Another day, another silly talking point. Friday: REPUBLICANS MAY VOTE IN OUR PRIMARY!!!

[Joe the Revelator]

We've seen this before. It's a lot of sound and fury but nothing more.

Are our memories so short? Do we not remember 'Operation Chaos'?

In late February 2008, Limbaugh announced "Operation Chaos," a political call to action with the initial plan to have voters of the Republican Party temporarily cross over to vote in the Democratic primary and vote for Hillary Clinton, who at the time was in the midst of losing eleven straight primary contests to Barack Obama. Limbaugh has also cited the open primary process in the early primary states of New Hampshire and South Carolina, which allowed independent voters to cross over into the Republican primaries to choose John McCain over more conservative candidates (such as Fred Thompson), as an inspiration.

[libtodeath]

1. This will be the excuse when Bernie wins.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. That and Nevada is not truly minority

[farleftlib]

5. Bingo

You win! They see it coming and they're pre-emptively trying to delegitimize it.

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. Dredging from that is kind of ... What is the word?

Pathetic

[Xipe Totec]

3. Either Democratic candidate will beat the crap out of any Republican candidate so bring it on. nt

[seaotter]

6. That does not appear to be the case

Judging by recent polling.

[Xipe Totec]

9. Oh, noes!

I am verklempt!

[seaotter]

10. You should be.

[Xipe Totec]

12. The Polls have spoken. Let's all go home. The election is over. nt

[seaotter]

14. That does seem to be the Hillary battle cry!!!

Ya walked right into that one.

[Joe the Revelator]

7. Polling says no

[reformist2]

8. I'm more concerned with the superdelegates spoiling the outcome!

[Joe the Revelator]

11. Please do not worry about that. If Bernie wins states...

...and the Superdelegates tip it to Hillary, the party will have much larger issues to tend to.

[Gothmog]

13. Due to the competitive GOP race, Nevada is one of the few states where this trick is possible

Limbaugh's operation chaos was used and was viable in 2008 because McCain had locked up the GOP nomination early on. That is not the case this cycle. Most hard core GOP types are busy fighting over their nominee which is stopping the GOP from attempting an operation chaos this cycle in most states. Nevada is the only state that I know of that has its caucus on different days for each party. The only way that this trick works is because the primaries are on different days.

It is clear that the Nevada GOP wants Sanders to be the nominee The Nevada college republicans are going to cheat and vote in the Democratic caucuses for Sanders because he is the weakest possible Democratic nominee http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/nevada-republicans-eye-electoral-mischief-dem-caucuses

Ralston noted yesterday that “organized” Republican efforts to intervene in the Democratic contest are now underway. This includes College Republicans urging members to support the “socialist” in order to help the GOP candidate “prevail” in November, and coincided with work from a prominent conservative activist in Nevada encouraging Republicans to intervene with a similar message.

Here is the flyer that the Nevada college republicans are using to encourage Nevada college republicans to vote for the socialist



Again and again, it is clear that the GOP and their affiliates want Sanders to be the nominee because he is the weakest possible nominee

[Joe the Revelator]

15. The weakest nominee who polls the best against republicans? That is something else.

Out of this world.

secondly, college republicans are about as powerful and influential as a hang nail. Don't lose any sleep over it.

[Gothmog]

16. Hypothetical match up polls are worthless and should not be relied for anything

Here is a good thread talking about these polls http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511038010

The reliance on these polls by Sanders supporters amuse me. http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/harrys-guide-to-2016-election-polls/

Ignore hypothetical matchups in primary season – they also measure nothing. General election polls before and during the primary season have a very wide margin of error. That’s especially the case for candidates who aren’t even in the race and therefore haven’t been treated to the onslaught of skeptical media coverage usually associated with being the candidate.

Sanders supporters have to rely on these worthless polls because it is clear that Sanders is not viable in a general election where the Kochs will be spending $887 million and the RNC candidate may spend an additional billion dollars.

No one should rely on hypo match up type polls in selecting a nominee at this stage of the race.

[libdem4life]

20. So amuse me as to why are you so sure of your opinion, without polls, that is? Crystal Ball?

Silly me, I have to rely on polls...momentum...excitement at rallies...unsold tickets...listening to people I admire and, yes, agree with etc. to get a kind of a drift.

The Tipping Point is approaching where the will of the people is going to overthrow the 1%ers. History...yeah, our own history, instructs that when the people are not listened to or taken into consideration, they revolt. What you have so aptly described ... Oligarchy ... is not going to fly much longer.

Just wondering how you are So Sure of Your Opinion...without worthless polls, please.

