This Jessica Valenti piece is worth reading:
I knew going into Super Tuesday that Elizabeth Warren was unlikely to win big. I had prepared myself for that. What did take me by surprise, though, was just how poorly she fared: Even in her home state of Massachusetts, she finished third.
Warren’s team says the senator is “talking … to assess a path forward,” but it’s hard to imagine a viable presidential campaign after last night.
It’s enough to make me feel, well, despairing: that we had the candidate of a lifetime — someone with the energy, vision, and follow-through to lead the country out of our nightmarish era — and that the media and voters basically outright erased and ignored her.
I honestly do not get it. I really don’t. I’m not the most enlightened or woke man on the planet, but maybe I benefited more from growing up on a college campus surrounded by women who are smarter and work harder than me and it doesn’t intimidate or bother me. For that matter, probably my greatest strength is appreciating how stupid I am and knowing my limitations, and recognizing people who know what they are talking about and getting out of their way when they do things. I’ve digressed.
She really is the best candidate out there. She single-handedly ended two campaigns on the debate stage- first, of course was that Delaney character who, if he is lucky, people in a few years will forget he even ran:
The second one was even more important, because Michael Bloomberg is an autocrat and a fascist, and was a true threat to democracy and the Democratic party. Warren recognized that, and worked behind the scenes to make sure he was on the debate stage. This, of course, was met with the reactions that THE DNC IS BEING BOUGHT OUT BY A BILLIONAIRE and the usual stuff, but, again, Warren had a plan.
She let Bloomberg get up on stage, and then she murdered him in front of the entire nation:
Elizabeth Warren threw herself on this grenade and saved the rest of us, and she paid a price for being the “shrill” and “shouty” woman. Do not be disillusioned about this. Michael Bloomberg is no longer in this race because of Warren. I can only dream what she would do to other billionaires if we made her President.
But that is not to be. We’re down to Biden and Bernie. Such a lost opportunity.
PatrickG
I knew she had no real chance when I cast my ballot for her.
When the returns came, I cried. For all the reasons Valenti outlines. Prediction doesn’t have the gut punch of reality.
Lymie
I am trying not to dispair. Biden is so weak with so much baggage. He is terrible. And if you wanted progressive policies Warren is so much better than Sanders. Misogyny is such a societal issue.
Elizabelle
Thank you, John.
Missed opportunity, no doubt. I hope we are all pleasantly surprised by the next chapters of her career.
We are due. In this age of the ignominous Trump.
guachi
Warren’s appeal was primarily to:
Women
liberals
whites
college educated
Ask someone who isn’t one of the above and maybe you’ll get an answer as to why she didn’t catch on.
Is there any white woman who has a great reputation in the black community? (that isn’t Hillary because of her husband).
Is there any white female Democrat who has a great reputation among non-college educated men?
I’ll edit to be more blunt: No white woman will ever be elected President as a Democrat because no white woman will ever be the favorite of black voters.
cokane
I dunno, maybe accept that our intuitions about her are wrong? She may have been the best presidential material, but not the best candidate to win a general election. Matchup polls showed her doing worse than Biden or Sanders versus Trump.
She failed to win her own state. At some point you might have to accept that your initial take on her as a candidate–not as a president–was mistaken. I know I have.
anarchoRex
Well, I’m curious what Warren supporters think is the reason she did so poorly?
ETA: I’m also curious, if Warren drops out and endorses Bernie, how her former supporters that move to Biden will justify it.
ThresherK
Sady Doyle pegged how her media betters would handle (or ignore) Warren a year ago
cokane
@guachi: Exit polling shows she lost Massachusetts women to Biden. I’m sorry, but she was not going to be this formidable general election candidate.
Cacti
In the end, Warren had problems with two groups of voters.
Those who didn’t know her, and those who did.
guachi
@cokane: The writing was on the wall after SC. Black voters rejected her so many white voters did, too.
eclare
@Lymie: Joe will have kickass surrogates. Wait til Barack and Michelle get out there.
anarchoRex
I don’t really understand this narrative developing that she was punished for taking out Bloomberg? Unless I’m misreading it.
dww44
I mailed in my absentee ballot on Monday and marked the oval by her name. That primary is not until the 24th. While I am sad that this likely means the end of her campaign, I had been holding out hope that she could make it to the convention and play a big role in the outcome there. The person who’s most sad, though, is my 13 year old grandson who was really invested in her candidacy. His Mom is also sad because she cannot understand how we ended up, after such a promising start, with a 77 year old white man and a 78 year old one, both of whom if nominated and elected will be a year older at inaugaration. While she’s not a spring chicken, she has long behaved and moved like one and she’s more than a 4 year term younger than they.
Just heard on the Chris Hayes show that polling./data show that 60% of her voters/supporters will go to Sanders. Not so, never will be so in this household.
chopper
this. this so much.
Mary G
It is heartbreaking. I could see it coming, but I still had hope and it was crushed. I honestly believed that American voters would learn from 2016 and at least keep her up there in competition with the B boys, and they failed.
I so wanted to live to see a woman president, and I don’t think I will.
dww44
@anarchoRex: I’ve not been reading that narrative. Been too busy with life, but I do think that did not help her.
Sally
Me too!
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
Somebody told me tonight that Bloomberg should be Biden’s VP. I was like, um, no, he won’t be. Bloomberg having such a big ego that he would never play second fiddle as VP is reason enough why he would never be the VP candidate
anarchoRex
Because it helped Biden? That’s the only argument I’ve seen that makes sense to me.
Sally
MisterForkbeard
@anarchoRex: I think that justification would be pretty easy for a lot of Warren voters I know: They think Bernie is temperamentally unsuited, can’t plan strategically, and is really bad at working with people or making allies.
Basically, they don’t think he can enact any of his ideas and are worried that he’d lose to Trump
ETA: this is less important, but many of them are seriously angry at Bernie’s online supporters and have been over the past few weeks. Others may not have that issue – pretty sure my wife would prefer Sanders over Biden, and she was in for Warren.
West of the Cascades
@Mary G: Don’t give up – with all seriousness I say that either Sanders or Biden is more likely than not to pick a woman as Vice President; more likely than not to beat Trump in November; and then an even bet to not complete his first term.
It’s not the ideal way of getting the first woman president, but seems the most likely at this point (the ideal way is that Trump and Pence die simultaneously before November 3rd).
trollhattan
Yup. All of it.
anarchoRex
@dww44: also curious why you’ll ignore her endorsement if she endorses Bernie?
anarchoRex
@MisterForkbeard: so it’s a calculation over who seems more electable versus whose platform you’re closer to?
Lumpy
There’s a lot of factors here, but I think partly she made some missteps; When being challenged on policies, specifically how to pay for things, she shouldn’t have felt compelled to get into micro-details. Wonks may like it, but voters find it confusing, and it makes it seem like she’s vulnerable to criticism (by responding to attacks she might not need to respond to). Republicans never explain how they will pay for things – hell, Trump said Mexico would pay for the wall. That was enough for a lot of people.
The major media also didn’t favor her, for a lot of the same reasons they don’t favor Bernie (taxes will go up on the wealthy, fear of change, etc).
If Bernie is the nominee, I hope Warren is his running mate. Despite some of the hippie-punching we see here (anti-Bernie sentiment) they are friends and have worked together in the past. I think that is a winning ticket!
trollhattan
@anarchoRex:
It could be in reference to this bit of nonsense.
