Slate: Sanders is risking his party's nominee, his coalition, and message.

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

Contrary to what the title of the article implies, it doesn't attack Bernie or his policies. It only highlights the inconsistencies in Sanders' campaign so far. The whole thing is relevant so I posted and bolded it, but I suggest you read the article from the website.

From Slate

With a scorched-earth campaign against Clinton, Sanders is risking his party’s nominee, its coalition, and his message.

Bernie Sanders is still in it to win it. Which is a problem. Because he can’t.

Hillary Clinton holds 1,768 pledged delegates—allocated through primaries and caucuses—to Sanders’ 1,494. To overcome that deficit, Sanders would have to win 67 percent of all remaining delegates, including massive wins in Clinton-friendly states such as California and New Jersey. Barring an extraordinary shift, this won’t happen. It’s not a live possibility.

And yet Sanders is trying to get around these facts by arguing, in effect, that the will of his voters counts for more than the majority. In doing so, he isn’t just fighting till the last vote for a worthy cause—he’s deriding and disregarding the votes of the party’s most loyal backers, voters who are key to any progressive project, now and in the future.

But the Sanders campaign doesn’t seem to care. “While Mr. Sanders says he does not want Mr. Trump to win in November, his advisers and allies say he is willing to do some harm to Mrs. Clinton in the shorter term if it means he can capture a majority of the 475 pledged delegates at stake in California and arrive at the Philadelphia convention with maximum political power,” reports the New York Times on the campaign’s newest strategy—a scorched-earth run to the finish.

The reaction from mainstream Democrats, and even from a few Sanders supporters, has been decidedly negative. On the other end, Sanders’ defenders say this is no different from what Clinton herself did in the 2008 primary, when she continued until the summer, as anti–Barack Obama anger and vitriol simmered in her camp. It’s true there are real parallels and similarities. But there are real distinctions, too, that make Sanders’ actions different in kind.

Let’s compare Sanders’ actions with Clinton’s at this point in 2008. Like Clinton, Sanders has adopted an almost intransigent tone, even echoing elements of her old rhetoric. “I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on,” said Clinton in early May of that year, citing an Associated Press story that “found how Senator Obama’s support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me.” A few days later, she would crush Obama in the West Virginia primary.

After Sanders won that same primary, he made a similar argument, saying that he is the only candidate who can win working-class voters, in contrast to a Democratic Party that has allowed a “right-wing extremist Republican Party to capture the votes of the majority of working people in this country.” But this description of the electorate is true only if you omit blacks, Latinos, and Asians. Factor them into the population of “working people,” and Democrats win that group, handily.

If it were just this rhetoric, Sanders staying in wouldn’t be an issue. Things get heated at the end of a presidential primary, but there’s no reason the losing candidate should bail before the end. That said, there are key differences between 2008 and now. Then, Clinton promised to run only to the last primary, to give every Democrat a chance to vote (and at that point, when it was clear Obama had the pledged delegates and superdelegates to win, she conceded). Now, Sanders vows to take this fight to the convention, even if—it seems—he’s still behind in pledged delegates.

Sanders isn’t just planning a run to the convention—he’s also hoping to flip enough superdelegates from the Clinton camp to erase the difference in pledged delegates, giving him the nomination. It’s a fair strategy (given the rules), but a curious one, given the extent to which Team Sanders has blasted superdelegates as unfair—another way the Democratic National Committee has rigged the primary.

Democratic leaders say they’re worried, and it’s easy to see why. In the past month, Sanders has switched gears, from a policy critique of Clinton to a process argument against the Democratic Party. The argument? That any outcome short of full deference to his campaign is evidence of corruption and betrayal. “The Democratic Party has a choice,” he said in a statement, issued after a near riotous confrontationbetween Sanders and Clinton supporters in Nevada, where the former accused the latter of rigging the process for their candidate. “It can open its doors and welcome into the party people who are prepared to fight for real economic and social change … or the party can choose to maintain its status quo structure, remain dependent on big-money campaign contributions and be a party with limited participation and limited energy.”

In the meantime, he’ll show no care or concern in his rhetoric or attacks, a fact emphasized by the degree to which a vocal minority of his backers believe the entire process has been rigged against them, with Clinton as the illegitimate winner of an unfair contest. It drove the fracas in Nevada, and if Sanders plans to strafe Clinton ahead of California, it could drive tension elsewhere, all the way to the convention.

