“His Red-State Wins Matter More Than Hillary’s”: Why Is Bernie Sanders Slamming Southern Democrats?
So what do we make of Bernie Sanders’s continuing habit of denigrating the Democratic voters of the South? He did it Wednesday night on Larry Wilmore’s show, when he said that having early Southern primaries “distorts reality.” And he did it again in the debate, when he dismissed the importance of Clinton’s votes from the South because the region is “the most conservative part of the country.”
Okay. I’m (in)famously on record as saying the Democrats should just forget the South. The argument of that column, admittedly florid rhetoric aside, was that for the purposes of general elections, the Democratic Party shouldn’t even try very hard in the South anymore. The party should of course fight to hold the African American House seats, and there might be occasional opportunities to swipe a seat in a college town. But other than that, for the foreseeable future, the South is gone, I argued, and the Democrats shouldn’t throw good money after bad down there. You can agree or disagree with that, but it is an argument about general elections (I wrote it right after Mary Landrieu lost to Bill Cassidy in a Louisiana Senate race).
Primary elections, however, are completely different animals. Primary elections are about voters within a political party—and sometimes without, in open primaries, which are another debate that we may get to in the future—having their shot at choosing which candidate their party should nominate. There are of course some states that matter more than others. But there aren’t any individual votes that matter more than others, at least among primaries (caucuses don’t usually report individual votes). For Sanders to dismiss Clinton’s Southern votes as distortions of reality is hugely insulting to Democrats from the region.
And to one group of Democrats in particular, who are concentrated in the South and who happen to be the most loyal Democratic voters in the country. I don’t think Sanders has a racist bone in his body, but is there not a certain racial tone-deafness in dismissing the votes of millions of black voters as distortions of reality? This is the one moment, their state’s presidential primary, when these African American voters have a chance to flex some actual political power in the national arena.
And then to write off Clinton’s Southern votes as “conservative” is just a lie intended to fool the gullible. Sure, the South is conservative at general-election time. But at Democratic primary time, it’s pretty darn liberal. It’s blacks and Latinos (where they exist in large numbers) and trial lawyers and college professors and school teachers and social workers and the like. They’re not conservative, any more than the people caucusing for Sanders in Idaho and Oklahoma are conservative, and he knows it.
The topic of Sanders’s own red state wins actually raises another point. He’s won seven states that both he and Clinton would/will lose by at least 15 points in November, and in many cases more like 30: Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, and Alaska, along with the aforementioned two. And he won them in caucuses, not primaries, which nearly everyone agrees are less democratic, less representative of the whole of the voting population.
Now let’s look at Clinton’s red-state wins. She’s won 10 red states: Texas, Arizona, Missouri, Georgia, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, and South Carolina (I’m calling North Carolina purple, and of course Virginia and Florida and Ohio). Neither she nor Sanders would probably win in these states either, although a Clinton win over Donald Trump seems conceivable in a couple of them.
In any case, yes, they’ve both won states that are unwinnable in the fall. Yet do you hear Clinton going around saying that Sanders’s victories in these states are distortions of reality? I don’t. But Sanders goes around bragging, as he did at the debate, about winning eight of the last nine contests, “many of them by landslide” margins, referring to these very states where he or Clinton would get walloped in the fall, while denouncing her red-state wins as aberrational. What is it about his red states that count—or more to the point, perhaps, what is it about hers that makes them not count?
I try to set a limit on the number of times I use the “imagine if” device, because candidates have different histories, and those histories provide the context for our reactions to the things they do. But here goes. Imagine if the situation were reversed and Sanders had won the Southern states, and it was Clinton dismissing Southern Democratic votes as meaningless. The more sanctimonious among Sanders’s supporters would have tarred and feathered her as a racist weeks ago. Her very reputation among Democrats would likely be in tatters.
I’m not sure what the thinking is in Sanders land. Their collective back is against the wall, and they’re in a high-stress situation. But Sanders and his team—wife Jane, campaign manager Jeff Weaver—have been saying these things repeatedly now, for weeks. I guess it’s part of an electability argument. Even that is wrong—as I noted above, a couple of Clinton’s red states are possibly gettable in the fall, while none of Sanders’s states are. But insulting your own party’s—oh, wait. Ah. Maybe that has something to do with this too. Whatever the reasons—not a good look.
By: Michael Tomasky, The Daily Beast, April 16, 2016
“Will The GOP Truly Choose To Risk The Wrath Of Trump’s Voters?”: It Would Almost Certainly Be Very Ugly For The GOP
After all the sturm und drang of the Republican contests it appears to come to this: all signs point to a brokered GOP convention, as it’s unlikely that Donald Trump will reach the absolute majority of delegates required to take the nomination outright. If current electoral patterns hold, Trump will likely fall just short of the magic number required to win on the first ballot. Though I wouldn’t normally link to anything out of Breitbart, their delegate predictions showing Trump falling short by 50 to 100 delegates for the upcoming GOP contests seem sober and likely accurate barring unforeseen events.
