# Obama's Double-Leg Takedown of Bernie Sanders and Supporters
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439
**Category:** Politics & Elections
**Created:** [May 9, 2016, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439 "2016-05-09T21:04:21Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 8
### Author:  [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/141 "2016-05-15T13:52:10Z")
> [@DSeid](#):
>
> I am not sure how that early tracking would play in America … But the reality is that American industry does not need workers with a standard High School education and as much of fan as I am of a broad liberal arts education (and I am) the job opportunities are more for those with technical skills (and the specific knowledge to learn new technical skills) than a broad knowledge base.
The german approach adapts to the german methodology of doing things. The broader concept of the technical education of a broad quality does not mean of the necessity the rigidity of the german system, which is a german cultural choice.
---
### Author:  [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/142 "2016-05-15T13:55:39Z")
> [@Acsenray](#):
>
> You’re not going to change our minds about education
I don’t care if I did or not. This is a small message board. I made an observation about the young white millenial’s puzzlement about why somehow the non white ethnic minorities are not seduced by what seduces him in draw the reference to the system I know and what seems a similar blindness… relative to also the desires of the ‘visible minorities’ …
changing american myopies is playing the Don Quixote.
> [@](#):
>
> It’s your own burden to make yourself understood.
To confuse vocation and technical as words has to do with your american mythologies, not the meaning of the words as they are far from the synonyms.
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### Author:  [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/143 "2016-05-15T13:58:01Z")
> [@Ramira](#):
>
> To confuse vocation and technical as words has to do with your american mythologies, not the meaning of the words as they are far from the synonyms.
Words mean what the people you say them to think they mean. Thats a basic fact about communication.
And, yes, I realize this all fits in with your Americans-are-uniquely-stupid shtik.
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### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/144 "2016-05-15T14:08:52Z")
In the U.S. as far as schooling goes vocational and technical are synonymous.
And our fascination with a four year liberal arts education is class based - not income based. You can be a financially successful plumber - but it isn’t genteel. Weird country we have - we probably have more of the class burdens that we tried to shake from our colonials day than we care to admit.
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### Author:  [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/145 "2016-05-15T14:20:26Z")
> [@Acsenray](#):
>
> Words mean what the people you say them to think they mean. Thats a basic fact about communication.
In the ordinary English vocation =/= technical, or then the degree in the engineering is a vocational education.
> [@](#):
>
> And, yes, I realize this all fits in with your Americans-are-uniquely-stupid shtik.
other than the typical american over-sensitiveness to anything but praise to uniqueness, I have never said americans are uniquely stupid. They are suffering of course from the typical big-country disease of self-regarding myopies, and the americans are more than usually seduced by their own Uniqueness narrative.
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### Author:  [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/146 "2016-05-15T14:22:32Z")
You know who doesn’t vote, and who really doesn’t vote during mid-term elections? Poor people.
Obama clearly gave this speech as a double-leg takedown of the poor, who are too damned lazy to solve their own problems by memorizing the names of their DAs and Attorney General.
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### Author:  [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/147 "2016-05-15T14:31:19Z")
> [@Eonwe](#):
>
> Obama clearly gave this speech as a double-leg takedown of the poor, who are too damned lazy to solve their own problems by memorizing the names of their DAs and Attorney General.
This is a weird thing to ridicule. Voting for law enforcement authorities actually matters. And it’s hard to vote for the right person if you don’t know anyone’s name. In America, voting usually happens by name.
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### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/148 "2016-05-15T14:37:22Z")
> [@Ramira](#):
>
> In the ordinary English vocation =/= technical, or then the degree in the engineering is a vocational education.
But not in American educational usage. In American educational usage, an engineering degree is gotten at a four year college, generally one (there are a FEW exceptions) that also offers liberal arts degrees and your Engineering degree will involve taking general liberal arts requirements. An Accounting degree - another vocational degree in the sense that you are training for something specific - is also gotten at a four year college with liberal arts requirements (you can get a vocational two year Accounting degree, but you won’t qualify to get a CPA). Nursing degrees are similar to Accountants, you can get a two year vocational degree, but a four year RN is much preferred in the industry - which you won’t get at anything we’d consider a vocational school. Accountants, nurses and engineers all benefit from having a Master’s degree on top of that.
