# Bernie Sanders, presidential candidate? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [December 19, 2014, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692 "2014-12-19T19:38:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/21 "2014-12-21T03:20:54Z")
What’s weird about Kennedy is that Kennedy led a lot of the deregulation efforts in the Senate. I’m not sure what exactly Kennedy didn’t like about Carter’s policies. Given that Kennedy couldn’t even explain why he wanted to be President, Kennedy probably just felt it was “his time”. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/22 "2014-12-21T04:04:31Z")
Sanders is an Independent (and a Socialist Party member when he was in the House), not a Democrat, so no, he won’t be running as a Democrat, and therefore no, he isn’t a legit contender. ---
**Author:** ![davida03801](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b5e925/32.png) [@davida03801](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davida03801)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2014, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/23 "2014-12-21T15:20:25Z")
Would love to see Bernie run. Not that I support him, but he would sure get underneath the skin of Hillary. That be good sport to view. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/24 "2014-12-22T12:48:43Z")
Sanders/Warren '16! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/25 "2014-12-22T15:05:25Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > Sanders is an Independent (and a Socialist Party member when he was in the House), not a Democrat, so no, he won’t be running as a Democrat, and therefore no, he isn’t a legit contender. He still could run for the Democratic nomination. The American party system is very fluid, with no dues or membership cards or expulsion mechanisms. If David Duke says he’s a Republican, he’s a Republcan; if Lyndon LaRouche says he’s a Democrat, he’s a Democrat. I recall a Q&A with Ralph Nader I attended during one of his presidential runs – he told me he was not a “member” of the Green Party, even though he was running on the Green ticket. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/26 "2014-12-23T00:22:24Z")
[From _In These Times,_](http://inthesetimes.com/article/17474/bernie_sanders_for_president) an argument that Sanders should make a third-party run. No existing party is specified, the idea is that the candidacy might call it into existence, like Perot and Reform. > [@](#): > > Merely impacting the 2016 presidential elections through the Democratic primaries is too small of a goal given the times we are in, and will not go far or fast enough to move the people and the planet away from the brink of corporate and climate catastrophe. The last thing we need is a firebrand like Mr. Sanders to spearhead a populist electoral charge and raise expectations, only to concede after a few weeks, endorse Hillary and urge his followers back into the folds of the establishment Democratic tent. > > It would be disappointing, to say the least, to see a lifelong independent and self-described democratic socialist using the specter of a Republican boogey-man to scare millions of everyday people back into the two-party closet. The truth is, our country’s neoliberal turn advanced tremendously under the Carter, Clinton and Obama Administrations, and it was the Supreme Court that stole the 2000 election from Al Gore, not Ralph Nader. > > Neither should Mr. Sanders run only as an independent without attempting to build the kind of organizational and party infrastructure that can live on after his campaign is over, as Nader failed to do in 2004. Mr. Sanders should instead aim higher and strive to change the course of U.S. history by making 2016 the year that an independent third party broke through the white noise and became a permanent fixture in American politics. This should not be done through the Green Party, but through the construction of a new, broad-based democratic socialist party. > > Building a nationally viable third party in less than two years will be challenging, but Mr. Sanders has long enough coattails to pull it off. For one thing, the conditions in this country are ripe for this kind of move. Grassroots social movements, from Madison to Occupy Wall Street to #BlackLivesMatter, have been growing steadily since the economic crash in 2008, and have articulated a reform agenda that neither political party appears willing to embrace. Quixotic, but worth thinking about. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/27 "2014-12-23T00:38:09Z")
We need a four party system: progressives, centrist(Democrats), Republicans, and Tea Party. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/28 "2014-12-23T02:04:17Z")
Left, center, right, and far-right? How on earth would we need that? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/29 "2014-12-23T03:34:45Z")
> [@andros](#): > > Left, center, right, and far-right? How on earth would we need that? OK, OK, you can also have Communists or Greens, but you gotta pick one. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/30 "2014-12-23T03:53:57Z")
> [@andros](#): > > Left, center, right, and far-right? How on earth would we need that? Pssst! Over here! The point is to split the Tea Partiers off from the main elephant herd and lure them into a killing-zone. That is, it makes it easier for FEMA to round them up for the death-camps, just use their voting registration. The only way Real Americans can defeat this wicked plan is to not register to vote! ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/31 "2014-12-23T14:36:22Z")
It’s fine to have two parties if the intraparty squabbling is at a fairly low level. When it gets cutthroat, and if it’s happening in both parties so as not to disadvantage just one side, then maybe it would make sense for each party to split in two. A four party system could actually make sense and introduce some real competition in states and districts that keep on sending the same parties to Congress. That way you can have progressive vs. corporate Democrat in blue districts and corporate Republican vs. Tea Partier in red districts. We already get that in the primaries of course, but that’s a tiny slice of a district’s electorate. Of course in real life this will probably never happen because as soon as one party actually does this, the other party will pull together in the interests of getting an easy win. And progressives have a long history of just sitting down and shutting up because they fear the right more than they want the left to win. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/32 "2014-12-23T14:41:51Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > And progressives have a long history of just sitting down and shutting up because they fear the right more than they want the left to win. Just like the Teabaggers held their noses while pulling the lever for Mitt Romney? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/33 "2014-12-23T14:48:40Z")
