# To get this out of the way, I don't think Bernie would have won either. **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 9, 2016, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148 "2016-11-09T07:10:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**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:** [November 11, 2016, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/61 "2016-11-11T04:56:41Z")
Probably. I voted for Stein and would absolutely have voted for Clinton if my vote counted as much as everyone else’s. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2016, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/62 "2016-11-11T05:23:24Z")
> [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > Anecdotally, it seems like a lot of people did this. I wonder if it would have been enough to get the Green Party to 5%. The same Green Party whose VP nominee said Sanders and his supporters represent white supremacy? Way to draw in voters. ---
**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:** [November 11, 2016, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/63 "2016-11-11T05:33:57Z")
> [@ThisIsTheEnd](#): > > No. He’s a fucking socialist for christ’s sake. I wouldn’t even have voted for him. Trump would have gotten 400 EVs running against Bernie. Lol. Nobody except hardcore Tea Partier types and the think tank crowd gives a fuck about Bernie’s socialism. He’d have done a much better job of keeping the white working-class vote in the Driftless Area, Michigan, and Pennsylvania which would have preserved his firewall. And if you actually wouldn’t have voted for him if he’d been the nominee, I hope you never lectured Sanders supporters that they had to support Clinton to stop Trump. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2016, 5:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/64 "2016-11-11T05:59:36Z")
I think a much better idea than someone like Bernie would be a kind of “prairie populist” with a hardcore economically left wing message, but who doesn’t let ranting extremists like BLM run the show, who doesn’t believe being skeptical about a big upsurge in Muslim immigration makes you a bigot, who is willing to call out the campus PC brigade for being ridiculous ivory tower ninnies who don’t have a clue about the real world. And who–to give Bernie credit on one point–gives up on the gun control issue. ---
**Author:** ![DerekMichaels00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f14d63/32.png) [@DerekMichaels00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DerekMichaels00)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2016, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/65 "2016-11-11T07:19:29Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > I think a much better idea than someone like Bernie would be a kind of “prairie populist” with a hardcore economically left wing message, but who doesn’t let ranting extremists like BLM run the show, who doesn’t believe being skeptical about a big upsurge in Muslim immigration makes you a bigot, who is willing to call out the campus PC brigade for being ridiculous ivory tower ninnies who don’t have a clue about the real world. And who–to give Bernie credit on one point–gives up on the gun control issue. sadly tho, that was far from Bernie on the non-economic issues; he not only won the Muslim vote but now wants to make one the face of the party as DNC chair; the SJWs loved him a lot more than Hillary. ---
**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:** [November 11, 2016, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/66 "2016-11-11T07:36:04Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > The same Green Party whose VP nominee said Sanders and his supporters represent white supremacy? Way to draw in voters. Yeah, I’m not sure that would have actually been a GOOD thing, but I do wonder about it. It’s a crappy election when you have to hold your nose even to vote third party. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2016, 7:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/67 "2016-11-11T07:46:46Z")
one thing people forget tho trump is as much of a middle finger to the gop leadership as the dems ---
**Author:** ![irritant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/dfb087/32.png) [@irritant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/irritant)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/68 "2016-11-15T02:02:10Z")
So Kurt Eichenwald [has a piece in Newsweek today](http://www.newsweek.com/myths-cost-democrats-presidential-election-521044) that, among other things, effectively trashes the idea that Bernie could have won in my mind. This is just a sample of things that apparently appear in the Republicans’ Sanders oppo book: > [@](#): > > Then there’s the fact that Sanders was on unemployment until his mid-30s, and that he stole electricity from a neighbor after failing to pay his bills, and that he co-sponsored a bill to ship Vermont’s nuclear waste to a poor Hispanic community in Texas, where it could be dumped. You can just see the words “environmental racist” on Republican billboards. And if you can’t, I already did. They were in the Republican opposition research book as a proposal on how to frame the nuclear waste issue. > > Also on the list: Sanders violated campaign finance laws, criticized Clinton for supporting the 1994 crime bill that he voted for, and he voted against the Amber Alert system. His pitch for universal health care would have been used against him too, since it was tried in his home state of Vermont and collapsed due to excessive costs. Worst of all, the Republicans also had video of Sanders at a 1985 rally thrown by the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua where half a million people chanted, “Here, there, everywhere/the Yankee will die,’’ while President Daniel Ortega condemned “state terrorism” by America. Sanders said, on camera, supporting the Sandinistas was “patriotic.” Does anybody seriously believe that the voters who wouldn’t go for Hillary would have gone for this? ---
