Make No Mistake, Sandersism Has Defeated Clintonism

[silvershadow]

Make No Mistake, Sandersism Has Defeated Clintonism

05/18/2016 02:23 pm ET |

Seth Abramson
Attorney; Assistant Professor, UNH; Series Editor, Best American Experimental Writing

In 2008, Hillary Clinton — on her way to losing the Democratic nomination — won nine of the final 25 nominating contests. In 2016, she may well — despite being treated as the likely winner of this year’s Democratic primary by the mainstream media — win only seven or eight of the final 25 state primaries and caucuses.

If you’re wondering how Clinton could perform worse in the second half of the election cycle in 2016 than she did in 2008 and still be in a position to win, there’s a good explanation for it that goes beyond the fact that the neck-and-neck Democratic primary race we’ve had for over two months started with a brief but solid run for Clinton. In 2008, both Democratic candidates were sanctioned by Party elders, so super-delegates were free to pick whoever they thought was the stronger candidate without fear of reprisal. In 2016, super-delegates are expected to go with Clinton even if the insurgent Sanders has clearly shown himself, by mid-June, to be the stronger general-election candidate in terms of both head-to-head match-ups with Trump, favorability ratings among independent voters, and performance in the second half of the nominating season.

Super-delegates will fall into line — the thinking goes — not because Clinton is a strong general-election bet, or liked by many people, or a real spokeswoman for the ideology of the Party base, or able to win independents, or nearly the same candidate in May that she was in February, or capable of winning over her current Democratic opposition the way Obama did after the primary in 2008, but because Democrats in Washington have made clear that any super-delegates who back the now-stronger horse in Philadelphia this July — Sanders — will be ostracized from the Party. Fear, then, is what could make Clinton the Democratic nominee even if (a) super-delegates are officially charged with voting for the strongest general-election candidate, and (b) Clinton goes on a historic losing streak in the back half of the primary season election calendar.

But all that’s horse-race nonsense, and won’t matter very much to political historians looking back at this period in American history from the vantage point of, say, 2116.

more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-abramson/make-no-mistake-sanderism_b_10008136.html

[LiberalArkie]

1. His campaign taught a valuable lesson: a person who the people want can be supported by the people

and not the fat cats. But the campaign still has to fight the system. And the system favors candidates of the system and not those wanted to change the system.

[silvershadow]

4. Hopefully it opened more than a few eyes...and I think it did. nt

[MisterP]

2. IS there such a thing as Clintonism? it's basically a vacuum--it's for full neoliberalism

while riding Social Security and Medicare as they promise to sell it off, appealing to the poor while making them poorer AND also appealing to the yuppies

[silvershadow]

3. I couldn't agree more. nt

[MisterP]

5. I'm not even so sure the superdels will go for her: she cares only about those who've

demonstrated 101% loyalty (hence a lot of the viciousness in the election) while those who were only at 99%--well, they have to be punished

what do YOU think, if she wins, she's going to do to a party that allowed Sanders to get so close?

[silvershadow]

6. I am pretty sure, after this disaster of a primary, they will surely be hard pressed to

ignore the trend. The wheels fell of the HRC bus at this first of the year, and she never recovered- The Great Coast to Coast Disenfranchisement Tour was a desperate attempt to change that, but it failed- epically.

[Mike__M]

7. This is like a Manifesto of Sanders' political revolution

In Sandersism, universal healthcare is a human right that cannot be subjected to the realpolitik of incremental legislation. In this view, Obamacare must of course be maintained until the very moment we switch to a single-payer system, but it is the obligation of every person concerned with human rights to militate for such a system to the exclusion of others. In Sandersism, a college education is a public good all Americans are entitled to, meaning that whatever funding priorities must be rearranged to make this possible must be rearranged. “We can’t do it” is no more a reply to the Sandersist view of higher education than would be a similar statement with respect to other basic American rights. In Sandersism, climate change supplants terrorism as the top threat to national security, without degrading any of the current anti-terrorism efforts that respect human rights and appropriately assess the scope (and primary drivers) of our terror risk. In Sandersism, a living wage for all Americans is a human right, not something for politicians to log-roll endlessly about. A Sandersist’s first offer to her negotiating partner on the subject of a living wage is $15, and her second offer is $15, and her third offer is $15, and every offer thereafter is $15 — for saying $10 or $12 is akin to saying that minorities can sometimes be discriminated against without the immediate and utter disapproval of American law.

In Sandersism you negotiate with any and all parties of good faith up until the moment doing so requires sacrificing a principle. If, under those conditions, not enough parties of good faith remain, you spend all your time and resources writing executive orders and working for an end to gerrymandering and the defeat of all bad-faith politicians in local, state, and national primaries and generals. In Sandersism politics is an arena where ideas, not bank accounts or special interests, are contested; every American is given every possible opportunity to vote; corporate practices that maim or kill living humans are outlawed; those few economic practices that can terminally endanger basic economic justice are adequately regulated; and we spend as much money making sure our criminal justice system and law enforcement apparatuses are actually just as we do ensuring our military is capable and appropriately fearsome. Sandersism is a “we” and an “us” movement that transcends the artificial divisions of the party era and the atomization of persons and communities. A Sandersist spends the minimum amount of time running for office and the maximum amount of time doing the difficult work of governing — and in both roles places transparency ahead of political exigency ten times out of ten.

[Dont call me Shirley]

8. Seth was on Nicole Sandler show today speaking this very truth....

Check her show out at radio or not

[silvershadow]

9. Thank you. I will do that.

[Dont call me Shirley]

10. Nicole is awesome. I've traded Thom in for her.

She has in depth interviews with no commercials.

[silvershadow]

11. Oh, very cool. I have to go to bed early for me tonight. I have to be up early

in the morning for an appointment out of town. Probably won't even get to look until tomorrow afternoon sometime. But I have it bookmarked. Thank you!

[Duckfan]

12. But the $64,000 question remains:

Will all the air be out of her tires by convention time?

[Miles Archer]

13. Yeah, well...it's the truth, and the truth hurts.

It's the first time I've seen it expressed so succinctly, but not the first time I've seen it.

And the difference between the superdelegates and the average American voter is that the voters are afraid of jack shit.

The question that comes up again and again and again on DU from Clinton supporters is "Well, if she isn't well-liked, why did she get so many votes?"

And the answer is "read this effing article."

In 2016, super-delegates are expected to go with Clinton even if the insurgent Sanders has clearly shown himself, by mid-June, to be the stronger general-election candidate in terms of both head-to-head match-ups with Trump, favorability ratings among independent voters, and performance in the second half of the nominating season.

Super-delegates will fall into line — the thinking goes — not because Clinton is a strong general-election bet, or liked by many people, or a real spokeswoman for the ideology of the Party base, or able to win independents, or nearly the same candidate in May that she was in February, or capable of winning over her current Democratic opposition the way Obama did after the primary in 2008, but because Democrats in Washington have made clear that any super-delegates who back the now-stronger horse in Philadelphia this July — Sanders — will be ostracized from the Party. Fear, then, is what could make Clinton the Democratic nominee even if (a) super-delegates are officially charged with voting for the strongest general-election candidate, and (b) Clinton goes on a historic losing streak in the back half of the primary season election calendar.

[Donkees]

14. WABC-7NY focus: Bernie Sanders campaign has the enthusiasm; Clinton and Trump high unfavorables...

Bernie stronger candidate against Trump.