Same here. I’d love the job, but would hate the campaign (and, like Hillary, would probably lose).
I think it’s to her credit she was willing to do something she didn’t want to do to get a job she thought she’d be good at. It’s more than I’ve done to realize my goal of getting to the White House.
Who the fuck wouldn’t prefer to skip the interview and just do the job?
How about an “interview” where the other candidates get to attack you during the process?
All of which does exactly the things I said it would do: bankrupt the federal government and destroy federalism in our governmental contract with the people. Each of the programs you discuss are top-down solutions that would make FDR-Kennedy lovers proud; they are not the type of federal government I want to have.
So, to convince me I’m wrong in my opinion about the effect of not supporting Mr. Sanders, you’d have to convince me that my conclusion about what his proposals would do to us is wrong, not that I’m wrong about what I want for the country. 
I question this. If somebody was looking for an outsider candidate, they were going to pick Trump over Sanders. Sanders has been in Congress since 1991 and he was in state politics for ten years before that. The Republicans would have had an easy time puncturing any claims that he was a political outsider.
I voted for Bernie in the primaries. I still like Bernie and his policies. I voted for Hillary in the general, even though I would have preferred to have Bernie there.
But Bernie is too old and has too much negative baggage - even among Democrats - to win. If there were a frontrunner right now, it wouldn’t be him. And that’s certainly not the reason Trump is in office. The OP is ridiculous.
While the rather ridiculous “tax reform” has temporarily increased the deficit, as we know from past experience, that eventually flattens out (I’ve never been convinced it results in MORE revenue down the road, but it’s clear that the revenue eventually gets made up for the most part). However, as we also know from past experience, social entitlement programs NEVER reduce their relative expenditures; I learned that lesson during political science classes in the late 70s, for goodness sake, and nothing in the last 40 years has convinced me otherwise. So, while President Trump may have temporarily increased the debt (and not at a rate that will bankrupt us in any conceivable way), Mr. Sanders’ programs would have increased our debt spending at a much higher rate, and for a much, MUCH longer term.
Hell, we can’t even figure out how to solve the mess that is the Social Security Program; who thinks that when the time comes, it isn’t solved by deficit spending??
The 17 richest people in America have a combined net worth of $1,000,000,000,000.
Yeah, one trillion dollars.
That would pay for a few socialistic ideas.
No, I’m not espousing confiscation of their assets (I’d leave them $100M each to live in comfort for the rest of their lives! :D), but if you want an answer to how socialists really could pay for some pretty expensive programs, there it is.
There used to be a fair amount of truth to the notion that you couldn’t pay for everything by taxing the rich; you had to tax the middle class. But over the past few decades, and especially since the crash of 2008, this country’s had massive increase of wealth, and it’s almost all gone straight to the super-rich. Nowadays, you really COULD pay for big stuff by taxing the rich.
Are you talking about this exchange?
If so, you have very poorly mischaracterized it.
If nothing else, you left off a very, very key word “again”.
She has already run for president, and she would like to be president. That you would interpret that as being entitled and instructing the peasants is entirely a reflection on how you chose to interpret it, but has nothing to do with what she said. You mischaracterized what she said, and then made up the attitude that you think she would have had to say the things that you claim she said. All of that is only in your own mind.
It’d be like being turned down for a job that you spent a grueling year plus interviewing for, and they ask, “Did you want to interview for that job again?” And you answer, “No, No, but I would like to have that job.”
Age isnt really that big of a deal. I notice that many of the best Democratic candidates are being dismissed as “too old” while we never hear that about GOP candidates. I suspect more fake news and Kremlin propaganda, to push hard the idea that 70 is “too old”- it ain’t.
However, the rest of you post is correct. Bernie cant win and couldnt win. Mind you, I like the guy, he is honest.
