William Rivers Pitt: Naked Politics: Sanders, Clinton and How to Win When You're Losing

[babylonsister]

http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/36090-naked-politics-sanders-clinton-and-how-to-win-when-you-re-losing

Naked Politics: Sanders, Clinton and How to Win When You're Losing
Wednesday, 18 May 2016 00:00 By William Rivers Pitt, Truthout | Op-Ed



First, the bare facts: Hillary Clinton won Kentucky by 1,923 votes as of the most recent accounting -- MSNBC is calling her the "Assumed Winner," a new term in the campaign coverage lexicon -- and Bernie Sanders won Oregon by close to 10 points with no assumptions involved.

In the world of gambling, they call this a "push." In short, Tuesday was a tie, though Clinton gained enough new delegates to snuggle up close to the finish line of nomination completion. Sanders has to run the table from here on out and win every contest in a staggering rout to gain the nomination, and that's not going to happen. On the Republican side, Donald Trump won Oregon by 12 billion points against two guys who aren't in the race anymore. He didn't even bother to give a victory speech, but it's gonna be great folks, trust me, it's gonna be great.

Now to the hard part: context and consequences. Bernie Sanders is doomed in this contest. That sucks on a wide variety of levels. It sucks generationally because no presidential candidate since Robert Kennedy has done what Sanders has done these last months. He has inspired those who think politics is for old people and suckers to shed their cynicism and knock on doors, make phone calls to potential voters and believe they can actually make a difference in a profoundly bent political system. He has told the kind of truths about the state of this nation that are seldom heard, but are as necessary to this nation as penicillin is to the immune system when a lethal infection has taken root.

For his trouble, Sanders gets called a "thug" on live TV. I've been watching politically oriented television "news" programming with dreary regularity since Reagan was elected in 1980, and I've never seen anything like what I saw on Tuesday. MSNBC -- the ha ha ha "liberal" news network -- went to work on the Sanders campaign as if Bernie had shot Rachel Maddow's dog in her front yard. It went on for hours. The crux of it centered around the mess that went down at the Nevada Democratic Convention this past weekend. The process of appointing delegates from the Nevada caucus was hijacked by Clinton surrogates in broad daylight, and some Sanders people flipped their lids. According to the Sanders campaign:

The chair of the convention announced that the convention rules passed on voice vote, when the vote was a clear no-vote. At the very least, the Chair should have allowed for a headcount.

The chair allowed its Credentials Committee to en mass rule that 64 delegates were ineligible without offering an opportunity for 58 of them to be heard. That decision enabled the Clinton campaign to end up with a 30-vote majority.

The chair refused to acknowledge any motions made from the floor or allow votes on them.

The chair refused to accept any petitions for amendments to the rules that were properly submitted.

snip//

MSNBC and the other networks took that "penchant for violence" quote from the Nevada Democratic Party and jumped on it like hungry dogs going after a soup bone. Constant, vivid, inexcusable violence at Trump rallies is good television. A few screwed Sanders supporters crashing the fence and being stupid? Armageddon, on the hour every hour, with "These Sanders supporters did this stuff, let's ask a Clinton advocate what they think." Sanders was omitted from the conversation. If no chairs had been (allegedly!) thrown, he wouldn't have been part of the broadcast. The bias was that dramatically obvious.

Noam Chomsky has spoken for years and at length about the means by which entrenched power narrows the debate. "The smart way to keep people passive and obedient," he said, "is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum." Bernie Sanders scares the hell out of the Establishment, and the manner in which its media mouthpieces cover this sham of an election in order to shove him and his supporters into the woods is as obvious as it is filthy. Sanders is being shamed for what went down in Las Vegas, but Vegas will tell you all you need to know about how easy it is to run the table when the fix is in.

