# The Hypocrisy of Bernie Sanders and the question of what's important to him and his movement **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [April 20, 2017, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882 "2017-04-20T22:48:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/21 "2017-04-21T06:17:34Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > a guy in Nebraska named Heath Mello who sponsored a bill requiring all women wanting an abortion to first get an ultrasound. The bill required the clinic to offer a choice of an ultrasound, it didn’t make ultrasounds mandatory. If she requested one, the law also required the screen to be shown to her. From what I can tell this whole story has drawn a lot of FUD, likes claims that Mello had a 100% rating from Planned Parenthood. Democrats are screwed. ---
**Author:** ![CairoCarol](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cairocarol/32/3825_2.png) [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/22 "2017-04-21T06:38:55Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > There are many ways to serve one’s country, sometime it involves eating some shit. Here’s my grin, here’s my spoon. Sorry to hijack, but do you often use “shit-eating grin” that way? It’s the first time I’ve heard it used thusly (though Urban Dictionary agrees that it is a secondary definition). Generally speaking, a person has a “shit eating grin” when they are enjoying something that they shouldn’t be doing. (I’ve always thought the expression came from the contented look on a dog’s face after a particularly tasty foray into the cat’s litter box.) ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 9:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/23 "2017-04-21T09:21:55Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > He said he didn’t care, he’d rather have nobody than someone who isn’t a progressive. There’s the real problem with the BernItDowners: If you don’t vote for the less worse candidate, you don’t get “nobody”. Elections don’t happen in a vacuum. You don’t get “this person who isn’t quite perfect on my issues or nobody”. You get “this person who isn’t quite perfect on my issues or somebody who is actively opposed to my issues”. ---
**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:** [April 21, 2017, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/24 "2017-04-21T10:15:11Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > What is it about Ossoff that would make you feel that supporting him is somehow comparable to eating shit? > > On what issues do you find him to be insufficently progressive? > > Please be as specific as you can. > [@elucidator](#): > > Let me see if I got this right. What you took away from what I said was me saying that Mr Ossoff is “insufficiently progressive”? _That_ was what I was saying to you. > > Thinking you might just as well skip reading stuff I post. Waste of time, you could be reading more of that Spandan Chakrabarti. To be fair to **IW** , that is what you said. It’s not the only thing you said, but it was probably the only thing you said that he didn’t understand, which is why he asked you to explain it. He likely didn’t comment about the rest of the post because he did understand that. ---
**Author:** ![Folacin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folacin/32/3195_2.png) [@Folacin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folacin)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/25 "2017-04-21T10:57:03Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > There’s the real problem with the BernItDowners: If you don’t vote for the less worse candidate, you don’t get “nobody”. Elections don’t happen in a vacuum. You don’t get “this person who isn’t quite perfect on my issues or nobody”. You get “this person who isn’t quite perfect on my issues or somebody who is actively opposed to my issues”. Yep - this is what ‘bends the arc of history towards justice’ in a two-party system. If candidate A supports 10% of your platform and candidate B supports 0%, vote for A. Once you get to where everyone in Congress supports at least 10%, then you look for people who support 20%. It’s slow, but hopefully you get there before things go completely to shit. ETA - the purity thing is why the GOP can’t do anything any more - the Tea Party refuses to compromise and primaries any one who does. That is not the strategy of successful major party. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/26 "2017-04-21T11:34:47Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Your post here is moronic. While this does - barely - meet the ‘post not poster’ dichotomy, I’d prefer to avoid such disparaging remarks if possible. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/27 "2017-04-21T17:15:26Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > To be fair to **IW** , that is what you said… What was your first clue in finding me out, **John**? Was it the clever way I avoided even mentioning Ossoff? Darn, gotta get up pretty early in the afternoon to fool you! Should have been more cunning, maybe a glancing reference to Mr Ossoff would have convinced you I was launching an assault on Wendall Wilkie. True, Texans are widely known for subtle rhetoric and veiled innuendo, but I’ve lived in Baja Canada for some time now, and its starting to wear off. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/28 "2017-04-21T17:28:17Z")
To be fair, political endorsements are, in fact, a limited resource. If every Democrat endorses every Democratic candidate, and every Republican endorses every Republican candidate, then the endorsements quickly become meaningless. In order for a given figure’s endorsements to mean anything, they must occasionally endorse the other party’s candidates, or at least withhold their endorsement from both sides in a race. That said, I don’t know anything about Mr. Ossoff’s politics or positions, so I can’t say whether Sanders’ withholding of his endorsement here is justified or not. And I do think that right now, Democrats should be erring on the side of unity, not divisiveness. So yes, it’s quite possible that this decision from Sanders is a mistake. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/29 "2017-04-21T18:06:23Z")
