# DNC closes ranks: new rule excludes interlopers **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [June 10, 2018, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846 "2018-06-10T22:29:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/101 "2018-06-21T20:47:05Z")
> [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > How did he sabotage the campaign? By continuing to drain resources from Clinton after the issue was settled, continuing to criticize her (even after the convention), and refusing to ask his supporters to work for her; more lately by blasting the party’s basic morality. Where were you in 2016? :dubious: He still has never even fucking joined the party he’s made so much hay out of criticizing, and his remaining supporters have still never reconciled themselves to the little problem of the perfect being enemy of the good. > [@](#): > > How would this new regulation have prevented him from doing so? By making him decide if he was in or out, ready to commit to advancing a cause or just go on an ego trip. > [@](#): > > How is someone who has been caucusing with Congressional Democrats since 1991, who the Vermont Democrats haven’t seen fit to run a candidate against in all that time, who has endorsed and campaigned for countless Democrats and zero Republicans, and who ran for the Democratic Presidential nomination not, for all practical purposes, a Democrat regardless of what he chooses to call himself? How can someone willing to do all that refuse to return the favor and join the party that has coddled him for so long? And please note what he’s done with all of that power over all that time - essentially nothing; just speeches about how horrible and corrupt the party that coddles him is. > [@](#): > > If he had run exactly the campaign he did in 2016, but had formally registered as a Democrat prior to doing so, would you still have any problem with him? Yes, for the same reasons. Sore losers who have been party members have pouted and sabotaged their parties’ nominees’ campaigns before - Reagan crippled Ford’s campaign, and Kennedy did it to Carter, just for examples. “No rational reason” indeed. It’s pretty damn obvious and necessary. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/102 "2018-06-21T21:17:22Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > The reason is that the Democratic nominee should be a Democrat, and that sore loser nonmembers should not be able to sabotage the Democratic campaign as effectively as Sanders did. How is that hard to understand? What do you think a Democrat is, and what should a Democrat be doing? ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/103 "2018-06-21T21:32:59Z")
Elvis, to the first point, you’re just objectively wrong. Sanders endorsed Clinton unequivocally and spent the summer and fall actively campaigning for her. Not sure where you were in 2016 if you missed that. I don’t know if you might have a better point about Reagan and/or Kennedy’s conduct, though I doubt it. In any case, do you feel it would have benefited the Republicans to have refused to consider Reagan as a potential candidate in 1980 based on that? Would the Democrats have been better off expelling Kennedy? I think what happens is that supporters of the establishment candidate (Ford and Carter, of course, were incumbents, and HRC might as well have been) blame their candidate’s loss on the divisive primary campaign. But I think the truth isn’t that strong primary challengers weaken the candidate in the general election, but that both having strong primary challengers and losing general elections are independently correlated with being a crappy candidate. And in that vein, care to address the question I asked above? > [@](#): > > And what I find really interesting from that article is that 25% of Hillary Clinton’s primary supporters voted for McCain in 2008! So why wasn’t anyone arguing that Hillary should be thrown out of the party and treated like a leper, given that her supporters could very well have cost the Dems the election with their disloyalty? And why wasn’t it terrible and unforgivable that Hillary hurt the Party in 2008 by staying in the race long after it was obvious she had only a tiny chance of winning? Any of you Bernie bashers want to take a shot at addressing this one? ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/104 "2018-06-21T21:34:26Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > If it helps you win elections, there is nothing wrong with it. If it makes it harder for you to win elections, then that’s what’s wrong with it. Didn’t help in 2016, did it? Good rule. ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/105 "2018-06-21T21:49:22Z")
A lot of this whole “he’s not a Democrat!” argument is just fundamentally bizarre to me. Like Bernie Sanders, I consider myself an independent, though in my actual voting behavior I am indistinguishable from a Democratic loyalist. I am registered as a Democrat, because I want to be able to vote in primaries. If my state had open primaries, I would probably re-register independent because I don’t really care to be part of a group that includes the likes of Rahm Emanuel and the Clintons. But we don’t, so I register as Democratic and don’t give it a second thought. I view political parties as a utilitarian instrument and will register and vote for whichever party seems likeliest to come closest to enacting my preferred policies (which, for the last 32 years, has always happened to be the Democratic Party, and I certainly don’t see that changing in the foreseeable future). But many people seem to view party affiliation as some sort of core aspect of their identity, like their religion or football team. I frankly have a hard time understanding that attitude, and no doubt the people who hold it have a hard time understanding mine. But I’m not going out of my way to insult them for that, because I’m smart enough to realize that would be stupid and counterproductive. Too bad the same can’t be said for the DNC. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/106 "2018-06-21T22:11:57Z")
