Bernie Sanders says he’s more electable than Hillary Clinton. Um, no.

[brooklynite]

Washington Post:

Here's the essence of the Sanders camp's argument:

The totality of this data begins to raise real questions about the conventional wisdom’s assumptions regarding which Democratic candidate would fare better in the general election. That Bernie outperforms Clinton with independents and Republicans by wide margins (by net 22 point[s] and 40 points, respectively) should suggest that he is actually better positioned in the general election than is Clinton. The head-to-head match-ups bear this out as Bernie does comparably well if not better than Clinton in essentially every general election match-up with leading Republicans.

...snip...

The "wide margins" that the Sanders camp cites are tied to favorable/unfavorable numbers, not head-to-head horse-race ones. So, yes, according to a recent WaPo-ABC News poll, Sanders has "only" a net negative 30 favorable (26 fav/56 unfav) score among Republicans while Clinton has a net negative 70 (15 fav/85 unfav). But, this assertion — "The fact that Sanders is seen in such a different light by Republicans indicates he has more potential to win a larger share of Republican voters in a general election than does Clinton" — is a bridge way too far.

...snip...

Sanders, on the other hand, isn't nearly as well known or well defined as Clinton. Up until six months ago, he was the answer to a Senate trivia question — nothing more. The Sanders campaign seems to be mistaking Republicans not really having a strong impression of the senator from Vermont to him having a genuine chance of winning any decent chunk of Republican voters as the Democratic nominee. (There's a big portion of the memo dedicated to how Sanders does better than Clinton in head-to-head matchups with the most likely Republican nominees.)

[litlbilly]

1. ummm YES...

[NurseJackie]

2. I'll cut "Coach Sanders" a little (but not much) slack for fudging the numbers.

I think of it this way: Sanders is like the high school football coach of the underdog team that's currently behind the district champs with a score of 66-22 (at the beginning of the last quarter). The coach isn't likely to tell the team "Well boys, looks like we're screwed. There's no way to win this. We tried our best, but it's over. If you want to just call it quits now, we can go get some pizza. My treat."

Of course he's going to fudge the numbers and misrepresent them a little! Who can blame him? He'll soldier-onward until the votes, states and delegates no longer provide a path to the nomination.

[Hiraeth]

3. You all keep posting but, all I read is blah blah blah.