Keep in mind, Bernie is not a Democrat. ---
**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:** [April 21, 2017, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/30 "2017-04-21T18:15:21Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > What was your first clue in finding me out, **John**? Was it the clever way I avoided even mentioning Ossoff? Darn, gotta get up pretty early in the afternoon to fool you! So, you’re gonna double down on that, huh? Well, the first clue was that you responded to a post that was explicitly about Ossoff. I think most folks reading your post would assume you were talking about him, too. You were obviously talking about someone, and since you didn’t name who that someone was, it would be natural to assume it was the someone in the post you quoted. The 2nd clue was that Ossoff is the subject of the thread. But what would that matter? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/31 "2017-04-21T18:15:27Z")
Q: How do we know Bernie’s not a Democrat? A: Don’t worry. He’ll tell you. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/32 "2017-04-21T18:37:08Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > …The 2nd clue was that Ossoff is the subject of the thread. But what would that matter? And here I was, thinking that the thread was about “Bernie’s hypocrisy”! In half-hearted defense, that _was_ in the title. By the way, have you read _Biography of Wellington_? Its about Napoleon. ---
**Author:** ![Evan\_Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b487fb/32.png) [@Evan\_Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evan_Drake)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/33 "2017-04-21T19:03:09Z")
From another thread I saw Matt Taibbi’s **[review](http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/taibbi-on-the-new-book-that-brutalizes-the-clinton-campaign-w477978)** of a book on the late Clinton campaign. _This traced back to 2008, a failed run that the Clintons had concluded was due to the disloyalty and treachery of staff and other Democrats. After that race, Hillary had aides create “loyalty scores” (from one for most loyal, to seven for most treacherous) for members of Congress. Bill Clinton since 2008 had “campaigned against some of the sevens” to “help knock them out of office,” apparently to purify the Dem ranks heading into 2016._ Purity tests go both ways. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/34 "2017-04-21T20:12:36Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > I really hope the progressives do not get mired into demanding purity tests. I was in a debate with someone before about Elizabeth Warren. I said it’d be great if all 50 states could elect senators like Warren, but MA is one of the most liberal states in the US (top 10 at minimum), you can’t elect someone like Warren in Mississippi or Alabama in the current climate. He said he didn’t care, he’d rather have nobody than someone who isn’t a progressive. > > Sanders has gotten flack for voting with the gun lobby, so he fails progressive litmus tests too. > > Anyway, it sucks. I hope the progressive movement doesn’t turn into the tea party, demanding 100% purity and rather having a member of the opposition party in charge than a candidate who you only agree with on 85% of the issues. I agree with you in aggregate. But to play a bit of Devil’s Advocate, I think it’s worth noting what the counter-arguments are (IMO). [ol] [li]Having moderates as elected members of the Democratic (or Republican) Party muddles the party’s imagine and message. Many hard-core leftists (and rightists) believe that their message would be much more popular than it currently is if it was consistently promoted by their party and their party consistently acted in accordance with those principles. If you believe that (though I personally don’t) then it could be worth having the opposition win a particular election rather than the 85% guy, because even though you lose in the short term, you gain in the long run by presenting the true unadulterated version of your system, which will thereby win wider appeal.[/li][li]Having moderates influences the leadership of the party, and there are a relatively fixed number of leadership positions available. If you have a smaller number of elected officials but consisting only of True Believers, then you’re more likely to have a leadership drawn exclusively from those ranks. But if in addition to those same number of hard-core members you also have an additional number of moderates, then you’re more likely to have some of the leadership slots allocated to that wing of the party, which would diminish the influence of the True Believers overall.[/li][/ol] ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/35 "2017-04-21T20:19:08Z")
