Yes. I’m clearly talking about the double standard from democratic party establishment supporters. Bernie is bad because he’ll scare away old people, but Biden is never bad because he’ll scare away people who want some sort of progressive agenda. When the people who don’t like Bernie are scared away, that’s Bernie’s fault. But when the people who don’t like Biden are scared away, that’s their own fault. The concern and blame for scaring away voters only works in one direction.
Or, to put it another way, why is it that progressives always have to give up their values and fall in line and vote for someone they don’t like, but people supporting the “moderate” conservative establishment corporate candidate never have to suck it up and vote for a progressive? The “they’ll scare away these voters!” narrative only is ever used to favor the establishment candidates.
We can’t nominate Bernie, because he might scare away establishment voters. But we can nominate Biden just fine, even if he scares away progressive voters, because fuck them and it’s their own fault and they better fucking fall in line or they personally suck Trump’s dick.
Why is that?
Because voter opinions are a bell curve, and bell curves are always a lot bigger towards the middle.
In case you don’t remember, Shitbag Sanders got his ass kicked in the primaries, especially in 2020. The voters have sent a message that we don’t want his fucking revolution.
Yes, some crybaby progressives will whine and tweet until their thumbs fall off about how they’re not going to vote for Biden. And they can fuck themselves. Pandering to the most fickle of voters is never a good strategy. Half of those shitters didn’t even turn out for Bernie in the primary and would be the most unreliable voters in November even with Bernie as the nominee. Maybe they’ll vote, maybe they’ll stay home, maybe mommy will make them a hot pocket and they’ll smoke a bowl.
I’d also like to imply that you’re probably sexist. You bros are fine with a revolution as long as you get to be in charge, blacks and chics have their place and I’m sure you’ll get around to helping them any day now. I think that Bernie bros are Trump supporters with liberal arts degrees, you’re not angry at the injustice, you’re angry that now that it’s your turn, your white privilege doesn’t go as far as it used to.
I do NOT think OP is a troll, nor a racist, nor a closet Trumpist. I sympathize with him. I admire Bernie Sanders and admire many of the people who supported him.
OP is wrong on one essential point, however. D’s fell in line behind Biden for one simple reason: We think he has the highest chance of beating Trump.
Maybe we’re wrong. But please stop spinning an alternate reality in which some secret cabal would rather lose with Biden than win with Sanders. It makes you look stupid.
Very few of us blame Bernie when his dim-witted supporters turn against Biden. We blame the dim-witted supporters.
As for your question: Why is this so complicated? Biden wants to row the boat, however slowly and incompetently, in the same direction as Bernie does. Trump and his cabal of evil-doers are rowing in the opposite direction as fast as they can. (They’ve already done huge damage. Another 4 years will end the America we loved.) How is it Biden’s fault — or the fault of us rational-thinking Americans — if dim-witted Bernie-brats don’t even understand which direction they want the boat to be rowed?
Exactly this. Bernie is a problematic candidate in the general because he would be running for president in the USA, not Europe, not Canada, but in the one and only major industrialized democracy left on earth that doesn’t even have universal health care, among many other things, and may not for a long time yet. Bernie is an admirable trailblazer but he’s far ahead of his time in a nation in which the corporatocracy is firmly in control. Republicans have it easy because they can go full-on crazy on plutocracy, but Democrats have to tread a careful middle ground between rationality and the existing power structure.
Sexist? You’re the one supporting a guy with a credible sexual assault allegation hanging over his head, not RealFDR.
But Bernie’s signature issues (M4A, Wall Street reform, student debt relief, etc…) all enjoy broad bipartisan support. Wherever the middle of the bell curve is, Bernie can’t be that far from it.
And yet, he lost. Twice. Because his supporters either didn’t show up in expected numbers or didn’t exists. Look, people can like the ideology but not the cost. They can also be painfully aware that while Bernie is an inspiring ideological revolutionary, he lacks legislative leadership and governing skills.
Believe me, Biden is a far cry from who I want as the next POTUS. But he’s who got the most votes. It’s a moot point to continue debating the merits of the Sanders policy that might have been. It’s not going to happen. Not in 2016 and not in 2020. Let it go, FFS.
Odd that Warren wouldn’t support Bernie, isn’t it? Odd that women don’t support him https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-are-women-less-likely-than-men-to-support-sanders/, odd that blacks don’t support him. Odd that AOC stopped supporting him.
Just odd.
When he ran again in this cycle it was clear that Bernie is about Bernie. Had he really cared, he would have stayed out of the primary and used his considerable resources and network to back someone who promoted the issues he cares about, but what Bernie cares about is getting attention at rallies.
Sure, whatever. That’s a different thing from the whole “Sure, Sanders lost the primary twice (and this time worse than before) but he was totally going to win the general, trust me” thing.