**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:** [November 15, 2016, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/69 "2016-11-15T05:08:40Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#): > > I doubt Trump woulda let his 25+ years in Washington go, and he could’ve hit him on Obamacare as well, pork barrel spending, deficit, debt, etc. Yeah, and? Clinton had to carry all that and her husband’s economic record–McJobs, anyone? Bernie could have done pretty well. I can’t say he’d win. I think a lot of pissed off centrists and feminists would have stayed home. But he might have had more people in other categories show up, and he might have had a better electoral map. I know I was out when Hillary Clinton won. I said I couldn’t campaign for her, and I didn’t. I think I read too much poison against her by people who–yeah, maybe they were sexist, I don’t know. But also, I don’t remember the 1990’s all _that_ fondly, and while Bubba was treated very badly by the right-wing media, he was also incapable of holding onto the Democratic majority. I now think that if he’d actually grasped and respected working-class pocketbook issues, people would have been OK with gays in the military and the like. ---
**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:** [November 15, 2016, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/70 "2016-11-15T05:16:23Z")
> [@Rigamarole](#): > > Believe it or not, a lot of them did. The days after Bernie conceded, the Reddit sub “TheDonald” got a ton of new subscribers from the so-called “AfterBerners”. > > Bernie’s fanbase was big and it was fervent, enough to match the fervency of Trump’s many supporters. Hillary was fucking milquetoast. Almost nobody actually _likes_ Hillary, but simply shrugged and said “Eh, at least she’s not as bad as Trump.” That was the death of this election. On the charisma thing: Hillary had the lethal combination of looking electable while having relatively few truly passionate supporters. She had some, of course. I really believe a lot of people stayed home because they thought she _would_ win–and they didn’t feel personally invested enough to show up and make it happen, nor did they feel like it was close enough that they had to do so. _Because I almost did that myself._ Granted, I went after the likely lunch hour, but I was surprised not to stand in line for half an hour to vote. Trump’s unelectability got him in, and I suspect, given how unserious the man is, he’s disappointed. It would have been a lot more fun to lose. But I think it also matters that Hillary was the type to promise nothing, so she didn’t have to break a promise. The Democrats need to learn from the success of the “Contract with America” and the “New Deal.” Give us a program that we know we’re voting for, even if it isn’t perfect. And keep that promise. ---
**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:** [November 15, 2016, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/71 "2016-11-15T05:32:39Z")
Let me rephrase a thing a little. I surmise that lots of people who were unenthusiastic about Hillary figured that other people were enthusiastic and would show up, and so didn’t show at the polls themselves. I showed up to vote for other Democrats–not out of a desire to vote for Hillary herself, and I had to argue with myself whether to vote for her or Jill Stein. So, I take it that Hillary had terrible turnout and thus terrible coattails. I suspect, but don’t know, that a larger fraction of Democrats in blue-leaning states would have shown up for Bernie. Most voters who liked Bernie would have shown up to get our loud Jewish Commie grandpa into the White House, because we knew that it would be hard and it depended on us, not on someone like Amy Poehler who liked Hillary. It might not have been enough. On paper, Trump was able to get the Reform Party types _and_ the pro-lifers, and that’s a big bloc to beat. But it might have worked. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/72 "2016-11-15T16:03:06Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#): > > I doubt Trump woulda let his 25+ years in Washington go, and he could’ve hit him on Obamacare as well, pork barrel spending, deficit, debt, etc. This is shit that EVERY Democratic candidate has to deal with so unless you are saying that a Democrat couldn’t win this election, you are just pointing out where the partisan fault lines lie. Trump’s corruption and shady dealings just didn’t stick when he was being compared to Hillary with her secret (and expensive) speeches to wall street and the money going to her foundation. Bernie doesn’t have that whiff of corruption. Hillary is clearly a globalist and a corporatist who believes that free trade is good for America (or at least her American friends). Bernie has been a hard line union supporter for a long time. There is a clear fault line between white working class voters in the rust belt who are pro-union anti-trade and New Democrats who think that a “rising tide lifts all ships” when it comes to free trade and don’t really do more than give lip service to unions because they are inherently political entities have nowhere else to go. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/73 "2016-11-15T16:04:30Z")
> [@Rigamarole](#): > > Believe it or not, a lot of them did. The days after Bernie conceded, the Reddit sub “TheDonald” got a ton of new subscribers from the so-called “AfterBerners”. > > Bernie’s fanbase was big and it was fervent, enough to match the fervency of Trump’s many supporters. Hillary was fucking milquetoast. Almost nobody actually _likes_ Hillary, but simply shrugged and said “Eh, at least she’s not as bad as Trump.” That was the death of this election. Were you around in 2008? There were a shit ton of Hillary or Bust voters who insisted that we must, simply MUST elect a woman. Then McCain nominated Palin and they all went away. