Picking a winning candidate does not make you a "winner" or a "cool kid"

[Armstead]

Just a reminder for those inclined to hubris and a sense of arrogance and superiority because of the fortunes of a candidate one has decided to support.

That is all.

[rock]

1. But it does feel good

[Armstead]

6. Feeling good is fine

Behaving like a butthole is being a butthole

[Squinch]

2. Actually, picking a winning candidate DOES make you a winner. By definition.

[Armstead]

7. It means you selected a candidate that may be a winner

No reflection on any other attributes of the picker

Just as buying a winning lottery ticket has no bearing on ones entrepreneurial abilities.

[Squinch]

20. If one buys a winning lottery ticket, one has won. Therefore one is called a winner.

You guys pick the weirdest stuff to complain about.

[Armstead]

21. I don't think complaining when people behave arrogently....

Is weird...especially when they have nothing to be arrogent about.

[Squinch]

22. You are complaining because people who win are called winners.

[Armstead]

24. Naw...I'm just getting sick of all the "sore winner" crap going on

A voter is not a winner if they support a winning candidate.

They might be a winner because of their own achievements, personal relationships...or whatever measurement one chooses to determine individual success.

The might be a loser for the same reasons. Or somewhere in between (the most common category).

But none of that gives a person the right to behave smug and superior if they choose to support a particular political candidate. There seems to be a lot of that going around.

[Squinch]

28. Aaaaaaand your circular argument has gone back to the starting point. Go 'head. You keep

schooling everyone in a website on correct deportment if that makes you happy.

No matter that the Sanders supporters have ben trashing and stalking and censoring people right and left for months. You're being bullied by "smugness" and you need to fight back!

[Armstead]

30. I'm venting but if you want to call it "schooling" feel free.

[mythology]

38. As opposed to the sore loser thing you've got going?

You can't honestly complain about some people who support Clinton being smug and superior without at least mentioning that some Sanders supporters are equally smug and superior.

[Armstead]

39. I'll admit it...I've been guilty of it at times too

Happy now?

[Kalidurga]

3. I rarely pick winners

I voted for Bill Clinton once in 1992. I voted for Lenora Fulani once. I voted for Jill Stein once. I voted for Al Gore. So, for me it's not about voting for who I think will win. That's not what voting is about. It's supposedly sending a message. My vote for Lenora was as close to a no confidence vote as we are allowed in our system.

[Tarc]

4. I backed Dean in 04 and Hillary in 08

It's nice to be right from the get-go for a change.

[Armstead]

8. That's fine

Just remember it doesn't transform you as a person

Your choices lost previously. Doesn't mean you were a loser then. If your choice wins this time, you are still the same person.

[treestar]

5. Ironic in that

At the beginning there were some DU posts depending on this concept. Bernie was to win big in the early states and that would create momentum, because everyone likes a winner.

[Armstead]

9. Not ironic at all. People do gravitate to winners. Doesn't make them winners themselves

[treestar]

13. Of course not

Though if they were working on the campaign they might feel a We Won sort of jubilation.

[Armstead]

18. Nothing wrong with "we won" jubulation

But "our candidate won so we're better than you losers, and your candidate really sucks" is a different matter.

[senz]

10. When you don't give a damn about people, issues, the direction the country is taking,

it's very easy to turn politics into a sport with no content, no content whatsoever.

Some call it emptiness.

Some call it "fun."

[TheBlackAdder]

11. In one's mind it does. Politics share common brain centers with religion and sports teams.

[insta8er]

12. We are in the Kardashian age, this is what it amounts to...wanting to be part of the rich bunch.

[KingFlorez]

14. And you don't win by losing

That is all.

[Armstead]

16. Yes you do...If you're committed to something larger losing is merely a setback

[wildeyed]

15. OK.

But it is still fun to win

[Armstead]

17. Long as you keep it in perspective

[wildeyed]

19. Yeah.

I was already a cool kid before this election, so it is easy for me to stay grounded.

But seriously. I have no desire to rub anything in anyone's face. Except for the one who called me "old-assed". And anyone who called me a Republican. I might face-rub them a little. But they fully deserve it

[DrDan]

23. actually it works both ways - picking a candidate supported by your demographic does not make you

a "winner" or "cool kid".