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### Author:  [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/149 "2016-05-15T14:59:57Z")
> [@Ramira](#):
>
> yes I am aware of the american mythologies on this subject.
I have created [a GD thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=19332131#post19332131) intended to discuss what educational system in America would best help create more middle class and higher jobs. Maybe we can move this discussion there?
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/150 "2016-05-15T15:39:19Z")
> [@Ramira](#):
>
> yes I am aware of the american mythologies on this subject.
What you are apparently not aware of is what life is like here in the US. Even if you did, though, you wouldn’t be justified in taking such a condescending view. Not that that’s different for most outsiders.
It may not be this way in France, but in at least the last 20 years here the majority of workers do not have the same career for their lifetimes. That means a need for flexibility and broader knowledge than being able to operate a punch for the rest of your life.
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### Author:  [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/151 "2016-05-15T15:41:25Z")
I am more than aware, and technical =/= “operating a punch” but it does reflect the narrowness of the american understanding of the concept.
oh and the problem is not different for the youth who go from the short term job to the short term job with no security and no ability to move up. Your situaiton is not unique…
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/152 "2016-05-15T15:46:22Z")
> [@Ramira](#):
>
> I am more than aware, and technical =/= “operating a punch” but it does reflect the narrowness of the american understanding of the concept.
>
> oh and the problem is not different for the youth who go from the short term job to the short term job with no security and no ability to move up. Your situaiton is not unique…
So tell me, exactly how long have you lived in the US?
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### Author:  [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/153 "2016-05-15T16:13:24Z")
So France’s system has dramatically put their investment in technical education (from the same link):
> [@](#):
>
> … In 17 years, the number of degrees awarded at Sections de Technicien Supérieur (STS), 2- and 3-year courses conducted in high schools following the baccalauréat, has increased fivefold, from 11,526 in 1975 to 62,171 in 1992. These institutes absorb the increasing number of students who complete the technology courses of study in high school, such as construction mechanics, electronics, and microprocessing. d These high school technology tracks, initially designed to prepare students for immediate employment, are increasingly becoming a first stage toward students’ higher education in technology institutes.
>
> Other 2-year technology institutes for high-level technical workers, the Instituts Universitaires de Technologie (IUT), have about one-third the enrollment of the STS. They are connected to existing universities, but administered separately. …
The result of this focus? [French unemployment hits new record](http://www.france24.com/en/20160324-french-unemployment-hits-new-record). 10.3%. Much much higher than the United State’s or Germany’s.
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### Author:  [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/154 "2016-05-15T16:29:05Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#):
>
> This is a weird thing to ridicule. Voting for law enforcement authorities actually matters. And it’s hard to vote for the right person if you don’t know anyone’s name. In America, voting usually happens by name.
My sarcastic point was that while the OP considered this to be clearly targeted at “Sanders supporters”, voter participation is shown to track pretty clearly with income, and not with support of Bernie Sanders. So, if we want to really get behind the intent of this speech and take down the constituency the least likely to vote, let’s start by taking down the poor, who can’t be bothered to vote half the time.
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### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/155 "2016-05-15T17:21:51Z")
> [@Eonwe](#):
>
> My sarcastic point was that while the OP considered this to be clearly targeted at “Sanders supporters”, voter participation is shown to track pretty clearly with income, and not with support of Bernie Sanders. So, if we want to really get behind the intent of this speech and take down the constituency the least likely to vote, let’s start by taking down the poor, who can’t be bothered to vote half the time.
And age, and ethnicity - so speaking to a Howard graduating class hits a number of low vote populations - some of whom overlap with Sanders supporters - though I agree this had little to do with calling out Sanders supporters specifically.
The GOP does well because old white people with above average incomes (like me) vote consistently - and those people are more likely to be conservative.
