The Dems don't understand Bernie is probably unelectable

The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna 
Are not very pure or true.
With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck 
And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack
I may be a bit of a Jew.
-Sylvia Plath, Daddy

As we grew up, my maternal Grandmother was such a worrier and reminderer, we would jokingly wonder if we had Jewish roots.

My paternal uncle doesn't care for Jews. Not high-level hatred, but more the Jews-killed-Jesus level. Hilarity ensued when his genetic profile came back with some Jewishness in it.

My sister, whose favorite picture from her trip to Israel was of her in front of the American Embassy in Jerusalem, came back Jew-negative on her profile. But that doesn't signify, considering my uncle's results.

My dad was not a Jew-hater, but low level 'they own the banks,' etc.

Once at a family gathering my paternal cousin said, "Bush is a secret Jew, Cheney, is a secret Jew." My eyes and my son's met across the table. He still brings it up humorously from time to time.

Some Democratic candidates want jailed felons to be allowed to vote

Please Lord never ever ever let these people have any actual power again in this country. I don’t think we will survive it. https://t.co/TSvUPlzSvU

— The OG Hillbilly (@LauraLMonroe33) April 26, 2019

Even Piers Morgan thinks it's "lunacy" to let felons vote.

Bernie Sanders Compares Democratic Party To Titanic

"They would rather go down with the Titanic so long as they have first-class seats"

Is America in the mood for another plain-spoken New Yorker?

"Nearly Half of Sanders Supporters Won't Support Clinton"

Bloomberg News:  In the two weeks since Hillary Clinton wrapped up the Democratic presidential primary, runner-up Bernie Sanders has promised to work hard to defeat Donald Trump — but he’s given no sign he’ll soon embrace Clinton, his party’s presumptive nominee. Neither have many of Sanders’s supporters. A June 14th Bloomberg Politics national poll of likely voters in November’s election found that barely half of those who favored Sanders — 55 percent — plan to vote for Clinton. Instead, 22 percent say they’ll vote for Trump, while 18 percent favor Libertarian Gary Johnson. “I’m a registered Democrat, but I cannot bring myself to vote for another establishment politician like Hillary,” says Laura Armes, a 43-year-old homemaker from Beeville, Texas, who participated in the Bloomberg poll and plans to vote for Trump. “I don’t agree with a lot of what Trump says. But he won’t owe anybody. What you see is what you get.”

Conversations with two dozen Sanders supporters revealed a lingering distrust of Clinton as too establishment-friendly, hawkish or untrustworthy. As some Sanders fans see it, the primary was not a simple preference for purity over pragmatism, but a moral choice between an honest figure and someone whom they consider fundamentally corrupted by the ways of Washington. Sanders has fed these perceptions throughout his campaign, which is one reason he's having a hard time coming around to an endorsement.

Voters like Armes, who says she’ll “definitely” vote in November, highlight the difficulty Clinton faces in unifying her party. Clinton’s paltry support among Sanders voters could still grow, as his disheartened fans process the hard-fought primary campaign. But the Bloomberg poll found that only 5 percent of Sanders supporters who don’t currently back Clinton would consider doing so in the future. (read more)

Breaking: "Trump backs out of debate with Bernie Sanders"

Politico:  Donald Trump will not participate in a debate with Sen. Bernie Sanders, the GOP nominee said in a statement on Friday.

"Based on the fact that the Democratic nominating process is totally rigged and Crooked Hillary Clinton and Deborah Wasserman Schultz will not allow Bernie Sanders to win, and now that I am the presumptive Republican nominee, it seems inappropriate that I would debate the second place finisher," Trump said. "Likewise, the networks want to make a killing on these events and are not proving to be too generous to charitable causes, in this case, women’s health issues. Therefore, as much as I want to debate Bernie Sanders - and it would be an easy payday - I will wait to debate the first place finisher in the Democratic Party, probably Crooked Hillary Clinton, or whoever it may be."

Trump had originally told Jimmy Kimmel earlier this week he would participate in a debate with Sanders if the host network would donate millions of dollars to a charity.