Sanders would have lost. Probably lost by wider margins than Clinton. Because Sanders turns off the demographic that actually votes and votes and larger numbers than other demographics. You can say how unfair it is that 68 year old traditional Democrats won’t vote for Sanders but that doesn’t change the probable math. We’re not even talking party insiders or “establishment supporters”, just people at home who came out in large numbers because they like Biden and who roundly rejected Sanders.
*Bernie is going to turn out the youth vote! *
Uh, then why didn’t they turn out for him in the primaries?
Getting out to vote is hard!
Harder for white college kids than black people in the south who turned out for Biden?
For the record, I supported Warren in the primary, but I’ve moved on because I’m not a child.
In some states, Bernie’s real numbers weren’t actually down from 2016. It’s just that a big surge from the suburbs for Biden occurred instead. Dem primary turnouts were up substantially in general, I believe.
This suggests that Sanders failed to expand his support from 2016 (and was shedding some supporters since new voters would have entered the fold) while Biden was seeing a surge in people who were interested in him. Not exactly a winning formula for Sanders in a general election.
Because the establishment voters showed up and voted, and the progressive voters did not (in the same numbers.) It’s that simple.
In elections, who wins an argument is determined by votes. Biden gets more people to vote for his side of the argument. Therefore, he wins. The day young progressive voters actually show up at the polls, they will win.
Why didn’t Kamala Harris win the argument? Or Amy Klobuchar? Cory Booker? Same reason Sanders didn’t.
Fucking centrist liberals, always blocking the will of the majority by outvoting us! Sneaky bastards!
Someone sent me a picture of this signtoday. 
I’ve been doing this my entire life. I’ve supported candidates that didn’t win in the general, then held my nose and voted for my party’s candidate. I’m from the generation that considers doing that to be a civic duty.
And the moderate candidates I’m supporting now are way more progressive than the progressive candidates of my youth.
But I don’t think that electing a progressive revolutionary is going to gain you anything in terms of progressive public policy at this time. Changing out the guy at the top is useless if you don’t have a strong base of progressive leaders below him. Concentrate on building that base. Elect progressives to state and local offices. Elect more congressional reps like AOC. Flip state governments and enact progressive policy, like what is happening in Virginia. Elect progressive judges. Conservatives have been doing this for years and it’s been very successful for them.
And if you can’t get the guy you really want in, you need to help us push back the tide of conservatism. Because it’s not more of the same. Because if Trump wins in 2020 and you get a progressive in 2024, you’re not getting free college and universal healthcare. Your candidate is going to be facing challenges like making sure every American citizen has access to a loaf of bread once a week. Challenges like fighting off the Chinese Army when they come to repossess Fort Knox. Challenges like keeping actual sewage out of the drinking water.
And there’s one other lesson you need to learn from the Trump/ Republican saga. In order to be a strong advocate for a position, you do not have to believe that position yourself. “Representative” is a job title, a career, a skill set. If your biggest concern is how sincerely your candidate really believes in the positions they advocate rather than how effectively they can be in enacting them, you aren’t going to get candidates that can win. A little Machiavellianism goes a long way in politics and if you destroy good candidates over ideological purity, you aren’t going to get candidates that can win.
Because you’ve got to play the game you’re playing, not the one you think you should be playing. The rules suck, but crippling yourself by adhering to the rules as they should be in a kind and just world is suicide.
I don’t really buy this. On social issues? Sure, everyone is less racist and homphobic and all that. That’s fine. Those are the issues that the rich let us argue over because they don’t care about the result, it doesn’t affect them. We can squabble over abortion and gay rights and gun control - they don’t give a shit. In fact, they like it, it gives them the chance to make us feel like we’re making a real choice when in terms of economics, income inequality, and who holds the political power in this country, both parties are on the same side. The parties are vastly more similar than they are different.
But economically? There used to be people on both sides who genuinely tried to serve the American public before the rich. Now there are none - Bernie is the last one that will run in our lifetimes, barring some real deal unexpected massive change in American society. Every single “moderate” democrat serves the rich and corporate interests firsts, and the American people a distant second.
We are an oligarchy, a managed democracy, and a kleptocracy, the parties only differ in how blatant and how destructively greedy they are in the short term. The democrats favor a more sane policy of keeping the economy good for the rich in the long term, so they’ve got a little more sane economic policy, whereas the Republicans are in the blatant Banana Republic looting the country stage. But they are not on different sides of the spectrum. They are both tools of the oligarchy. They are both significantly right wing.
Don’t confuse following social trends that don’t affect the rich as a move towards being progressive or left. We were far more left than we were now in the 1930s through 1970s. FDR was considered a class traitor for actually serving the American public. We will never see anyone like that again.