Today is the sixth week of voting in the 2020 primary, and the second week with multiple states voting. We’ve got:
Michigan: 125 delegates
Washington: 89 delegates
Missouri: 68 delegates
Mississippi: 36 delegates
Idaho: 20 delegates
North Dakota: 14 delegates
I’ll be voting in the Michigan primary for Joe Biden, with a smile on my face and joy in my heart. I started last year out praying for a Sherrod Brown candidacy. Found myself having great hopes for Cory Booker, then Steve Bullock, but all along happy that Joe Biden was in the race if all else failed. I was excited over Liz Warren rising in the ranks for the latter part of the year. In the waning days of 2019, I was waffling between Liz and Biden. In early 2020, as Biden slipped, I found myself making eyes with Mike Bloomberg. By early-February, I was a pretty solid Bloomberger. Then by late-February, I was, again, all-eyes on Joe Biden. Immensely glad he was in the race and looking strong. It’s been a wild ride.
This past year has been exercise of me studying a voting pool of two: my Uncle G and Cousin D (metro Detroit union guys, both Obama voters, one voted Trump in 2016, one sat out the election, one a retiree, one a young dad, neither especially “high information” voters). I’ve tried to figure out who they could pull the lever for over Trump in 2020. I had confidence in all of the names I listed above, at one point or another. But they all fizzled or never took off…except Biden. He may not be the perfect guy, but I’m now convinced he’s absolutely the right guy for the time.
I’ve never once this year thought about who I want in the White House (if that was the case, it’d have been Liz Warren all the way); rather, this year’s been about who can actually win the industrial Midwest in these current times, by way of my Uncle G and Cousin D. I’ve gone from Brown, Booker, Bullock, Warren to Bloomberg… but ultimately Biden’s the guy that I will pull the lever for with a smile on my face and joy in my heart, because he’s the guy Uncle G and Cousin D can vote for in November.
It’ll be a good day for Biden. Bernie’s best shots are in WA, Seattle is Bernie Bro central. But it’s a primary and not a caucus so Bernie Bros can’t pull their caucus intimidation shit or block the parking. I’d guess Bernie has a shot in Idaho, it’s very white and very red, so if you’re a Dem there you’re probably very liberal.
Every Bernie Bro has reminded me that Bernie did pull a surprise in MI in 2016. Maybe he will again, but I highly doubt it.
North Dakota? Yeah, who knows there, it’s a weird caucus/primary format.
I’d love to see Bernie not be viable in Mississippi. Nothing screams establishment like African American women in Mississippi, right Bernie? Surely they’re all in the pockets of big banks and Wall Street.
Agreed. I think there are an awful lot of voters out there on both sides of the aisle that think best candidate as “anyone but trump.”
Biden, believe it or not, finally has lined up the planets.
I would happily vote for Bernie if he gets the nom, but I think the Bernie Bros (my nephew being one of them) hostage scenario isn’t worth much. The few millennials that do vote, and will only vote for Bernie, are outnumbered by the Never Trumpers from both parties. At least, that is my story and I’m sticking with it.
That’s what I’m thinking to, the Bernie hostage takers this time around are loud, they’re very loud on Twitter, but they’re concentrated in blue states or else they fall in the most unreliable voter category anyway. And with the coalition that Biden has with most of the other candidates there’s no need to reach an outstretched hand to them, we saw how they bit us in 2016 and reminded us that when you take a snake inside your house, they’re still a snake and will eventually bite you.
My one vote today in Michigan will be to continue the Joementum. Another good day for Biden, another day for Sanders and his supporters to whine about the party establishment putting their thumbs on the scale. Soon enough it will all be over and Bernie will put away the D next to his name for another four years.
I supported Warren, but it sure does seem that the establishment has been putting their thumbs on the scale.
A number of my friends support Sanders. They have done so from quite rational positions, though I think they are a bit deluded about his realistic chances in the general. But for the love of little three-legged weasels, can we stop with all of this Bernie Bro bashing? Can’t you just disagree with people without claiming their support comes from idiotic one-note youths daring to interfere in a grown-up election? If you don’t like someone’s tactics, call out the individual or the Russian bot or whatever. But you (general you) are slandering the whole campaign, I think in part because of what happened in 2016.
I don’t know. Maybe it’s my own bias: I’ve seen a lot of support for Sanders this go-round, but not a single example of Bernie Bro behaviour, which I did see in 2016.
Shitbag Sanders himself is hiring trolls at the highest levels of his campaign. Red rose Twitter is full of noxious Bernie Bros. They’ve regularly disrupted other campaign’s rallies as well as booing during their election watch parties.
But, in general this time around, no one is playing games. Shoot the fucking hostage, take your damn ball and go home, I don’t care.
Biden has got an election to win. We’re not going to do the ‘What has Biden done to earn my vote?’ ‘The lesser of two evils is still evil’ or any of that 2016 Bernie bro idiocy.
And screw that establishment has their thumb on the scale bullshit. It’s always a fucking conspiracy when Bernie loses, I’m sure Biden kicking ass and racking up black votes in the south is because they’re all in the pockets of big banks and Wall Street.
When the 538 forecasts were unfrozen after Super Tuesday, Biden had a predicted 35 delegate lead in today’s contests. Now, with the forecasts frozen again after new polls, Biden is plus 75, not including Dems abroad. I bet Warren endorses Biden if he comes away with +35 delegates or more. I think Obama might endorse with a huge win. Obama endorses for sure when Biden wins big next Tuesday.
The language used in your posts is absolutely detestable. They are so utterly deplorable, narrow-minded, divisive AND tone-deaf that it often boggles my mind.
I don’t think Obama endorses until Biden has the majority vote mathematically sewn up. He does not want to interfere in the primary process, though clearly he prefers Biden.
I thought that was a cogent, right-on-the-money post. We tried to stroke the Bros deluded, childish egos, and that’s not enough for them. So, time to tell ‘em like it is: Go fuck yourselves. (Not you, personally, of course).
Not that we should waste much energy saying even that much, since few of them apparently vote, anyways.
I happy dropped my Biden-marked ballot in the mailbox over the weekend. I do predict that Sanders will win here (Washington), but I think it’ll be a lot narrower than 2016. Clinton actually won the Washington Primary in 2016, though since the delegates were awarded by the caucus, it might not be a great predictor.
On the whole “Bernie-bro” question, if you haven’t seen that behavior in 2020, you’re probably staying off things like Twitter and ignoring Chapo Trap House-type nonsense. Good for you! But it’s out there, in great force. That said, I’m sure the vast majority of those who cast their ballots for Bernie did so out of an authentic belief that he would be the best candidate to take on Trump, would do the most to make the economy more fair for regular people, or repair the structural imbalances in our system. I just disagree with them, and harbor no hard feelings. I do wish Sanders himself would do more to distance the campaign from the former group, however. He seems to treat them the way Trump treats White Nationalists: publicly, they’re at a distance, but under the table, there’s some serious footsy going on.
I suppose this is the appropriate thread to mention that yesterday I got a friend request on Facebook from a dog, whose entire posting history was one anti-Biden thread after another.
Because I love Bernie, too. I would consider myself a “Bernie supporter.” I’m just explaining why the tone of an appropriate response to someone saying they won’t vote for Biden because reasons doesn’t always have to be gentle. We try the gentle approach sometimes, and other times we get real.
