This can happen when a political party nominates an unelectable candidate

[Tom Rinaldo]

TRUMP IS “UNELECTABLE”….. 63 Percent of Americans Say They’ll ‘Definitely, DEFINITELY Not’ Vote for Trump….
April 9, 2016
http://www.papamiket.com/trump-is-unelectable-63-percent-of-americans-say-theyll-definitely-definitely-not-vote-for-trump/

"Former 2016 GOP candidate, Sen. Lindsey Graham, joins Morning Joe to discuss why he endorsed Jeb Bush, why Donald Trump is the most unelectable Republican candidate of his lifetime"

"In a presentation Wednesday night at Carleton College about the 2016 presidential campaign, University of Minnesota political scientist Larry Jacobs poured quite a bit of cold water on the widespread belief in some Democratic Party circles that presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump is unelectable"
https://www.minnpost.com/eric-black-ink/2016/05/larry-jacobs-questions-belief-donald-trump-unelectable/

Mar 15, 2016 Cokie Roberts, NPR and the impossibility of objectivity. ... She and her husband argue that Trump is unelectable, that his ideas are half-baked, and that he lacks character.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2016/03/15/cokie-roberts-npr-and-the-impossibility-of-objectivity/

Aug 25, 2015 It's now harder to see an end to the Trump-Fox war soon. As I reported this week, Trump's poll numbers remain strong and he's building a robust campaign operation, which is a threat to Ailes's political project: "Roger says Trump is unelectable. His goal here is to save the country," a source close to Ailes told me.
(can't link to this one, it is a right wing source)

"Those Republican leaders who fear that Trump is unelectable in a general election — and there are many — publicly suggest they have until mid-March to coalesce behind a viable alternative."
https://news.yahoo.com/rattling-the-establishment-win-for-trump-sends-110107036.html

[MrsCoffee]

1. More comparisons to Trump.

I wouldn’t brag about that.

Will Russia and the FBI be interfering on his behalf? Does he have a basket of treasonous deplorables to help him steal the election?

Trump didn’t win.

[Perseus]

4. If I may assume what the goal of the original post is trying to tell us

And I understand that is dangerous to assume (ass u me).

So many people whose crystal ball was telling them that trump would not win and got it wrong. A popular discussion in DU is Bernie Sanders inability to beat trump, they are predicting that if Sanders wins the nomination there is no way he will beat trump, which is what many, including some republicans, said about the creature.

Granted that I feel they stole enough votes to win that small margin in states where the Electoral College has weight, but nonetheless, so many people go it wrong.

Bottom line is that people need to stop predicting, if those who predict were good at it they would be part of the 1% of the wealthiest people in the World.

[Tom Rinaldo]

10. Bingo. You assume correctly

I did a quick "Duck Duck" search using the phrase "Trump is unelectable" because that was the only way I could think of not to get flooded with irrelevant results. For example when I searched for "Trump" and "Unelectable" instead, the second result I got was listed as: "Bernie Sanders's agenda makes him the definition of unelectable.

It is harder to search for entries from 2015 and 2016 that reflect the thinking of Democratic strategists at the time that Trump would be the easiest Republican to defeat. It was talked about in pundit TV chatter but less frequently put in print because many of those pundits did not want to weaken Trump's chances of actually winning the nomination. Something similar happened in 1980, when many leading Democrats were rooting for Ronald Reagan to win the Republican nomination because he would supposedly be the easiest Republican for Jimmy Carter to defeat. And I'm certain that John Major thought he would score an easy win when he put Brexit up for a referendum vote. Yes, Russia interfered there too, but even with that later revealed the Brits just installed a strongly Pro Brexit government just a few weeks back.

[DownriverDem]

2. We've lost big too

Don't forget George McGovern who won 1 State (MA) and Washington DC. He promised freebies too.