Just a reminder for those inclined to hubris and a sense of arrogance and superiority because of the perceived popularity of a candidate one has decided to support.

That is all.

[Armstead]

25. I acknowledge it works both ways

[Vinca]

27. Even if the candidate is wrong?

[Armstead]

31. So all the people who voted for GWB were "right"?

[Vinca]

32. I think you explained the problem about politics absolutely perfectly. It's about winning.

That "winner" can be a war mongering, environment killing, money-loving opportunist, but "winning" is all that matters.

[merrily]

37. That is one of the worst posts I have ever seen on this board. nt

[seabeyond]

33. Having the candidate of choice win, does make you the winner. Lol.

[merrily]

36. Please see Reply 31. Win the battle, lose the war.

[seabeyond]

52. A war you create if You are talking that the Democrat you do not like won. What war? Not my war.

I am a lover, not a fighter .

If you are talking about win the primary, lost the GE? Well that is just story telling.

So, I am unclear what you are talking about. That can be taken different ways.

My point is right on. A win makes one a winner. Am I right?

[merrily]

54. Um, no. I haven't created a war. I'm no neocon.

And I have already responded to the tautology you are calling your point.

[seabeyond]

55. I do not know what war you are talking about. Won the battle, lost the war. What war?

[B Calm]

34. It makes you able to swallow whatever shitty candidate the DNC rams down

your throat!

[mythology]

41. At absolute worst, the voters are the ones forcing Clinton on you

You know the ones giving her such a substantial edge in pledged delegates? The DNC can't make people vote for Clinton.

[B Calm]

45. Exactly, but it still makes the voter gullible to swallow whatever

shitty candidate the DNC wants. So sad. .

[merrily]

35. Sadly, a lot of voters feel otherwise. That's why media has been saying since 2012 that Hillary was

(again) the inevitable nominee.

In 2007, I picked from the Democratic field the candidate I though likeliest to win the general and I chose correctly. Without necessarily intending so to do, I did the same in 2014. I sure hope he wins the primary.

[Orsino]

40. Since Americans tend to treat politics as they do sports, picking winners...

...give us a warm, proxy feeling of victory.

If the actual winner honors our support by working for us, the victory becomes real.

[Armstead]

43. It's like assuming that you are a great baseball player if you live in Kansas City

[DCBob]

42. What feels "cool" is the picking the winner of the general election!

[Armstead]

46. Feeling cool and happy is fine

Assuming that makes one a better person or "Charlie Sheenlike" than the person who picked another candidate is not fine. (IMHO of course.)

[DCBob]

48. I agree with that.

There is no need for Hillary supporters to act that way.

[NurseJackie]

44. You're correct ... it does not *make* you a winner.

It just affirms that we ARE (and have been) winners. There's nothing arrogant about that.

Why be such a kill-joy? You guys have had your fun, now it's time for OUR fun to begin!

I'm not sure about the "cool" part, that's subjective. But the winning part isn't subjective at all. Either you win or you lose. There are no ties when it comes to the selection of the party's nominee.

[Armstead]

47. Have your fun. I'm fine with that.

But the notion that political fandom gives one individual superiority and the right to be smug and personally dismissive of those who made a different choice is not.

[Demsrule86]

50. I guess that also means

momentum is BS too right?

[Demsrule86]

49. Of course it does

No one wants to vote for the loser...sorry I voted for Bernie in Ohio...had I knows how he would behave and i wouldn't have done so.

[Live and Learn]

51. It only makes you responsible for whatever evil policies your winning candidate enacts.

I feel quite confident in taking that responsibility on with Bernie.

The Clinton supporters should be quite worried since we will constantly remind them that we told them so and America's downfall and their own resulting complaints are their own fault.

And supporting a warmonger will never, in any universe, be considered cool.

[blm]

53. Kerry had about 2 dozen posting supporters here at DU while Dean had about 200 posting

here regularly. As difficult as it became here during the heat of the primary battles, I don't recall the Kerry supporters taunting the supporters of Dean.