Wait until the Republicans go after Bernie

[Onlooker]

To tell you the truth, the Hillary campaign has been pretty gentle on Bernie. Yes, they've attacked him on gun control and on being disloyal to Obama, but by and large they have held their fire. In fact, so has Bernie. Like Hillary, he has let others do his bidding when it comes to negative politics. The Bernie campaign has painted Hillary as some right-wing avaricious militarist. The Hillary campaign has not tried to paint such an ugly portrait of Bernie, except perhaps as a pie-in-the-sky idealist.

But, indeed, Hillary has certainly been attacked far more than Bernie. The right and left portray heras dishonest, turn the harmless email scandal into a traitorous act, turned her support for the Arab Spring into support for ISIS, labeled her as homophobic, even suggested she was an active racist. These over the top attacks on her have certainly weakened her, to Bernie's and the Republicans' advantage.

But, Bernie has hardly been attacked by the right wing. They want him to be the Democratic nominee because they think once they start their attacks on him, he will be more vulnerable than Hillary. If they thought he was bigger threat, quite obviously they would have already started attacking him.

So, if Bernie is the nominee, what will the right blow out of proportion and turn against him? I think they will use a number of different facts. Again, their challenge will not be to report the truth, but make their interpretation of the facts into the truth, just as the right and left have done to Hillary with her email troubles and the fall of Qadaffi.

I think the right wing will do the following against Bernie, but again I want to underscore that to liberals most of these things things are good, harmless, or at worst easily forgiven, but Republicans are not going to go after the liberal vote.
- They'll use his new-found progressive views on gun control to prove he is inconsistent, anti-gun, and can't be trusted.
- They'll make the Veterans scandal in which 40 or more people died while Bernie was heading the Senate VA committee into his Benghazi or worse, and use his statements defending the system to cast doubt about his competency.
- They'll bring up his support for the stealth bomber (which was important to the state of VT) as evidence he's just another opportunistic, wasteful politician.
- They'll argue that by putting family members on his campaign payroll he was corrupt.
- They'll play up to middle America his comments that are sympathetic to Castro and the Sandinistas to suggest that he is not a real American, and they absolutely engage in red-baiting.
- They will exploit his foreign policy ideas and inexperience by playing on fears of terrorism. They will use that to point out that he was a conscientious objector on religious grounds during the Vietnam war so as to appeal to independents.
- They will also find subtle ways to bring up that Bernie is Jewish and has a child out of wedlock to pull Mormons and others who might consider Bernie back into the fold.
- They will bring up the fact that he has no experience in the private sector in a way that suggests he can't relate to most Americans.
- And God knows what else they will find in the record that they can distort in the worst ways.

Consider how many Bernie supporters now believe that Hillary Clinton, who actually has a track record to the left of Obama, is everything from a neocon to a Wall Street lacky. If Bernie supporters can be fooled that easily, just imagine how easy it will be to fool Trump supporters.

The reason the Republicans are not attacking Bernie are the same as the reasons the Democrats are hardly attacking Trump or Cruz. Everyone wants to run against the candidate they think is weakest. That doesn't mean that Bernie is the weaker candidate, it just means that the Republicans think so.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

1. That's nothing when compared to what they have on Hillary

Don't worry they won't dare to go after him

[Trust Buster]

2. Republicans ignore Sanders. Why waste political ammo on him ?

[SamKnause]

3. Bring it on.

[SHRED]

4. If Donald and Hillary become the nominees

He will be the anti-establishment candidate and Hillary will represent the establishment.

Far more damaging than anything you listed.

[astrophuss42]

5. Also, the primaries aren't over yet. I mean, agree to disagree on that point if you want............

[yourpaljoey]

6. Please include a side of hash when serving up nonsense... and a large glass of

pffft!

[GreatGazoo]

7. Sanders: 34 years of elected office Hillary: 8

Sanders: 11 elections
Hillary: 2 elections

The real problem for those attacking Sanders is they have nothing to work with. People don't go around trying to change the captions on 50 year old photos if they have something better.

They don't.