There is a case that all of this is proper, that if Sanders wants to change the Democratic Party—and bring independent voters into the tent—he has to attack the nominating process and the institutional Democratic Party. It’s a bad case. To start, the risk of a destructive drive to the convention—a divided party against Donald Trump—doesn’t remotely justify the gains of a more open nominating process.

Even if it did, it’s worth looking at the grievances on display. Sanders believes he was harmed by the debate schedule. But that’s hard to gauge. Would a handful of additional debates have won him more votes in states like South Carolina and Florida, where he had core demographic weaknesses? And the fact that additional debates didn’t improve his performance in demographically similar states throws water on the argument.

Sanders’ most expansive argument is against “closed primaries,” which have entered his stump speech as a fundamentally unfair part of the process. But closed primaries weren’t created in response to Sanders—they are a long-standing feature. Critically, they are far from the least democratic part of the process. That goes to caucuses, which by their design preclude the vast majority of a given electorate from participating. If closed primaries are undemocratic for keeping out registered independents, then caucuses are undemocratic for keeping out everyone. Yet Sanders hasn’t railed against them. And why would he? They’ve delivered his largest victory margins and have fueled his campaign.

All of this might be different if Sanders held any democratic legitimacy—a majority of the popular vote or a pledged delegate lead. But he has neither. Thirteen million people have voted for Clinton to be the Democratic Party’s nominee versus 10 million for Sanders. If he were, somehow, to persuade superdelegates—i.e., elected officials and longtime party activists—to abandon Clinton, he would have negated those voters and their choice, after six months of arguing that the party must respect his supporters. A cynical observer might say that Sanders isn’t angry with the lack of democracy as much as he’s angry at losing. In any case, it’s more than a bad look for his effort—it’s ugly.

When he derides most Democratic primary voters as everything wrong with a party of “limited participation and limited energy,” when he looks for ways to nullify Clinton’s popular vote and pledged delegate majority, when he touts his support among working-class whites and dismisses (predominantly black) Southern Democrats and their votes, Sanders is attacking the coalition that elected Barack Obama—the coalition that arguably made his progressive movement possible—whether he realizes it or not.

This coalition is predominantly nonwhite, centered in black and Latino communities, and it’s the reason Clinton stands as the likely nominee. These voters have enabled liberals to, for the first time, craft a national coalition that doesn’t have to shy from questions of racial justice and gender equality, or—like the Democratic Party of Bill Clinton—acquiesce in the face of white backlash, subsuming nonwhite concerns to the anxieties of white voters. And critically, these voters are among those Americans with the most to lose if Sanders decides that his shot at the nomination—or at changing debate and primary rules—is more important than keeping Donald Trump from the White House.

And all of this is counterproductive to his stated goal of pulling the Democratic Party to the left. If Sanders is going to have any influence—if the Sanders coalition is indeed the Democratic coalition of the future—then his supporters need to see the party as a viable vehicle for their interests, a place where they can win victories and move the needle in their direction, which isn’t possible if they view the entire political system as irreversibly flawed.

Sanders should fight until the last vote, and he should use his influence to put his stamp on what Democrats do in the fall. But this scorched-earth campaign is foolish. It helps neither him nor his message.

--

[Redstreak 6,653]

Bernie. Do it.

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

2 minutes ago, Redstreak said:

Bernie. Do it.

Did you even read the article?

[Redstreak 6,653]

Just now, LebaneseDude said:

Did you even read the article?

 

Spoiler

no

 

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

5 minutes ago, Redstreak said:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

no

 

Well do you mind not trolling? It's not even attacking Bernie, just his recent tactics and statements, because they go against his original message which the writer supports  

This is the same writer who wrote this ..  

There replaced the article's title with its subtitle. Maybe it'll be less offensive to your sensibilities. 

[Redstreak 6,653]

4 minutes ago, LebaneseDude said:

Well do you mind not trolling? It's not even attacking Bernie  

Well I've read it now and all it does is start of by discussing how what Sanders is doing now is echoing what Clinton did in 08 but somehow what she did is alright and just fighting for the process while his is somehow inherently wrong, by then it simply devolves into baseless claims and misinterpretations of things he's said. So... it's kinda basically any of the other tens of articles you've already posted.

