorly Jimmy Carter was at working with Congress, to the point of frustrating many in his own party. Sanders would be Carter on steroids.
Anyone else see Sanders on This Week?
Explain why it’s okay (as Sanders admitted) to vote for the Crime Bill and then turn around and criticize Hillary Clinton - who wasn’t even in office at that time?
See, this is what is beginning to irk me about Bernie and his bros. “ZOMG! Clinton voted for a bill that ended up having negative consequences”
Okay, but Bernie apparently did too.
“No that’s different! You don’t get it, bro. Wall Street! Super PACS! BLAHHHH!!!”
Yes, no doubt he’d like to deflect attention from that vote; his claim here is that what’s really important is having said, or NOT having said, the Bad Words (“super predators” in this case). Video exists of her saying them.
Of course if any video or audio emerged of Sanders having uttered the Bad Words himself, this topic would be dropped.
(For the record: yeah, I DO think that the phrase ‘super predators’ fed racism, even though not everyone who used the phrase realized, at the time, how pernicious it was. Based on other words and actions of Hillary Clinton at the time, I think she’s one of those who didn’t see the underlying racism in use of the phrase until later–as opposed to use of the phrase as a consciously-racist dog whistle.)
Not quite what she said, if you actually read it.
This seems like an excellent summary. I really wish all the Demos and Demo-leaning media would cut down on the intraparty vehemence. Such crap is only funny when the Republicans do it. 
Indeed. How did the Washington Post come up with such a headline? Editors’ bias? Need to sell papers? … I suppose Clinton’s handlers could have helped with “wink, wink, you might phrase the headline like this …”
Sloppy journalism? Reporting what they wanted to hear for the “good story” rather than what they actually heard?
Are you really alleging a conspiracy in which the editors of WaPo are subject to copy suggestions from “Clinton’s handlers”? Really?
In any case it was not said and taking aggressive action that was far outside the pale based on a misleading newspaper headline, making up a quote that the paper had not made up, is, let’s just say, not good judgement, and that minimally poor judgement on Sanders’ part was not WaPo’s fault or responsibility.
Again, moving along. New York up next. A closed primary (only one caucus left). So far the closed primaries have been Louisiana, Democrats Abroad, Florida, and Arizona. Clinton has solidly won all of them except for Democrats Abroad. Still Sanders outperformed his polling some of the time. Currently RCP rolling average places it at Clinton +14 drifting slightly bigger), 538 polling only Clinton +17, polling plus Clinton +25. Nine days is still lots of time to change the numbers, a debate to be had, a trip to Rome to go on, lots of ads to play …
I think that was a joke.
You know it is getting very hard to tell any more this cycle.
Of little actual significance other than curiosity as to how this actually occurred … the story fleshed out a wee bit more.
Bolding mine.
So it does seem like he was invited and that he requested the invitation.
And again, the infighting at the Vatican seems to be quite dysfunctional.
Oh, yeah, bureaucrats in the Vatican have been fighting tooth and nail over prerogatives since before any of the modern nations existed.
I frankly don’t understand the hindsight over the 1994 Crime Bill. I remember the late 1980s and early 1990s, and the fact is that inner cities had become violent war zones, with insanely high numbers of African Americans getting murdered by other African Americans. Many, many African Americans wanted something done about the problem. Clinton responded.
Can we look back now and say that we need modifications? Sure, but that’s true of a lot of legislation. Elect people who are reasonable and can acknowledge the failures of a law or that some unintended consequences may have occurred. Sanders voters instead what to cherry pick the fact that Clinton has voted for laws that had unintended or unforeseen consequences (while ignoring his own votes I might add).
That is why I don’t really feel the Bern. It’s easy to look at the 25-year political record of someone who has been out, front and center, and accountable to ALL of the voters in the United States and cherry pick votes and custom-write any narrative you want. Hillary probably has made statements and votes she wishes she could take back. But the fact is, Bernie Sanders has not ever once been in that position of being accountable to a much wider audience than his home state. He’s represented the state of Vermont. Whether it’s being against the war in Iraq because he knows people there don’t have men and women in uniform or being a little soft on guns because the state’s rural problem can’t really relate to the problems that people in the inner city might deal with, Sanders has taken positions that were easy to take because he knew he had the support of voters in his state. He’s never once taken a position that threatened his political career or the loss of his party’s control of the legislature in his own state, let alone the country.
At its best (Dems), the primary is an internship for the Presidency. It’s a pressure cooker that simulates the higher-pressure environment of being President. We get to see how candidates (and their campaigns; remember, a lot of these people will migrate to the White House after the election) react.
At its worst (Pubs), it’s a carnival sideshow.