[Kittycat]

12. +1000

If they had it, they would have sunk him. Because HRC is the weaker candidate, and they can't wait to not only tear her apart, but Bill, and get back at them both for years of lent up hatred. There's no love for them except on the neocon bomb the Middle East circle.

[Politicalboi]

8. Let them

They have NOTHING on him and EVERYTHING on Hillary. Bring it on!!!!!

[randr]

9. Hillary will end up on the trash pile of history

as fast as the whole Bush clan.
Does anyone really think the Clintons can do better than Jeb etal?
Bernie can attract far more Trumpites than Hillary will lose Democrats.

[Broward]

10. Someone's being fooled alright, nt.

[GreenPartyVoter]

11. Wait until Bernie goes after them!

[arcane1]

13. You seem eager to invent right wing attacks on Bernie. And they're lame ones.

And they will fail

[WDIM]

14. Hillary Clintons record proves she is a neocon

and a wall street lacky.

The only thing responsible for making people think that is Hillary's actions.

Her record of aggression in the Middle East and Destabilizing the ME is crystal clear.

Her record of taking money from the war profiteers and foreign dictators is crystal clear.

Her record of taking money from Wall Street and protecting corrupt billionaires is crystal clear.

Her elitist artistocratic mentality that she can do no wrong and that she is above the rules and laws that apply to others is crystal clear.

If the shoe fits wear it.

[Onlooker]

15. You fell for it. LOL.

He record in support of the Arab Spring is positive; her record on the Iraq War is not as simple as you seem to think; her record on taking money from foreign dictator is equally complex as the Clinton Foundation has done a lot of good work in oppressive countries; her record on protecting billionaires is mainstream, but certainly not right wing. Her elitist aristocratic mentality that she can do no wrong is no different than Bernie who acts like he's god's gift to this world. But, as I said, if Bernie supporters can be fooled by political distortions, imagine how easy it will be to fool Trump supporters about Bernie. But, thanks for posting talking points. It's great you have them memorized, but too bad you don't have them analyzed. Bernie is better than Hillary, but their differences are not nearly as great as what you claim.

[WDIM]

20. You have fallen for it and its no laughing matter.

The Arab Spring was a failure due to her action and inaction and SOS. Egypt is in chaos and producing new terrorist, Libya is in chaos and producing new terrorist, Syria is in chaos and producing new terrorist, Yemen is in chaos and producing new terrorist. Iraq is in chaos on and on.

Its no political distortion it is reality. Boeing and the Saudis paid her off to approve weapons deals.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/05/hillary-clinton-foundation-state-arms-deals

This article as the best critique I've seen of her record as SOS.
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/14401-hillary-clintons-legacy-as-secretary-of-state

Hillary Clinton leaves her position as Secretary of State with a legacy of supporting autocratic regimes and occupation armies, opposing enforcement of international humanitarian law, undermining arms control and defending military solutions to complex political problems.

During the Arab Spring, Clinton pushed for stronger US support for pro-Western dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Bahrain, as well as the Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara. She successfully convinced the initially critical White House to support the right-wing golpistas in Honduras, who ousted that country's democratically-elected government in 2009.

One illustrative case comes in her support for the autocratic monarchy in Morocco, which she has praised for having "women's rights protected and expanded." The reality for women in Morocco and Moroccan-occupied Western Sahara, however, is very different. For example, Article 475 of the Moroccan penal code absolves the rapist if he consents to marrying his rape victim. Just weeks after Clinton praised the Moroccan regime for its record on women's rights, Amina Filali, a 16-year old Moroccan girl - who had been raped at the age of 15 and forced to marry her rapist, who subsequently battered and abused her - burned herself to death. Similarly, it was not long after a previous visit to Morocco, where she praised that autocratic monarchy's human rights record, that the regime illegally expelled Aminatou Haidar, known as the Saharan Gandhi, for her leadership in the nonviolent resistance struggle to the illegal Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara. Haidar - a winner of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award and other honors for her nonviolent activism, and who had previously spent years in Moroccan prisons, where she was repeatedly tortured - went on a month-long hunger strike that almost killed her before Morocco relented to international pressure and allowed her to return to her country.