In fact our OP has it backwards- the support of Bernie is part of why we have Trump in office now. Too many Bernie-Bros repeated the fake news and half-truths spread by the Kremlin and the GOP - and they kept doing so after Bernie had no chance at all of winning. This poisoned the minds of too many independents and progressives that stayed home or voted third party as they had been convinced that “Crooked Hillary” was just as bad as Trump. We have learned they they were very wrong.
In effect, by spreading that negativity they were supporting Trump (and I was given a Warning for telling a poster he was doing that very thing). We now know this.
So the OP, as usual, is dead wrong. He is spreading fake news.
Are you suggesting taxing income or “wealth.” I don’t think you’d get many people (even democrats) on board with taking assets of super rich people.
Yes, Clinton lost due to a massive disinformation and negative crap. Of course, mind you the FBI memo and her strategy didnt help. It had nothing to do with policy.
Bernie would have been hit hard by that same campaign.
I disagree that he’s too old.
However, the OP here is spreading just that sort of crap we had in 2016, crap predicated and designed to bring in four more years of trump.
Which is exactly what the GOP said. Hmmm. I question your motives here.
It wasn’t the Party, it was the VOTERS. Bernie never had a plurality. Clinton constantly beat him in the popular vote , Bernie won in a few states but basically he did well in the Caucuses- which are not indicative of the voters and are pretty damn un-democratic.
Ah, I questioned your motives in another post, but this one, attacking Beto out of hand, makes my opinion solid. My opinion here is that your thread here is a attempt to get four more years of Trump. *Perhaps *you dont think you are doing that, but that is the effect.
Beto would be a great Dem candidate.
As others have said, Bernie comes with even more baggage then Clinton. The ads write themselves, Sanders is a Jewish communist radical who wants to make the US into a combination of the former Soviet union and Venezuala, outlaw Christianity and private property and require everyone to keep Kosher. Add in not so subtle allusions to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion by Trump and leading to a 2 fold rise in antisemitism, and you find yourself with a Straight Dope full of threads asking why we picked the worst possible candidate instead of a safe bet like Hillary Clinton who would have beat Trump at a walk.
Ro Khanna is a carpetbagger* who was afraid to run vs a GOP candidate so instead knocked out a solid Dem incumbent.
*He moved from the 12th to the 15th and then the 17th to find the best target.
The current occupant of the White House comes immediately to mind. For him campaigning is much more fun than actually having to govern, which is why he hasn’t stopped doing the first and is neglecting the second. I think that Clinton made this comment precisely to distinguish herself from Trump.
Point taken. I should have specified sane people that actually want the job.
Why wont the Bernie base vote for Harris or beto? *If *the “bernie base” will not vote for any democratic candidate other than Bernie :dubious:- then fuck them, we dont need them, they arent Democrats.
But the "bernie base " *will *vote for a good dem candidate, in fact most of them voted for Hillary in 2016.
Just a few malcontents, poisoned by the same sort of negativity here, stayed home or voted third party.
Look, Bernie has some great ideas. But he **LOST. **
While I agree that Gun Control should not be a big portion of the platform, you are kinda wrong on the primaries:
Colorado- Caucus.
Minnesota- Caucus.
Bernie did really well in the caucus states, but I believe if there had been a true popular vote, his campaign would never have gotten so far.
No. The GOP/Karl Rove/Kremlin hate and fake news machine would have swung into full steam vs Bernie. Sanders had a huge advantage in that there was little negative campaigning against him. That would change in a heartbeat. I have no doubt at all that there were plans for the negative campaign had Sanders won the primary.
Do you honestly think that America would vote for a card carrying COMMIE ? :eek: Not that Sanders is one, but how hard would it be for the Kremlin to fake up such a card? And with Sanders being a avowed socialist, millions of American would believe (Many Americans dont think there is much gap between Socialism and Communism) . Then they put up pictures of Sanders at a Communist rally (fake them, or hell, it’s not hard be believe he might have went to one)- and* viola! *
Not to mention Sanders wife’s issues, refusal to share tax returns, and so forth.
It would have been horrible. Worse than Swiftboating.