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

1 hour ago, Redstreak said:

Well I've read it now and all it does is start of by discussing how what Sanders is doing now is echoing what Clinton did in 08 but somehow what she did is alright and just fighting for the process while his is somehow inherently wrong, by then it simply devolves into baseless claims and misinterpretations of things he's said. So... it's kinda basically any of the other tens of articles you've already posted.

So you read a quarter of it?

Why do you so readily dismiss this writers' statements as delusional or something when he's probably one of the more neutral writers (for Democrats) you can find on Slate. He even supported Bernie and told him to fight on. He supports Bernie's inspirational movement (I do too by the way...)

http://www.slate.com/authors.jamelle_bouie.html

Of course that was before his campaign took a massive shift in strategy.

Let me remind you that this article is criticizing his inconsistencies that are compromising his message. Not his policies, nor his continued stay in the running.

------

The writer blasted Clinton's actions in 08 and even said that Sanders is following her footsteps. He also said that Clinton stuck around til the primaries, while Sanders wants to go to the convention. The main difference is that Clinton was ahead in national votes. Also she never attacked the system or criticized the fairness of the competitions. Sanders is in a far worse position than she ever was, but she conceded after the final primary while he wants to go all the way to the convention. Rather than use the convention to unite the party as Hillary did in 08, he wants to use it to continue a futile attempt for the nomination. That's all he said in relation to Clinton. 

That's literally where the comparisons ended. 

I find it incredibly odd that you so quickly dismiss the rest of the article, when it only relied on facts and credible reasoning.

Under the spoilers.

Spoiler

 

First there is this little bit (under spoilers):

Spoiler

“It can open its doors and welcome into the party people who are prepared to fight for real economic and social change … or the party can choose to maintain its status quo structure, remain dependent on big-money campaign contributions and be a party with limited participation and limited energy.”

How is it not obvious that this is a it's a Me vs Establishment statement, especially when he's literally called Clinton status quo, dependent on PACs, and part of the establishment that inspires no one? Is he trying to imply that the Democratic party is not already welcoming these people?

Just because they don't always manage to bring about the "real" economic and social change that they want, doesn't mean they haven't brought on any.

How entirely dismissive of all the good Bill Clinton and Barack Obama have done in the wake of tragic Republican presidencies and in the face of vastly different cultural/ideological perspectives than today.

He's intentionally dividing the camps. That schism is not something that can be healed overnight.

But, let's forget that point if you're so persistent.

-------

There's this paragraph:

Spoiler

Sanders believes he was harmed by the debate schedule. But that’s hard to gauge. Would a handful of additional debates have won him more votes in states like South Carolina and Florida, where he had core demographic weaknesses? And the fact that additional debates didn’t improve his performance in demographically similar states throws water on the argument.

You're telling me that this argument has no ground? He claims he was harmed by the debate schedule, when he has no actual proof of that happening, especially when the demographics were not in favor of him. Do you disagree? You mean to say that Bernie would do well in Florida compared to Clinton? Florida of all places? The state of minorities and significantly disproportionate older populations?  

------

Then there's this paragraph which I snipped for brevity:

Spoiler

Sanders’ most expansive argument is against “closed primaries,” and yet caucuses are undemocratic for keeping out everyone. Yet Sanders hasn’t railed against them. And why would he? They’ve delivered his largest victory margins and have fueled his campaign.

I see you dodging this point completely. How do you justify this inconsistency? Why attack the fairness of primaries when caucuses are inherently unfair? I don't understand how this is not inconsistent.

-----

Spoiler

All of this might be different if Sanders held any democratic legitimacy—a majority of the popular vote or a pledged delegate lead. But he has neither.

This is misrepresentation? He's significantly behind in votes and not only that, in a very ironic switch on your claim of misrepresentation:

Spoiler

He looks for ways to nullify Clinton’s popular vote and pledged delegate majority, when he touts his support among working-class whites and dismisses (predominantly black) Southern Democrats and their votes, Sanders is attacking the coalition that elected Barack Obama—the coalition that arguably made his progressive movement possible—whether he realizes it or not.

You going to argue that this isn't the case? He has NOT dismissed the votes of minorities and those in the south to make his statement that he's a better candidate?

In his very statement, he completely dismisses their votes. How is that not misrepresentation of the population he wants to represent?