Mary G
@anarchoRex: Because we are grown ass adults who are entitled to vote our values. One of my values is having an executive who executes instead of just running their mouth and making extremely poor hiring choices.
Brachiator
@guachi:
Wow. That took an odd turn into crazy town. Hillary Clinton built alliances with women of color independent of her husband.
And sad to say, based on her weak poll showings, Warren didn’t pull much support from anyone. And Kamala Harris didn’t poll particularly well with black women.
To be blunt, it seems as though you pulled your conclusion out of thin air.
MisterForkbeard
@anarchoRex: No, it’s a “this guy would make a bad president even if he does want things I agree with.”
You can agree with someone and still think they’re incompetent, inspire bullies, etc. AND they doubt he’d would win and that his overall style and personality would mean he’s an ineffective president.
chopper
the fact that warren didn’t get anywhere close to the WH is an indictment. it just goes to show how terrible this country is, how awful and meaningless and shallow our political culture has become.
sigh.
anarchoRex
@Lumpy: I don’t see what she brings to the ticket. If it’s expertise, we’d be better served with her as Treasury Secretary, or head of the Fed. If it’s demographics, wouldn’t a better choice be someone like Abrams or Barbara Lee?
topclimber
Nevertheless, she will persist.
Jeffro
An “autocrat and a fascist”? I dunno, kind of lost me there JC
Also cokane, cacti, and anarchoRex ?
“Vote for (and donate to, and door-knock for) the candidate you like best”, BJers said ad infinitum. Well, for a variety of reasons, our fellow Democrats didn’t swarm to Warren, and so here we are, faced with a choice between trumpov’s hand-picked favorite opponent and the one he feared so much he violated his constitutional oath and endangered our national security over.
Really complicated stuff…
Elizabelle
This thread is a sea of pie. Out of here.
Gvg
Well, first of all most voters just don’t pay all that much attention. They really don’t know who this woman is. The media doesn’t really help anyone smart. It’s an entertainment industry.
Second, voters are spooked and want a sure thing. Many of us have already supported better candidates and had them lose…Hillary for instance. We know we need to have bunches of other people like someone and must be part of a crowd to win. I think Hillary was loads better than Warren myself.
Third, I have to say I don’t think she is that talented a politician. She missed some cues, walked into some “traps” in the last few years. The stupid Indian thing and hanging out with Bernie, agreeing initially that the establishment rigged things for Hillary. She can write good legislation, maybe run a consumer agency, but I think she would have difficulty with the nitro Republicans that are a fact of life for the next few years at least. I wouldn’ do better than her and anyone will have trouble, but she is not the best i’ve ever seen. I don’t see anyone great this year except maybe Pelosi. We’ll get by if we collectively assemble a great team though. Trump isn’t the only toxic idiot, he picks only the worst and when the general campaign starts it’ll hurt him. Warren will be a very useful part of the greater whole that is the Democratic Party. I don’t need to be in love. I think the party is more my love than any one politician. They match my values.
McConnel is the smart one I want defeated but not sure that can be done.
chopper
@anarchoRex:
i’m sure, thanks to the snake emoji crew, she’s only gonna get behind bernie if he full-on wins the whole show.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Brachiator:
Do you think the “Kamala is a Cop” BS had any effect?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Elizabelle:
Are you sure you’re not overusing the pie filter?
dww44
@guachi: I’m not sure that your last sentence speaks well of either white or black democrats. TBH, I think more highly of Democratic voters than this. but it would be enlightening if you would expand on that statement. Why is it that Black voters won’t ever vote/elect a white woman as President?
In my minority/majority city and county, the majority of white Democrats are women and those women have volunteered and worked in local and state elections within the largely Black controlled Democratic party. For me personally, I find your unequivocal statement disturbing and depressing.
Chyron HR
@guachi:
Yeah, fucking LIBERALS am I right? What do they think this is, the Democratic party or something? And don’t get me started on EDUCATION. Knowing things sounds pretty fruity to me.
anarchoRex
@Mary G: I always got the sense that she was supported for having the best judgement and plans. I find it funny that once her judgement is to endorse the other left candidate in the race a lot of people will drop that support.
Chris T.
@Lymie: Despair is not useful, and:
WaterGirl
@Elizabelle: Hope you got at least one CatCake before you left!
Repatriated
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Replies to pied posters get pied too.
Raoul Paste
I’m disappointed too, and I was surprised when knowledgeable people whom I respect didn’t think much of her.
Hell, I’m still lamenting the loss of Al Gore. That nerd is still my #1 choice for wonk-President
White & Gold Purgatorian
Oh good grief! Warren is not the best candidate out there. The best candidate is one who can get the most people to vote for him or her and Warren is clearly failing that. I get that she is smart and accomplished and speaks to your particular concerns, but she has not connected with actual voters and I think actually misjudged their deepest concerns. The people who are voting don’t want 4 more years of Trump. He is an existential crisis to many Democratic voters and arguably to our democracy itself. Sure, the sweeping changes Elizabeth Warren promises to fight for would be grand, but those grand visions are, like most political promises, unlikely to ever become reality. And the price for betting she could deliver on them is an increased probability of 4 more years of Trump. That is an unacceptable risk for a lot of people less well positioned than the average Warren supporter. It is literally existential. This is when you want a calm steady hand, not promises that won’t come true.
Brachiator
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
I also heard that and think it is an incredibly stupid idea. As you note, I don’t think Bloomberg’s ego would let him settle for VP.
And voters clearly rejected him. There is no reason to give him a second chance.
Jeffro
@Lumpy: Yes, a lot of factors and you nailed a few of them. Only a very small segment of D voters (and no GOP voters, obvs) care about wonky detailed plans for issues X, Y, and Z. I’m one of them, but it’s just true.
topclimber
@Cacti: Nevertheless, you are a dope.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Sexism. And:
A very large part of our large primary field looked at 2016 and concluded that the party and the country wanted some variant of Sandersism.
In 2018, a handful of more-or-less Sandersite candidates won in a handful of safe blue districts, and a lot more candidates who looked more like Obama or Clinton (or Biden) won in a lot more districts and states.
That large part of our field stayed focused on chasing the Sandersite vote.
Here we are.
VFX Lurker
Hillary Clinton won the Democratic Primary with black voter support in 2016. In the general election, 94% of black women voted for Hillary Clinton.
Not sure why you think Bill Clinton deserves credit for Hillary’s black voter support. Hillary was going undercover to desegregate schools all the way back in 1972.
ETA: ditto on what Brachiator said.
Kent
I think there is a tendency for many of us to imagine a country that simply doesn’t exist. This is the country that stole a continent by wiping out hundreds of indigenous cultures. This is the country that industrialized slavery and then institutionalized a century of white supremacy as the law of the land. This is the country that separates children from their parents and cages them. This is the country that doubled down on monster pickups and SUVs and McMansions and suburban sprawl AFTER the course of climate change became scientifically indisputable.
That is not a country that elects Professor Senator Elizabeth Warren with her 100 plans to save us from ourselves.
And I’m heavy hearted too. I was all in for Warren after Harris left the race.
hells littlest angel
I hate to admit how often I dream of that, usually as a murder-suicide.
PatrickG
@cokane:
What a wonderfully succinct way to sum up why this Warren supporter, at least, is grieving. It’s not about her, per se. It’s about the fact that Democratic voters looked at “the best presidential material” and resoundingly said no in favor of two deeply flawed male candidates.
I’ll vote for the (D) in November, and I’ll do my part once I pick myself back up. This is just another shock to the system. Honestly, I’m kind of surprised I still expect anything better from our deeply dysfunctional political system.