If no candidate reaches a majority on the first ballot, the race moves to a second ballot in which the delegates are (mostly) free to vote for whomever they please. And that person will almost certainly not be Donald Trump. Whether it’s in Colorado where the Cruz campaign outworked Donald Trump to win all 21 delegates, or in Indiana where state and county party officials are so hostile to Trump that nearly every delegate will bolt from him after the first ballot, the table is set to prevent the clear winner of the majority of votes in the GOP primary from getting the nomination.
The beneficiary of the second-ballot vote will almost certainly be Ted Cruz. As Nate Silver notes, the possibility of Paul Ryan or another white-horse knight being nominated at the convention is fairly low, the actual human delegates making the decisions are mostly conservative activists from suburbs and rural areas all across the nation much likely to back a more legitimate hardliner like Cruz than the handpicked choice of the beltway and Charles Koch.
In either case, though, there’s the problem of what to do about Donald Trump and his voters. He (like the other candidates still in the race) has already rescinded his pledge to back the eventual nominee. If he is denied the nomination despite earning a clear plurality of actual votes, there’s no telling what he might do, but it would almost certainly be very ugly for the GOP. While the chances of an independent candidacy are next to nil, he would likely spend the entire rest of the election season creating headlines by sabotaging the eventual nominee and directing his voters to stay home and/or decline to vote for him. If even 10% of Trump’s voters chose to stay home, that in turn would have disastrous consequences for the GOP ticket both at the top and downballot.
One might say that a Trump nomination would be so toxic to the GOP brand that party officials will be inclined to take their chances on that scenario. There’s certainly plenty of data to show that while Trump’s voters might stay home from the polls in a huff, a large number of less populist GOP voters would refuse to vote for him in the fall. But it’s not entirely clear that Ted Cruz is any more likable or appealing to the general electorate–and Cruz’ actual policy positions on everything but immigration are significantly more extreme than Trump’s. So in essence Republican officials might end up infuriating the most dedicated and motivated plurality of their voting base for not that much advantage.
Would they really make such a move to protect social conservatism and Reaganomics from even the slightest challenge of Trumpist heresy? It seems increasingly likely, but it would be a shortsighted move.
By: David Atkins, Political Animal Blog, The Washington Monthly, April 9, 2016
“Stop Global Whining”: In This World, You Can’t Break An Appointment With Disappointment
New York Times columnist Charles Blow didn’t go far enough: frankly, anybody who subscribes to the “Bernie or Bust” mentality needs to have his or her head examined. I’m sure such scans are covered by Obamacare (i.e., the shameful corporate compromise by that closet Republican in the White House!).
It is unfathomable that so-called committed progressives would selfishly sit out the 2016 general election because they can’t get over the fact that their preferred candidate did not win the Democratic nomination. It is unconscionable that those who claim to want to move America forward would allow the country to race backward over the next four to eight years. It is unbelievable that anyone with a halfway-rational mind thinks “Bernie or Bust” is a good idea.
The hatred that the “Bernie or Bust” camp holds for Hillary Clinton defies logic: how can one love Sanders and loathe Clinton? Both candidates are among the most accomplished public servants of the past half-century: despite their differences, they are united in their compassion for America’s shunned, stigmatized and suffering.
Sanders clearly respects Clinton, but for some reason, a critical mass of his supporters have nothing but disrespect for the former Secretary of State. These supporters have fallen for the false narrative that Clinton worships the wealthy and pleases the powerful–and that Sanders is the only morally sound candidate in the race. The Hillary-as-corporate-sellout meme is just as jaw-droppingly dopey as the argument that there was no substantive difference between Al Gore and George W. Bush sixteen years ago. What did Santayana say about those who don’t learn from history?
By the way, what exactly do the “Bernie or Bust” folks mean when they call Clinton a “corporatist”? Isn’t “corporatist” an inscrutable insult, not unlike the use of the term “politically correct” by right-wingers? I doubt any member of the “Bernie or Bust” crowd can provide a non-convoluted explanation of the term “corporatist.” The term is all sound and fury, signifying nothing.
What will these holier-than-Hillary folks say if Donald Trump is elected President–and his hate-filled rhetoric leads to more Mexicans being mauled by the malevolent? “Oops”? “My bad”? “I wasn’t thinking”?
Neither Clinton or Sanders are saints: Clinton is as imperfect on fracking as Sanders is on firearms. Yet I don’t see Clinton’s supporters threatening to stay home if the Vermonter is victorious in the Democratic primary.
