Hillary-Bernie Skirmishes Begin, Can All-Out War Be Far Behind?

[eridani]

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/31091-hillary-bernie-skirmishes-begin-can-all-out-war-be-far-behind

The media is giving Bernie a pass right now, I very rarely read in any coverage of Bernie that he is a socialist.

This is evidence that McCaskill doesn’t read much coverage of Bernie, since he regularly self-identifies as a “democratic socialist” and most media coverage follows suit. By implication, McCaskill is calling Sanders out for his policy positions, such as universal health care, universal college education, a living wage, good, affordable childcare, and other policy choices that have been sacrificed to “outrageous tax loopholes for billionaires and large corporations.” (The Hill notes that “Sanders’s ‘socialist’ policies sound a lot like Teddy Roosevelt’s and Reagan’s,” and later adds President Taft.)

These days, the “socialist” label is more meaningless than ever, though for some it serves as a pallid form of Red-baiting (call it Pink-baiting). Calling Sanders a “socialist” is not only redundant and irrelevant, it’s an intellectually dishonest tactic for avoiding the substance of the issues Sanders is running on. As MSNBC anchor Lawrence O’Donnell never seems to tire of saying, almost all of us are socialists one way or another, and have been for a long time, at least supporters of Social Security, or Medicare, or Obamacare, and so on.

[merrily]

1. She's not exactly truthful. Only VERY recently have I seen or heard ANY story

about Sanders that does not mention "socialist." Most often, they say "socialist," and not Democratic Socialist, which is a lie. McCaskill and Gutierrez have both been untruthful about Bernie. Gutierrez, whose been in the Congressional Progressive Caucus with Bernie since Gutierrez got to Congress (when Bernie was chair) even claimed not to know Bernie's name, so he could refer to him as "the socialist." We've also witnessed a couple of anti-Semitic dog whistles.

Different primary, same type tactics. The more things change, the more they stay the same, as the French supposedly say.

[BrotherIvan]

2. If they do a rerun of 2008, as evidence suggests, no amount of money in the

world will make up for it. All those people who voted for Obama will happily vote for someone else. People's memories aren't that short. I can't believe she went negative so soon. Very poor choice.

[Divernan]

3. She has a long, proud tradition of poor choices, IMO.

[BrotherIvan]

16. The poorest being trying to channel Elizabeth Warren

It just emphasizes three points:

A) These are the issues that people care about
B) Hillary is willing to say anything for the campaign, i.e. not trustworthy
C) Hillary aint no Elizabeth Warren (as shown by her record and statements)

The idea for Hillary to run from the press and never be specific about anything is also going to sink in. If she can't get on her feet and have a civil relationship with the press, that will be very detrimental. They are going to catch her every time she loads the Q&As with staffers, because for some reason the campaign is petrified of her being asked real questions. They are afraid of who she is and that never works.

Hillary Clinton has many positive attributes, her strongest being foreign relations. She should have run on that. Instead, they decided to make her sound like someone else, and that merely points out that she has low scores in the trust department. Free Hillary Clinton!!

[merrily]

6. People who post regularly do not miss much during a contested campaign

and their memories are not that short. People who don't post, or don't have politics as a hobby, I am not so sure. I think they go to work every day, come home, eat, bath the kids, and collapse in front of the TV for a bit before they doze off.

[BrotherIvan]

15. That is true

But it just leads to a general bad taste in everyone's mouths. And she's not as fresh as she was in 2008. Her biggest issue is her unfavorables, the highest being "trustworthy". This primary will all come down to trust, IMO. Obama paved the way for Bernie Sanders. He never would have had a shot at any other point in my lifetime that I know of.

[merrily]

17. She polls as untrustworthy and media are now saying she has an

"enthusiasm" problem.

I guess Madison is finally changing the media narrative some, although they are quick to add that Sanders won't win. I guess God has given them stone tablets that say that. They are so vile and transparent.

[BrotherIvan]

18. Bernmentum has got to be freaking them out

I hope all the enthusiasm continues and doesn't sour once the attack ads and surrogates cover the airwaves. Her poll numbers can only go down which is a terrible narrative.

[localroger]

7. All indications are that she is about to make the same mistakes she did in 2008

I have nothing against Hillary and would readily vote for her if she gets the nomination, but she lost to Barack in 2008 because her campaign fundamentally misunderstood the math of the primary process, which is not winner-take-all like the general election. Barack hired a full time staff member whose job was to scour the entire country, not just states where he was prevailing overall, for districts he could carry and he campaigned in all those districts. The Clinton campaign seemed to think that they would sweep everything on Super Tuesday, but by the time Super Tuesday arrived Obama had built an unsurmountable mathematical advantage a district or two at a time, and the rest as we know was history.