Sanders: Democratic Convention Could Be 'Messy'

AP:  Sanders said he will "condemn any and all forms of violence" but his campaign was welcoming political newcomers and first-time attendees of party conventions. He said the Democratic Party faces a choice of becoming more inclusive or maintaining the status quo.

"I think if they make the right choice and open the doors to working-class people and young people and create the kind of dynamism that the Democratic Party needs, it's going to be messy," Sanders said.

"Democracy is not always nice and quiet and gentle but that is where the Democratic Party should go."

Asked if the convention could be problematical, Sanders said: "So what? Democracy is messy. Everyday my life is messy. But if you want everything to be quiet and orderly and allow, you know, just things to proceed without vigorous debate, that is not what democracy is about."

Hillary falls from 22 to 6 point lead in Pennsylvania primary poll

Latest.com:  A new poll found that Hillary Clinton’s lead over Bernie Sanders in the critical Pennsylvania primary has plummeted to the single digits after the former Secretary of State led the Vermont Senator by more than 20 points.

A new Quinnipiac poll released Wednesday shows Clinton leading Sanders by just a 50-44 margin three weeks out from the state’s primary.

Bernie Sanders: Hillary Clinton is not qualified to be president. Look out Hillary... the globes are coming off. 

Hillary becomes Bernie Sanders

Bernie Sanders: Hillary cheats

Mediaite:  A Bernie Sanders aide told Fox News’ Ed Henry that a picture of Secretary Hillary Clinton backstage with her campaign aides during a commercial break shows that she broke the rules during Wednesday’s Univision debate.

Sanders aide Jeff Weaver told me photo circulating of @HillaryClinton w/staff during debate break violates DNC rules pic.twitter.com/CYeowyNI7y

— Ed Henry (@edhenry) March 10, 2016

The rules of the debate banned candidates from meeting with staff during breaks. When contacted by Henry, Clinton spokeswoman Jen Palmieri responded by saying she didn’t know the photo existed.

"Dearborn, top Arab-American U.S. city, just voted for Donald Trump, Jewish candidate Bernie Sanders"

The Week: The Michigan electorate was full of surprises on Tuesday. The biggest was Sen. Bernie Sanders' upset win over Hillary Clinton, but there were also some interesting results from the city of Dearborn, the "Arab capital of North America," with about 41 percent of the city claiming Arab ancestry. Dearborn houses the Arab American National Museum and several large mosques — unlike the Chaldean Christian Arab community in nearby Sterling Heights, "the Dearborn community is overwhelmingly Muslim," says Michigan Radio. And Dearborn Republicans voted for Donald Trump, the candidate pledging to close U.S. borders to Muslims, 39 percent to 30 percent for nearest competitor John Kasich.

Dearborn Democrats, meanwhile, picked Sanders, 59 percent to 39 percent for Clinton.

Watch Hillary and Bernie pretend to debate

"Dem debate: Fierce grilling except for emails, FBI, Top Secret, Benghazi, debt and…."

Investors Business Daily:   Of the 16,000 words uttered by Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and moderators Gwen Ifil and Judy Woodruff, not one of them concerned Clinton’s deepening email scandal. Not one mention of the words email, e-mail, private server or FBI.

Not a single media question or opponent mention of the huge legal cloud hanging over the party’s presumptive nominee. Nor of the ongoing FBI investigation into unauthorized use of her unsecured private email server for government business, including loose handling of Top Secret documents endangering national security intelligence-gathering and covert operations. (read more)

ht AllenS

Bernie buys Rev Al a cup of coffee

"I support all your new tax ideas, and I'm really looking forward to not paying them." pic.twitter.com/YGIgbmhXVw

— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) February 10, 2016

My Thoughts Exactly

Before I go on with this short history, let me make a general observation– the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.
One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. This philosophy fitted on to my early adult life, when I saw the improbable, the implausible, often the 'impossible,' come true.
~ F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Crack-Up*

It is possible and even desirable to simultaneously understand both Sanders and Trump: they both represent disaffection. If you cannot understand modern American disaffected politics, you really need to get out of your bubble. Get out of your DC-loving bubble.

I noticed something funny happening in Washington, DC, about five years ago when I traveled there. I wrote a bizarre blog post about it back here. It was the physical reversion I noticed -- not the progression.