Spoiler

Back and Latino communities, the reason Clinton stands as the likely nominee. These voters have enabled liberals to, for the first time, craft a national coalition that doesn’t have to shy from questions of racial justice and gender equality, or—like the Democratic Party of Bill Clinton—acquiesce in the face of white backlash, subsuming nonwhite concerns to the anxieties of white voters. And critically, these voters are among those Americans with the most to lose if Sanders decides that his shot at the nomination—or at changing debate and primary rules—is more important than keeping Donald Trump from the White House

You argue that this is conjecture when it's a known fact given what ended up happening in the general election as well as his presidency? How do you not correlate the two together? You arguing with established political realities?  Open any document on the Internet. Stop minimizing the effects of minorities on US politics.----

 

 

 

The fact that you quickly dismissed this article before reading it is dangerously analogous to putting yourself in an echo chamber. I suggest you open yourself to gathering more information, because if you  honestly fail to see how Sanders's inconsistencies when you have very openly criticized Clinton's, it only makes your opinion irrelevant given its clear and persistent bias. I'm sure you don't want that.

[rpggal 332]

I just have one thing to point out. It's not logically inconsistent to say that you represent the people (i.e. the policies you advocate have the best interests of the people as paramount) yet nevertheless the people do not choose you as their representative. One claim is a matter of policy, the other is a matter of process. The author is ignoring the fact that the "corruption" that is super PACs works *through* the democratic process by buying the most ads to buy the most votes. It's a nice ideal to think the popular vote represents the will of the people, but the fact is that votes are bought by ads paid for by super PACs, and the people vote (the process) on the will of corporations (the policy) as a result. They may be educated enough to know what's in their best interest (though most aren't, politics and economics are much more complicated than the average citizen has education enough to make an informed decision on), but even then people have their own lives to worry about and don't have the time or energy to thoroughly research the candidates to see for themselves if the candidate walks the walk regarding their interests. They cast their vote on the basis of name recognition and attitude, which will be more positive the more positive ads they see and more negative the more negative ads they see. That is the corruption of super PACs: big money coming into people's homes (in the form of ads) and swaying the votes of the people against their own interest. It's not about how the votes are counted. The voting process is rigged against the people's interest before the votes are even cast, and super PACs are a major reason why. So to cite voting behavior of the people as evidence against his claim that he represents them or cares about democracy really just misses that fundamental distinction and mischaracterizes the mechanism of the corruption he's talking about. He does care about democracy, that's why he wants campaign contribution reform, so that when an ad comes on TV to try to buy your vote at least it's your fellow citizen trying to get you on their side just as often as a corporation trying to get you on theirs.

[PartySick 172,545]

First lemme be honest...I didn't read all that

But I did come across something on facebook earlier today that I wanted to share with you and it's related:

"The other thing to keep in mind about the Democratic anxiety today concerning Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton is that at this point in the primary process, it's always like this. There is always acrimony and upset between remaining candidates at this part of the race. Parties just do this. It is to be expected. It's very, very rarely fatal."

Since Rachel said that on Wednesday, a new NYT/CBS poll shows 72% of Sanders supporters say they would vote for Clinton this November (versus 60% of Clinton supporters for Obama at this time in 2008). X

It seems like Hillary (and the Democrats) will be just fine. Most of Bernie's supporters, myself included, know well and good that Hillary is better than Trump and if (when ) she wins the Dem. nomination, it's either her or him. If their numbers are anything to go by, 72% of us are choosing her  Bernie will most likely end up supporting her as well.

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

1 hour ago, rpggal said:

I just have one thing to point out. It's not logically inconsistent to say that you represent the people (i.e. the policies you advocate have the best interests of the people as paramount) yet nevertheless the people do not choose you as their representative. One claim is a matter of policy, the other is a matter of process.

You're right in that one is policy and the other is process, but they are not mutually exclusive events. The issue is that Bernie is not even representing all people in policy. His entire campaign has focused on economic issues, downplaying major concerns like foreign policy and deconstruction of discrimination and xenophobia. Furthermore, his economic reforms focus almost completely on the working class. He claims that the taxations needed to fund his plans will be taken purely from the rich, but that is simply not the way it works in any country he supposedly wants to emulate. The middle class is going to take a significant hit. So he's not only failing to represent all people, he's not even wanted by them, unless they're young and/or white. Yet he continues to claim that he has the "people's" side. That has unfortunate implications that minorities or those that do not vote for him are not part of the people, especially when his supporters are in the clear minority.

