Can Bernie win? Absolutely!

[Fiendish Thingy]

Written by a non-Bernie supporter (and since it’s Salon, I’ll save some of you the trouble by posting your substance free “blah blah blah H.A. Goodman” response so you don’t have to)

https://www.salon.com/2020/02/25/can-bernie-win-absolutely--and-i-dont-even-support-him/

It is quite comprehensive, covers Sanders’ strengths and weaknesses, and includes a review of and links to Bitecofer’s model as evidence of Sanders’ chance to win and Dems keep the house and possibly take the Senate.

It’s worth reading the whole thing, but here are some highlights:

Essentially, Bitecofer says the candidate isn't nearly as important as voter turnout and the strength of "negative partisanship." Simply put, national elections aren't decided by issues, legislative records or many of the old school measures of electoral success. In the post-2016 era, elections are won or lost based on energy — the determination of voters to punish (or "own" ) the other side. Turnout and the will to inflict pain on the enemy at the ballot box is how elections are decided now. I don't love the sentiment, but I don't disagree that it exists.

In this respect, Bitecofer's 2020 model says the Democratic Party, including its presidential nominee, is poised to defeat the Trump-Republican machine in November, including pickups in the House, and perhaps even a Democratic majority in the Senate. (The Senate map is favorable to the Democrats anyway, given that they only have to defend a handful of seats compared with a couple dozen seats for the Republicans to retain.)

Bitecofer told Politico that the old models too heavily rely upon the "swing voters" theory — the idea that elections are won or lost based on those insufferably fickle undecideds, around 15 percent of likely voters. She calls this the "Chuck Todd theory of American politics." In 2016, for instance, Hillary Clinton built her campaign around those old models, the old assumptions, while the Red Hat cult was gathering energy on its own (with outside help, of course).

<snip>

As for Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, remember that around 70,000 votes separated Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump across those three states last time. Not only does Bitecofer's model show the Democratic nominee recapturing those states for the blue column this year, regardless of the nominee, but Bernie's voters won't flock to third-party spoilers like Jill Stein if he's the nominee, and they certainly won't vote for Trump. Duh.

But let's put aside Bitecofer's model and look strictly at the numbers. In 2016, Trump won that Rust Belt trifecta by less than 1 percent of the popular vote: a 10,000-vote margin in Michigan, 22,000 votes in Wisconsin and about 44,000 in Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, around 51,000 Bernie Sanders primary supporters flipped and voted for Trump in Wisconsin; around 47,000 Sanders voters went for Trump in Michigan; and a whopping 116,000 more in Pennsylvania. We're talking about election-altering margins. That won't happen this time. I would caution Democrats not to decide based exclusively on the Bernie-or-bust threat, but that doesn't make it less real.

More at the link, including discussion of the “socialism” issue, voter turnout, and down ballot races.

[Fiendish Thingy]

2. I ran your post through Google translate and Babelfish and they both said

“Huh?”

Since you posted your reply less than a minute after I posted my OP, perhaps you should actually read it, and the link to the original article, and try responding again, then we can have a discussion.

[floppyboo]

4. 25% up in Nevada, so here's a raspberry for you

[ananda]

3. Of course he can .. in a landslide!

Bernie has the right message for people first,
and that message has never changed!

[Gothmog]

19. If sanders is the nominee, trump will win 45+ states and Kevin McCarthy will be Speaker

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

[Fiendish Thingy]

31. No evidence to support that assertion, only fear nt

[Gothmog]

33. Research reveals that Sen. Sanders's electability is based on a polling mirage.

Link to tweet

[redstateblues]

6. Count out Florida

[uponit7771]

7. Not according to 3 month swing state numbers vs Trump, this is like McGovern we're being warned &

... ignoring the warnings

[walkingman]

8. If Bernie gets more votes than any other candidate then he should be the nominee - same for

every other candidate. If the Super Delegates step in then the Party is gone.....People have to know that their vote matters or otherwise why vote?

[uponit7771]

9. Yes, those are the rules that doesn't mean he has the best chance at winning. Sanders can win

... but that's an uphill battle relative to all of US history polling data.

[Fiendish Thingy]

11. Bitecofer's model says ANY of our top candidates can win, if anti-Trump turnout is high nt

[uponit7771]

13. That's a big variable vs what we already know; Sanders numbers against Trump in the swings states

... for the last 3 months are luke warm at best

[Meadowoak]

20. Not in the polling data I've seen. Bernie's numbers have been going up in

The rust belt states. The ones that failed us in 2016.

[uponit7771]

21. There are no polling avg outside of Mi Show Sanders beating Trump outside MOE for last 3 months

I don't know where you're getting your data from

[walkingman]

23. So what is your solution? I like Bernie but definitely do not what another 4 years of Trump.

[uponit7771]

24. Since America hasn't had a democratically elected republican president in the last 20 years ...

... then national numbers mean nothing, look at the swing state numbers.

That's what we failed to do in the last election or failed to calculate the 300% over performance of Russia backed 3rd party candidates.

