How It All Came Apart for Bernie Sanders

[William769]

In mid-January, a few weeks before the Iowa caucuses, Senator Bernie Sanders’s pollster offered a stark prognosis for the campaign: Mr. Sanders was on track to finish strong in the first three nominating states, but Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s powerful support from older African-Americans could make him a resilient foe in South Carolina and beyond.

The pollster, Ben Tulchin, in a meeting with campaign aides, recommended a new offensive to influence older black voters, according to three people briefed on his presentation. The data showed two clear vulnerabilities for Mr. Biden: his past support for overhauling Social Security, and his authorship of a punitive criminal justice law in the 1990s.

But the suggestion met with resistance. Some senior advisers argued that it wasn’t worth diverting resources from Iowa and New Hampshire, people familiar with the campaign’s deliberations said. Others pressed Mr. Tulchin on what kind of message, exactly, would make voters rethink their support for the most loyal ally of the first black president.

Crucially, both Mr. Sanders and his wife, Jane, consistently expressed reservations about going negative on Mr. Biden, preferring to stick with the left-wing policy message they have been pressing for 40 years.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/elections-2020/how-it-all-came-apart-for-bernie-sanders/ar-BB11uW8I?ocid=msedgdhp

Well worth reading.

[relayerbob]

1. I've heard before about them not wanting to go negative

While this is admirable, by allowing to occur, and doing it themselves, they have demonstrated the inability to make big, bold decisions. Going negative is the lower energy, lower class way to go, and demonstrates that they made poor personnel decisions, and are not able to readjust effectively under changing conditions. This all fits in the category of poor leadership qualities. While Sanders has many good policy ideas, in the end, it was his demonstrated poor leadership skills that led me to other candidates.

[Happy Hoosier]

27. But they DID go negative... officially and even more so unofficially. NT

[Jim_S]

2. The Sad Thing Is,

The orange anal blister's campaign won't hesitate to go negative and bring up all those past issues that could be very problomatic in the general election. It wasn't Bernie's style to do that, and it cost him.

[videohead5]

7. Biden has Trump's budget

In black and white he can hit Trump over the head with. The cuts to social security, Medicare and Medicaid. If he brings up the crime bill he can hit Trump with the Central Park Five.

[Hav]

19. But it was Bernie's style

As soon as he started losing, he went negative and and made ads with exactly the kind of points that the article mentioned.

[marble falls]

3. They got this right ...

"Crucially, both Mr. Sanders and his wife, Jane, consistently expressed reservations about going negative on Mr. Biden, preferring to stick with the left-wing policy message they have been pressing for 40 years."

I was so disappointed over everybody jumping Biden instead of Trump.

We needed a message of what was wrong with Trumps programs. And Joe and Bernie got it right.

[msongs]

4. good leaders adapt and change with the reality of the times nt

[The Magistrate]

5. Sanders Is Negative, Sir

For Sanders to refrain from negative campaigning, he would have to fire most of his aides and surrogates, and denounce publicly as fools and frauds his most dedicated supporters. All he has ever done is try and posture as above what his claque says, and campaign for the destruction of the 'Democratic Establishment'. Which of course includes any prominent Democrat holding or seeking office.




"When things are not called by their right names, what is said cannot make sense. When what is said does not make sense, what is planned cannot succeed. When plans do not succeed, people become uneasy. When people are uneasy, punishments do not fit crimes. When punishments do not fit crimes, people cannot know where to put hand or foot."

[wyldwolf]

6. Was his pollster Mr. Obvious?

Everyone who is anyone was predicting Sanders would fizzle. I'm surprised he didn't get the word before January.

[George II]

8. It is a good read, but a bit misleading (not by you, William)....

Of the two points brought up:

1. Biden didn't support "overhauling" Social Security, but make relatively minor changes to it - changes that from time to time even Sanders advocated.

2. Although Biden did author the bill, Sanders (in the House at the time) voted for the bill.

It could be that they didn't "go negative" because that could have backfired considering Sanders' record on both issues.

Parenthetically, after the bill was passed it was noted that the penalties for the two types of cocaine were inconsistent. Accordingly Democrats in 1995 proposed to lessen the penalty for crack cocaine to that of powder cocaine. Sanders balked at that - instead he wanted to RAISE the penalty for powder cocaine to that of crack cocaine, effectively strengthening the penalties in the bill that Democrats wanted to weaken.

