It’s fucking stupid that you draw the line on who is your enemy and who is your friend at Elizabeth Warren.
I’m as Bernie or bust as the next guy but I don’t think this is correct. People can be persuaded to act in their own material interest, and the Overton window can be shifted rapidly (look at how many Biden voters like M4A, which was anathema even 4 years ago for instance).
The problem was strategic. Bernie gambled that old school grassroots movement building (albeit more modern and data-driven) would be sufficient to overcome the media influence on the most active cohort of voters (olds). He was wrong. Might have been able to guess that from Trumps success in 2016, but he/we didn’t. Trumps success is 100% down to his being a very effective media whore. He manipulates the press effectively and he puts old eyeballs on screens. Bernie doesn’t.
Super Tuesday proved unequivocally that dominating ‘earned’ media is enough. I didn’t think it would be, and maybe as the TV generation ages out of the electorate it won’t be anymore, but for now it is.
In retrospect, Bernie should have made for better TV. His very effective 19th century campaign wasn’t effective enough to win this fight.
Long term, though, it may be effective in getting some of the policy goals in place, which is more important than winning one election. The work of building an actual left here is arguably more important than winning right now. There’s a nonzero chance Bernie was always running as movement building as much as to win. In which case, his ‘bad’ choices may be the right ones for the long term.
There is space to the right of socialists and to the left of establishment centrist moderate Democrats. Either you agree with that statement and can name Democrats who fit there or you disagree with that statement.
I don’t buy into the “if you are not with us then you are against us” mentality, so I find Warren to exist in that space.
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Man, people, suck everywhere and yes, we get the leaders we deserve. This is still the armchair coaching thread though, yeah?
This is the same worldview of those that believe racism is binary.
Or Bernie drops out early, endorses Warren, and she gets branded Pink Commie Scum.
I mean, alex is up there posting Zuckerburg crying like that hasn’t been my point.
Oh, it’s a joke. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, what a knee-slapper!
You said, and I quote, “I voted for Sanders in the primary, THOUGH HE WASN’T MY INITIAL FIRST CHOICE”. (Caps are mine)
There is, was, and has been only one decent choice. When you combine this with your extensive history ITT of spewing forth every centrist argument known to man, the rational conclusion is that you are either lying or you have no idea who you are.
In all your other posts you make Neera Tanden look like Che Guevara. What are we supposed to think?
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Some of it just boils down to luck and being dependent on how other people do things. Do the centrists fail to coalesce if the New York Times doesn’t boost Klobuchar with a half-endorsement because Buttigieg does better at her expense and refuses to get behind Biden? Does Bloomberg entering the race earlier and contesting the early states wound Biden enough to make him drop out before South Carolina? Or does that give Warren a chance to emasculate him while she was still up in the polls and cement her position in the race?
There’s no guaranteed Nash equilibrium strategy in a GTO analysis of multi-player games. There were a lot of bad choices made based on inaccurate assumptions about how other players act.
Bernie’s campaign was run in a manner that assumed that centrists wouldn’t coalesce behind a single candidate before Super Tuesday. That they did (and I don’t think there was anything unethical about Buttigieg and Klobuchar dropping out when they did) doesn’t mean that Bernie’s strategy was wrong. It may have been the strategy that gave him the best chance of winning and he was just unlucky that circumstances gave other candidates a reason to drop out in a way that was harmful to his chances.
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I don’t take issue with what you wrote, but I don’t see how that renders my argument incorrect. I wasn’t trying to argue a Grand Unified Theory of why Bernie lost. I’m definitely well-aware that most people don’t vote according to how their ideology matches with x candidate. In fact, my main argument (made in other posts I’ve made, but not that one) mirrors yours! They’re mutually compatible.
Edit: re-reading my post and I don’t blame you for thinking this was my primary argument. I came a bit strong with it, using imprecise language
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I’m not sure it was a “gamble” to risk his campaign on having record under 35 turnout fueled by grassroots voters and organization a la Obama. It was just the only way he could win and the fact that he didn’t even break 08 levels was basically a death sentence for the campaign.
To complete the analogy you would need Warren supporters saying she lost because she was too awesome. No strategic, political or campaign errors at all.
One of them is a self-identified socialist. One of them in the Year of Our Lord 2020 said she is a “capitalist to my bones”.
I am a person who wants to dismantle the overtly inhumane and evil economic system known as capitalism. So it seems to be a pretty logically placed line!
Also, Ben Simmons is a massively overrated scrub who doesn’t know that 3 is more than 2 and will never sniff a ring as long as he and the vastly superior Embiid are on the same team. So take that!
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Furthermore, let’s imagine it wasn’t refuted. A lot of this “they’re identical, therefore…” seems to flow in one direction.
I know Goldfish Brain is an epidemic but I remember way back in late summer/early fall of '19 the plan was whichever of the two gained traction would garner support from the other and progressives would back him or her. Not only did much change in six months, Warrenites can’t seem to recall anything that happened in those six months.
It’s all like,
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Liz makes billionaires cry.
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???
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Go Joe!
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I’m open to the argument that Warren lost because Bernie was right about a woman not being able to winand she misunderstood that he was talking about the primaries, specific to 2020, and not the general election.
I obviously don’t think she is blameless, and as someone who was basically indifferent between Warren and Bernie, I am literally posting in this thread trying to figure out what went wrong. This primary should have been a lay-up for the left. The rift between them and the ensuing collapse of the progressive wing of the party seems like a good place to start.
Yes and why didn’t this happen? I mean I know Liz is a snake but are all her supporters snakes too?
Sure. And Bernie and Liz certainly made mistakes. But holy shit so did Biden.
You’re right. It’s our fault. Not yours. Over and over again.
I like many others here was Warren first but switched. You are minimizing her errors too much. They were significant and it’s completely fair to switch for those reasons.