Her IRW vote was complex, her taking money from brutal dictators is complex, typical Clinton apologist talking points.

There is no distortion of Hillary Clinton she is who she is and anyone with two eyes can see it.

[vkkv]

16. Bernie has not accepted any Lockheed Martin contributions.

While members of Congress have received over $8 million collectively from the F-35’s manufacturer since 2001, Bernie has not accepted any Lockheed Martin contributions.

The F-35 Lightning II is a single-engine, single-seat, stealth fighter plane produced by Lockheed Martin, which advertises the aircraft as advanced and affordable, and crucial to maintaining air superiority as U.S. fleets get smaller and older. It has been called the most expensive weapons system in the world.

The major point of controversy is that the project has not been as efficient as Lockheed Martin promised. The cost of the planned 2,457 planes totals $391.1 billion dollars, which is almost twice the initial estimate. In addition, there have been numerous delays and malfunctions during testing.

As such, the F-35 has been the subject of criticism from politicians and government reports. An April 2015 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report notes that “the [F-35] program has experienced significant cost, schedule, and performance problems.”


So is it true that Bernie supports the F-35?
Yes and no. The idea that Bernie supports the F-35 program stems from his positive reception to part of the F-35 fleet being stationed in Vermont.

Nonetheless, Bernie is highly concerned “about cost overruns on the plane.” In June 2014, Bernie called the F-35 program “incredibly wasteful.” Ultimately, however, Bernie realizes that the plane is going to be a reality, and concluded that “as long as the F-35 is deployed anywhere, I believe we should strive to protect the Vermont Air National Guard’s mission and maintain hundreds of jobs here in Vermont.”

[Punkingal]

17. Let them go a it.

[NorthCarolina]

18. What I want to know is

what exactly did Wall Street fork over millions of dollars to Hillary to hear from her? Has she given any updated info on when she will be releasing her Wall Street speech transcripts?

[Viva_La_Revolution]

19. clinton found nothing or she would have used it already

What are they gonna find that she couldn't?

[WDIM]

21. If those are the best attacks you can come up with Bernie is definately the better candidate.

- They'll use his new-found progressive views on gun control to prove he is inconsistent, anti-gun, and can't be trusted.
They already do that with Hillary and Obama. The attack hasn't worked except for their base that would never vote democrat.

- They'll bring up his support for the stealth bomber (which was important to the state of VT) as evidence he's just another opportunistic, wasteful politician. The Republicans support the Stealth Bomber. They never met a Bomber they didn't like.

- They'll argue that by putting family members on his campaign payroll he was corrupt.
The republicans do this as well

- They'll play up to middle America his comments that are sympathetic to Castro and the Sandinistas to suggest that he is not a real American, and they absolutely engage in red-baiting.
The will engage in Red-baiting and call him a socialist. But so far that attack has not worked. People that support Bernie understand what social democracy means. And if anybody can make a strong case for social democracy it is Bernie. But, Billionaire exploiter Donald Trump up against Bernie Sanders it will be the best thing to ever happen to social democracy in this country.

- They will exploit his foreign policy ideas and inexperience by playing on fears of terrorism. They will use that to point out that he was a conscientious objector on religious grounds during the Vietnam war so as to appeal to independents.
Trumps foreign policy is much more disastrous, Trump also has no experience and did not go to Vietnam. Bernie Sanders opposition to Vietnam only shows his foresight to not supporting disastrous wars of aggression just like his IWR vote. He was correct to not fight in Vietnam nobody should of been forced to.

- They will also find subtle ways to bring up that Bernie is Jewish and has a child out of wedlock to pull Mormons and others who might consider Bernie back into the fold.
Trump also has child out of wedlock and multiple divorces. Don't be anti-Semitic!

- They will bring up the fact that he has no experience in the private sector in a way that suggests he can't relate to most Americans.
Which would be a lie. He has been a teacher, a carpenter, a writer etc. I think his type of jobs are very representative of most Americans.

[Arkansas Granny]

22. And every anti-Sanders ad would be played out against a red background emblazoned with

the hammer and sickle emblem. They would really play on the socialist/communist link.