1 hour ago, rpggal said:

 The author is ignoring the fact that the "corruption" that is super PACs works *through* the democratic process by buying the most ads to buy the most votes. It's a nice ideal to think the popular vote represents the will of the people, but the fact is that votes are bought by ads paid for by super PACs, and the people vote (the process) on the will of corporations (the policy) as a result. They may be educated enough to know what's in their best interest (though most aren't, politics and economics are much more complicated than the average citizen has education enough to make an informed decision on), but even then people have their own lives to worry about and don't have the time or energy to thoroughly research the candidates to see for themselves if the candidate walks the walk regarding their interests. They cast their vote on the basis of name recognition and attitude, which will be more positive the more positive ads they see and more negative the more negative ads they see. That is the corruption of super PACs: big money coming into people's homes (in the form of ads) and swaying the votes of the people against their own interest.

The entire point of Super PACs is to have "unlimited" funding on advertisements for their candidate.

What is corruption?

Political corruption is the use of powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. An illegal act by an officeholder constitutes political corruption only if the act is directly related to their official duties, is done under color of law or involves trading in influence.

How are Super PACs using government officials? How are they illegitimate private gain? 

I don't get why corruption is the term being used here. Unfairness in image projection perhaps. Corruption is a very inaccurate description, and it's problematic because it carries very negative connotations that do not apply in this case.

I believe you're grossly over-representing the impact Super PACs have. They are most definitely not the primary factor here. They're not the only ones who release ads. They just proliferate ads due to higher spending.

You claim that they are swaying the voters. I can easily counter that by saying that their absence can only reduce the amount of information the voters have. Why are you assuming that less information is better, especially when you also state that they tend to be less educated on issues and politics? 

You stated it yourself. It's the people that are not putting the time and effort to understand their candidate. That people allow themselves to be swayed is their own fault. Shifting the blame to Super PACs is implying that one front for advertisements is brainwashing the people when they can easily obtain the information for themselves.

I can't really disagree with your statement that there are people out there who don't use their heads, but whether or not there are Super PACs ultimately makes no difference with these people to begin with then. What's the difference between positive/negative ad ratios of 3000 to 2999 and 300 and 299 then? The overall result is going to be similar, because those are the only pieces of information those people would rely on. So why blame Super PACs?

Perhaps you're referring to independents? One assumes they are independent BECAUSE they have done enough research on their respective parties and realized they do not associate with either of them. If they are independents because they are too lazy or simply do not have enough information, then they are no different from the people described above.

I think your logic is missing key details.

For one, it assumes that Super PACs are the main reason for the "corruption"(image projection) ignoring the fact that Democrats have to use them to counter the Republican ones. Money is important. Sanders should know it. Bernie, the one who hasn't, not only had his own "Super PACs" in the form of union groups, he also ended up having over 650+ pages of violations where people donated more than the limit. Therefore he had more available funding than he should have. In this case it was actually illegal... This is actual corruption that matches the definition.

Note that I'm not actually defending Super PACs. I find that it would be best if they are eliminated entirely from the race. More than that, I also believe that Americans need to be more aware of their own political contexts. Blaming politicians and "corruption" is nothing but a scapegoat for their own failures to seek out information that is out there. I managed to find a lot of information on easily accessible public sources and very often appear to be more informed than Americans themselves. How is this remotely acceptable?

1 hour ago, rpggal said:

 cite voting behavior of the people as evidence against his claim that he represents them or cares about democracy really just misses that fundamental distinction and mischaracterizes the mechanism of the corruption he's talking about. He does care about democracy, that's why he wants campaign contribution reform, so that when an ad comes on TV to try to buy your vote at least it's your fellow citizen trying to get you on their side just as often as a corporation trying to get you on theirs.

I honestly can't find the distinction between his version of corruption and his claims on the version he fights against. Corruption is corruption, whatever the form.

Someone with 700 pages of violations, willfully ignored over time as the evidence suggests, has no right to criticize the financial integrity of other people, especially when he refuses to release tax returns and sketchily requests extensions til after the major primaries in June.

Someone who has repeatedly told half-truths and incomplete messages about his own campaign policies cannot criticize enemy PACs for pointing out those fallacies. They have the time and money. They will find the faults and exploit them. Those faults need to be explained.

I'm not railing against Sanders here. The longer this election goes however, the less of a puritan Sanders is coming out to be. Yet apparently his supporters are all too willful to look away from all the corruption he's displayed throughout his process because they are so adamant to remove another they've set their sights on.

