Rachel Bitecofer: Progressives overreached with Sanders

[highplainsdem]

Link to tweet

They won’t like hearing this but progressives overreached w Sanders & cost themselves their 1st real shot at the party’s nomination. Had they gone w Warren, outcome might have been different but too many people are spooked by the actual socialist thing.
There’s a lesson in that

[relayerbob]

1. Yep

[dalton99a]

2. Good message, wrong messenger, horrible labeling

[squirecam]

3. Biden is a progressive.

He’s just not a socialist.

[dhill926]

9. yep...

his speech tonight was progressive as hell....

[onetexan]

11. +1 -K&R

[TwilightZone]

4. That's not going to go over well.

Especially after her column about swing voters was posted by Sanders supporters about two thousand times.

[Indykatie]

7. Rachel Built her Reputation on Being Spot On on the 2018 House Seat Wins

I continued to follow her but have often been put off by her seeming disdain for Joe Biden and her opinion that he was a very weak candidate. She missed tonight's results by a mile. Her taking "progressives" to task this late in the game b/c they have a "flawed" messenger is rich.

[Awsi Dooger]

15. Rachel Bitecofer is a comedy act

No kidding she would miss by a mile. Every premise is flawed. I've been howling for a solid month that anything she says is taken seriously, let alone hoisted.

I've wagered on this stuff for 28 years. I know countless guys who have wagered on it as long or longer. Not one of them pays any attention to turnout as opposed to raw preference.

Nobody is reinventing the wheel around here. Who the hell cares that she forecast a wave in a first term midterm? That's like forecasting the Dutch to fare well in speed skating.

As I've emphasized, voters flow like water in primaries. It is exactly like water in a tank. Tip it sideways and everything changes. Likeminded people all pick up on the same thing and react accordingly. That's why polling is imprecise in primaries and the results are quick changing and difficult to gauge. Momentum can land far beyond logic or estimates.

Once you emerge from that setting, general elections are exactly the opposite. Those stacks of self-identified liberals and conservatives regulate every state and make forecasting incredibly simple. Incredibly rigid. Rachel Bitecofer is an outright fool if she thinks turnout can dent that type of thing. If Joe Biden is nominee he will have to win on preference.

The variable will be number of undecided voters. That varied dramatically from 2012 with few undecideds to 2016 with a ton of undecideds since both candidates were so unpopular. Logically 2020 will be somewhere in the middle but probably closer to 2012. Voters tend to make up their mind about an incumbent early in the process.

These are generalities about swing voters. Again, the trends do not change significantly:

* Women are more likely to be undecided than men
* Young voters are more likely to be undecided than senior citizens
* People without a high school diploma are more likely to be late swing voters
* Republicans who self-identify as moderates or liberals are vastly more likely to be swing voters than ones who self-identify as conservative. Obviously that makes sense. We'll see if Biden can make a dent
* Easterners are swing voters more than any other region. Midwesterners are next. Southerners and westerners are least likely to change their mind. BTW, that finding is one I have used countless times in statewide wagering. A lead in a southern state is gold. That's why I have wagered on Republicans so many times in states like Georgia or North Carolina when the polling is tight but they have the lead. I have also wagered on leading Democrats amidst tight polling in states like Oregon and Washington and more recently Nevada and Colorado.

The easterners prone to changing their mind late can also account for surprises like tonight in Massachusetts, or when Hillary upset Obama in New Hampshire in 2008.

[Fiendish Thingy]

20. How was she wrong?

I don’t recall Bitecofer endorsing or making any projections as far as state primary outcomes.

All she has said was that ANY Democrat could beat Trump if that candidate inspires massive turnout of existing anti-Trump voters, as opposed to trying to flip 2016 Trump voters back to the Dem side. She has always put an asterisk by Sanders’ name, noting that her model is less consistent/stable with him as the nominee.

With large numbers of people waiting 2-4 hours to vote in some areas, in a primary, I think we got a preview of the anti-Trump momentum for November, whoever our nominee turns out to be.

I do agree that progressives missed their best candidate in a generation, and probably for a generation to come, with Warren (unless she is the nominee in 2024...).

[cilla4progress]

5. I thhink she's right.

All of youse.

[elleng]

8. She's often right.

'too many people are spooked by the actual socialist thing.'

[Cha]

18. I agree with her.. don't know

who she is 'cause I don't have tv I guess.

[Raine]

19. I think so too nt

[FM123]

6. what is that old saying again - a day late and a dollar short....

"Had they gone w Warren, outcome might have been different"

[oasis]

13. Or, "woulda, coulda, shoulda". nt

[LizBeth]

10. Yup. Us HRC voters would esaily have gotten on board with Warren. As a matter of fact,

for many of us women HRC voters we were very much on board. Warren could have done it. Gotten cross votes and did good for this nation, while being the first woman president.

Yup.

[Demsrule86]

12. I agree.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

14. I have to admit that I am glad that some BS supporters out there didn't go with Warren.

[Gothmog]

16. Where is sanders' magical voter revolution?

[Awsi Dooger]

17. Rachel Bitecofer is also brutally wrong about Warren winning the nomination

Elizabeth Warren is not as strong as Hillary Clinton. I posted that a year ago regarding Warren and Kamala Harris and sadly Amy Klobuchar, even though I hoped Klobuchar would somehow emerge to be the nominee.

It was a simple reference point: How can you nominate a female if a female was the most recent loser, and the current female is not nearly as commanding as the prior one?

Rachel Bitecofer predictably allows the big picture to fly comfortably above her head. After losing those midwestern states in 2016 this party was not going to nominate a very liberal and polarizing Massachusetts female with a built-in nickname. I love Warren's politics but let's not ignore Warren's approval rating. She has had a national net negative approval ever since she became prominent and Trump stuck that Pocahontas on her.

Elizabeth Warren also struggles among men and independents. That has been documented throughout this race. I was in Boston for 10 days during her 2018 senate race. I listed to the debates. When I spoke to locals about her it was a very lukewarm response. Mostly they were convinced she was using the senate race as brief stepping stone to 2020 presidential, even though she denied it.

[Tarheel_Dem]

21. K&R