FWIW, I voted for Bernie in the MA primary and ended up kind of regretting it in June when he hadn’t conceded and I was seeing top-of-reddit stories every day that were blatantly false in the Sanders reddit. I felt like the campaign was encouraging this fervor by inaction, if nothing else. Even though Bernie himself in interviews was generally understated.
It’s made me a bit nervous about supporting a similar candidate coming from slightly outside the Democratic party in the future.
Jeff Weaver was responsible for most of that. Of course, Bernie was ultimately responsible in that he should have fired that guy wayyyy earlier.
Ultimately I only blame Bernie himself for making the same assumption that so many others did – of course Clinton would win, so of course now was the best time to pressure to change the platform.
Clinton’s great failure was to see the rise of Bernie essentially as an outlier, and then stay the course. Her bitterness about this to me shows that she felt this conclusion is still true, and her failure to strongly campaign in Bernie-heavy states seems like a true miscalculation and mistake and really a misapprehension of what was going on in the world politically. And honestly, still does.
Clinton’s advisers were right in that the only thing Democrats in heavily Republican states can do is send money - those votes are wasted. 70%/30% vs 57/43% is exactly the same loss. But they did not conceive that they might lose in marginal states. In almost every case the margin of loss was within the 3rd party vote, and this time almost all the 3rd party candidates were pulling Democratic voters. The idea that she should have had an uncontested nomination and the convention essentially her self-anointment seems to be a true character flaw that drove/still drives her detractors mad - that she had earned the nomination and that everyone needed to get behind her, because (conveniently) Republicans.
IMO Clinton’s great failure was thinking that “my opponent is a sociopathic narcissistic grifter whose campaign promises are either transparently false or openly xenophobic” was a sufficient argument for electing her.
It was a sufficient argument, but the electorate was too irrational to be swayed by it.
It’s not Clinton’s fault that Trump is president. It’s the American people’s. At least she stood up to the fucker.
This is patently false, the largest third party vote getter was Gary Johnson, in almost every single state.
That draws more from the GOP than Dems.
Turns out to win elections, you can’t be hated by over half the populace.
Is it a fair hatred? Probably not, but that’s irrelevant. Democracy isn’t fair, don’t run people that no one likes if you want to win.
Really? Gary Johnson was a former Republican. And also, at this point, a pothead by profession. I’ve tried digging around here but can’t find exact numbers. It seems like there is more overlap between Sander and Johnson voters than Clinton and Johnson or Trump and Johnson, though.
The real problem is that message doesn’t actually matter. Even candidate doesn’t actually matter. For those who play team sports, it’s all about the jersey. And Republicans are basically playing sports games and their voters are the cheering crowds. That’s why it doesn’t matter if policy changes on a dime or is hypocritical or contradictory, as long as Our Side wins.
I will flat out state this is false. By your own statement Johnson is a former Republican, running as a Libertarian. Economically he certainly draws more from Republican voters.
I couldn’t find great post election results, but polls from the time of the conventions show, clearly, that Johnson had almost no support from Sanders voters.
Obviously, towards the end, most of the dissidents even voted Clinton. Party unanimity usually forms later, much like it was for Clinton voters in '08.
Interesting. Well, thanks for the correction!
I maintain this to this very day. Hillary Clinton could have ripped an unborn fetus from the womb of an expectant illegal immigrant mother on live television and devoured it whole and still been the patently correct decision for who to vote for as president in 2016.
That our electorate was unable to understand that is one of the most absolute condemnations of a nation I have ever witnessed or read about.
At work, or in life in general, there are times when i Know I am right (and lets assume it isn’t just ego). Then i have to convince other people/co workers that they should support my idea. Sometimes even though my idea is the best, i fail to convince others and we use a worse idea. Now partly they should realize the genius of my idea, and that is their fault, but more importantly i personally failed to convince them. It is my failure, even if my idea is the best.
And Hillary certainly did run a godawful campaign. We’re talking about someone whose main campaign message was about supporting her as a person and NOT about something like helping people in America or making the country great again. We’re talking about someone who did such a poor job that amazingly a lot of people thought Donald Super Corrupt Trump was more in touch with the middle class than her.
Well sure. I mean…women. Amirite?
Or she didn’t, it’s just that most voters in the handful of states that matteted are racist, mysoginist, Fox News watchers.
We’ve covered this shit 100 times before. Her campaign was fine. It could have better, there’s a lot of shit she should have done differently, but it was fine. Everyone, including Hillary, her campaign, and even Trump underestimated what a total piece of shit the average American voter is.
Have a friend who’s read a pre-release version of the book.
Says that easily the vast majority of the book is spent:
And then she does say that because she failed to put away a candidate because of her own shortcomings, it made things close. And with things that close, stuff like Republicans pouncing on Sanders’ attacks and making them their own AND (especially apparently) the Comey October surprise both were way more important in the end than they should’ve been.
But the reaction from the pundit class has jumped on that latter bit and run with it. So it’s like you have a QB after a terrible, close loss taking responsibility for getting sacked, throwing interceptions, and leaving the game close so that a fluke call by a referee ended up being decisive when it shouldn’t have been. And then the next day: “Star QB blames refs for losing game.”
And FWIW, there’s no evidence that Sanders Democrats cost Clinton the election. Sanders supporters who voted Democratic in the past voted for her by a huge margin – as big a margin as Hillary’s supporters voted for Obama in '08. I think any assertion she makes that left-leaning Sanders supporters cost her votes is indeed hogwash. The evidence clearly says “Not the case.”
Man I know you’re joking, but no.
My meaning in that statement is I don’t have to be a Clinton voter to be for democratic values. So no, Hillary, just because I didn’t vote for you in the primary, any judgement you have if me as a voter doesn’t equate me to your enemy, nor the “other side.” Im not sexist, im not Republican, and I’m not trying to sabotage our party. I just didn’t like you, Hillary.
I’m still trying to work up the most tasteless joke I can make about an older woman’s vagaries.
So, you know…
The electorate did shift, and much of that was due to the weaknesses of Dems like Hillary Clinton.
Hillary’s Hot Flash Foible?