2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: What do Hillary Supporters have against open primaries? [View all]RichVRichV
(885 posts)You're entire argument for Bernie doing bad in the general elections is a poll that none of us can see, that asks some obscure questions that no one can respond to, of a group of people that isn't listed. What an absolute joke!
What questions were asked? How were they asked? How many people were polled? What was the demographic breakdowns of those polled? How strong was their support for Bernie before the questionnaire? Were these independents, Republicans, Democrats? What was the age demographic of this poll?
You're a proud member of the reality based community and you can't post an actual poll available for everyone to see? If you're a member of the Hillary's reality based community, I'm scared to ask what her fantasy based community looks like.
Let me post some real polls for you. Not some made up ones that only insiders supposedly get a look at.
-USA Today
-CNN
-WaPo
Should I keep going? Unlike you I have real polls to back me up.
But this goes well beyond polling. You see Bernie hasn't just recently changed his views like some other candidate running. He has been running on the same platform for 35 years. And in spite of this platform, he has dominated in his home state of Vermont. In 2012 Bernie won with 71% of the vote against a very well financed Republican who threw a ton of negative ads at him. And while Vermont may not be very representative of the Democratic side of the fence, it is of the other side. It's rural, it's white, it has a large number of independents, and a sizable number of Republicans. And yet Bernie has won consistently there in spite of these supposed flaws that will be exploited in the general.
Furthermore Bernie polls great with independents, light years better than Hillary does. And unlike her he actually makes a dent in the Republican voter base (all she does is inflame them). You don't win the general election without the independent voters.
Also Bernie has something that no candidate in history has had to this scale, a massive army of online volunteers who instantly counter every smear thrown at him. If you haven't seen it in action during the primary then you need to get out in reality a little more.
Finally let's get to the congressional endorsements. You claim that not endorsing Bernie is proof that he can't win. There couldn't possibly be any other reason than that.
It couldn't be that Hillary has a history of being vindictive towards people that don't throw their support behind her while Bernie doesn't. To put it bluntly they only make an enemy if they endorse one way. And Hillary hasn't done any arm twisting on any endorsements. No, none at all.
It also couldn't be that most people are in congress because they have had some wealthy benefactors getting and keeping them there. Hillary maintains the gravy train, Bernie challenges it. That obviously plays no part.
Nope it has to be some big conspiracy that they believe Bernie can't win the general election. In spite of every bit of evidence to the contrary.