[oberliner]

1. Chomsky: I'd 'absolutely' vote for Hillary Clinton

Noam Chomsky would “absolutely” choose Hillary Clinton over the Republican nominee if he lived in a swing state, but her primary challenger, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, “doesn’t have much of a chance," the MIT professor and intellectual said in a recent interview.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/01/noam-chomsky-supports-hillary-clinton-218192#ixzz4966dOcg4

Smart guy.

[msanthrope]

2. We're gonna need a bigger bus. nt

[RoccoR5955]

3. I think I shall follow Chomksy's lead

I do not live in a swing state, so I feel free to vote for some other candidate than Hilliary or Drumpf.

[lagomorph777]

11. I live in a swing state, but after NV, DWS/Brock just convinced me to go Green

I have to sleep at night after my vote.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

14. me too, oregon will def go blue

Mix a little more green into that tho, and we could go turquoise

[fasttense]

6. Yeah because Bernie won in Nevada

Here's the thing. Those supposed violent actions should have gotten Bernie voters something. If they were so violent and intimidating why did Hillary still come out on top?

See, it was Hillary supporters who had to lie to get ahead.

[Demsrule86]

9. Hillary won Nevada

in February...and this was a dress rehearsal for mischief in Philie..now you know it won't fly. The Nevada debacle was ordered by top Sanders campaign workers.

[bigtree]

5. is there ONE Sanders supporter who can take responsibility for his failing campaign

...without acting as if he's the only one of the two who's subject to forces working to see him fail?

NO ONE in our party has been subjected to as much negative press as Hillary Clinton, save her husband, in this election and in ALL of the years preceding she's been in the public spotlight. Yet, she has not only fought back from her loss to Obama in 2008, but she's prevailing in this election against odds and resistance that Sanders can only imagine.

It's not some virtue that the Sanders camp looks to be defeated by it all. It's a measure of his ineffectiveness and Hillary's acumen. If he can't push his agenda past the political forces arrayed against him, why should we expect him to perform any better in office?

The fix? Does he mean the will of the voters who chose Hillary over Sanders in the NV caucuses? The will of the majority of people of Nevada who voted for Hillary; the will of the voter that some Sanders supporters intended to subvert at the NV convention?

I doubt it. Evidently, he's making a point which has been refuted. There was no 'fix' in Nevada. The credentials committee was evenly split between parties. Even the chair of the convention who caught the brunt of the violent and abusive threats was a Sanders supporter. Some 'fix' that was. The results out of the convention actually matched the caucus result. You can't get any closer to democracy than that.

[aikoaiko]

7. What "odds and resistance that Sanders can only imagine."?

What are you talking about? HRC has been the assumed DNC nominee for the last 2 years by the press.

[Demsrule86]

10. She was assumed in 08...more so.

And Obama still beat her...he was a good candidate who drew crowds and voters. Bernie has been the worst thing to hit progressive policy since McGovern

[TimPlo]

18. Obama also was African american.

That saved him from Clinton surrogates lying and calling him a racist like they did with Sanders. Obama also was lucky that most (D) are not racist and don't like dog whistle bullshit dealing with race. So when Clinton said Obama was not white enough to win GE so she should be the DNC choice she lost some of the white voters that would supported her. She got lucky in 2016 because it is easier to paint a race card and get black voters to buy it because they see racism directed at them all time from GOP so they are more defensive and the lies about Sanders being a racist worked.

[demmiblue]

8. K&R

[CorkySt.Clair]

12. Still waiting for Fitzmas, Willy.

[Native]

13. I think Pitt meant, "Apparent" Winner, not "Assumed"

[tritsofme]

15. Sanders will win the nomination in 24 business hours. Stay tuned!

[Nye Bevan]

17. HILLARY CLINTON HAS BEEN INDICTED.

Exclusive to Truthout and Will Pitt.

[Duppers]

16. K & R

[still_one]

19. After the awful expletives that Mr. Pitt hurled at President Obama, calling him every vile name in

the book. Mr. Pitt's opinion and credibility mean bupkis