I’m going to leave the thread and go do some house cleaning and Netflix with my partner, so likely won’t see replies. Best wishes, all.
P.S. No hostility intended towards you, just heavy sadness that our society is sclerotic (to put it mildly) when it comes to women in politics.
Larime
@anarchoRex: You’re assuming she endorses him. I don’t think she endorses at all.
guachi
@Brachiator: Warren, like Klobuchar, did far better among white voters than black voters. Harris did equally poorly among both white and black voters.
Clinton was crushed among black voters by Obama. Yes, she beat up on Sanders but if she wasn’t named Clinton I’m not certain how far she’d get.
Can you name one white female Democrat who’d have the slightest chance to win the Presidency?
The first female President is more likely to be a Republican than a Democrat.
bbleh
@guachi: No white woman will ever be elected President as a Democrat because no white woman will ever be the favorite of black voters.
Hmm, the (admittedly few )black voters I have spoken with have told me that the they didn’t think Warren could win because white voters wouldn’t vote for a woman.
And FWIW, I think they’re correct. A huge proportion of Americans — men and women — who are overwhelmingly white, are so stuck in some time period at least a century old that they can’t even conceive of a woman president. They can’t deal with women bosses, they can’t deal with strong female characters in movies, and they can’t deal with even the idea of women as political leaders.
Americans are basically children, politically speaking. And this is a big part of that.
Jeffro
Btw Chuck Schumer firing back (via spokesperson) about Roberts’ hypocrisy/critiquing…nice!
PACK
THE
COURT
in 2021!
Mike in NC
See Jennifer Rubin’s latest WaPo column on why Elizbeth Warren fizzled.
VFX Lurker
Where? Kamala Harris was not on my California ballot this year.
anarchoRex
@Jeffro: Bloomberg is absolutely an autocrat and a fascist, it’s his entire political record.
dww44
@anarchoRex: I became anti Bernie in 2016 and haven’t looked back from that. I like Warren as a candidate and am sad that her candidacy has not resonated with enough primary voters. If she endorses Bernie, I will be disappointed, but I was never gonna be a Bernie supporter and will be a reluctant voter if he wins the nomination. In every way possible, I think he’s the wrong person to take the Democratic party to victory in November. I also resent the fact that he uses the party apparatus at the same time that he condemns it and those who support it.
dlwchico
Years ago, before she was a senator I think, I saw her on The Daily Show and was smitten with her then and thought “She should be President.”
At the time it was not something I thought might ever actually happen. Then she was a senator and in 2016 I hoped she might run but she pretty firmly said she wasn’t, from what I remember.
Now we had the chance and it was like Lucy with that football.
Thanks America.
Mike in NC
@guachi:
The name you hear most is Nikki Haley, ex-governor of SC and a truly terrible excuse of a human being.
Adam L Silverman
@dww44:
We ended up here because of a combination of four things. The first is that Senator Sanders has been running non-stop for president since 2016. He never really stopped running when that election ended. The second is Vice President Biden’s name recognition and connection to President Obama. The third is the sad reality of our news media, especially our political news media and how they frame and shape and weight things in a campaign. The fourth and final reason this happened is that the 2020 presidential election is not about Medicare for All or any other specific policy or plan. It is solely a referendum on the President. On whether he gets four more years and the Republic is fully transformed into a white Christian herrenvolk democracy where the rest of us are either considered white on sufferance – for instance Jews – or become some variant of second class citizens if not actual unpersons or whether a hard stop is placed on what he and his administration are trying to do. And because this is the reality of the campaign, and a good part of the context of it, the 2020 presidential election becomes one of “more Trump” or “make it stop”. VP Biden, partially because of his connection to President Obama, partially because of his personal biography, and partially because of his ability to be really and genuinely publicly and privately empathetic and sympathetic personifies this choice.
The 2020 presidential election is about whether the house (the US) will continue to be burned down by the President, his administration, the GOP, and the conservative movement or whether the fire will be put out, the structure assessed for damage, a determination made about what can be salvaged and refurbished versus what has to be thrown away and replaced with something updated and better. That’s what the election is about. The President obviously represents the arson and burn down the house side of the analogy. VP Biden, better than almost anyone, represents the put the fire out, everyone take a deep breath, assess the damage, and make repairs side of the analogy. Senator Warren, as impressive as she is, doesn’t convey this. Though for the life of me I do not know why. Senator Sanders is the representation of someone who always thought the house was an eyesore and structurally unsound so he wants to accelerate the fire because he has this completely different idea of what should replace it.
For the vast majority of Americans they just want this administration to stop. They don’t want to have to pay attention every minute of every day to what the President, his administration, his party, and the conservative movement are doing because failure to do so could lead to a terrible outcome. They want to be able to go back to not paying attention to who is or is not president for days at a time. They want the pain to stop. They want the horror to stop. That’s it. And for significant groups within the Democratic coalition they can’t afford to take a risk on revolution. Because they know that it isn’t easy, isn’t safe. And that it is always met with overwhelming resistance and pushback from those who want the US to be a white Christian herrenvolk. And that’s why VP Biden has reemerged this week despite his age and his baggage and his malapropisms and occasionally Munchausian stories, why the people with the most to lose in the Democratic coalition who have been its back bone for decades are supporting him and rejecting Senator Sanders and why for all that she would be the best of the three as president, Senator Warren can’t get any traction.
currants
@cokane: Sure, she “fail(ed) to win her own state.” She’s my rep. You know who was the FIRST senator from MA who was not a person with a penis? Elizabeth Warren. You know who was the second one? There isn’t one. You think misogyny isn’t alive and well in MA?
Felanius Kootea
@guachi: And yet Harris fizzled. Face it, there’s always some reason in the US why a highly qualified woman somehow doesn’t cut it, but mediocre men are given a pass when it comes to the presidency. Misogyny is a terrible thing.
It’s a shame that the US is one of the few countries admired by many that has never given the world a female leader. Pakistan had Bhutto, India had Indira Gandhi, UK – Theresa May and Margaret Thatcher, Germany – Angela Merkel. The list goes on and on. It seems likely that the first US woman president will be a conservative.
anarchoRex
@Larime: That is my presupposition, yes, but I agree that the most likely move is for her not to endorse. Which, I predict, she will be shit on endlessly for by Bernie’s base, unfortunately.
BR
@guachi:
These generalizations grate for me because I’m not white or female. And I’ve been supporting her since before she was even a senator. She could have caught on, but she peaked too early and got hammered by the business media who saw her as a threat and everyone else was happy to pile on. I’ll admit that if she had had Obama’s political skill, she might have turned it around, but nobody out there today has Obama’s skill.
Anya
I was having breakfast in Harlem with my dad and people were talking about the election. I was gripping about Warren’s loss and a couple sitting next to us started talking to us about the election and how their daughter was also angry about the results (she too is a Warren supporter). The couple shared with us about how the husband’s mom, a church-going AA woman who is active in her church and in her community is anti-Warren because according to her, Warren disrespected Obama and was opposition to him when he was president. I mean, this is a single anecdote but maybe this is widespread?
The above anecdote might not be representative but what explains Warren’s lack of support in the AA communities. I can’t understand why Warren who is really good at understanding intersectionality and she doesn’t shy away from naming our country’s legacy of racism and oppression can’t get any traction. Her policy positions on social justice are really great. And she articulates these policies in a clear way.
kindness
There is more misogyny out there for top positions than I thought existed. I know we saw it with Hillary when she ran, but I kinda chalked that up to general Clinton hatred that had been baked into the cake by Republicans since the 90’s. But I think that is wrong. I think there is a lot of resistance to a woman Chief Exec. They use ‘polite’ words like shrill or angry.