It’s one thing when you compete and lose and then come together as a party. The Democrats have a history of actually kneecapping progressive options to put forward the more electable candidate. And progressives put up with it. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2014, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/34 "2014-12-23T15:09:53Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > It’s one thing when you compete and lose and then come together as a party. The Democrats have a history of actually kneecapping progressive options to put forward the more electable candidate. And progressives put up with it. Got an example of a progressive that was kneecapped? Again, in 2012 the un-Romneys came out of the clown car one by one and each was more conservative than Romney, and each was cut down- some by their own missteps and some because of Romney’s carpet bomb negative ads. So they kneecapped conservative options to put forward the more electable candidate. And conservatives put up with it. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2015, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/36 "2015-01-28T15:07:59Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > [From _In These Times,_](http://inthesetimes.com/article/17474/bernie_sanders_for_president) an argument that Sanders should make a third-party run. No existing party is specified, the idea is that the candidacy might call it into existence, like Perot and Reform. > > Quixotic, but worth thinking about. However, [Sanders says he won’t run third-party.](http://inthesetimes.com/article/17572/bernie_sanders_president) > [@](#): > > Naturally, “Will you run for president in 2016?” was the first question DFA Executive Director Charles Chamberlain asked Sanders. Though not definitive, his answer was enough to leave these activists hopeful. > > “I am giving very serious consideration to it, but before you make a decision of that magnitude, … you have to make sure that you can do it well,” Sanders said. “So what we are doing is reaching out to folks all over this country trying to determine whether or not we can put the grassroots organization together that we need.” > > Sanders knows he will have to rely on grassroots mobilization to have a fighting chance at being elected, because his campaign will take on every monied interest. “If I run, we’ll be taking on the billionaire class,” he said. “That’s Wall Street, the drug companies, the military industrial complex.” > > To the dismay some idealists, Sanders rejected the idea of running for president as an independent. “No matter what I do, I will not be a spoiler,” Sanders said. “I will not play that role in helping to elect some right-wing Republican as President of the United States.” ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2015, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/37 "2015-01-29T00:44:22Z")
Well, I don’t see how Sanders is an extremist. That a lot of people do more or less shows what’s actually wrong with the American electorate… ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2015, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/38 "2015-01-29T00:54:54Z")
I don;'t think Sanders is an extremist either, he just calls himself one, whether intentionally or not. But to be honest, he seems well to the right of your average left-wing European politician to my eyes, and might even be a little to the right of Liz Warren. ---
**Author:** ![Ze\_Pr0fes0re](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/8dc957/32.png) [@Ze\_Pr0fes0re](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ze_Pr0fes0re)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2015, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/39 "2015-06-03T07:39:47Z")
Sanders is cool. But he only reads from Que-cards (while the other rich cunts have professional speech writers for every interview) and is thus unable to provide variety. When you’ve seen one interview with him in the last 3 months you’ve seen them all. I’m from ze Socialist paradise of United Scandinavia and we have some problems, us too. But frankly most of them stem from de-regulation x.X 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2015, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/40 "2015-06-03T13:52:42Z")
Biggest impact of someone like Sanders is to help the winner portray themselves as more moderate, by shifting one end of the spectrum further to the extreme. Apparently there are leftists who view Clinton as “center-right” or the like. These people are either delusional or are playing a semantic game (most likely the latter). But even for the more rational people, the candidacy of a more extreme person can only help the front-runner, as above. > [@adaher](#): > > Is Sanders really to the left of Dennis Kucinich? I’d actually say he’s a little to the right of him, despite proclaiming himself a socialist. > > Moving the debate in a new direction only happens if you have enough supporters that other candidates want them. Ron Paul had that going for him. Sanders, probably not so much. Kucinich was ignored. Sanders will be too unless he can develop a Paul-like following. The general point is true, but not so applicable in this case. The problem Kucinich had was that there were multiple credible candidates running at the same time as him, and he therefore had a very hard time being taken seriously by mainstream people. But this time around there’s a dearth of Clinton alternatives, so anyone else in the ring will attract a lot of attention. Unless more mainstream candidates enter the ring, I would expect Sanders to attract far more attention and support than Kucinich did. > [@BrainGlutton](#): > > He still could run for the Democratic nomination. The American party system is very fluid, with no dues or membership cards or expulsion mechanisms. If David Duke says he’s a Republican, he’s a Republcan; if Lyndon LaRouche says he’s a Democrat, he’s a Democrat. > > I recall a Q&A with Ralph Nader I attended during one of his presidential runs – he told me he was not a “member” of the Green Party, even though he was running on the Green ticket. FTM, Joe Lieberman was never actually a member of the [Connecticut for Lieberman Party](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut_for_Lieberman), but was re-elected to the Senate under their banner. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2015, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692/41 "2015-06-03T14:21:15Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > Apparently there are leftists who view Clinton as “center-right” or the like. These people are either delusional or are playing a semantic game (most likely the latter). Where would you place her, then? **Bill** was center-right, certainly – we can tell because he **governed** from that position for eight years. What do you see that makes Hillary any more leftier? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bernie-sanders-presidential-candidate/707692.md?page=3)