[Tom Rinaldo]

11. I'm glad you brought up 1972

By my count that was 48 years ago. So let's look back 48 years from 1972, shall we? If results from 48 years ago are relevant today, then events of the 48 years that preceded the 1972 election were probably instructive also. So 48 years prior to Nixon's second election Calvin Coolidge was President and FDR had not yet run for and won the presidency 4 consecutive times. The Great Depression and World War II were closer to 1972 chronologically than McGovern's defeat is to 2020. Memories of the first TV's entering American homes were fresher back in 1972 than McGovern's defeat in 1972 is today.

You know what else happened in 1972? The Watergate break in.

[beastie boy]

3. Remember, Hillary won.

Unless you are insinuating that any Democratic candidate will seek interference of a foreign power to get elected, your analogy doesn't work.

Actually, I am hoping that you are not drawing any analogies, and your post just doesn't belong in the Democratic Primary forum.

[thesquanderer]

7. The point is simply that unelectable candidates can win. People thought Hillary was unelectable too.

That was the crazy thing, we had an election between two "unelectable" candidates, as each party put up candidates who were underwater in favorability. But someone had to win, and someone did, no matter how you look at it.

Bernie is more popular now than Hillary was in 2016, so if he's our candidate, I think he'll do well.

[beastie boy]

9. If two "unelectable" candidates run against each other, one of them is guaranteed to win.

Of course, "unelectable" is not an absolute term, and it is within the realm of possibility that an "unelectable" candidate can win over an "electable" one, however unlikely the odds are. But Trump is a bad example of this, since he cheated in a way that borders on treason. The odds of a traitor running for office are even smaller than an unelectable candidate winning, and yet it is not outside of the realm of possibilities, as we now know.

[Tom Rinaldo]

12. Would you feel better if I reminded fellow DU members of how many Democrats were certain

...that Ronald Reagan was the dream candidate for Jimmy Carter to run against? I assure you Russia did not meddle in the 1980 election on Reagan's behalf.

Both in 1980 and in 2016 I was not buying the argument that the Republican candidate with the most fervent base would necessarily be the easiest to defeat.

My point is simple. Those entrenched in conventional thinking in any political party, Democratic or Republican, are usually certain that they have a good read on the electorate. Until they don't.

[beastie boy]

13. I am still trying to figure out if you are referring to Bernie as being considered "unelectable" by

the Democrats entrenched in conventional thinking. It seems you are, but you are not saying it outright. If you are, it is strange that you give examples of Republicans who were considered "unelectable" by the Democrats, whatever their numbers have been. Are you saying that the entrenched Democrats keep making the same error in judgement with regard to Republican candidates? Since you are posting in the Primaries forum, I can only assume that this alleged error in judgement somehow relates to the Democratic Primaries. I wonder what the connection is between the two. Perhaps I am a bit dense, but I would like you to spell it out, so it doesn't look like comparing apples and oranges.

Regardless of your ability to make a compelling connection between the two, I am certain that there were more entrenched Democrats who considered Howard Baker the dream candidate against Carter than the populist front-runner Reagan.

[Tom Rinaldo]

14. James Carville and Chris Mathews are but two examples of Democratic pundits/strategists/analysts

who have studied politics for a long long time and rose to the top of their fields. Each first burst into prominence through their association to Democratic presidential candidates, Carter and Clinton respectively, who were more or less thought of as insurgents by more established Democratic Party officials of the time. Now they are sure that Bernie Sanders is "unelectable." Most of us to varying extents live inside of "bubbles" that reinforce our already established presumptions. Sanders breaks the mold of Democratic candidates who are within the Carville/Mathews etc. "comfort zone" that they view the world from. That can be true of pro-Sanders voices also of course, but they don't wield the same high wattage megaphones yet that well established pundits start out with, and many of the latter push the predominant media narrative that Sanders is "unelectable." All of that can turn on a dime though when there is a sea change in the electorate, and I believe we have been seeing one stirring for the last five years or so. Suddenly it became Barack Obama's brain trust, and no longer James Carville's like, who were the hot political gurus after Obama defeated Clinton and went on to become President

I think the biases of conventional thinking were on display in the Republican party in late 2015 and early 2016 and the same can be seen today in large segments of the Democratic Party. Conventional thinking is not the province of any political party or ideology, it is simply the discounting of new information that make former truths less valid. In my own opinion, and this is an opinion board after all, the absolute certainty with which some proclaim that Sanders is absolutely unelectable, is a telling sign that they are viewing this election through a standard issue late 1990's lens. In my opinion that is reinforced by their temptation to cite election returns from 48 years ago to buttress the case they are trying to make now.