This may be another reason why the Sanders campaign didn't want to "go negative" - it would have exposed glaring faults in his positions on the 1994 Crime Bill.

[William769]

9. I agree but after last night I am afraid to offer anything more than the article.

[George II]

10. .

[NurseJackie]

17. ...

[The Magistrate]

12. He Voted For The Bill Himself, Sir, Into The Bargain

'Don't vote for him, he voted just like me!' is a pretty poor line of attack. Oh, Sanders had his 'reasons' for casting that vote, but he he cast it, and those 'reasons' don't matter a tinker's damn against that. Hard as it is to remember now, a good deal of support for that bill came from leaders in the black community, where many certainly felt themselves menaced by increasingly violent crime. Such men and women may be forgiven for failing to forsee how police would treat it as carte blanche for assault on young black men in general.




"When things are not called by their right names, what is said cannot make sense. When what is said does not make sense, what is planned cannot succeed. When plans do not succeed, people become uneasy. When people are uneasy, punishments do not fit crimes. When punishments do not fit crimes, people cannot know where to put hand or foot."

[betsuni]

33. Yes.

And they already used the crime bill.

[BlueIdaho]

11. What happened was

The voters chose Biden and not Sanders. It’s time we listen to the voters and move forward.

[TomCADem]

13. Bernie campaign slams Warren as candidate of the elite

This inside story is undercut by the fact that Bernie repeatedly goes negative. He even went negative on Elizabeth Warren. Bernie primary message is to attack the character of his opponents to suggest that they are motivated by personal greed or are agents of the "establishment."

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/11/bernie-quietly-goes-negative-on-warren-097594

DES MOINES, Iowa — The nonaggression pact between Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren is seriously fraying.

Sanders’ campaign has begun stealthily attacking Warren as a candidate of the upper crust who could not expand the Democratic base in a general election, according to talking points his campaign is using to sway voters and obtained by POLITICO.

The script instructs Sanders volunteers to tell voters leaning toward the Massachusetts senator that the “people who support her are highly-educated, more affluent people who are going to show up and vote Democratic no matter what” and that “she's bringing no new bases into the Democratic Party.”


“I like Elizabeth Warren. [optional]” the script begins. “In fact, she’s my second choice. But here’s my concern about her.” It then pivots to the criticisms of Warren.

[FM123]

30. As a supporter of Elizabeth Warren, I got to tell you - that stung.

“I like Elizabeth Warren. [optional]” the script begins. “In fact, she’s my second choice. But here’s my concern about her.” It then pivots to the criticisms of Warren.

[Gothmog]

14. Interesting article

Link to tweet

?s=20

[showblue22]

15. Except his campaign did go hard negative.

Bernie's campaign did use SS and the crime bill. Also, his campaign staff were retweeting accounts that were talking about Joe and "dementia." Pretty low and negative if you ask me.

[TomCADem]

16. BS Likes to Push a False Equivalency Between Republicans and Democrats

BS will use his campaign as a pretext to attack and undermine the Democratic party.

Link to tweet

[showblue22]

18. "THEY can't stop us."

Yes. He lumps us together with repukes. It's insulting. As a proud democrat, I feel insulted. It's part of the reason he lost. He kept insulting us.

[George II]

22. Yes. To him it's always "them against us".

[George II]

21. Yes, while on the surface he was "playing nice", his upper staffers - Turner, Sirota, Gray - were...

...relentless on twitter and other social media, repeating almost hourly for weeks the phony "Biden wants to cut SS", "Biden wrote the Crime Bill", and their latest "Biden will veto medicare for all".

[showblue22]

26. He has a different definition of negative.

[ucrdem]

24. Big time.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/04/sanders-kicks-new-phase-campaign-ad-blitz-challenging-biden-march-primary-states

[Gothmog]

20. Cynthia Nixon was dispatched to Florida??

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

[showblue22]

25. WTF does Cynthia Nixon have in common with the Latino community?

I'm glad he lost. Can you imagine him running the WH like this?

[Gothmog]

38. You and I are not the only people confused by this

Link to tweet

[showblue22]

39. Exactly!

Good god!

