Why Bernie Sanders's rise is more impressive than Donald Trump's

[cal04]

Ezra Klein
http://www.vox.com/2015/9/14/9324501/bernie-sanders-donald-trump

(snip)
New polls show Sanders leading Hillary Clinton in both Iowa and New Hampshire. His leads aren't Trump-size — at least not yet — but they were secured without the wall-to-wall media coverage that attends Trump, without the name recognition Trump brought to the race, and against a much stronger frontrunner than Trump faced.

And Sanders has built those leads while remaining, well, Sanders. He promised he wouldn't run a negative campaign, and he hasn't — a fact that Clinton allies privately mention with relief. He hasn't signed on with a Super PAC or begun taking money from the kinds of donors he campaigns against. His campaign has been free of stunts and provocations and dense with policy proposals and issue papers. He's attracting supporters the old-fashioned way — by convincing people he's the kind of politician they want to back.

(snip)
To put it simply, it's very unlikely that Trump is going to persuade the Republican Party that the proper position on immigration is to implement mass deportations and make Mexico pay to build a wall. But it's entirely possible Sanders could convince Democratic Party leaders that campaign finance reform is a much more important issue than they had previously recognized, and that a serious, root-and-branch overhaul of the system should be the party's top priority.

Sanders is still a long shot. He trails Clinton badly in national polls and in more diverse states. But if his rise continues, it may prove more durable, and more significant, than Trump's political stardom.

[dorkzilla]

1. K&R!!!!!

He is going to pull this off!!!!

[Faux pas]

2. Kicketty Kickin'

[HassleCat]

3. I find Trump impressive

He's a huckster of the first order. While I don't like hucksters, I'm impressed by his ability to whip up fear and capitalize on it. I respect Godwin's law, but it's easy to see how a certain German man rose from obscurity to become a major threat to most of western humanity. Trump is proof that, at least conceptually, it can happen here.

[Stevepol]

5. "It can happen here"? It has already happened here to a considerable extent.

And it happened in many respects in the same way. Even as people joked about the leader and parodied his style of talk and mannerisms, the democratic process was gradually disrupted, elections were stolen (and continue to be stolen), people were intimidated, certain groups were marginalized, arbitrary foreign countries were demonized and invaded.

I am speaking of course of the buffoon turned "war president" George W. Luckily, he was not able to destroy Western civilization. But the next buffoon who will inevitably arise at some time in the future, possibly even this time around, will indeed not only be able to destroy Western civilization but will actually do it, and the nature of the world itself will change irreparably I think. I hope it happens after I'm gone.

[HassleCat]

6. He did a good job in Iraq

We pretty much destroyed their civilization, or at least their modern infrastructure. Despite our highly publicized efforts to rebuild a small part of what we destroyed, it will be many years before Iraq recovers.

[jwirr]

8. Don't be so sure that W is not yet going to destroy

western civilization. 800,000 refugees in Europe and who knows how many more across the world may very well do the job. Not because of who they are but because civilizations have crashed from far smaller impacts.

[orpupilofnature57]

4. Every second people are waking up!!!!! Connecting the dots to Who's Who, and anyone with a half a

brain knows Mr. Trump has a genius that has made him, it's called Misanthropy and we're his next scam .

[dpatbrown]

7. As past elections have shown,

IF Bernie wins Iowa and N.H., he will get a tremendous amount of attention. That's how he will pull it off. His popularity will only rise, and never fall in the Democratic primary. Our job, spread the word. Everywhere.