Larime
@anarchoRex: They already shit on her endlessly for daring to exist. She’ll deal with it.
currants
@dww44: Not here, either. Sanders doesn’t have the policy chops or the political abilities to do anything but but grouch at people, and I don’t see that he’s got much of a policy team, either, even if I can generally agree with his views on health care and education. I think Biden’s delusional (or really hasn’t been paying attention) about working across the aisle, but I’d sooner vote for him than Sanders.
currants
@Mary G:
Same.
Eljai
I was reading some Twitter comments by Lisa Sharon Harper, a Black writer and activist who supported Elizabeth Warren. (Sorry, having trouble linking on my phone.) Harper said her first response was how profoundly patriarchal we are as a nation and how she still believes this. But then she mentions that Biden got overwhelming support from Black Southern women, who tend to be matriarchal. This paragraph really got me in the gut:
“The Biden wave is less about patriarchy and more a revelation of the level of trauma our nation has absorbed. Record numbers of voters turned out from every demographic to vote for Biden. Why? Because our nation is terrified by the possibility of four more years of Trump. In the middle of terror, dreaming becomes nearly impossible. When terrorized, you literally have ONE GOAL: Make it stop.”
Can’t argue about the trauma. She added that if we lived in normal times Warren would have swept the country. I hope she’s right.
Another Scott
I think you called me a liar on national TV.
I still see no reason – none – why SP Warren would endorse St. Bernard – especially early.
Cheers,
Scott.
Adam L Silverman
@Kent:
Kent
@dww44: Sanders still labels himself an Independent on his Senate web site. I scanned and could not find the word Democrat anywhere on his 2020 campaign site. Fuck him.
I think what actually happened in 2016 is that Sanders gathered up a lot of anti-Hillary vote in the primaries in white working class areas like West Virginia and mistook it for pro-Sanders support for his agenda. As Cole pointed out. The only place he has come close to hitting 50% is in his home state of Vermont where he only got 50% this time around compared to 80% in 2016.
Oh well, Biden it is. My heart was with Warren too. But we don’t live in that country. She could easily win the governorship here in WA or any office she ran for. But not the country we live in today.
Redshift
@anarchoRex:
I guess not understanding the difference between liking a person and finding their plans impressive and slavishly following their every decision explains why you’re a Bernie supporter.
gwangung
@Adam L Silverman: Yup. Exactly.
lamh36
Ronno2018
Yeah, I am sad too. She is awesome. My Dad, may he rest in peace, who got more liberal as he got older, pretty much decided a woman should not run in 2020 for the Dems as Hillary lost. I of course disagreed but I think a lot of older Dems have that same attitude. Hopefully we win in the fall and have a woman VP who is set up to win in 24 or 28. Jesus I feel old already.
Sab
@Elizabelle: Really? Some pastry but not overwhelming.
Kent
@bbleh: This. The online hissy fit that erupted recently about the female Star Wars characters and the female ghost busters was eye opening to me. I just don’t get the rage. And I’m an aging white male. I just don’t get where it comes from.
Brachiator
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
RE: And Kamala Harris didn’t poll particularly well with black women.
With some people, yes, undoubtedly.
But Harris wasn’t really that well known outside of Northern California, and I say this as a Southern Californian who had to study up on her. She had to build a national following in a short period of time.
But I don’t know. I never heard much buzz about her candidacy. As with Warren, there were people who liked her, but she never really caught fire.
topclimber
@Adam L Silverman: I like your house analogy because I used it myself in conversation with blue doggish brother. Nice to see you are so smart!
You are right that we probably need Biden to put out the fire. But we need Warren and even Bernie to point out that the house was rotten at the foundations, unaffordable for many, and had water lapping at the front door from climate change.
I reasonably hope for a Biden restoration of Obama class decency, repair to our international standing, triage in the federal bureaucracy and relief for blacks and immigrants battered by Trump and the GOP. But he is not the one to deal with fundamental problems.
My fear is that we ignore the factors that brought us Trump in the first place because we forget about them after we get past the immediate calamity.
anarchoRex
@Redshift: I get that you’re upset rn, but why do you think I slavishly support Bernie rather than his plans? If he suddenly moved to the right and adopted Biden’s platform his base would drop him like a hot rock.
Eljai
@Eljai: found the link. Interesting thread: https://twitter.com/lisasharper/status/1235188641187627009?s=20
frosty
I’m hoping she’s still in when I send in my PA absentee ballot. I want her to stay in until the convention and we can see what sort of plan she’s got for that.
VFX Lurker
Not sure if I remember Warren/Obama conflict when Obama was President. I do remember a stir when Warren (and others) indirectly criticized former President Barack Obama for accepting speaking fees in 2017. Folks noted at the time that white ex-Presidents did not get similarly criticized for the same action.
Adam L Silverman
@Felanius Kootea: An American woman became prime minister of Israel in 1969.
dww44
@Adam L Silverman: Thank you, Adam. Gonna share with my teacher daughter and with the bright politically involved grandson. I believe your response will ease their disappointment and increase their understanding.
The Dangerman
@White & Gold Purgatorian:
Warren might have done well enough if Sanders sat it out, but Sanders is the equal of Trump in the Narcissism Department and had to come in. I read someplace that Sanders being in brought Biden in because Sanders is the path to disaster (and the Russians, and Trump, know it). Hell, Sanders being in, coupled with Biden having his own set of issues, brought in Bloomberg.
At any rate, sometime in the past week or so, there was a collective “fuck me blind, Sanders is gonna take this thing?” moment and voters went en masse for calm, safe waters. Which, for better or worse, meant Biden.
I would have preferred Warren, but eyes on the prize, Folks, the only thing that matters is Trump has to concede on Election Night or soon thereafter (and I think it will fucking break him; ah, too bad).
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Last night there was an interesting exchange between Joy Reid and Chris Hayes. Reid was explaining that her young sons– I’m guessing around twenty?– are Biden supporters in spite of being told they should be for Bernie. Why? He has Obama’s back for eight years. Hayes said a woman asked him who she should vote for in the primary, he gave the “who do you want to be president?” reply, she said: Obama.
Among extremely on-line progressives, opinion of Obama tends to range from a gentleman’s B for effort to the idiot here who called him “milquetoast” yesterday to the true morons who tweet things like “Obamacare kills poor people.” Bloomberg briefly bought himself 15% of the party by running ads that convinced some people he had Obama’s endorsement (John Heileman let slip yesterday that in fact, MB and BHO intensely dislike each other.) Warren figured out in Nevada that Obama was popular. Now Bernie has an ad I just saw portraying he and Obama as great allies– and I laughed out loud when I saw the old fraud follows up that lie with a graphic describing Himself as “authentic”.
Larime
I think we really are dealing with a ton of trauma as a party and country, and that makes bland, safe and predictable the go-to choice. The PTSD over Hillary losing to literally the LEAST qualified white male available is real, and too many of us dare not hope or dream of anything but getting him out. I keep hearing that black voters don’t trust white voters to show up for a woman, and as a white guy I can’t blame them.
Jeffro
@anarchoRex: autocrat: please. Fascist: you’re just defining the whole thing down, now.
I’m not making excuses for him and his flaws, flawed policies, tendencies, any of it. But this is ridiculous.