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### Author:  [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/156 "2016-05-15T17:31:30Z")
> [@Eonwe](#):
>
> My sarcastic point was that while the OP considered this to be clearly targeted at “Sanders supporters”, voter participation is shown to track pretty clearly with income, and not with support of Bernie Sanders. …
[Um no.](http://www.nonprofitvote.org/documents/2013/09/america-goes-to-the-polls-2012-voter-participation-gaps-in-the-2012-presidential-election.pdf) Before engaging in sarcasm frst check the facts.
No question lower income Americans have lower voter participation rates than higher income Americans. In 2012 an impressive 72% for those who are in households that make $75K/yr or more compared to “just” 62% for those whose households are at $50K/yr or less.
But Millennials? 18 to 29 year olds voter participation rate in 2012 was a whole whopping 45% voter turnout compared to 66% for those over 30.
Household income of $50K/yr or less too high for you? Even those who make [$10K/yr or less](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/01/income-gap-at-the-polls-113997) have participation rates higher - 47% in 2012.
And that’s a presidential election! [Midterms even worse](http://www.nonprofitvote.org/documents/2011/11/voter-participation-gaps-in-the-2010-midterm-election.pdf). The low income group dropped to be sure, down to 40%. Yeah pretty crappy. Millennials? Down to 24%. More than 3 out 4 Millennials did not bother to vote in mid-terms.
So, yeah, uh … no. That simply put sucks. We bemoan the low voter turnout of Hispanics as a group ID but hell they beat that.
A big group, albeit of sometimes divergent interests and priorities\*, roughly half of the White members of the age group voting GOP, of potentially some real impact and power to make real differences over time … possibly … but certainly not if they don’t vote.
When more than half of the group does not bother to vote in a presidential election, and three out of four do not in midterms, what sort of response should they get to cries of “poor poor pitiful me … things are not changing how I want them to change …”
Again Obama was engaging in no takedown of any group. But let’s get our facts right. Millennial voter participation is just simply awful. Being young is a much better predictor of non-participation than is income level.
\*Before one assumes that Millennials all speak with one voice one might want go beyond even the consideration that about half of White Millennials stated a GOP preference in that linked poll to [this article](http://www.bentley.edu/impact/articles/power-millennials-dont-know-they-have) polling beliefs of Millennials as well. In some ways they are. And in some not.
> [@](#):
>
> White respondents were nearly twice as likely to feel that the government pays too much attention to the problems of racial minority groups. And nearly half of all white respondents said they felt discrimination against white people was as big a problem as discrimination against people of color.
>
> Only about 20 percent of the millennials said they were comfortable talking about bias. …
>
> … Among the most likely voters, the Harvard poll found traditional Republican constituencies showing more enthusiasm than Democratic ones for participating in the upcoming midterms, with 44 percent of 2012 Mitt Romney voters saying they will definitely be voting — a statistically significant difference compared to the 35 percent of 2012 Barack Obama voters saying the same. …
>
> … the political views of millennials did sometimes differ significantly across racial and ethnic lines. While half of both white and non-white millennials say they are political independents, nearly twice as many non-white millennials — 37 percent — identified as Democrats compared with 19 percent of white millennials.
>
> The Pew survey also found that white and non-white millennials have different views on the role of government. On balance, about half of white millennials say they would prefer a smaller government that provides fewer services rather than a bigger government that provides more services. Non-white millennials lean heavily toward a bigger government — more than 70 percent say they would prefer a bigger government that provides more services. The racial gaps are about as wide among Gen Xers and baby boomers.
>
> Surveys are all well and good but the true political voice of the majority of millennials remains to be seen. Less than half showed up at the ballot box in the past two presidential elections. And those numbers are dropping …
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### Author:  [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/157 "2016-05-15T17:41:13Z")
> [@DSeid](#):
>
> So France’s system has dramatically put their investment in technical education (from the same link)
Dramatic is a relative, in fact the system remains biased to an elitist education.
But you illustrate the error in looking to the education to answer all issues and looking superficially at factors.
> [@](#):
>
> The result of this focus? [French unemployment hits new record](http://www.france24.com/en/20160324-french-unemployment-hits-new-record). 10.3%. Much much higher than the United State’s or Germany’s.
No this is **not** the result of such a focus (even though it is not a real focus, only a relative change).