We should look at the person who is constantly beating Trump the most in swing states.

Lets not make this another McGovern where McGover was never polling ahead of Nixon but the party chose him anyway with some of the same promises levied by Sanders.

[Gothmog]

18. Research reveals that Sen. Sanders's electability is based on a polling mirage.

Link to tweet

[JudyM]

30. Just read the paper, this doesn't seem like reliable science: assumptions about, e.g., rethugs

being more likely to come out to vote against sanders than others, without even quantifying that.

[Fiendish Thingy]

32. The mirage is the myth of the "swing voter" nt

[Fiendish Thingy]

10. You really think Sanders would lose 48 states?

I encourage you to read up on Bitecofer’s model and data, and compare it to whatever you are looking at.

It will be a hard fought election with any nominee, but it won’t be a blowout like McGovern in 1972- the only people pushing that are from “the Chuck Todd school of journalism”.

[uponit7771]

12. No, he'd lose 3 of the 4 big swing states according to 3 month swing state polls vs Trump.

... that's enough to lose the election.

48 or 3 ... doesn't matter, we should be looking at swing states and not national polling or anything else

[Fiendish Thingy]

14. Post your data

All the data I have seen show all our candidates beating Trump in Michigan and PA.

[uponit7771]

15. Link, this is from NBC latest poll that backs up the 3 month average against Trump

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/meet-the-press/nbc-news-wsj-poll-sanders-opens-double-digit-national-lead-n1138191

The 4 and 11 swing states this year from wiki (NBC took 11 vs 4)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swing_state

Then take those 4 or 11 from wikipedia and google search - [swing state] Trump vs Sanders to get the 3 month avg


There's no other candidate beside Biden that has been beating Trump outside of MOE in the swing states in the last 3 months and still continues to do so even after Trumps bashing.


That's why Trump wants Biden out

We're being warned just like the national numbers against McGovern and too many people are ignoring them

[JudyM]

16. "The best way for Trump to win is through defeatism metastasizing into an actual defeat."

Last edited Tue Feb 25, 2020, 08:18 PM - Edit history (1)

“...Defeatism leads to reduced energy which will lead to a second Trump term.”

Hopefully the handwringing here will start to fade, better sooner than later. If it’s going to be Sanders, the best Dems can do to win, according to this research, is to show vibrant enthusiasm.

[Sympthsical]

28. This is currently what concerns me most

People determined they will lose increase the chances that we will lose.

Whoever we nominate, I will pretend and behave as if they were my first best choice all the way to November. We can’t afford otherwise.

[JudyM]

29. I will, too. And quickly shift gears to support the nominee. Even if it's a quasi-republican.

[Fiendish Thingy]

34. It's called a self-fulfilling prophecy nt

[Sympthsical]

35. Yep n/t

[Gothmog]

17. "New research suggests Sanders would drive swing voters to Trump -- and need a youth turnout miracle

Link to tweet

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

22. Was just going to post that

You beat me to it.

[Kurt V.]

26. here is the problem with that article- voter turn out 18 to 29 y.o. has increased 79% since 2014.

[frazzled]

25. But turnout so far has been tepid

He's bringing few new voters to the table.

The results so far show that Mr. Sanders has prevailed by broadening his appeal among traditional Democratic voters, not by fundamentally transforming the electorate.

In Iowa, for instance, turnout for the caucuses was lower than expected, up 3 percent compared with 2016, and the increase was concentrated in more well-educated areas where Mr. Sanders struggled, according to a New York Times analysis; in the Iowa precincts where Mr. Sanders won, turnout increased by only 1 percentage point.
There was no sign of a Sanders voter surge in New Hampshire either, nor on Saturday in Nevada, where the nearly final results indicated that turnout would finish above 2016 but well short of 2008 levels, despite a decade of population growth and a new early voting option that attracted some 75,000 voters. The low numbers are all the more striking given the huge turnout in the 2018 midterm elections, which was the highest in a century.

There was also no clear evidence across the early states of much greater participation by young people, a typically low-turnout group that makes up a core part of Mr. Sanders’s base and that he has long said he can motivate to get out to the polls. And Mr. Sanders has struggled to overcome his longstanding weakness in affluent, well-educated suburbs, where Democrats excelled in the midterm elections and where many traditionally Republican voters are skeptical about President Trump’s performance, meaning they could be up for grabs in November.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/24/us/politics/bernie-sanders-democratic-voters.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage§ion=Politics

[zipplewrath]

27. It's the incumbents race to lose

that's the general expectation. As such, if he loses, what's wrong with him losing to someone that might actually move the country towards the direction that poll after poll indicates they want to move?

[Blue_Tires]

36. Fun fact: As late as OCTOBER 2016

H.A. Goodman was screaming all up and down Twitter that the FBI arrest of Hillary Clinton was imminent... Then he encouraged his readers to either vote 3rd party or stay home.

Goodman doesn't support Sanders because he's been a Trump chaos agent all this time...

[Fiendish Thingy]

37. Did you read the rest of my post and the linked article? Nt