I mean.. we're all human. Corruption can never go away. This isn't a defeatist attitude. It's a realistic one. I'm not even claiming the Democrat party isn't corrupt in some ways. It is a human construct and humans are fundamentally flawed. What makes anyone so certain that the vision Sanders wants to bring about won't have corruption of its own?

Why are people assuming that Sanders' own revolution is immune from corruption? If he were to magically have his own political party, why are people assuming that everyone will be on the same track, cooperate happily, and quietly agree to having their needs set aside for others?

I don't get it. I think the term "corruption" is thrown around too readily.

Those are my thoughts on the matter. I enjoyed reading your response.

[Adakam 2]

4 hours ago, LebaneseDude said:

Why are people assuming that Sanders' own revolution is immune from corruption? If he were to magically have his own political party, why are people assuming that everyone will be on the same track, cooperate happily, and quietly agree to having their needs set aside for others?

Just like the republican-filled congress was a barrier for Obama all the time

[Nemo 4,410]

Honestly I think the only thing that's destructive to the party is BS articles like this.

[rpggal 332]

14 hours ago, LebaneseDude said:

You're right in that one is policy and the other is process, but they are not mutually exclusive events. The issue is that Bernie is not even representing all people in policy. His entire campaign has focused on economic issues, downplaying major concerns like foreign policy and deconstruction of discrimination and xenophobia. Furthermore, his economic reforms focus almost completely on the working class. He claims that the taxations needed to fund his plans will be taken purely from the rich, but that is simply not the way it works in any country he supposedly wants to emulate. The middle class is going to take a significant hit. So he's not only failing to represent all people, he's not even wanted by them, unless they're young and/or white. Yet he continues to claim that he has the "people's" side. That has unfortunate implications that minorities or those that do not vote for him are not part of the people, especially when his supporters are in the clear minority.

The entire point of Super PACs is to have "unlimited" funding on advertisements for their candidate.

What is corruption?

Political corruption is the use of powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. An illegal act by an officeholder constitutes political corruption only if the act is directly related to their official duties, is done under color of law or involves trading in influence.

How are Super PACs using government officials? How are they illegitimate private gain? 

I don't get why corruption is the term being used here. Unfairness in image projection perhaps. Corruption is a very inaccurate description, and it's problematic because it carries very negative connotations that do not apply in this case.

I believe you're grossly over-representing the impact Super PACs have. They are most definitely not the primary factor here. They're not the only ones who release ads. They just proliferate ads due to higher spending.

You claim that they are swaying the voters. I can easily counter that by saying that their absence can only reduce the amount of information the voters have. Why are you assuming that less information is better, especially when you also state that they tend to be less educated on issues and politics? 

You stated it yourself. It's the people that are not putting the time and effort to understand their candidate. That people allow themselves to be swayed is their own fault. Shifting the blame to Super PACs is implying that one front for advertisements is brainwashing the people when they can easily obtain the information for themselves.

I can't really disagree with your statement that there are people out there who don't use their heads, but whether or not there are Super PACs ultimately makes no difference with these people to begin with then. What's the difference between positive/negative ad ratios of 3000 to 2999 and 300 and 299 then? The overall result is going to be similar, because those are the only pieces of information those people would rely on. So why blame Super PACs?

Perhaps you're referring to independents? One assumes they are independent BECAUSE they have done enough research on their respective parties and realized they do not associate with either of them. If they are independents because they are too lazy or simply do not have enough information, then they are no different from the people described above.

I think your logic is missing key details.

For one, it assumes that Super PACs are the main reason for the "corruption"(image projection) ignoring the fact that Democrats have to use them to counter the Republican ones. Money is important. Sanders should know it. Bernie, the one who hasn't, not only had his own "Super PACs" in the form of union groups, he also ended up having over 650+ pages of violations where people donated more than the limit. Therefore he had more available funding than he should have. In this case it was actually illegal... This is actual corruption that matches the definition.

Note that I'm not actually defending Super PACs. I find that it would be best if they are eliminated entirely from the race. More than that, I also believe that Americans need to be more aware of their own political contexts. Blaming politicians and "corruption" is nothing but a scapegoat for their own failures to seek out information that is out there. I managed to find a lot of information on easily accessible public sources and very often appear to be more informed than Americans themselves. How is this remotely acceptable?