I'll hold the notion that something can be both progressive and regressive for a while now and see what happens. More tension I suppose.
_____________
*h/t: rcommal for reminding me of the Fitzgerald quote.

"Hillary Clinton '100 percent confident' FBI won't find wrongdoing"

The Hill: Speaking at Thursday night’s Democratic primary debate, Clinton blamed Republicans for seeking to gin up controversy, likening the email controversy to the GOP’s investigation around her response to the 2012 terror attack in Benghazi, Libya.

Clinton pointed to a revelation today that former Secretary of State Colin Powell and aides to former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice also used personal email accounts.

The FBI is investigating Clinton’s unconventional email server and use of a personal email account, and some Republicans are speculating it will lead to an indictment.

Clinton said there’s no chance of that happening.

“I am 100 percent confident, this is a security review requested and carried out that will be resolved,” she said. “But I have to add, if there’s a security review about me, there will have to be security reviews for a lot of other people including Republican officeholders because we have this absurd situation of retroactive classifications, honest to goodness, this just beggars the imagination."

Instapundit analysis: The Fix Is In.  Meanwhile, the Hillary campaign seemed to walk back a promise to release transcripts of Hillary's lucrative Goldman Sachs speeches.  From the New York Times...

In response to a question at Thursday night’s debate, Hillary Clinton said she would “look into” the possibility of releasing transcripts of her paid remarks to banking, corporate and financial services companies like Goldman Sachs.

But by Friday morning, it did not appear that much looking was underway.

Joel Benenson, Mrs. Clinton’s pollster, gave little indication at a Wall Street Journal breakfast with reporters that the transcripts would be forthcoming.

“I don’t think voters are interested in the transcripts of her speeches,” he said.

If the speeches contain little to no substance, justifying the hefty sums Goldman Sachs paid for them, the campaigns worries the transcripts could show the speeches to be nothing more than an end run around political contribution limits. At a time when Bernie Sanders has chosen to make Hillarys Wall Street connections his main go-to reason as to why democrat voters should reject her and give him the party's nomination for president. There is little to no chance Hillary is about to release them.

Iowa Caucus: Kids table running ~8-2 Bernie

Kids table running ~8-2 Bernie pic.twitter.com/NAhMPYOO0H

— Ben Smith (@BuzzFeedBen) February 2, 2016

Bernie's New Ad

h/t AllenS

Trump vs. Sanders?

"Get Ready for a Populist Disaster"

What was supposed to be a coronation for Hillary Clinton in the Democratic contest has turned into such a tough fight that the former Secretary of State may end up losing in both states to Bernie Sanders. Sanders refused to affiliate himself with the Democratic Party throughout his twenty-five years in Congress, preferring to call himself a Socialist.

If anything, both appear to be gaining momentum as the contests approach. Donald Trump picked up a big endorsement this week from Tea Party favorite Sarah Palin who joined Trump on the campaign trail in Iowa. Sanders has managed to leverage his hostility to super-PACs and deep-pocket donors into a small-ticket fundraising machine strong enough that Clinton’s campaign now openly frets that Team Sanders could outraise in hard money.

A year ago, the possibility of a general election in which two outsiders ended up with major-party nominations seemed like bad political fiction, a fantasy dreamed up by pundits. Now, a Trump-Sanders showdown in November isn’t just possible, it’s one of the more likely outcomes. That would guarantee a populist, anti-establishment outcome and could even become the greatest shock to the American political system since the advent of the two-party system in the mid-nineteenth century.

The article goes on to tell the cautionary tale of woe that was Minnesota's experimentation with the election of Independent Jesse the body Ventura as Governor. Closing the article with "the ancient Minnesotan proverb"... be careful what you wish for, uff dah – you might just get it, you betcha.

For obvious reasons this may not be the best time to be experimenting with Bernie's Socialism or Trump's brand of National Populism. In terms of having their house in order in a 'first of it's kind' comprehensive "Best Countries" report the United States in now #4 in the world.

Link to source

Feel the Bern

Berns disapproval 

In Case the Democrats forgot to tell you, they are having a debate tonight