Monday Open Thread [5.2.16]

INDIANA—NBC/WSJ/Marist–Trump 49, Cruz 34, Kasich 13
INDIANA—NBC/WSJ/Marist–Clinton 50, Sanders 46

So Andrew Sullivan is back and he does not disappoint. He says Trump is an Extinction-Level Event for American Democracy.

Could it be that the Donald has emerged from the populist circuses of pro wrestling and New York City tabloids, via reality television and Twitter, to prove not just Plato but also James Madison right, that democracies “have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention … and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths”? Is he testing democracy’s singular weakness — its susceptibility to the demagogue — by blasting through the firewalls we once had in place to prevent such a person from seizing power? Or am I overreacting?

Perhaps. The nausea comes and goes, and there have been days when the news algorithm has actually reassured me that “peak Trump” has arrived. But it hasn’t gone away, and neither has Trump. In the wake of his most recent primary triumphs, at a time when he is perilously close to winning enough delegates to grab the Republican nomination outright, I think we must confront this dread and be clear about what this election has already revealed about the fragility of our way of life and the threat late-stage democracy is beginning to pose to itself.

It is a long but worthwhile read.

Whoa. DeMint admits voter ID is about electing Rs. 'elections begin to change towards more conservative candidates' https://t.co/4MwomxeSSq

— Glenn Thrush (@GlennThrush) May 2, 2016

Bernie still has delusions of grandeur.

Despite losing five of the last six Democratic primaries — including a crucial loss to Hillary Clinton in New York — Bernie Sanders isn’t ready to call it quits. In fact, at a press conference in Washington, D.C., on Sunday, Sanders told reporters he expected the Democratic National Convention in July to be “a contested contest.” “It is virtually impossible for Secretary Clinton to reach the majority of convention delegates by June 14 with pledged delegates alone,” he said. “She will need superdelegates to take her over the top.”

He therefore urged superdelegates to switch allegiances if their vote doesn’t coincide with the outcome of their state’s primary. “In states where either candidate has won a landslide victory, those superdelegates ought to seriously reflect on whether they should cast their vote in line with the wishes of the people in their states,” he said. “If I win a state with 70 percent of the votes, you know what? I think I’m entitled to those superdelegates.”

I guess a graceful exit from the race is not in the cards.

Sanders insisting that a candidate must win majority of pledged delegates isn't how it works. The facts: pic.twitter.com/rfHIq2EwKJ

— Mark Murray (@mmurraypolitics) May 2, 2016

Pema Levy tells us why Hillary Clinton cannot just tell Sanders to drop out:

Hillary Clinton’s lead in delegates over rival Bernie Sanders is now almost insurmountable as they move toward the conclusion of the Democratic presidential primary contest. But Clinton has not called on him to drop out of the race, for one simple reason: the example her own campaign set in 2008.

So we will fight this thing through to June 14, and then Bernie will meet with Hillary and enthusiastically endorse her without preconditions, which is what she did in 2008. Precedent from 2008 goes both ways.

Clinton-Sanders Contest Fuels Democratic Support for Expanding Obamacare https://t.co/McvpIqYKQp

— Capital Journal (@WSJPolitics) May 1, 2016

So about that notion that Trump will somehow poach Sanders’ voters? Charles M. Blow at The New York Times says forget about it:

Trump’s supporters seem to see a country in decline, a government that is out of control and incompetent, an influx of immigrants that represent an existential threat and a culture that is hamstrung by political correctness.

Conversely, Sanders’s supporters see a democracy slipping into oligarchy, a country that has utterly failed to keep pace with its global peers on social structure issues — economic equality, taxation, health care and education — and has gone completely off the rails on many others, like criminal justice and mass incarceration.

These are not crowds that are likely to lie down together. Indeed, I would imagine that Trump’s brand of xenophobia, racism, Islamophobia, misogyny and fascism would not go down easily with the faction of left progressives that swell the ranks of Sanders’s supporters.

More from @POLITICOMag: the great @mikegrunwald wrote the definitive piece on how Obama lost his narrative https://t.co/WDv0RT4Nk8

— Susan Glasser (@sbg1) May 2, 2016

Rebecca Shapiro at The Guardian writes that while the world adores Justin Trudeau; in Canada, we’re still reserving judgment:

A retired lawyer on the west coast told me that while Canadians are not wholly enthused by the new PM, the nostalgia from his “iconic” connections will allow him a longer honeymoon period. Meanwhile, the president of my synagogue in Vancouver also attributed Justin Trudeau’s electoral success to his last name—she expressed blatant disapproval for his “lightweight” foreign policy and “celebrity” appeal. She did confirm however, with characteristic Canadian politeness, that “he’s a nice kid, don’t get me wrong.”

Canadian millennials, on the other hand, are the demographic supposedly most taken in by Trudeau’s idealism – their vote helped propel him into office, as they mobilized in excitement at the alternative Trudeau posed to the arch-conservative Harper. But these younger voters are also withholding full endorsement, concerned that the government’s heavy spending will mean an insurmountable deficit, and that not enough is being done to make housing affordable.

So weird how in Trumpland someone is always raping us. Especially if we're white men >>> https://t.co/MBmLv2YSay

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) May 2, 2016

From the fingers of George F. Will: “In losing disastrously, Trump probably would create down-ballot carnage sufficient to end even Republican control of the House. Ticket splitting is becoming rare in polarized America: In 2012, only 5.7 percent of voters supported a presidential candidate and a congressional candidate of opposite parties…Were he to be nominated, conservatives would have two tasks. One would be to help him lose 50 states — condign punishment for his comprehensive disdain for conservative essentials, including the manners and grace that should lubricate the nation’s civic life. Second, conservatives can try to save from the anti-Trump undertow as many senators, representatives, governors and state legislators as possible.”