Adam L Silverman
@Eljai:
This is exactly what it is all about.
Kent
@Brachiator: I don’t think Kamala the Cop had much to do with anything and i don’t think Warren’s M4A plan had much to do with anything. The forces are MUCH bigger than that.
Harris dropped out because her campaign was a disaster and she was polling poorly in key states. I doubt 1 in 1000 voters who were randomly polled regarding Harris had even heard of the Cop thing much less been influenced by it. Twitter thinks it is a lot more important than it really is.
Warren just failed to expand beyond urban white professional liberals. I don’t think 1 in 100 voters yesterday were really making their decision based on M4A.
Redshift
@anarchoRex:
So you missed all the coverage afterward about how she came off as “too angry,” and that was a problem she needed to solve? (Sadly, I heard it repeated by an older female Democrat at an event the following weekend.)
Kifaru1
@guachi: I actually know a number of male Republican never-Trumpers who voted for her in VA because she actually understands the capitalist system and wouldn’t tank the markets while putting more liberal programs in place. Sounds crazy, but it is true. I will admit that they are college educated LOL
Adam L Silverman
@lamh36: Josh Marshall did some mark up on that. And I think he did an excellent job.
anarchoRex
@Jeffro: I mean, he literally ran a police state that crushed POC, and made every effort to turn NYC into a playground for the rich. I think you might be defining them up too much.
Adam L Silverman
@topclimber: No arguments here.
anarchoRex
@Redshift: If that’s what cable news was saying then yeah, I missed it, I don’t watch them. The only reactions I saw about it was admiration at Warren showing Bloomberg his own guts.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
another more prosaic factor that I suspect hurt Harris and probably Warren was the romance of Buttigieg sucked up a loooot of wine-track money that might otherwise have gone to them, and then Bloomberg’s entry into the race threw everything out of kilter
also the primary calendar
Nicole
@Eljai:
This… makes a lot of sense.
Adam L Silverman
@dww44: You’re welcome. I’m not happy about it either. I had my own preferences among the candidates, I just try not to promote them here as I don’t think that is fair since I’m a front pager and I shouldn’t be advocating for specific candidates because of the work I do.
Death Panel Truck
I voted for Warren in the primary because I believe in her message, and because I wanted to cast a vote enthusiastically for a female candidate. I couldn’t do that with Hillary. She just didn’t inspire me at all, so I had to hold my nose. I don’t want to have to do that again.
lamh36
@Adam L Silverman: thx for that.
this response had me thinking…hmmm..
Anya
Africa, Asia, South America, Australia, and Europe all elected women head of states. What is holding us back?
Rina99
@Adam L Silverman:
I’ve never cared about being “inspired” by a candidate. I evaluated the candidates based on what they could get done if we still had a Republican senate after the election. That meant the place they’d have the greatest amount of control would be foreign policy. On that point, I supported Biden over Warren and the others because I believe he could stop the bleeding on that front with the most effectiveness. I used the same calculation in backing Clinton over Obama in 2008. He didn’t win me over until he won my confidence that he could go out there and handle those issues.
Whatever his verbal stumbles, Biden has never given me a reason to doubt he wasn’t still on top of his game in foreign policy. The M4A vs. public option fight doesn’t sway me because it’s going to come down to whatever comes out of Congress. Biden will sign whatever progressive legislation that comes across his desk, appoint good judges, and make sound personnel decisions.
We’re all informed by our experiences, and my particular ones as a Black woman from the South means I don’t feel I have the luxury of ignoring how others who aren’t like me will probably vote. I have family members who I genuinely don’t think will survive another four years of a Trump administration. I’m going with what I feel is the best option for getting votes in swing states, and I don’t believe that is Warren.
TLDR; you nailed it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@lamh36: I don’t know who strikes me as less likely to respond to that kind of pressure: Ayanna Pressley or Elizabeth Warren.
Brachiator
@guachi:
Wow. You really want to double down on your faulty reasoning. This is a supremely pointless forced question that would get you a failing grade in an elementary Rhetoric class.
I have no idea. But then again, I voted for Warren.
If you had asked if I thought Obama had a chance to win the presidency before he kicked butt in the primary, I might have said no.
Here, you could be right. Or not. In the UK, Margaret Thatcher, not a liberal politician, became the first woman prime minister.
ETA: I have said before that Obama’s success changed things, and also scared a lot of people, including many liberals.
When Obama first began his presidential bid, I had people remind me that everyone knew that Hillary would win. Because the conventional wisdom was that America would first have a woman president, then a Jewish (male) president and then, only after a number of years, a black president.
Obama flipped the script, and even though a lot of people have retreated into old ways of thinking, Obama actually opened it up for everyone.
So I don’t know who the woman president might be. But it will be someone who ignores all the old fears and biases, and tells the people, “Yeah, I’m the one you were waiting for.”
lamh36
Was he grinding his teeth and grimacing when he said this…
dww44
@BR: I think this is spot-on.
My spouse watches CNBC every day. So I see a lot of it and I did work in the investment world for almost 3 decades. They really didn’t like her. Frankly, I came to believe not an inconsequential number of them feared her.
Interestingly, today during one of CNBC’s midday roundtable discussions about the state of the market (currently rallying) , one guest opined that the market was up, not only because the C virus was increasingly viewed as less of a threat to the economy, but was reacting to a weakened Sanders candidacy.
gwangung
Just remember folks…the jackals here are in our own type of bubble….and it’s kinda obvious given how we missed the hows and whys of South Carolina and Super Tuesday….
Chetan Murthy
I didn’t watch the debates, and only watched a few clips. Just watched that entire Warren video. Oh man, I’m so glad I voted Tuesday for the candidate I thought would make the best President. Even if she won’t be President now. Ah, well. Thank you for finding it and posting it, John.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman: Amen on that last point: people are rallying to stop the abuse. To stop the hour-by-hour abuse by this president* and his RWNJ-on-steroids-‘cause-he-has-no-other-bases-of-support agenda.
Absolutely.
Many large segments of the D base are savvy about what is and isn’t possible (within our own party and also with infrequent D learners) and they don’t want anything to blur the lines here. Not up for a female president? Okay. Not up for a person of color? Okay. Not up for M4A? Need a little or a lot more name recognition than governor of a western state or a mayor from a small town? Okay. Perhaps someone a little less charisma-challenged than some of these folks? Got it!
HERE’S THE MOST GENIAL OLD WHITE MALE LINKED TO OBAMA WHO SUPPORTS THE BROADEST POSSIBLE PLATFORM OF DEMOCRATIC PARTY VALUES…what do you say, D voters? And the voters have spoken.
A party’s presidential nominee is a figurehead for a coalition of interests in our system. If people are wildly confused as to how we ended up with Biden and Sanders, they are misunderstanding the true nature of our coalition of interests (most often, by over-weighting their own narrow interest group)
lamh36
@lamh36:
dww44
@Adam L Silverman: I appreciate this more. I sort of like not always knowing who someone who opines on politics actually supports.
rp
Please…Bloomberg isn’t a fascist. The real problem with using that term is that loses all meaning. If Bloomberg is a fascist, what’s trump?
Anya
@lamh36: I watch Pressley very closely and I highly doubt that she’ll support Sanders.
dww44
@lamh36: Wow. Am assuming Sanders said this in the Maddow interview? I didn’t watch. But, what do you think he meant?
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
anarchoRex
@rp: Also a fascist.
BruceFromOhio
Lost? No, that says ‘gone forever’ to me. She’ll be around for awhile. Missed opportunity, perhaps.