Which leads me to another objection I have to Bernie: he comes off sometimes as a petulant child (in contrast to Trump, who’s like a devil child…DAMIEN!). My male impulse for revenge aside, Hillary has acted like an adult and hasn’t seemed to rise to the bait. (She probably goes home or to the hotel and beats the crap out of Bill instead, but she doesn’t show it otherwise.) 
I agree with your entire post but will highlight just this bit. Yes, Sanders is trying mightily to put across the idea that there is no such thing as ‘unintended or unforeseen consequences’–that a vote implies certain knowledge of how things will work out. Sensible people find this position difficult to respect, in that it seems to assume that politicians have powers of clairvoyance; Sander’s implicit claim is that Clinton knew that the Crime Bill would lead to unjust mass incarcerations (and supported it in the light of this supernatural foreknowledge).
His dilemma here is that having voted for the infamous Crime Bill himself, he’s in the position of simultaneously claiming that the Crime Bill had NO negative consequences for African-Americans, and also that uttering of the phrase ‘super predators’ was, in and of itself, responsible for the mass incarceration of young black men.
Clearly this absurdity would be hard for him to defend, should anyone call him on it.
A vote doesn’t just happen in a vacuum. Here are Bernie’s remarks on the House floor:
Ultimately he expressed these misgivings and voted for it because of the Violence Against Women Act of which he was a passionate supporter.
And oddly enough he managed to express his thoughts without calling male black teenagers “super predators” who needed to be brought "to a heel."
Context matters.
Yes, Hillary apologized for those remarks. Bernie didn’t have any remarks to apologize for; instead his words on the House floor fit in perfectly with his values today.
You know, it’s becoming really fascinating to see how Bernie Bros find ways to rationalize why a vote by Hillary Clinton is somehow racist and yet their guy who voted in exactly the same way is somehow not a racist. Let’s begin by saying that there is nothing inherently racist about what Hillary said. What’s extrapolated as racist by opportunistic Bernie Bros is that she was clearly including to the absolute worst of inner city criminals who were terrorizing inner city neighborhoods. The criticism against Clinton comes down to the fact that Hillary Clinton had some choice words about people who were involved in street gangs. But who didn’t have choice words for people who were involved in organized crime? That’s why the crime bill was enacted in the first place – to stem the tide of violence in black communities. Committed by black perpetrators. That wasn’t the only reason, but they were certainly an intended target of the bill. The Congressional Black Caucus – 70 percent of them – voted for the same bill. On largely the same grounds. They heard her comments then. There was no outrage about the comment then. Only now is there outrage by people who are far removed from the context of the circumstances surrounding why the bill was signed in the first place.
Again, I reiterate my criticism of the Sanders campaign. They vote for the same laws, and even if they don’t, they completely ignore the circumstances of the arguments for why legislation was proposed and signed into law. They simply cherry pick the facts and criticize based on the circumstances in 2016, which are vastly different now.
That is not a productive way to go about trying to build coalitions and run a country. If you want to have a discussion in 2016 about finding ways to reduce mass incarceration, then propose laws that attempt to do that. The fact is that Bernie Sanders has voted for the Crime Bill of 1994 – that’s on record. He has NOT proposed anything in the way of amendments or laws that would actually replace it. Say what you want. Spin it how you want. But those are the facts.
My, what a nice strawman you built!
I never said Hillary Clinton was racist.
You should tell her to stop apologizing for it if it’s as benign and harmless as you imply.
The people who lamented a system that made such things inevitable. You know, like Bernie did. In the video I linked to from the House chamber. Did you watch them? Those words are very different than the ones Hillary used.
Incidentally, I don’t blame either candidate for their support of the crime bill. At the time many people wanted it including many in black communities besieged by violence.
But if you or anyone else attempts to use Bernie’s vote against him in a cynical ploy, then you have to take in everything surrounding the vote including the rhetoric. The avoidance of doing so - let alone making up positions and putting words in the mouths of those who would force you to do so - is simply not good enough.
Let’s be clear. They wanted a bill. They didn’t necessarily want that bill. From the NY Times in 1994:
Blacks Relent on Crime Bill, But Not Without Bitterness
This year a tricky vote on a crime bill became even tougher when the $33 billion measure was sweetened with more than $7 billion for crime-prevention programs, including millions for the kind of Federal aid for inner cities that black Democrats have been demanding – and generally not getting – for many, many years.
That money – and the prospect that an even more Draconian crime bill could be enacted, with less money for social programs and without a ban on 19 different types of assault weapons – was enough to induce 28 of the 38 black Democrats to vote last Thursday to allow the bill to be considered by the full House.