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/74 "2016-11-15T16:10:34Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Sorry, no. Hillary is awesome and a perfect representative of what many college-educated women have experienced throughout their lives. No matter how competent you are, any ambition is mocked and feared, any mistakes are magnified, and macho jerks use their old-boys network to sideline you. Male privilege is as strong as ever, and now blames the woman for letting herself get taken advantage of. > > I’m a Republican who eagerly voted for Hillary because I see through all the shit people throw at her. Bernie would’ve never had my vote, because he was pulling the same crap all the other old boys do. So you voted for her because of … vagina. Male privilege as strong as ever? Please, tell me more. If your choices were Bernie or Trump, you would have stayed home? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/75 "2016-11-15T16:26:42Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > You’re simply reinforcing my point. I was replying to a post claiming nobody actually liked Clinton. That’s obviously untrue. > > Denying there’s a double standard helps no one. Just because some women overcome sexism at some times, doesn’t deny the women who or times when they did not. The only difference between Clinton and most other politicians is she a woman. Her glaring deficiencies are merely called minor quirks in others. > > I don’t approve of name calling as a replacement for critical discussion. But it’s not hard to recognize when women get criticized for things men do with little critique. Right, because life has been SOOOOOOO unfair to Hillary Clinton. :rolleyes: So the things Hillary got in trouble for that aren’t really gender based: Giving expensive secret speeches to Wall Street while claiming to be the right person to clean up wall street. Deleting emails while her emails were under subpoena. Giving extra access to folks who donated generously to the Clinton Foundation. DNC, Debbie Wasserman Schultz (who later got a job in her campaign), and Donna Brazile. I don’t think any of these issues would have received less focus if she had a penis. Stuff that might have had something to do with her being a woman: Her reputation as a nasty bitch. To some extent, people expect better behavior from women than men. Men can get away with being assholes sometimes, women, less so. But her reputation as a nasty bitch is generally well deserved. Her support of Bill Clinton and vilification of his accusers. These days it is vogue to assume anyone accused of sexual assault guilty but back then having your wife take a bullet for you could insulate you from these sort of accusations. And Hillary took the bullet because she had political ambitions that depended on Bill Clinton’s political trajectory. If a man did something similar, he wouldn’t be taking the same sort of heat for it. Hillary didn’t lose because she’s a woman. She lost DESPITE being a woman. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/76 "2016-11-15T16:39:20Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Yes, that’s what I took from your post. You’re treating a presidential election like choosing a high school clique. > > I’m sorry that calling some opposition to Clinton sexist upset you. But some opposition to Clinton was in fact sexist. > > There must come a time when accepting sexism in silence is not acceptable. You’re probably right that this was a poor time to do so, because calling out sexists offended some people who might’ve otherwise voted for Hillary. And that sucks. But the sexism is still there. And you think that her sex worked more against her than for her? Her sex was almost the only thing she had going for her. She had the fervent support of people who would support any Democrat with a vagina. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/77 "2016-11-15T16:41:16Z")
> [@Kron](#): > > I agreed during the primaries, and I agree now. Like you, I held my nose and voted Clinton, because Trump has shown himself to be a horrible person… but I wonder, how many couldn’t do it, especially with that attitude that any of the non-establishment, grass-roots Bernie supporters were nothing more than idiot children? And women that supported Bernie only did so because that’s where the cute boys were. I am NOT the only reason women were supporting Bernie. ---
**Author:** ![Truman\_Burbank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecc23a/32.png) [@Truman\_Burbank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Truman_Burbank)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/78 "2016-11-15T16:48:30Z")
I don’t think Bernie could have survived and won through all of the “communist!/Socialist!” BS the right would have thrown at him. I always get a chuckly when people complain about Bernie getting shafted by the Dems. Shall we recall that Bernie is NOT a Dem? He chooses to be an independent. I guess that means he decided to forgo some of the support of the Dem machinery. I think Bernie is too (or at least is _perceived_ to be) too liberal for the general electorate. I agree with him about 95% of the time, but I’m well to the left. ---
**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:** [November 15, 2016, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/79 "2016-11-15T17:50:11Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > It’s a great illustration of how left-wing revolutionary movements always end up eating their own (as famous figures from Robespierre to Trotsky found out the hard way). These are the kinds of people Bernie came up with, and the kind of core supporters he had in the primaries; yet now they are happy to shout “Fuck Bernie”. You are playing with fire when you try to lead a political movement with these kinds of firebrands as your base. I think you may need a broader brush, you missed the Andromeda Galaxy. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2016, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148/80 "2016-11-15T18:04:10Z")
Hillary is reviled by half the country. And a lot of those who do not revile her still did not want her as President. I did not want her a President and I’m a life long Democrat. I couldn’t think of another democrat who carried as much baggage as her. Had she run against _anyone_ but Trump (or Cruz), I would have voted Republican. Sanders would have beat him senseless. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-get-this-out-of-the-way-i-dont-think-bernie-would-have-won-either/771148.md?page=5)