The “Bernie or Bust” folks are just as irrational in their quest for ideological purity as the Tea Partiers who went after Dede Scozzafava, Bob Inglis, Mike Castle and Richard Lugar were. By choosing to stay home in the general election in the event Sanders loses the Democratic primary, these folks could effectively rig the game against the middle class for good.
In addition to harboring a heightened hostility towards Hillary Clinton, the “Bernie or Bust” crowd is notorious for its obnoxious opprobrium towards President Obama.
How many times have you heard the #NeverHillary types lambaste the 44th President as a compromising “corporatist” who stabbed progressives in the back at every turn and genuflected to the 1 percent? (Even Sanders himself bought into this odd narrative: why else would he have called for Obama to be primaried in 2012, knowing full well that such a primary would have weakened Obama in the general election, just as Ted Kennedy’s 1980 primary challenge to President Carter made the incumbent easy prey for Ronald Reagan?)
I’m not exactly sure where the “Bernie or Bust” crowd got the idea that Obama was supposed to be the ultimate progressive warrior: his famous speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention made it clear, to everyone who actually paid attention, that Obama was a pragmatist at heart, someone who believed that reaching across the aisle was a moral duty, someone who was committed to the idea that the red, white and blue, involved, well, red and blue.
That speech–an insight into Barack Obama’s soul–was not a particularly progressive address, and anyone who expected Obama to govern from a perspective of progressive purity apparently failed to grasp the true tenor of that speech. Having said that, progressives made gains during the Obama administration, as Paul Krugman has noted. Too bad some of those progressives don’t seem to appreciate it.
I argued last year that “a compelling case can be made that Barack Obama is one of the greatest presidents of all-time.” Sadly, it appears that Obama will not get the historical props he deserves for his accomplishments–not only because of the revisionist history of the reactionary right, but also because of the revisionist history of the self-righteous “Bernie or Bust”-ers on the left, the Union of the Ungrateful that fails to acknowledge Obama’s victories on economic reform, equality, climate change and health care, among other issues. This time, the cliche is appropriate: if Obama walked on water, progressive purists would say he couldn’t swim.
Like Prince’s parents in “When Doves Cry,” the “Bernie or Bust” crowd is too bold and never satisfied–and they will find new reasons to be disgruntled if Sanders upsets Clinton in the Democratic primary and becomes the 45th president. They won’t be happy once President Sanders compromises with Republicans and conservative Democrats, as he must in order to govern. They won’t be happy if President Sanders authorizes drone strikes and sanctions the strengthening of the surveillance state in an effort to incapacitate ISIS. They won’t be happy when President Sanders makes it clear that he cannot fully, or even partially, implement his economic vision.
Presumably, they will then turn on Sanders and denounce him as another traitor to the cause, another sellout to the “Democratic establishment” (cue the horror music). They will never acknowledge the truth: that governing is hard work and requires compromise. Bill Clinton understood this. Barack Obama understands this. If he succeeds Obama as President, Bernie Sanders will understand this. However, his most fervent supporters won’t–because, at bottom, they do not understand that in this world, you can’t break an appointment with disappointment.
By: D. R. Tucker, Political Animal Blog, The Washington Monthly, April 3, 2016
“Tied To The Party’s Nominee”: Why Donald Trump Is Big Trouble For Republican Senators And Congressmen
Mitch McConnell can always be counted on to put a brave face on things. Asked on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday whether he’s encouraging Republican Senate candidates to distance themselves from Donald Trump should he be the party’s nominee, McConnell essentially said that it isn’t a problem. “We are going to run individual races no matter who the presidential nominee is,” McConnell said. “Senate races are statewide races. You can craft your own message for your own people. And that’s exactly what we intend to do this fall, no matter who the nominee is.”
It’s certainly what many of them will try to do. But can they get away with it?
A few might. But distancing yourself from your party’s leader may be harder now than it has ever been.
To see why, we have to start with an understanding of how much information voters have about different candidates. We can think about a kind of information hierarchy, the top of which is the presidential race. That contest will dominate all the news sources people have about politics: newspapers, local and national TV news, social media, even the conversations they have with family, friends, and co-workers. If the race is between Trump and Hillary Clinton, the clash of these two big, controversial personalities will dominate the news.
The next level down is races for Senate or governor — amply funded, and featuring incumbents with whom people have at least a passing familiarity, but not nearly as prominent as the presidential race. You’ll absolutely hear Trump and Clinton’s messages, whether you believe them or not, but with the lower offices, it’s a challenge just to get the candidate’s name and face in front of people. Go to House seats, and then farther to state legislature or local races, and voters hear only the occasional snippet, drowned out by everything else that’s going on.
That means that it can be difficult to convince voters of something a bit complicated, something that requires them to undo their default assumptions. And one of those assumptions is that candidates from the same party are going to be partners.