[ucrdem]

23. He went negative on Hillary with NAFTA TV ads in Michigan and she lost the state to Trump.

Bernie's 2016 Michigan ad:

He had two negative Biden ads, a similar one on NAFTA and another one on SS, running for weeks in battleground states, including Michigan, until this week in fact:

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/04/sanders-kicks-new-phase-campaign-ad-blitz-challenging-biden-march-primary-states

"reservations about going negative on Mr. Biden"? Oh please. It's SOP.

p.s. When looking for Bernie's 2016 NAFTA ad I came across one very similar to it -- except that it's a 2016 Trump ad:

[LizBeth]

28. Interesting article, something left out. He did not win Iowa and tied NH showing he did not have

ability for the landslide he projected, expected. Took off the glow immediately. The black vote in SC spoke. Amy and Pete and Beto getting behind Biden in Texas.

[showblue22]

29. Did he see winning as him getting revenge on democrats?

"Mr. Sanders was not interested in moving in that direction. Some advisers, who endured the divisive 2016 campaign, believed that it was only after seizing a dominant advantage that Mr. Sanders could attempt to make peace with a Democratic establishment that remained intensely wary of him."

[Gothmog]

31. Bernie was so sure he was going to beat Biden that he campaigned in Klobouchar and Warren's states

Link to tweet

[ucrdem]

32. Right, I remember that, just before Super Tuesday.

It seemed so supremely tacky, especially after blowing off the march in Selma that weekend. Welp, he got his ass handed to him, and no one can say he didn't earn it.

[Cha]

35. Right! That was some just desserts!

TY, Goth!

[Cha]

34. Mahalo, Bill.. it was interesting to read the authors' perspective..

Mr. Sanders proved unable to expand his base well beyond the left or to win over African-Americans in meaningful numbers. He failed to heed warnings from traditional party leaders, and even from within his campaign, about the need to modulate his message and unify Democrats. He allowed internal arguments to fester within his campaign, an ungainly operation that fragmented into factions beneath the only two real decision makers — Mr. Sanders and his wife, Jane.

So much for "internal polling".. And Mahalo James Clyburn and all the GOTV..like Vivica A Fox!

In an email sent to Mr. Sanders and a group of senior aides, Mr. Tulchin reminded the senator that their internal polling had him trailing Mr. Biden by only four points. Two days later, the former vice president would win South Carolina by nearly 30 points.

We Told him.. Keep it up!

I was Mr. Sanders’s persistent lashing of the “political establishment” that concerned Representative Peter Welch, a liberal Democrat and fellow Vermonter who was one of just a few members of Congress to endorse Mr. Sanders’s campaign.

Ooops.. bern notice guy...

In private Mr. Sanders’s campaign went further, according to two people familiar with the internal turmoil. As punishment for stirring the controversy, Mr. Sirota, who is based in Colorado, was barred from traveling for the campaign outside of visits to its Washington headquarters.

No can do..

Pushing Mr. Sanders to reach out to “establishment Democrats” whom he regularly taunted was even tougher — despite the best efforts of even some of his staunchest supporters on the left. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez repeatedly urged the campaign to broaden Mr. Sanders’s message and seek out new allies, outside his familiar base. (In a statement, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez denied any “tension or major disagreements” with Mr. Sanders.)

BS "knew who to blame".. no self reflection.. There's that word again.. "ESTABLISMENT".. deal!

After being routed across the country, Mr. Sanders knew who to blame in an appearance on ABC’s “This Week.”

“What the establishment wanted was to make sure that people coalesced around Biden and try to defeat me,” Mr. Sanders said. “So that’s not surprising.”

[Gothmog]

36. It seems that even the sanders have now realized that Sirota is toxic

Link to tweet

[Scurrilous]

37. '...expressed reservations about going negative on Mr. Biden...'

Remember this? Q: who was the first to sign this? Remember? Ran around yelling 'first.' Who was first to break this? Hint: It's the same person for both.

We must defeat Donald Trump. The first step is a primary contest that produces a strong Democratic nominee. The second step is winning the general election. We will not accept anything less. To ensure this outcome, I pledge to:

Make the primary constructive. I’ll respect the other candidates and make the primary election about inspiring voters with my vision for the future.

ally behind the winner. I’ll support the ultimate Democratic nominee, whomever it is — period. No Monday morning quarterbacking. No third-party threats. Immediately after there’s a nominee, I’ll endorse.

Do the work to beat Trump. I will do everything in my power to make the Democratic Nominee the next President of the United States. As soon as there is a nominee, I will put myself at the disposal of the campaign.

https://pledge.indivisible.org/

[Renew Deal]

40. There is little new in there for most DUers

But it is still a good documentation of events.