Forgot to mention: obviously much of the opposition of this sort is emotional. But it’s not like it has zero rational basis either, IMO. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/36 "2017-04-21T20:48:00Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Fuck Bernie Sanders. The biggest mistake the Clinton team made was not blocking him from joining the party. If the Dems wish to keep on losing, that is an excellent mentality to have. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2017, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/37 "2017-04-21T20:51:37Z")
> [@marshmallow](#): > > The bill required the clinic to offer a choice of an ultrasound, it didn’t make ultrasounds mandatory. If she requested one, the law also required the screen to be shown to her. From what I can tell this whole story has drawn a lot of FUD, likes claims that Mello had a 100% rating from Planned Parenthood. Democrats are screwed. Thank you-this is very pertinent information [that needs to be kept in mind](https://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/04/20/1654527/-Heath-Mello-abortion-ultrasound-and-Bernie-Sanders). Also, **Ibn Warraq** , I generally respect even if I don’t always agree with your perspective so I hope you note that “The People’s View” is an extremely anti-Sanders website whose statements about him should generally be taken with a grain of salt to say the least. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2017, 9:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/38 "2017-04-23T09:37:19Z")
Even when you agree on the issues, there’s the problem of priorities. I just saw an old Real Time episode from 2005 where Maher was pestering Russ Feingold to say that the Democrats should make climate change their #1 priority. Feingold waffled for a bit but then came down hard on prioritizing getting out of Iraq and addressing campaign finance issues(the Abramoff scandal was in the headlines at the time). Although Feingold has always been on the left wing on climate change, it’s never been a top issue for him. And so Democrats in Nebraska are now in a battle over whether abortion is more important than income inequality. And here’s the thing: a party does actually have to make those choices, because political capital is limited. Obama, when he took office, wanted to do economic stimulus, financial reform, health care, cilmate change, and immigration reform. He got to do three of those. Chances are, it could have been any three, but he had to prioritize and those were his priorities: stimulus, financial reform, health care. By the time he got to priority#4, climate change, the car had run out of gas. So this is a debate the party should have, and Republicans need to have more explicit debates on priorities as well. We need to move beyond this childish idea that 100% of our agenda can be implemented with no tradeoffs. ---
**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:** [April 23, 2017, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/39 "2017-04-23T20:12:59Z")
What in the world does messaging have to do with anything? The problem here Sanders is once again making the perfect the enemy of the good. You just cannot do this. Once the candidates are drawn, you absolutely cannot say “I reject all of them.” You pick the one who is closest to your goals. Sanders has the same mentality as the Tea Party/Freedom Caucus on all of this. It’s what’s tearing up the Republican Party. And, honestly, I’m not sure that his vilification of Clinton didn’t cause at least part of the reluctance in supporting her since then. Throw in that she seemed like she would win, and people who bought his message felt they could just stay at home and sully themselves by voting for an impure candidate. If you are progressive, then endorse the most progressive candidate. Duh. If you can’t do that, then you’re just making things worse. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882/40 "2017-04-24T14:31:21Z")
What the country needs is 218 Congressmen who will stand up and say ‘Nay’ to more bank deregulation, and will say ‘Nay’ to plans for further shifting the tax burden from the rich to the middle class. Politicians can prattle about their Walls, boast about how many Mothers Of All Bombs they’d drop when someone makes them mad, quibble over whether 15-round gun magazines should be sold on Sundays, or how many ultrasounds they think state legislatures should mandate for rapist and rapee, _ **but a few key issues dwarf all the trivia. Global warming. Income Inequality. Campaign finance reform to combat the increasing power of kleptocrats.** _ > [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Ok, enlighten me then. What is your opinion of Bernie Sanders call for “a 50 states strategy” while saying he’d only support Democratic candidates who were “economic populists” even if that means essentially conceding certain districts to Republicans while deciding that he doesn’t find forcing rape victims to undergo ultrasound before getting an abortion as a deal breaker? It sounds like pragmatism at its best: Ignoring all the exaggerated gibberish that fills the blogs, and seeking Congressmen who will stand up and say ‘Nay’ to the kleptocrats. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-hypocrisy-of-bernie-sanders-and-the-question-of-whats-important-to-him-and-his-movement/784882.md?page=3)