# What's Up With Biden and Sanders? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [February 7, 2019, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134 "2019-02-07T19:56:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**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:** [February 10, 2019, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134/21 "2019-02-10T03:24:22Z")
I don’t equate the “Bernie Bro” behavior with Sanders, but I do the “Clinton cheated” and the “Democrats have a conspiracy against me” message that made it harder to coalesce behind the nominee after it was over. You don’t try to push voter fraud. As for Biden, I think he has stuff that tanks him with everyone. The gaffes, “creepy Biden,” losing before (after Clinton just reminded us of how bad that can be), being “establishment”, being associated with Obama, being seen as too centrist and Republican-lite, being old. There’s just something to attack him for that would resonate with everyone. And I’m totally against the idea we had last time that even a lesser candidate could beat Trump. We need the strongest to stop him. ---
**Author:** ![Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2019, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134/22 "2019-02-10T03:33:20Z")
> [@Sherrerd](#): > > As a person moving forward in time rather than backward, I’d love to be able to say “age doesn’t matter” about the Presidency. It would be satisfying to cast aside limitations and denounce bias–ageist bias definitely exists, and is often a great injustice. > > But I can’t really say that about the Presidency. I tend to agree with what you’ve written here—though I’d reserve the right to feel differently about a different candidate. It’s possible that some ‘young for his-or-her age’ candidate might appear, but frankly, I just don’t think that description applies to Biden. And Bloomberg is the same age I believe, and Sanders a year older. I think they are all very energetic, but I also agree that they are really old. I have known some 79-year-olds with remarkable stamina, excellent cognitive abilities, and all those other things you want in a president. But getting into your eighties seems to sap people’s strength and cognition; I have known few if any 86-or-87-year-olds about whom I’d say the same. Plus which, we’re looking ten years down the road, after the rigors of a two-year campaign and eight years of a job that ages everybody prematurely. I guess we’ll see what happens, but choosing any of the three seems like a risk to me! ---
**Author:** ![Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2019, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134/23 "2019-02-10T03:56:37Z")
> [@Emily\_Litella](#): > > …Same with the sexual harassment allegations, he didn’t even know about it, but apologized anyway. > … Well, first of all, it was a pretty poor apology. “I apologize to any woman who feels like she was not treated appropriately,” which was his first attempt, really doesn’t cut it. It’s a politician’s apology all the way. Too vague (“any” woman? let’s address the real people here), too dismissive (“who feels like,” as though the women were misinterpreting things and being overly sensitive), too euphemistic (“not treated appropriately” is a very strange way to refer to allegations of being forcibly kissed, among other things). It didn’t help that he issued the apology in a very perfunctory way, as though it was merely some unfortunate distraction. Mistreatment of people should never be a “distraction,” but his voice and body language made it evident that he wanted to get off that topic as quickly as possible and back to his policies. Second, it was his campaign and it’s his business to know what’s going on. And in addition the burden’s on him to hire people who won’t go around harassing other workers. He SHOULD apologize for being unaware and for hiring people who were looking for opportunities to treat women badly. And it’s appalling that he said he didn;t know what was going on because he was “a little bit busy running around the country trying to make the case” for the nomination. Way to diminish the issue again. Passing a new Glass-Steagall Act and putting further regulations on Wall Street = important. Making sure that women working for me are “treated appropriately” = not important. Hard to escape that conclusion. He could have tried “I apologize to the women who were harassed by members of my campaign” and followed that up with “I wasn’t giving the attention I should have to the inner workings of the campaign, and in retrospect, I hired some people I should not have hired.” But he didn’t, till afterward, till it was clear that this rather graceless “sorry if they were offended” semi-apology wasn’t going over well. It’s hard for me to see Sanders’s apology as something that speaks well of him; I think the way he handled it suggests the opposite. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2019, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134/24 "2019-02-10T04:03:27Z")
> [@MichaelEmouse](#): > > What did Sauron do when Frodo put on the Ring? Umm nothing? But when he declared the ring his, Sauron flipped the fuck out, and rightly so. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2019, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134/25 "2019-02-10T04:08:47Z")
Am I the only one that was afraid to open the thread thinking there’s about a 50% chance this is going to be slash? ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2019, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134/26 "2019-02-10T05:30:58Z")
> [@Emily\_Litella](#): > > I like Bernie Sanders and I hope he does run. I think he might not if there is a better, younger candidate that has the same policies that he supports that he can endorse, but I’m not going to speculate on any candidate just yet. > > He would have to either: run as an independent which most people would hate since it could split the democratic vote and Trump wins again - OR - He registers as a Democrat again, which most Democrats would hate because it looks opportunistic. I think he would hesitate to register as a Democrat again because of the Debbie Wasserman-Schmidt/DNC fuckery where they did their best to rig the primary so Hillary would win. I hope Tom Perez is above all that next time around. Hillary pretty much bought the DNC in 2016. Some folks think Bernie was too slow to endorse Hillary after he lost the primary, I’m surprised he endorsed her at all. (just for the record, I’m not insane, I voted for Hillary in 2016). > > Then there are people who equate the bad behavior of the Bernie Bros with the man himself which to me is just plain wrong. Same with the sexual harassment allegations, he didn’t even know about it, but apologized anyway. > > Some folks believe the crap that Trump is spouting about Socialism and equate his policies with Venezuela, that’s wrong too. Bernie is what they call a Democratic socialist, and the policies he wants is more in line with how Scandinavian countries are run. How about a cite or else a retraction to support your claims about Hillary buying the DNC or Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (fixed your typo) rigging the primaries? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-biden-and-sanders/829134.md?page=1)