Biden aide Symone Sanders did NOT say the climate debate would be "dangerous territory"

[highplainsdem]

This is being misreported by way too many media sources, and too many on this board. Biden critics, usually.

The "dangerous territory" remark referred to changing the rules to allow single-issue debates when there would inevitably be demands for more single-issue debates, and then the DNC would be accused of playing favorites if it didn't agree to all of them.

The San Jose Mercury News puts Symone Sanders' remarks in context:

https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/08/22/climate-debate-democratic-national-committee-fight/

Party leadership, including DNC chair Tom Perez, is strongly against the idea, insisting it would be unfair to focus a debate on any single issue.

-snip-

Tina Podlodowski, the Washington State Democratic Party chair, who’s spearheading the effort, argued that holding a climate debate was “about our own survival on the planet.”

“We don’t have to lock ourselves into debates that don’t work for us,” she said. “This is our process, the process is not working, we can fix the darn process to be sure it represents the best of us.”

But Symone Sanders, a DNC member and senior advisor for presidential candidate Joe Biden, argued holding a climate debate “would fundamentally change the game” of what the campaigns had been told about the debate rules. Rewriting those rules now would be “dangerous territory in the middle of a Democratic primary process,” she said.

Biden has previously called for a climate debate, but Sanders noted that she was on the committee speaking for herself and not a campaign representative.

Other committee members argued that while climate change was an existential threat, issues such as voting rights or gun control also deserved their own debates.

“What do we say to the other 30 groups asking for these?” asked Craig Smith, a delegate from Florida, who opposed a climate debate. “We’re picking something out of the air.”

California DNC member Christine Pelosi, the daughter of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, called for holding a series of debates on specific issues including climate change. Her resolution was also voted down Thursday, but will likely come up again on Saturday.

Emphasis added.

So the "dangerous territory" was about the demands other activist groups would make for single-issue debates.

It was NOT about the climate debate per se.

[Cha]

1. But they soooooo thought they

had a BIG GOTCHA!

Thank Goodness for real news, highplainsdem and your researching!

[emmaverybo]

2. +1000, adding my thanks too to highplainsdem.

[Cha]

8. Hey Aloha, emmaverybo!

Very Important.. keep this one KICK!

[highplainsdem]

14. You're welcome, emmaverybo!

[highplainsdem]

9. You're welcome, Cha!

[Thekaspervote]

3. Thx for the clarification highplainsdem!

[highplainsdem]

15. You're welcome! Glad to be able to help!

[hurl]

4. "We're picking something out of the air."

No, Craig, we're picking the air.

[highplainsdem]

16. And other activists would pick other issues they'd demand single-issue debates on.

And if the DNC didn't okay all of them they'd be screaming about favoritism and unfairness.

[Demsrule86]

5. Thanks I saw this argument in an article in July...and it is a bad idea...and will cause

turmoil in the party when some group feels slighted. We don't need that sort of shit.

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/07/climate-debate-democrats-2020-terrible-idea.html

[highplainsdem]

17. You're welcome, and thanks for that link! I just posted an OP quoting some of that column:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/1287250607

[Demsrule86]

6. K&R with thanks again also.

[betsuni]

7. Thank you.

Sigh. I have the feeling this will have to be explained over and over and over and still there will be people who think that this was the DNC thwarting Bernie. Add one more to the list of conspiracy theories.

[highplainsdem]

20. You're welcome, and oh how I understand that sigh.

And that

[betsuni]

22. +1

[Scurrilous]

10. ...

[oasis]

11. "The truth shall set you free"

[Cha]

21. I know we live in the Twilight

Zone now.. but it really didn't sound like something Symone Sanders would say, right?

oasis

[oasis]

23. I'd love to see Symone "debate" those who dare twist the meaning

of her statement. She'd let 'em have it.

Symone don't play.

[Cha]

25. Yes, she would.. she has

NFLTG for gas lighting trolls. I've seen her in action!

Link to tweet

[oasis]

26. I love Symone's pushback. Thanx Cha.

[George II]

12. Exactly, but twitter and "here" are lighting up the wires with outrage. Unbelievable.

[highplainsdem]

13. Yep. This misunderstanding/misquoting is the faux anti-Biden outrage du jour. Sigh.

[Vegas Roller]

18. But ... but ..... supporters of a certain messiah

are spinning it like crazy

[MustLoveBeagles]

19. So people are misrepresenting what she said to score cheap political points?

Shocking.

Context is everything. Symone Sanders position on this is perfectly reasonable. Thanks highplainsdem.

[Cha]

24. I don't see anyone on this thread

who was grousing at Symone on the false report thread.

[still_one]

27. The DNC voted 18 - 7 against have a single debate topic. There are much better forums for single

issues that give it the time it deserves, Town Halls, where the candidates actually hear from the people themselves, and the candidates are giving it the time to respond

[quickesst]

28. exactly....

....what I've been trying to get across to a certain someone in another thread. The OP is definitely worth a K&R!

[Cha]

29. And, you did a brilliant job..

if I may say so!

[quickesst]

31. Thanks Cha

I've always said, nothing beats logic with a little added dash of common sense.

[Cha]

32. You'd be right.. gets

'em every time!

[Tarheel_Dem]

30. Makes perfect sense to me.

[Celerity]

33. A song for this OP

I say this because climate change was by FAR the one standalone issue that had been called for to have its own discrete debate. There was no other clamour for multiple one-offs.

This is just a cleverclogs attempt to mask and provide cover for the foot-dragging and stifling of bringing this extraordinarily vital issue to the front and centre of discourse, all driven, and now all done and dusted by the risk-adverse elements within the DNC and certain campaigns' advisory circles.

[melman]

34. She didn't say the debate would be dangerous territory

she just said having it would be dangerous territory.


A certain someone was trying to get that across to me in another thread.


They call it logic with a little added dash of common sense. I call it something else.

[Mike 03]

35. Just found this thread.

I was one of the people who overreacted to that quote, so I completely take all that back and appreciate seeing the context. Thanks for posting this, and apologies for not seeing it sooner. BTW, I'm NOT a Biden critic at all. I really like Biden. There are very few Dem candidates running for president I don't like.