@guachi:
Blunt? Ha! If you cut to the chase, truth has a sharp edge, my friend. Dem & progressive leaders have much to consider come January ’21, come what may.
Tbh, when Kamala hit the exit, I checked out. I very much look forward to what she does next, esp if it involves pantsing Moscow Mitch on a daily basis. In the interim, if it’s Uncle Joe, I’ll vote for Uncle Joe. If it’s Uncle Bernie, I’ll vote for Uncle Bernie. Anything but the dumpster fire.
Larime
@Brachiator: I think it’s pretty clear we’re closer to having a gay male President, or a Latino President, than a woman. The misogyny is deep, especially in the media. Having a black male President first wasn’t a surprise to me.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Did they cut out the “bless his heart”? /s
A Ghost To Most
@Elizabelle: Buh bye, Barcelona Barbie. Choke on your pie.
The Dangerman
@Nicole:
With a little tweaking, that would make a good bumper sticker; I can’t believe people waited in line for 7 hours in some places in a primary. In a primary! That never happens.
People don’t want to hear Trump any more. Go away, stop tweeting, go golfing, whatever, just fucking go away. And take your kids and your wife with you for the love of all that is decent.
anarchoRex
@A Ghost To Most: Why the rude response?
Johnnybuck
I’m going down to the courthouse in Douglas county Georgia and vote for Elizabeth Warren. It’s a heart pick, like it was for Jesse jackson in ‘84. And ‘88. I knew he couldn’t win either, but I fell in line when it all went down. Joe biden is better than the alternative. Rinse, lather, repeat. Time to mount up and ride folks.
topclimber
@Jeffro: Figurehead is the default. Leader is the ideal. Thanks to Trump, the default has become the ideal.
Actually, snappy as that is, the reality is that the default is good enough.
Adam L Silverman
@lamh36: I have no idea. Pressley is a better politician than the two of them put together. And while I’ve defended Congresswoman Omar here from accusations of anti-Semitism, and I’ll do it again if they’re bogus, I saw her interviewed by Ari Melber this evening and my takeaway is she is either really bad in interviews or she really doesn’t understand how politics and elections work.
BruceFromOhio
@gwangung: To cut to the chase one needs a sharp blade.
Anya
Okay, but are we going to talk about American Samoa voting for Lex Luthor and the Prankster?
rikyrah
@guachi:
2016
Percentage of Black women voting for Hillary Clinton
94
Percentage of Black men voting for Hillary Clinton
87
Get the ENTIRE Phuck Outta Here with the bullshyt that Black people won’t vote for a White Woman.
Out?Of?Here?
????
The Thin Black Duke
@lamh36: Thankfully Pressley is smarter than that. She can read the tea leaves very clearly.
Adam L Silverman
@Rina99:
While I actually read the whole thing, thank you for these kind words and acronym!
My position, despite my own preferences, since 2016 has been whomever women of color are supporting, provided they’re qualified, is who I’m supporting. And if there is a woman of color or just a woman regardless of color/ethnicity/religion running and running on the right things, that’s who I’m supporting.
lamh36
@rikyrah: FACTS!!!
Brachiator
@Kent:
This kind of begs the question of why neither of them polled well or did well in the primaries. I was really surprised that Warren consistently did poorly in primary voting.
I agree somewhat the “Kamala the cop” wasn’t universally a big deal. But it did come up regularly in black online forums and elsewhere.
And with Warren, her stance on M4A was not a bad thing. But it was as though people would say, “Warren’s got policies. Oh, look There’s Bernie. And Joe Biden is over there.” Warren got some attention, but no voter commitment.
BruceFromOhio
@dww44:
This was exactly what DadFromNY said when I spoke to him just a little while ago. When markets were melting down last week, he said, beware of the dead cat bounce. When I teased him about the cat being really bouncy, he said Uncle Joe’s success on ST showed the money changers that Uncle Bernie wasn’t going to make it. This was cause for joy. Wevs, man.
Redshift
I dunno, maybe because you’re enough of an ass to troll bummed-out Warren supporters for not doing exactly that? So why shouldn’t I troll you right back?
I am in fact only disappointed, not upset, so can the armchair psychology. I have been wryly amused all day at Sanders supporters, continuing their tactics from the campaign so far, expressing that it’s obvious Warren supporters should move to his camp without doing anything to win them over. (That’s the ones who aren’t angry that Warren didn’t do what’s best for Bernie before Super Tuesday, or explaining how they were right to call her a snake.)
Frankensteinbeck
@Adam L Silverman:
I have never agreed with you more.
@Eljai:
And this.
Adam L Silverman
@lamh36: Yes. She did a terrible interview until the second to last question, which she says she made up on the fly. She didn’t really press him, she let him talk over her. I used to think she had adopted a goofy naive person persona as her on air schtick. I’ve actually seen her speak off air when she came to talk at USAWC before my assignment there ended and that had reinforced my impression because she was serious and there was no goofy naïveté schtick. But I’m beginning to think she’s just a very smart, but goofy naive person in reality.
Eljai
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: ?
gwangung
@BruceFromOhio: Y’all got an Xacto, it seems. I stumble around….
@rikyrah: You have to put in the work, and she did more so than most politicians. (Still pisses me off that Sanders supporters pull that “he marched with MLK” shit. I think Kiah Morris is a better indicator of his attitudes).
anarchoRex
@Redshift: I’m not trying to troll anyone. I’m supporting a left candidate who is currently running behind in second place. Seems obvious to me that a smart move is to analyze the only other left candidate’s campaign to see what went wrong and right. The only way to figure that out is to ask supporters. I’ve never insulted Warren or anyone for supporting Warren here. I also agree with AOC that it’s not our place to tell her to drop-out.
EmanG
I too am greatly saddened by Warren’s inability to be our candidate, but I do have some hope. My first vote was against Reagan in 84. I, as much as any, am sick and tired of conpublicans (repservatives?) ruining what could be a perfectly nice society. Say what you will about Bernie (please don’t, that was rhetorical) but I have to give him props for moving the window on the public conversation. I got excited about Howard Dean saying he represented the democratic wing of the Democratic party. He moved the window. Bernie’s constant messaging about the inequality of the system moved the window, allowing Warren to take that idea and advance it further. These ideas are being mainstreamed into the culture in a way that wasn’t happening before (i.e. the squad, etc.). We’re obviously not going to get any of that in the immediate future, but those with agency and energy are not going to let go of it I pray. So still it stands; hope for the best, plan for the worst and above all persist.
phdesmond
@Elizabelle: i guess one has to learn when to tune out and try again some other time.
Rand Careaga
Honestly, can’t we reserve the term “fascist” for the real thing? I detest Bloomberg, but we have the genuine articles in power, and ought not dilute the word.
Brachiator
@Larime:
I do not minimize the misogyny at all. And I note that I believe that we will cut through it.
But again, I say if you look at where we are, Obama opened it up for everyone.
I do not believe that anyone would have said that we might have a gay male president or a Latino president 10 years ago.
People would say, “that’s crazy.”
And Obama’s election didn’t surprise you. But we were all there back in 2008. I remember hearing a prominent Los Angeles talk radio personality wisely intone that America simply was not ready for a black president.
And again, as people forget, a majority of people voted for Hillary Clinton over Trump.
gwangung
@Rand Careaga: Black and Latinx in NYC would vociferously disagree.
Adam L Silverman
@lamh36: That is not going to play as well as he thought it would before he said it.
