Democrats keep doing surprisingly well in special elections. The party’s most vulnerable Senate incumbents are running ahead of their rivals in key battleground states. One of Democrats’ signature issues — reproductive rights — has repeatedly proved a winning message.
And yet Joe Biden is struggling to pull even with Donald Trump.
It’s another ominous sign for the president: Even as other Democrats are running strong, the party’s down-ballot successes aren’t translating into momentum at the top of the ticket. Biden trails Trump in many of the states he needs to win to keep the White House. His job approval is underwater. And the coalition of voters that ushered him into office four years ago is fraying.
“Democrats are enthusiastic about trying to win the Senate and trying to win the House,” said Neil Oxman, a Pennsylvania-based Democratic strategist.
And they’re “not enthusiastic about Biden’s reelection,” Oxman said. “Period.”
I voted for Sanders in the last two primaries. But the fact remains he lost both primaries ultimately. He did well. And it’s possible he might have drawn in enough people who wouldn’t have voted otherwise. But there’s no guarantee of that. It’s all just baseless speculation.
And let’s be honest it’s entirely possible he would have had more trouble than Biden or Clinton in the general. The fascists acted friendly to him in the primaries specifically because of how it divided Democrats and the left. In the general they would have turned on him with the fierceness equal to Clinton or biden. And I think we have to acknowledge that was a brilliant strategy. Now 8 plus years on it’s still paying heavy dividends for them. As you’ve shown.
Even as the Democratic party acknowledged his voice and gave him positions of leadership. And Sanders himself stayed part of the democratic party. For some reason failing to be as offended as other people were being offended for him. Instead those people choosing to abandon the Democratic Party and take power from them. Ultimately taking power from and abandoning Sanders in the process. An odd thing to do for people who claim to like Bernie Sanders.
I remember, and maybe I misunderstood, when he was up against Biden last time and the biggest issue he had was that Elizabeth Warren’s similar message split votes. She was clearly losing but for some reason stayed in and siphoned votes away from him just long enough for him to back out.
More people wanted either Sanders or Warren than wanted Biden but ya’ll ended up with Biden. We have the same problem here in Canada where more vastly more people hate the Conservatives than support them and yet that party always ends up dangerously close to gaining power.
They’re definitely was a lot of overlap on interests. But that doesn’t automatically equate to siphoned off votes. There were a not insignificant number of people who were direct fans of things Warren has pushed for and accomplished. That would not automatically have translated over to sanders. We can speculate that a large number would. But as stated that would be speculation. We could speculate as to why Warren didn’t drop out. But again that would be speculation. However I don’t think that she had anything to gain or owed any allegiance to party leadership to just stay in as a spoiler. Far more likely it was just good old wishful thinking and hubris on her part. It could happen to any of us.
What exactly has Warren accomplished?
The first thing Just quickly off the top of my head Period the consumer Financial Protection Bureau was her baby.
The fact that Warren herself is a former republican. I disagree with her on a ton of shit. But I still have to respect her for some of the things she’s done. I think she’s wrong and misguided. But she definitely tries to do good/help in her eyes. And the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is absolutely a good thing.