And for the record, I do disagree with you regarding Howard Baker vs. Ronald Reagan, as to which Republicans most Democrats preferred for Carter to run against in 1980.

[beastie boy]

15. Ok, I am begining to understand the meaning of your OP.

The examples you cited in the OP of pundits who turned out to be wrong about Trump serve as an anecdotal illustration of how any pundit, whether entrenched in conventional thinking or not, can be wrong. Fair enough. As such, it is a valid subject to discuss in this forum. But it's a poor predictor of what may actually happen or not happen, or even to suggest that one group of pundits or another is usually wrong.

Can Bernie win the election despite the pronouncements of his unelectability by the entrenched conventional thinkers? Yes. Can he lose just as those same pundits predict? Yes. And the same goes for any pronouncement by non-entrenched, non-conventional thinkers. No outcome is outside of the realm of the possible. But in order to dismiss the conventional pundits outright, we need more than anecdotal corroboration of a sentiment. We actually need statistical data on how the number of instances of conventional pundits being wrong compares to the number of instances of them being right. And the same goes for non-entrenched non-conventional thinkers.

The same goes for the 1980 elections. We can disagree, but that's about it.

[Tom Rinaldo]

17. Fair enough to your post as well

What you mention would be an interesting, though complex, area for sociopolitical research:

...we need more than anecdotal corroboration of a sentiment. We actually need statistical data on how the number of instances of conventional pundits being wrong compares to the number of instances of them being right. And the same goes for non-entrenched non-conventional thinkers.

I would add another critical variable, which is again one that is difficult to define. It should include an assessment that factored in the relative contentment vs dissatisfaction of the public with "the way things are" in general and how that effects the accuracy of conventional thinking. Some times are more ripe with turmoil than others and that has a bearing on whether or not conventional thinking continues to reflect public attitudes on the best way to move forward

As you rightly point out, I may well be wrong about the current accuracy of "conventional political thinking" today, but I wanted to make a case for not automatically accepting the thrust of "conventional thinking" when a prior truism is not reexamined during a time of flux. In a cycle where so many primary voters are fixated on "electability" it is illustrative to look at who is defining that concept, how and why.

[handmade34]

5. "This can happen when..."

our Country still clings to an antiquated 'Electoral College'

[Zolorp]

6. Yeah, at this time in 2016 Trump polled so badly he was unelectable.

Nobody is polling like that right now, not even a candidate who is completely unelectable.

[abqtommy]

8. Hmmm...I've yet to see a poll that includes the effect of ratfuckery on an election.

[andym]

16. An un-electable candidate can only beat another un-electable candidate, so

Trump, the right wing propaganda machine, and Putin spent more than a year demonizing Hillary Clinton, until her favorability ratings were similar to Trump. Still Trump would have lost badly without the FBI investigations against Hillary and Comey's late announcement of another investigation.

Trump is actually MORE popular than he was then (still underwater in unfavorability), but he is achieving ~42-45% favorability rather than 35%. Thus, his goal is only to knock the Democratic nominee to around his own levels (or below). The question is how easy would it be for the Republicans to launch slanderous attacks each of our candidates. These attacks in the general election will be aimed at the middle, not the left.

Since your OP seems concerned with Bernie Sanders, albeit indirectly, let's address his electability. Unfortunately, Bernie Sanders is particularly susceptible to being attacked because of his embrace of socialism and his past modest radicalism. Ironically, Bernie's best defense against the socialist/radical attacks attempting to sway the moderates will be that he will not be able to implement most of his programs, so in reality he is a harmless old man who can safely replace Trump. Of course, he can not use this defense personally-- it can be employed by other Democrats.