> [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > A lot of this whole “he’s not a Democrat!” argument is just fundamentally bizarre to me. Like Bernie Sanders, I consider myself an independent, though in my actual voting behavior I am indistinguishable from a Democratic loyalist. I am registered as a Democrat, because I want to be able to vote in primaries. If my state had open primaries, I would probably re-register independent because I don’t really care to be part of a group that includes the likes of Rahm Emanuel and the Clintons. But we don’t, so I register as Democratic and don’t give it a second thought. > > I view political parties as a utilitarian instrument and will register and vote for whichever party seems likeliest to come closest to enacting my preferred policies (which, for the last 32 years, has always happened to be the Democratic Party, and I certainly don’t see that changing in the foreseeable future). But many people seem to view party affiliation as some sort of core aspect of their identity, like their religion or football team. I frankly have a hard time understanding that attitude, and no doubt the people who hold it have a hard time understanding mine. But I’m not going out of my way to insult them for that, because I’m smart enough to realize that would be stupid and counterproductive. Too bad the same can’t be said for the DNC. Well, I agree with you on that, so here’s one person who understands your position. And the weird thing about this anti-Bernie rule (and that’s clearly what it is) is that Bernie would probably have joined the Democratic Party if that’s what it would have taken to run on that ticket in 2016. What’s the big deal? If he wins, great for him. If he loses, he can go back to being an “I” instead of a “D”. In fact, if he wins he can go back to being an “I”. Then let’s see what the DNC does about that rule when he decides to run as an II (Independent Incumbent). ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/107 "2018-06-22T02:07:12Z")
I consider myself a Democrat and happily voted for Bill Clinton twice, Hillary Clinton in 2016, as well as Rahm in 2015. Sanders, however, ran against the Democratic Party in 2016 and continued to poison the well. Remember his jackass moves of, ‘Take it to the convention’ as well as retaining his secret service protection well after he lost the last primary? I’m glad his corrupt wife is an albatross and we’ve hopefully seen the last of his campaigns, although I’m sure Bernie will continue to pout and shoot his mouth off. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/108 "2018-06-22T11:57:33Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Bernie would probably have joined the Democratic Party if that’s what it would have taken to run on that ticket in 2016. Given that he’s never shown any interest in joining a party that he thinks has corrupted itself in its pursuit of actual accomplishment, that’s quite a “probably” there. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/109 "2018-06-22T12:02:45Z")
> [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > Elvis, to the first point, you’re just objectively wrong. Sanders endorsed Clinton unequivocally and spent the summer and fall actively campaigning for her. Belatedly and grudgingly, under pressure. > [@](#): > > In any case, do you feel it would have benefited the Republicans to have refused to consider Reagan as a potential candidate in 1980 based on that? Would the Democrats have been better off expelling Kennedy? You’re missing the party membership aspect of the question - which, btw, is the entire point. > [@](#): > > both having strong primary challengers and losing general elections are independently correlated with being a crappy candidate. Again, all blame goes to Clinton and the Democrats, not Saint Bernie. Gotcha. > [@](#): > > And in that vein, care to address the question I asked above? There seems to be no value in bothering, given your claim of “no rational reason”. The world is what it is, and actual accomplishment takes what it takes. Not everyone recognizes it. ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/110 "2018-06-22T12:58:13Z")
But obviously party membership ISN’T the whole point for you, since you just said that Bernie having joined the party wouldn’t have changed your opinion of him. Yes, nominating a horribly unpopular candidate who is bad at politics was the Democrats’ fault. Who else’s fault would it have been? Her net approval rating was way underwater long before Bernie entered the race. She had never won an election in which she didn’t have a huge advantage going in, and she had managed to blow one such election. And yet the Democratic establishment unified around her so early in the process that nobody but Sanders dared to run against her, thus making Trump’s win possible. And we’re supposed to feel loyal to this establishment? Pfui. In your last sentence there you just resort to sputtering word salad, so I’ll take pity and stop asking questions which would further reveal your inability to frame a rational argument. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/111 "2018-06-22T13:39:08Z")
> [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > But obviously party membership ISN’T the whole point for you, since you just said that Bernie having joined the party wouldn’t have changed your opinion of him. It would have changed _him_, by imposing responsibilities on him that he’s made a career out of shirking. He could still be irresponsible, but he’d be on the hook to answer questions about it that he’s never had to before. > [@](#): > > In your last sentence there you just resort to sputtering word salad, so I’ll take pity and stop asking questions which would further reveal your inability to frame a rational argument. You _aren’t_ asking questions, just ranting. You remain immersed in Hillary-hatred, just like Bernie or Trump, and that became just sad some time ago. ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/112 "2018-06-22T14:57:46Z")
