National

Brian Beutler at The New Republic says Bernie Sanders Won’t Go Quietly Into the Night and Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, should be grateful that he's sticking around.

The ninth Democratic primary debate revealed almost no new daylight between Clinton and Sanders. It mainly just revealed that Sanders won’t go quietly into the night. Sanders was withering in his criticisms, but the criticisms were almost all familiar. Occam’s razor suggests his strategy is intended to avoid a blowout defeat in New York’s presidential primary on Tuesday, which would probably constitute a fatal blow to his candidacy. And yet despite the campaign’s bitter turn, despite the fact that Sanders’s Hail Mary tack is much more likely to damage Clinton in the general election than to secure the nomination for himself, supporters should maintain a fondness for him as a fundamentally decent rival who has left Clinton, the Democratic Party, and the country better off. At the stage where all kindness has drained out of a campaign, most candidates find themselves tempted to sacrifice their remaining integrity to win. Sanders, by contrast, reminded skeptics why his supporters have been so loyal: With everything on the line, given the opportunity to obfuscate at Clinton’s expense, Sanders held firm even to views that promise to damage him in the state that could seal his fate.

Beutler was talking about Sanders' Israel answer. I am convinced that the answer neither helped him nor hurt him. Those turned off by his answer were likely already with Hillary and those who would like his answer were likely already with Bernie. Like Beutler says, if Bernie tried to go all hawkish and pro-Israel, he would have likely damaged himself with his own supporters.

Some food for thought:

A March 2008 Gallup poll shows that 28 percent of Clinton supporters say they would vote for John McCain over Obama, and 19 percent of Obama supporters say they would vote for McCain over Clinton. A 2016 Marist poll asks Sanders and Clinton supporters if they would vote for the other candidate in the general election. A New York Times/CBS poll from this year finds that 40 percent of Democrats think the tone of this primary has been more positive than previous primaries, and 48 percent think it’s about the same.

While our little "civil war" may seem nasty now, it is nothing compared to 2008. But in 2008, if my memory serves, we all supported Obama, I believe. At least all the front page contributors. The divide among contributors and commenters this time around may make our primary seem worse than 2008, more divided, but it is really not.

Earlier this week we learned that Sean Barney Sean Barney raised $150,148.75 in the first quarter of 2016, for a total of $231,000 for the entire campaign, and has $171,263.30 in cash on hand. We also learned that Lisa Blunt Rochester raised $134,770.74 in the first quarter, for a total of $256,293.15 for the entire campaign, and has 284,873.06 cash on hand, though that includes a $128,000 loan that Lisa has made to her own campaign. Last night the Townsend campaign announced that it raised $145,747.34 for the first quarter, $358,423.38 for the entire campaign, and $192,545.04 cash on hand. However, a key question needs to be made about each campaign's fundraising: how much of it was raised for the primary, and how much for the general? Because if the money was raised for the general, it cannot be used in the primary.

Blogger Emeritus, Liberal Geek makes a very sound point.

When Howard Dean had his moment in the sun there were people that stepped into the fray. Some of them stuck around and started blogs (DL is one), joined committees, started progressive clubs, etc. Today, there are a bunch of Deaniacs and other progressives that have roles in the Delaware Democratic party. Some are elected officials. If Bernie Sanders makes you want to make the Democratic party more like him, you need only give one evening a month to a local committee or club. There are whole RD committees that are progressives. Some day, they might be looking for someone to run for an office, and you might be the best person for the job. In the meantime, you can chat with candidates and ask them hard questions about the economy, Social Security, criminal justice reform, whatever.

When a Democratic President is elected (who isn't named Franklin Roosevelt) he (or she) stops being the leader of the Democratic Party and pushing for things that Democrats want. Instead he become "The President", and thereby has a view of events that extends beyond the provincial interests of the loser Americans who gather under the tattered banner reading "Democrats" Republican Presidents are not burdened by this urge to be the President of the entire country. They run roughshod over the opposition because they view it as their repsosibilty to work for the voters who put them in office (e.g Republicans).

Verizon is a despicable, union-busting, company. My brother-in-law is on strike. He looks like skin and bones after working mandatory 6-days a week, 12 hour shifts. Whatever you do, support…