And I really see no indication in her parrying with Bernie Sanders that anything is different this time. Her campaign is so confident in her position that they are doing nothing substantive to counter his message, which is resonating with the base in ways she can't.

[merrily]

9. She already has. McCaskill and Gutierrez are both her surrogates and I think Rehm was either

complicit or manipulated about that dual citizenship deal.

McCaskill is pushing "socialist" and not to be taken seriously, not a serious candidate. Gutierrez pushed never said anything about immigrants, unknown and socialist.

As for Rehm:

Career

Rehm began her radio career in 1973[4] as a volunteer for WAMU's The Home Show. In 1979, she took over as the host of WAMU's morning talk show, Kaleidoscope, which was renamed The Diane Rehm Show in 1984.

Rehm has interviewed many political and cultural figures, including John McCain, Barack Obama, Madeleine Albright, and others. She has said that her most touching interview was with Fred Rogers of the PBS program Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, conducted just before his death.[4] Rehm considers her interviews with Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton to have been "amazing experiences."[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diane_Rehm

Interviewing luminaries for over 40 years and the ones that stand out most for her are Bill and Hillary Clinton. And, she just happens to have misinformation about Sanders' being a dual citizen of America and Israel. Pure coincidences, no doubt.

[localroger]

11. I think you're right about those things

...but I think I'm right in estimating that it's a weak sauce approach to the problem Bernie poses for her, which will be about as useful as her Super Tuesday "sweep" was in 2008.

Hillary pretty much has the mirror problem all the riders of the GOP clown car have this year: Before she can win the general, she has to win the primary. Bernie is packing those auditoriums with people who like what he is saying, and none of this negative nabobbing does anything about that for her. Pink baiting (I am so stealing that phrase) is so 1992. Millennials don't care about "socialism." They care about health care and retirement, and they're not going to run from those things if you point out that their socialist.

Bernie is attracting people on core principles -- prosperity and security. He is saying all those things that can't be said but which ring so true to ordinary Americans. There is a class war and we're losing it. The 0.01% wants to buy another yacht while you starve. Trickle down is a lie that never worked and TPP is a giveaway to those same rich fat bastards who are stealing everything else. Everyone either has trouble finding work or is underemployed or knows people who are, and Bernie's prescriptions for our problems are plainspoken obvious truths. Bernie is actualy making inroads among rank and file Republicans. Immigration policy and personal smears are weak sauce indeed against a message like that.

[merrily]

13. Escalating dog whistles did not work with Obama.

Media, while continuing to treat Hillary as the inevitable nominee, have begun to mention her "enthusiasm problem."

BTW, I read or heard the other day that millenials now outnumber Boomers, so there's thar. They, however, been indoctrinated that Social Security is not going to exist for them, and Grandma and Grandpa are bankrupting them. The indoctrinators, of course, have been the politicians of both parties who would like to make sure that Social Security does not exist for them.

[TBF]

4. I think they are doing us a favor -

It's early and they have already ramped it up to eleven with their bigoted nonsense. Now we all know Bernie is Jewish and a scary socialist (which to the people under 40 doesn't really mean much anyway). We have plenty of time to explain to people exactly what socialist (or in this case "democratic socialist&quot means. I think this is going to backfire on them.

[restorefreedom]

10. exactly

i mean, a living wage, affordable college, health care, what is this country going to turn into?

(assuming i don't need the sarcasm thingy)

[Art_from_Ark]

5. Wait, what???

Since when was Reagan as president ever for "universal health care, universal college education, a living wage, good, affordable childcare"?????? Reagan was the poster boy for financial favors for corporations and billionaires and champion of trickle-down vodoo economics.

And Taft himself was the favorite of the moneyed elites. That's how he ended up as the Republican presidential nominee in 1912, despite the fact that Teddy Roosevelt was far more popular with the average citizen.

[merrily]

8. Initially, TR did not want to run again and hand-picked Taft as

Last edited Sat Jul 4, 2015, 10:35 AM - Edit history (1)

his successor. Then TR changed his mind, but it was too late.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Roosevelt#Election_of_1908

I guess variations on this kind of scenario are common in politics.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Palmer_%28politician%29Alice Palmer groomed Obama to take her place in the Illiinois Senate so she could run for the US House, but her run failed and she tried to muscle out Obama, but he won.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Palmer_%28politician%29

ETA: TR socialized a lot with the very wealthy as well, like Henry Ford and Thomas Edison, to name only two. Railroad magnates persuaded him to start a national park as an inexpensive destination for Mr. and Mrs. America, so that Mr. and Mrs. would buy railroad tickets to get to a national park.

[restorefreedom]

12. mccaskill and her ilk are aligning with repubs to trash bernie

not only is it reprehensible, i (almost) wish hillary was going to win the nom just to see them try and walk it back.

*almost*

[MisterP]

14. the officialists sided with the Pubs to blame Nader and again for the TPP: we know all this already!