What in the world are you even talking about? What “responsibilities” would registering Democrat have imposed on him? The responsibility of being a voting member of a congressional Democratic caucus? Uh, no, been doing that for a quarter century already. The responsibility of actively campaigning for fellow Democrats? No, he was doing that already, has continued to do so since the election, and your baseless claim that he did so “grudgingly” doesn’t change that. And what are these “questions” that he could have been asked as a Democrat, but which everyone was apparently magically prevented from asking him as long as he was an independent? I have asked numerous questions which you have dodged, and even openly bragged about your intention to dodge. I am not ranting, but pointing out objectively true facts about Clinton’s poor polling numbers and past electoral history which should have given any reasonable person grave doubts about her suitability as a candidate. I don’t “hate” Hillary, I’m just, like, capable of looking at polls and stuff. I really don’t enjoy constantly relitigating the 2016 primary. I would like to get on with the business of uniting the decent people of the country against Trump. This petty and short-sighted action by the DNC is completely counterproductive to that goal. ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/113 "2018-06-22T15:15:31Z")
And yes, I think it is fair to say there is NO RATIONAL REASON for them to do this. If they actually believe that it would be in the best interest of the party and the country to prevent Sanders from running again, they could just bar him from running. That would be an unbelievably stupid thing to do, but at least it would actually achieve their goal. That’s what a smart person would do if they somehow judged that the benefit of keeping Sanders out of the race outweighed the cost of pissing off a huge part of the base. This passive-aggressive shit, which \*doesn’t \*actually prevent him from running, gets them all of the downside of making that move, without the (theoretical) upside. Very stupid. Well, OK, it doesn’t come close to getting them _all_ the downside. If they actually barred Sanders from running, people other than obsessive message board geeks would notice and take offense. Still, stupid and counterproductive. ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/114 "2018-06-22T19:01:40Z")
While the party cannot prevent Sanders from running, I think this is a shot across the bow telling him not to pull this shit again. Remember Sanders actively campaigned the Democratic party. He did NOTHING to try to calm his most wacko cult members. In fact, his corrupt wife and Ted Devine regularly did interviews helping to fuel all the conspiracy theories that whipped his supporters into a fervor. Every single time Sanders lost a primary, it was because of some sort of conspiracy. Sanders got treated with the softest of kid gloves in 2016. That won’t be the case going forward. His Sour Revolution has proved how utterly useless his endorsement is. There’s going to be a large field of candidates for 2020 and the best ones will be out helping to elect as many Democrats during these midterm elections. That’s not Bernie’s MO, Bernie will whine when a camera is on, but there’s no way he’s going to do the hard work of raising money and campaigning for Democrats across the USA. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/115 "2018-06-23T01:15:32Z")
> [@dalej42](#): > > While the party cannot prevent Sanders from running, I think this is a shot across the bow telling him not to pull this shit again. I’m sure he’s shaking in his boots. Are the going to write him a nasty letter, too? ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/116 "2018-06-23T16:07:38Z")
One thing I have noticed is that Sanders continues attacking Democrats, and even did the Trump thing and blame them for the separated children. I would never vote for him after that, and I suspect there are others who would feel the same way. It was absolutely wrong when Trump did it, and it’s just as wrong when Sanders did it. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/117 "2018-06-23T16:46:16Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > One thing I have noticed is that Sanders continues attacking Democrats, and even did the Trump thing and blame them for the separated children. Got cite for that (emphasis added)? ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/118 "2018-06-23T16:50:13Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > I’m sure he’s shaking in his boots. Are the going to write him a nasty letter, too? Nope, but I can encourage Sen. Duckworth and Sen. Durbin to call Bernie out on his BS. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/119 "2018-06-23T17:09:49Z")
> [@dalej42](#): > > Nope, but I can encourage Sen. Duckworth and Sen. Durbin to call Bernie out on his BS. I see what you did there. 🙂 ---
**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:** [June 23, 2018, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846/120 "2018-06-23T20:27:55Z")
Minimally this thread helps make clear that Sanders is of very _divisive_ impact upon the Democratic party and upon all of those whose greater interests are in defeating Trump and the party that he has taken control over. The best thing he, and Clinton, could do for the good of the party, the country, and the world, would be to stay out of the national spotlight for a while, other than to support whoever wins the primaries, and even then to do so quietly. This continued litigation of who is most to blame for Trump’s 2016 electoral win is harmful. There are other people more than capable to represent the progressive wing in the next cycle, just as their are other people to represent the more traditional liberal Democratic alliance. There are good arguments to be had over whether nationally a full throated unabashed progressive, or a more traditional more centrist candidate, would succeed better. Let’s just move on past Sanders and Clinton and then whichever side and whoever prevails circle the wagons early in service of _the shared goals._ Or not. Two terms of Trump with those who oppose him all blaming each other for its having happened? Sure, go for it! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dnc-closes-ranks-new-rule-excludes-interlopers/815846.md?page=5)