[Gothmog]

17. Bernie Sanders says he polls better against GOP candidates than Hillary Clinton

While I still think that these polls are worthless, I am amused to see that Sanders was found to be misrepresenting these polls and that in fact his claim is not true http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/jan/26/bernie-s/bernie-sanders-says-he-polls-better-against-gop-ca/

In the runup to the Iowa caucus, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has repeatedly said he has a better chance of beating the eventual Republican nominee in the Nov. 8 general election than fellow Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

"Almost all of the polls that -- and polls are polls, they go up, they go down -- but almost all of the polls that have come out suggest that I am a much stronger candidate against the Republicans than is Hillary Clinton," he told voters during a Jan. 19 town hall meeting in Underwood, Iowa.

We took a look at the various national surveys, as compiled by RealClearPolitics and PollingReport.com to see how that assertion stacks up against the data.....

Our ruling

Sanders said, "Almost all of the polls that have come out suggest that I am a much stronger candidate against the Republicans than is Hillary Clinton."

The NBC News/Wall Street Journal national poll released before Sanders' statement supports his claim for Trump, but it has no data against Cruz or Rubio. Earlier polls say he doesn't outperform Clinton at all against Cruz, Rubio or Bush, and the narrow races combined with the margins of error make his contention even more dubious.

Beating Clinton in only two of eight hypothetical matchups is far from "almost all."

The statement is not accurate, so we rate it False.

[Joe the Revelator]

21. A month old article that doesn't take into account current polling....

...isn't a mind changer.

[Gothmog]

18. Democrats would be insane to nominate Sanders

Dana Milbank has some good comments on general election match up polls https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/democrats-would-be-insane-to-nominate-bernie-sanders/2016/01/26/0590e624-c472-11e5-a4aa-f25866ba0dc6_story.html?hpid=hp_opinions-for-wide-side_opinion-card-a%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

Sanders and his supporters boast of polls showing him, on average, matching up slightly better against Trump than Clinton does. But those matchups are misleading: Opponents have been attacking and defining Clinton for a quarter- century, but nobody has really gone to work yet on demonizing Sanders.

Watching Sanders at Monday night’s Democratic presidential forum in Des Moines, I imagined how Trump — or another Republican nominee — would disembowel the relatively unknown Vermonter.

The first questioner from the audience asked Sanders to explain why he embraces the “socialist” label and requested that Sanders define it “so that it doesn’t concern the rest of us citizens.”

Sanders, explaining that much of what he proposes is happening in Scandinavia and Germany (a concept that itself alarms Americans who don’t want to be like socialized Europe), answered vaguely: “Creating a government that works for all of us, not just a handful of people on the top — that’s my definition of democratic socialism.”

But that’s not how Republicans will define socialism — and they’ll have the dictionary on their side. They’ll portray Sanders as one who wants the government to own and control major industries and the means of production and distribution of goods. They’ll say he wants to take away private property. That wouldn’t be fair, but it would be easy. Socialists don’t win national elections in the United States .

Sanders on Monday night also admitted he would seek massive tax increases — “one of the biggest tax hikes in history,” as moderator Chris Cuomo put it — to expand Medicare to all. Sanders, this time making a comparison with Britain and France, allowed that “hypothetically, you’re going to pay $5,000 more in taxes,” and declared, “W e will raise taxes, yes we will.” He said this would be offset by lower health-insurance premiums and protested that “it’s demagogic to say, oh, you’re paying more in taxes.”

Well, yes — and Trump is a demagogue.

Sanders also made clear he would be happy to identify Democrats as the party of big government and of wealth redistribution. When Cuomo said Sanders seemed to be saying he would grow government “bigger than ever,” Sanders didn’t quarrel, saying, “P eople want to criticize me, okay,” and “F ine, if that’s the criticism, I accept it.”

Sanders accepts it, but are Democrats ready to accept ownership of socialism, massive tax increases and a dramatic expansion of government? If so, they will lose.

Match up polls are worthless because these polls do not measure what would happen to Sanders in a general election where Sanders is very vulnerable to negative ads.

[jillan]

19. This is very concerning because there are Republicans that support Bernie. So their vote

can be challenged?

This is not right.
If there is a problem with Nevada's registration process, then they need to deal with it, but to deny people the right to vote for the candidate of their choice is undemocratic!!

Will there be shenanigans? Probably but this is a caucus! You have to commit to 2-3 hours on a Saturday afternoon to caucus in Nevada. Do people really think a whole lot of goppers are going to do this? Seriously?

Sounds to me like someone is looking for a preemptive excuse.

[Lucinda]

22. Those that switch and caucus for him will be fine as long as they don't vote a second time. n/t