It is [more than well-known](http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21688429-fran-ois-hollande-has-one-last-chance-tackle-rising-jobless-rates-mode-demploi) that the significant driver of the unemployment (indeed so much the (Socialist Party) President has used an [emergency tool](http://www.wsj.com/articles/hollande-invokes-special-powers-to-bypass-national-assembly-on-labor-bill-1462891749)to force reform), particularly among the youth, is the labor code and its severe rigidities that divide the labor market into two parts, the CDIs and the CDDs, or the permanent and the temporary. The education, it is not a magic wand to overcome this although for a long decade the Left in the France has sought to pretend it is.
But my original comment in making the comparison of the rhetoric in the France did not mention as it is not a relevant factor for the Americans.
A similar rhetoric and what seemed to be a blindness to different interest factors for other populations was.
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### Author:  [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/158 "2016-05-15T18:32:26Z")
So **Ramira** your point was that you’d imagine that Black and other minority Americans would care more about technical training programs of various sorts than about university education.
And that despite the fact that a population shift up the education ladder in America (with more graduating HS, more graduating college, has resulted in increased median income across the board over the last several decade, college as a means of developing skills with complex thinking, creativity, (and I’d add communication skills) that can be applied broadly in a variety of fields, is demonstrably a myth.
To further piece together your thesis, and correct me if understand you incorrectly, that a broad liberal education is elitist in nature and that education by way of vocational, occupational and/or skills training better serves the interest of those and would be of more interest to those who are not of the elite class (in which you’d place in broad brushstrokes, Black Americans, other non white minorities, and immigrants).
Is that a fair summary of your position?
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/159 "2016-05-15T18:59:23Z")
So Ramira, you either ignored or missed my question. But let me put a finer point on it. I’ll assume you’ve never lived in the US, since you have given me no information otherwise.
What makes you think you know jackshit about the US, let alone what our problems are or how to fix them?
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### Author:  [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2016, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obamas-double-leg-takedown-of-bernie-sanders-and-supporters/754439/160 "2016-05-15T19:15:57Z")
[quote=“Johnny\_Ace, post:159, topic:754439”]
So Ramira, you either ignored or missed my question. But let me put a finer point on it. I’ll assume you’ve never lived in the US, since you have given me no information otherwise.[/qyite]
It is stupid and sterile to draw any conclusions about personal affirmations written on a message board anonymously. But I have indeed worked in the US even. This says nothing about anything I have written here and is completely useless knowledge to draw any conclusions.
> [@DSeid](#):
>
> So **Ramira** your point was that you’d imagine that Black and other minority Americans would care more about technical training programs of various sorts than about university education.
No, it was not.
I wrote
> [@](#):
>
> ```
> when I read here the sanders people, I hear the voices of the same kinds who are the ultra left radicals who push anti-reform in the France in the student syndicates, who are primarily interested in preserving their priviledged routes using the rhetoric of the equality. They are never interested in the actual actions -like the change in the elite oriented university focus to the more democratic technical and apprenticing programs- to help the classes who suffer from the deep discrimination (ethnic/race) in the employment markets. Of course I can read this wrong, but the rhetoric and the focus - a picture of sanders marching and arrested is convincing? - echoes strongly for me as from this kind of narrow vision that does not understand it is narrow and self deceiving.
>
> ```
>
> and having gone through the systems with “universal access” to the university (but that have ignored the technical training and the apprenticing), I see this as a very bad non solution for the problem of the social mobility and the problem of the ethnic minority in the face of economic challenges - and a bad economic solution by itself.
>
> but I do not speak to your system, it is just an observation.
I made a comparison between a kind of narrow rhetoric by a similar class of people and their lack of understanding of the political priorities of persons of ethnic minorities.
There were some responses with some exagered over-reactions, like the affirmation it is the general education, the liberal arts general that is superior to a technical education as jobs are disappearing. The American statistics show this is [a myth](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/05/worst-college-majors-hr-block_n_5455291.html).
> [@](#):
>
> Is that a fair summary of your position?
No none of it was. the reactions to exaggerated reactions are not a thesis.
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