Sunday, June 5, 2016

You Don't Like Hillary? Well, Voters Don't Like Bernie

I spend a lot of time reading and writing about the primary. Although I've written a few blog posts here, I devote much of my commenting to places like Reddit and Facebook, which are lousy with posts about Bernie. The vitriol I have received in return has been mind-blowing.

Most of the pro-Bernie camps talk about basically three issues: that Hillary is unlikable, untrustworthy, and essentially a Republican. Let me address this in one simple word: bullshit.

Let's tackle them one by one: likability. I get it Sanders supporters--you don't like her. You point to polls that show Bernie is much more likable, and point to that as a reason why he should be the nominee. What you fail to mention is that the Trump movement has coalesced around him, while Bernie supporters continue to trash her. You fail to mention that she consistently beats Trump in likability in those same polls. And most of all, you claim that she is unelectable due to these polls. Likability is what matters? Really? Are we in the 7th grade now? Apparently, she is liked well enough to have gained 3 million more votes than Sanders, and has two million more than Trump, who has been the presumptive nominee for quite some time now. People recognize that she is by far the most qualified and capable candidate in this field, and they vote for her. There are some legitimate reasons why you may not wish to do so, but not voting for her because you don't like her is, frankly, stupid. Lots of people voted for George W. Bush over the supremely qualified Al Gore, because they felt W was the kind of guy "you'd want to drink a beer with." How'd that work out, America? Five thousand American troops are dead and many more wounded. A hundred thousand Iraqis were killed. An economic crisis almost left this country in ruins. That's what voting for likability over experience will get you.

Then, there's the "issue" of being untrustworthy. To prove their case, Trump and Bernie voters alike (yes, politics makes strange bedfellows) have been accusing Hillary of everything from the "murder" of Vince Foster to Whitewater (which special prosecutor Ken Starr has essentially backtracked on) to the email "scandal". As to the latter, it's all nonsense. There's been zero evidence, other than a shady character named "Guccifer" who claims to have breached the server, that national security was compromised in any way. Guccifer is an admitted criminal who published the emails of the accounts he actually hacked, and US officials discount his story because he was unable to produce a single piece of proof that he hacked Clinton. Guccifer did hack many political figures, including former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who used an AOL account, for God's sake, but no one called for Powell to be imprisoned. As for the "scathing" IG report, it's clear that the State Department knew Hillary was using a private server, because she sent emails to them regularly.

Then there is the oft discussed claim that Clinton has rigged the election. This is where the tin foil hat brigade really takes off. Even Bernie himself has claimed election rigging, including in Puerto Rico, which hasn't even voted yet as of the time of this writing. What's interesting to me is that this so-called election rigging only happens in states which Bernie was losing anyway. You never hear a Bernie supporter claim that Michigan was rigged, for example, despite the fact that Hillary was leading the state by 21.4% going into the primary. But New York has to have been rigged, according to vocal Bernie supporters, because Hillary won a state she was expected to win by 11.7%.

And why does no one claim that Bernie is untrustworthy when he declared that superdelegates are there to subvert the will of the people, but now claims that he wants to flip the supers to his side? How is that not subverting the will of the voters? Remember, the supers have voted for the candidate with the most delegates every single time. Even Bill and Hillary in 2008 both voted for Obama at the convention, even though Hillary won the popular vote. Hillary actually made the motion to suspend the roll call vote and nominate Obama by acclimation.

And as for those claiming that the superdelegates gave Hillary an unfair advantage out of the gate, that is utter nonsense. Hillary had a huge lead in supers going into the 2008 nomination process as well over another relatively unknown candidate named Obama, but when it became clear that he was winning, they switched to him in droves, as they should have. The harsh, bitter truth is that Bernie has not run as successful a campaign as Obama in 2008. Had he done so, the supers would have switched to him as they did with Obama. But Bernie trails in every imaginable scenario. In fact, if there were no superdelegates, Hillary would already have won the nomination by taking more than half of the pledged delegates.

The last talking point is really rather laughable--that Hillary is a Republican in disguise. She voted the same as Sanders 93% of the time during her tenure in the Senate. If she's a Republican, then he must be as well, because they agreed on the vast majority of the issues. Based upon her voting record in the Senate, she was more liberal than 85% of her Democratic colleagues. She had a more liberal voting record than Obama, whom the Republicans portrayed as left of Castro.

There's no doubt that Bernie leads among some demographics, such a young white voters, and birds. But she is winning handily among women, blacks and Latinos (whom some rabid Bernie supporters label "low information voters". Yikes), and older voters. And Bernie may even lose the bird vote, as he is now being protested by animal rights activists for refusing to put together any sort of animal welfare agenda, as Hillary has.

I've even heard many Bernie supporters compare him to Jesus, because he's Jewish, worked as a carpenter, and is a socialist. Well, I own a pair of sandals, but oddly, I still can't walk on water.

I am not trying to change anyone's vote here, because that's an exercise in futility, at least among Bernie extremists. I have no doubt that most Bernie supporters will, after Tuesday's primaries, come around, especially when faced with the specter of Donald Drumpf.

And please spare me the polls that show Bernie beating the Donald. Hillary has trounced Bernie in the only polls that matter--actual votes.

June 7th can't come fast enough.