BruceFromOhio
@gwangung: I appreciate your comment, what I meant was, sometimes getting to the truth of it hurts.
Barbara
@Adam L Silverman: Totally agree that Warren’s focus on details and plans conveyed technocratic competence that doesn’t speak to the political moment. That is as succinct as I can make it.
Frankensteinbeck
@Adam L Silverman:
Yep. I had some hope they’d support Warren, but when they stuck with Biden, I trust they know what they’re doing. Their demographic has been saving mine from our own asshole stupidity for decades. The least I can do is defer to their judgment in this.
Ohio Mom
I chuckle, I certainly fit the Warren voter profile: white, middle-class, older female, college-educated,
I wanted to vote for her but it looks like she’ll be out by St. Patrick’s Day, when Ohio votes.
All I can say is, Eh, my whole voting life, more times than not, I’ve been disappointed with election results, starting with my first vote to re-elect Jimmy Carter. I’m used to it.
I can deal with Biden. I’m imagining he’ll stop with the nonsense about reaching across the aisle, that it’s a sop to lure in never-Trumpers.
Hopefully there will be someone in his administration who will push him to NOT look ahead, not behind, and there will be a reckoning. We need that as a nation.
gwangung
@Adam L Silverman: Yeah. To Black folks and their allies, they could hear the loud whoosh zooming over his head.
Adam L Silverman
@rp: Bloomberg is a small “a” authoritarian or, perhaps more accurately, a technocrat with authoritarian tendencies.
lamh36
@Adam L Silverman:
apparently it was an answer to a question about why he didn’t pursue Clyburn’s endorsement
Adam L Silverman
@Anya: She’s a sharp politician and excellent member of Congress. I fully expect she’ll eventually replace Senator Markey.
Adam L Silverman
@BruceFromOhio: Senator Harris needs to either become the Democratic leader in the Senate or the AG if the Democratic nominee defeats the President in November.
BruceFromOhio
@Ohio Mom: Can I buy you a beer? I punched the card for Dukakis. Talk about a disappointment – knowing your candidate was never going to make it, and may have been a worse choice, all while knowing that the candidate that would eventually win was a horrible mistake that no one would know about until it was far too late.
Conclude that elections really, really matter. And every single breathing human of voting age has to accept that if any of this is going to last.
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I don’t believe President Obama is from the south.//
BruceFromOhio
@Adam L Silverman: AG, Senate Lead, Supreme Court, let her pick – though the first two let her run for the executive again. If she wants to.
Felanius Kootea
@Adam L Silverman: Oh Adam, you and I both know that Golda Meir would never in a million years have been elected president of the US. I’m happy that Israel picked the right leader at the right time.
I voted for Warren in CA. I’m so disappointed right now. As I see it, the Democrats have had a “pipeline” problem in the last 16 years in terms of modeling female executive leadership at the state level (which might move people nationally, since clearly, female senators don’t). Maybe that will change with the new crop of Democratic female governors elected in 2015 and 2018. I sincerely hope it does.
The sad thing is that I can see Nikki Haley getting elected president before any female Democratic presidential candidate, because GOPers will fall right in line behind anyone spewing right wing bullshit and promising to uphold the patriarchy.
Biden’s campaign has been a total and complete joke compared to Warren’s but here we are. I’ll vote for him if I have to, without enthusiasm because I recognize the existential threat that is Trump. But she could take Trump on in a way that he can’t. It’s sad that most people don’t see that even after she destroyed Bloomberg and Delaney.
Omnes Omnibus
Wow, I was literally (literally) having that conversation on the phone about the time you were typing this.
Adam L Silverman
@gwangung: You should really tape his, and every other politicians, sit down, in depth interviews and then watch them three different ways. The first is as broadcast. The second with the sound off just watching his facial expressions, posture, hand gestures, body movements, and those of his interviewer. And the third where you’re just listening to the questions and answers and not watching the TV at all. And then compare your impressions from each different type of viewing/listening.
Kent
I think American Samoa was a caucus with only about 300 attending in which the paid Bloomberg folks and the Tulsi cultists managed to capture the proceedings and no other candidate had enough supporters to be viable.
It wasn’t a primary and the vote totals are under 300 I think.
Adam L Silverman
@lamh36: Yep. I watched the interview. As I replied to you in the next post, the answer is always no if you don’t ask the question. Senator Sanders does not seem to understand that politics is the art of the possible, not the art of the ideologically, inflexibly pure.
HRA
@Adam L Silverman:
Golda Meier a teacher from Chicago was my choice in writing a paper for English11 as someone I admired the most.
Adam L Silverman
@BruceFromOhio: Yep.
Adam L Silverman
@Felanius Kootea: I know, I was just being a smartass.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: Great minds…
Adam L Silverman
@HRA: I had to dress up as Theodore Herzl for a biographic presentation of him during 5th grade at the Hillel School of Tampa.
Anya
@Kent: Oh okay, thank you.
Marina
I feel lots of people liked her, and that she lost because people are desperate to get rid of f*$king DJT, and they bought the lies, brought to them nonstop by assorted media, that Biden was electable and she wasn’t. Only he isn’t particularly; he appears to have dementia–not as bad as DJT, but noticeable. Bernie is lucid, but he’s Bernie, with all the baggage that scares people off, like calling himself a socialist even though he’s a social democrat. Warren would have been perfect.
What the hell, world?
On the plus side, Fargo Season 4 is coming this April.
Darkrose
@Lumpy: I don’t want Warren to give up her Senate seat for anything less than the Oval Office. One of Obama’s mistakes was staffing his administration with Democratic senators, who were then replaced by Republicans. Harris would be a fine VP, because there hasn’t been a GOP senator from California in almost 30 years.
And the biggest reason Warren never gained traction is because she’s a woman. Democrats have internalized Hillary’s loss as “A woman can’t win,” and now it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Don K
@bbleh:
I think a lot of Americans think of the President as a king – and not a figurehead as in the UK, but an actual leader like King Arthur (pick an actual English king rather than a mythical figure if you want – I’m not expert enough on English history), leading the troops into battle on horseback, risking death in the process. And of course one has to have a penis to be that leader. Look at the lionization of Dubya landing on the fucking carrier as an example of the thinking.
Darkrose
@guachi: Can we talk about the fact that because the process is so broken, Harris never got to face any actual voters? So maybe the sweeping judgements about how she didn’t appeal to Black women voters should have a massive caveat that she ran out of money before a single vote was cast?
Elizabelle
@Felanius Kootea:
Maybe Elizabeth Warren will be deployed as a stiletto surrogate.
PJ
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Money wasn’t a problem for Warren – she raised $29MM in February. Harris, on the other hand, was only $1M in fundraising behind Biden when she dropped out, so I suspect that it was how her funds were being spent which was the larger problem for her.
Biden, on the other hand, took the lead last night and won several states without spending a dime in them, which shows that relationships and public sentiment built up over years are worth far more than money when running a campaign. I mean, just look at Bloomberg, he spent over $500MM (more than $1M for every American!) just to win American Samoa.
Darkrose
@Brachiator: As someone who was initially pro-Harris, I drifted away from her because I wasn’t clear on why she was running, especially after less than a full term in the Senate. She never seemed able to clearly articulate an agenda other than “Obama, but a woman.”
Humdog
@PatrickG: Your post really summed it up. 2016 made me so disappointed in the character of my fellow Americans. So many Rs were so much worse than I feared, and I didn’t hold them in high esteem before.