I honestly can't find the distinction between his version of corruption and his claims on the version he fights against. Corruption is corruption, whatever the form.

Someone with 700 pages of violations, willfully ignored over time as the evidence suggests, has no right to criticize the financial integrity of other people, especially when he refuses to release tax returns and sketchily requests extensions til after the major primaries in June.

Someone who has repeatedly told half-truths and incomplete messages about his own campaign policies cannot criticize enemy PACs for pointing out those fallacies. They have the time and money. They will find the faults and exploit them. Those faults need to be explained.

I'm not railing against Sanders here. The longer this election goes however, the less of a puritan Sanders is coming out to be. Yet apparently his supporters are all too willful to look away from all the corruption he's displayed throughout his process because they are so adamant to remove another they've set their sights on.

I mean.. we're all human. Corruption can never go away. This isn't a defeatist attitude. It's a realistic one. I'm not even claiming the Democrat party isn't corrupt in some ways. It is a human construct and humans are fundamentally flawed. What makes anyone so certain that the vision Sanders wants to bring about won't have corruption of its own?

Why are people assuming that Sanders' own revolution is immune from corruption? If he were to magically have his own political party, why are people assuming that everyone will be on the same track, cooperate happily, and quietly agree to having their needs set aside for others?

I don't get it. I think the term "corruption" is thrown around too readily.

Those are my thoughts on the matter. I enjoyed reading your response.

I disagree with your characterization of corruption in that it is far too narrow. Corruption is found in all kinds of different fields, not just politics, so it is erroneous to restrict it to the actions of government officials. Corruption is found in companies, sports, religion, etc., and the meaning of the word is the same in each: running things in a way that perverts it's stated intentions, often behind the scenes (e.g. sports are supposed to show the best player, yet matches may be rigged to fix bets; they're supposed to show who has the best natural talents, yet players may be using steroids to enhance performance. Even if these things were technically not against the rules, purists would consider them a perversion and corruption of the sport because they subvert the basic purpose of the activity). Democracy is supposed to be the people self-regulating by voting into law the policies they believe are best. The rules don't need to be broken for the system as a whole to be corrupt, i.e. representing the interest of corporations rather than the people. I gave the example of the unfair influence of advertisements paid for by super PACs. You have downplayed their influence and said voters should be personally responsible for their decisions. This morality of personal responsibility, though a popular one (especially by the GOP) flies in the face of the best available science, which has shown ad nauseum that human beings as a species are NOT rational, did not evolve TO BE rational, and have TONS of built in biases that predispose us to heuristic, emotion-driven thinking and make rational thought EXTEMELY difficult. The most damning bias of all is that everyone by default believes they don't have any biases, and will go through great lengths to convince themselves of it when their neutrality is challenged. Any morality based on this mythology of the rational man, a proven falsehood, is untenable. Morality must be based on facts, and the facts are that human beings are EXTREMELY susceptible to acting on the basis of heuristics and emotion, NOT on the basis of logic and reasoning (even the ones like you or I that believe that we are). These heuristics and emotions are based on our experiences and our environment, and once they have been formed they are VERY difficult to override. Whereas before being exposed to a positive fact sampling (e.g an ad) about an individual you would weigh both positive and negative facts equally, after you have been exposed you will by default approach negative facts about them with greater skepticism, rationalize those facts, see more positive facts as contradicting/disproving them, rather than the new facts contradicting the old. Same for negative facts. And that's just one of many biases ads can play off of to sway your emotions to vote one way versus another. Why should we hold a voter personally responsible for voting on biases and emotion when, as a species, it is almost impossible not to? Why should we hold the average citizen responsible for not having an education sufficient to make an informed decision when education in this county is cost prohibitive? Why should we hold them responsible for not researching the candidates outside of the ads they see when many, many Americans are working 2 jobs and taking care of kids and don't have time to become completely informed (and even then will not likely understand the policies in question, and will view them all through a biased lens anyway). I just find it unreasonable to put responsibility on an agent that for all intents and purposes could not do otherwise. Meanwhile, the government can do something about it by limiting the amount of money corporations put into campaigns such that these ads that sway us are at least speech by the people for the people, rather than by and for corporate interests. (I didn't touch on your other points because my point wasn't to say that Bernie's campaign is without contradiction, just that I disagreed with that specific contradiction as framed by the author).

[LebaneseDude 6,146]

1 hour ago, rpggal said:

*snip*

nvm