Split-ticket voting (choosing one party’s candidate for president and a different party’s candidate for lower offices) has declined in recent years, which is understandable in an era of partisan polarization and tight party unity. Half a century ago, when both parties contained a relatively broad ideological spectrum — for instance, the Democratic Party had both Northern liberals and Southern conservatives — it made more sense to view an individual senator or congressman as a free agent who might act independently of his or her party. But today, most important votes break firmly along partisan lines, which means that your senator is probably not going to surprise you, or the president, with anything he or she does.
That’s not to say there are no more maverick legislators who frequently abandon their party to support the other side’s position. There are a few, like Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) or Susan Collins (R-Maine). But there are fewer of them after every election, and they’re almost gone. The more party unity there is, the more every race is nationalized.
So a message like, “I don’t agree with my party’s leader, even though I will sometimes, but not at other times, and I agree with you that he’s a jerk” is going to be less persuasive now than it might have been at another time.
This could be especially tricky for the Republican incumbents representing swing states. We often think of “purple” states as containing mostly moderate voters, but that’s often not the case. Instead, they may have roughly equal numbers of strong liberals and strong conservatives. You can see that in places like Iowa and Wisconsin, both of which will have incumbent Republican senators facing serious challenges this year. That makes things complicated for those Republicans — they don’t want to alienate the Trump fans who will be coming out to vote for president, but they also don’t want to push away voters who can’t stand him.
And you can bet that in nearly every competitive Senate race, there are going to be ads targeting the Republican that will try to tie him or her to the Republican presidential nominee, particularly if Trump’s popularity stays as low as it is now. “Senator X stands with Trump,” they’ll say, as sinister music plays in the background. “Demeaning women. Threatening immigrants. Encouraging violence. Is that what we want representing us? Tell Senator X and Donald Trump that our state says no thanks.”
Some Republican incumbents are running in extremely conservative states, in which case they probably don’t have to worry. But others will face two questions: Whether they even want to distance themselves from Trump, and if they do, whether they can do it successfully. One thing’s for sure: it isn’t going to be as easy as Mitch McConnell would have you believe. And the farther you go down the ballot, the harder it’s going to get.
By: Paul Waldman, Senior Writer, The American Prospect; Contributor, The Week, March 22, 2016
“No Special-Interest Contributions?”: Will Trump Have To Go On A Fund-Raising Binge If He Wins The GOP Nomination?
One of the big story lines of the presidential cycle is that candidates other than front-runner Donald J. Trump have spent a lot more money on themselves and against him than he’s had to expend, enabling him to pose as the guy too rich (and too popular with small donors) to be vulnerable to “bribery.” This was exemplified by the failed effort by Marco Rubio and an assortment of conservative groups to take down Trump in Florida. Anti-Trump “independent” ads alone in the Sunshine State cost an estimated $35.5 million. Total spending by Trump and his supporters for the entire campaign nationwide is at $25.8 million.
Trump’s difference-maker financially, of course, has been his massive advantage in “earned media” (or what used to be called “free media,” because it’s provided by media coverage free of charge). MediaQuant, a firm that measures and values unpaid media coverage, estimates that Trump has harvested nearly $1.9 billion in earned media this cycle. That’s about twice as much as Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, John Kasich, and Jeb Bush combined have received, and within shouting distance of being twice as much as the two Democratic candidates combined as well.
But general-election campaigns are a lot more expensive than primaries. So it’s not surprising that Trump has hedged on repeating his “no special-interest contributions” pledge beyond the Republican Convention in July, and CNN is reporting that he’s already planning a big fund-raising blitz for the general election.
At The American Prospect, Eliza Newlin Carney puts all this together and suggests that total campaign costs are about to become too high for Trump to perpetually surf earned media to victory:
So far, Trump has enjoyed an extraordinary political ride, fending off millions worth of hostile attacks, prevailing against opponents who out-organized and outspent him, and sparing himself the punishing grind of high-dollar fundraisers. He’s also gotten considerable political mileage out of his claim to be above the big money fray. It remains to be seen whether Trump can continue playing by his own rules, or whether he will be forced to get his hands dirty in the messy business of campaign financing—and answer for it to voters.
But there are two factors that undercut this possibility. For one thing, Trump could liquidate some of his assets (estimated independently as having a value of about $4.5 billion) and self-finance to a considerable extent. And for another, this long nominating contest season in both parties is shortening the general-election campaign and the time and cost of any “air war.” Additionally, earned media is much easier to come by in presidential general elections than any other mode of politics, sometimes dwarfing paid media even when there’s not a wildly entertaining and galvanizing figure like Donald Trump in the fray. So it might make sense for Trump to wait and see if he even needs to spend a lot of money. At the current trajectory Americans won’t grow totally bored with the wiggy dude until some time well into 2017.
By: Ed Kilgore, Daily Intelligencer, New York Magazine, March 17, 2016
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