But in this primary, my fellow Democrats disappointed me. I am surprised I was surprised.
Tomorrow I will start trying to understand, or maybe next week. Netflix sounds about right for now.
Elizabelle
@phdesmond: Eh, I could see some of this was gonna be a pile-on on what a bad politician etc etc etc. And just not up for that.
One must pace oneself.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@PJ:
Still just stupefying to me, and it turns a whole bunch of campaign CW on its head, doesn’t it? and the rest of what you said
wrt the competition between Buttigieg and Warren, “wine-track money and votes‘ I should have said.
PJ
@Adam L Silverman: Which pretty fairly describes the job profile for the founder and boss of a contemporary technology company like Bloomberg L.P.
ziggy
@BruceFromOhio:
Yep, the market prefers Biden by far. I hate to say it, but the socialist trend from both Sanders and Warren is very scary to a lot of people, and not just Republicans. My husband is a true independent, and he really doesn’t like Warren. I don’t get that many here understand how much moderate Democrats and independents aren’t thrilled with her. It’s sad, but that’s the world we live in.
Suzy
@VFX Lurker: Warren criticized President Obama for negotiating the TPP “secretly”. Don’t remember the details but she kind of mischaracterized the intentions of President Obama. President Obama was in the middle of a delicate and very difficult multi-lateral negotiation, and the result was supposed to be presented to Congress for discussion and approval. She made a big deal about the whole affair, was talking constantly to the press, etc. Her tone and her language were kind of insulting. President Obama was pretty pissed. He rarely criticized someone of his own party, but said something about “someone believing her own press”.
James E Powell
I’m a little sad about Warren, too, but I’ve been cold-hearted about the campaign. This is about getting rid of Trump. It has been about getting rid of Trump since November 9, 2016.
Warren has to be thinking hard on what her next move is and I’m sure it’s painful. But she is, after all, a professional.
W/R/T suggestions that she or Harris get cabinet posts, I’d prefer that they both remain senators. We need more better senators.
Adam L Silverman
@PJ: Yep.
PJ
This is something that should be posted in every high school. Young people, who don’t have the life experience, are especially susceptible to the notion that insistence on ideological purity is noble and a sign of personal virtue. Older people, who’ve seen how things go down in real life, know that it’s not a sign of incorruptibility (witness Sanders’ self-dealing with his family members), but rather of someone who is likely ineffectual and insufferable, and afraid of leaving the castle of their self-righteousness. And should those who are ideologically pure actually get some power, woe unto the unbeliever.
Felanius Kootea
I wish that someone could list Democratic women politicians who Democrats would be thrilled to elect as president. We had a moderate (Klobuchar), someone with Democratic Socialist tendencies (Warren) and a number of women in between Gillibrand, Harris, etc. I guess we’re waiting for that special female unicorn, but in the meantime, any old guy will do, no matter how shouty, unaccomplished or incoherent. Sanders doesn’t seem to get that Trump is an existential threat but we have young Democrats ready to burn the party down for him. It’s sickening.
Another Scott
@PJ: Using Roman “MM” and “M” for “thousand-thousands” and “thousands” invites confusion. SI units, baby!!!1
$500E6 / 330E6 = $1.52 per person. (A lot more per vote, and a lot more per delegate, of course.)
We had an earlier thread on the numbers. ;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Felanius Kootea:
a whole lot of Democrats voted for Hillary Clinton. I was pretty happy to cast that vote, I can’t speak for the whole of the party that nominated and overwhelmingly supported her. I would’ve been very happy to vote for Harris, Klobuchar or Warren– I wish she had asked my advice. Gillibrand… meh.
gwangung
@ziggy: A lot of progressives don’t realize how unliked some progressive shibboleths are in general, particularly when a specific mechanism is laid out.
America is more progressive in a lot of ways than conventional wisdom has it…but it’s also more moderate than what may progressive thinkers think it is.
Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]
@rp: A Tyrant, in the sense that Plato described it in the republic.
Edit: The definition of a Tyrant (from Wikipedia since I’m doing an edit and have limited time)
moonbat
I agree with every sentence of this, JC. Basically the thoughts I’ve been having/struggling with all day. She was clearly the best candidate and she scared the shit out of the rich and powerful Bloomberg got in the race specifically to sabotage her because I guess he thinks he can take his billions with him when he dies next year.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Adam L Silverman: She won’t take AG, been there done that here in CA.
Amir Khalid
@Another Scott:
I think PJ was using both M and MM as abbreviations for million, which is really confusing.
Felanius Kootea
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Hillary went from being the most admired woman in US politics (according to a national poll before she announced that she would run for president) to “bitter old harpy who should shut up and stay out of sight” and the Cassandra of the Democratic Party within two years.
Don’t mind me, I’m just venting. I’ll feel better in about a month or so.
J R in WV
@Repatriated:
This is true. But I know who I have pied, and toggle those I haven’t pied to see what they have said. Sometimes I even toggle people I have pied, because many of those folks aren’t always asses.
Chris Johnson
@Rand Careaga: No, we have a demented puppet in power, loosely run by Putin. They are fucking clowns. Fascist is a perfectly valid word for Bloomberg, and there are only two people that’d stop me being able to vote blue no matter who: one, Tulsi Gabbard if Bernie wins and reveals himself by making her veep. Two, Bloomberg. If he gets made veep, or if he establishes beyond reasonable doubt that he’s done a complete buy-out of the Democratic Party (after first trying to replace Biden and failing), I can’t face that. He is the capable fascist that Trump could never be, the exact person you’ve been fearing from the Republican side… which of course is where he’s from, and you know it.
We can reserve ‘fascist’ for Bloomberg AND Trump AND McConnell etc. He’s not uniquely fascist. But he is more dangerous to democracy than Bernie, and that’s goin’ some.
J R in WV
Hey, anarchoRex !
You have provided me with many cute pix of little pastries, even the Cat Cake, which is the cutest.
But you haven’t said a word to me, and I haven’t really paid a lot of attention to people responding to your gibberish. I assume you still dwell in gibberish land? I’ll never know if you move back to sanity. Pied forever. Thanks to cleek, and M^4 and WaterGirl for that great tool!!!
PJ
@Amir Khalid: One M = one million, and two MMs = millions. (K = thousand). I never realized this was my own personal nomenclature.
206inKY
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Bingo.
PJ
@Another Scott: I’d still rather have my $1.52 check from Bloomberg, but I’m happy those political consultants and ad people and media buyers and sellers got paid.
Zanamu
Warren is only a bit older than I am, but she and Harris both know/knew going in. That thing where women have to be twice as good to be considered half as smart? We all have the T-shirts.
I will vote for Warren in Nebraska, because it will be an honor to do so.
I hope I can vote for Biden in the fall, because Biden is a genuinely decent, if clueless man (I can see the effort, at least).
I will vote for Sanders if I must, but I wish he would try to be likeable – try! for one minute! He is so obnoxious – With Bernie, alas, we are with him, or against him. If I were a POC, I’m not sure I could do it. And please, goddess, save me from the Bernie bros whose votes are too precious to spare on the impure average voter who only wants someone better than Trump. Is that so much to ask?
Suzy
@PJ: So very well said.
Betty
More than a little sad. the cable news folks needed their simple binary narrative. The lady confused things. We still should try to figure out how to get her the nomination. These old guys may not be able to get the job done.
david
OK, your first choice flopped. Get over it. Whoever wins the primary, vote for them in November.
She can be Treasury Secretary.
Between her and Harris as Attorney General, it will be a productive four years.