For those who may need reminding, calling any of our candidates a communist or insinuating

[yaesu]

that any are communists is right out of the fascist GOP handbook & only helps tRrump, not your candidate.

[Clash City Rocker]

1. But calling them a corporate shill or a slave to Wall Street is okay

[handmade34]

2. bam!

[Blue_true]

4. Yep. Funny how that logic works. nt

[peggysue2]

8. Whoosh!

x1000 Clash City Rocker!

I'd throw in the denigrating, poisonous tilt of the term 'Democratic Establishment' which includes the likes of Nancy Pelosi and her majority in the House, the only thing standing between us and a complete fascist takeover.

[relayerbob]

17. This

Good for the goose = good for the gander

[Dem Femme Fatale]

20. In simple terms

Yes

[mcar]

29. Why is that OK?

[George II]

24. Or "ruling class", "donor class", "billionaire class", "establishment Democrats", etc.

[ehrnst]

27. +1000.

[Vivienne235729]

25. +10000 EXACTLY!!

[mcar]

28. There you go

[zackymilly]

39. Mic Drop!!!! n/t

[SWBTATTReg]

3. Exactly. And wait for it too, they will (the repugs) will call him and our other candidates all...

sorts of idiotic names. Kind of like the ones that we all put up with in the 5th grade. You would think that they would have all grown up by now (the repugs) but nooooooo....of course not. Childish but not really unexpected. Perhaps, just perhaps one day they'll grow up and act like normal, decent human beings, like the rest of us do every day.

[left-of-center2012]

5. "GOP handbook & only helps tRrump"

One can add the buckets of mud thrown at other Democratic candidates
the past few weeks and months, by other Democratic candidates and their supporters,
which I expect to hear repeated this fall by the GOP against our eventual nominee.

[question everything]

6. No, not a communist. But alerting that the label socialist will trickle down ballot is important

[mopinko]

12. it would be nice if we could define our term. socialism v democratic socialism v

the real world, aka america today.

imho, bernie stepped in it when he recommended federalizing ca's power grid. that steps over the line i believe.

[question everything]

13. Most voters do not pay much attention to such distinction

The grab something form "Social media" from Fox, form Limpdick and this is enough.

[mopinko]

18. even a lot of dems dont really get it, tho.

equating everything that we pay for through taxes w socialism is a need thing that makes me nuts.
that's just government.

[Mr.Bill]

7. No one here needs to call Sanders a communist.

Every republican candidate in the country will do a fine job of that if he gets the nomination.

[democrattotheend]

9. Isn't it also against the rules here?

I thought using right wing talking points is against the rules.

[Bucky]

15. That's a kind of slippery slope definition

I agree argument should be made on their merits and without senseless name calling. But lots of arguments made on right-wing sites are perfectly legit, even if we disagree with them. Banning ideas is a little too 1984ish, thank you

Like if people attack my candidate by asking "How are you gonna pay for all those plans?" Well, that's straight off Red State, but it is a fair question.

[democrattotheend]

36. IMO asking how a candidate would pay for things...

is different from calling one of our candidates a communist. The former is a fair point; the latter is a right wing smear that has been used against Democrats for years - even those who don't call themselves socialists.

[Bucky]

10. I assume that the OP was about Bloomberg

cause of his deceptive praising of China and its "elected leader"

[Dem Femme Fatale]

21. !!

That was shocking.

Or the fact that Bloomberg has killed stories about how Ping's family had made a ton of money illegally, and Bloomberg news killed the story because he has a gigantic investment in China.

[oasis]

11. "socialist" and "revolution". I think it's the GOP ads with Bernie constantly

repeating those words amongst the multitudes that will lead the viewers to draw their own conclusions.

[Sloumeau]

14. And what if the candidate was a member of a group that supported Communist candidates?

Is telling people about that straight out of the GOP handbook?

[Gothmog]

16. You do know that trump has a ton of oppo on sanders and would destry sanders with negative ads?

I am very worried about down ballot races. sanders is a very weak candidate and would be easy for trump to destroy. In addition to the well written 101 page memorandum with oppo on sanders with a 1000 pages of backup from the Clinton campaign trump has his own oppo file on sanders that would destroy such a weak and divisive candidate like sanders.

Link to tweet

trump had a two foot thick book of oppo research on Sanders http://www.newsweek.com/myths-cost-democrats-presidential-election-521044

They ignored the fact that Sanders had not yet faced a real campaign against him. Clinton was in the delicate position of dealing with a large portion of voters who treated Sanders more like the Messiah than just another candidate. She was playing the long game—attacking Sanders strongly enough to win, but gently enough to avoid alienating his supporters. Given her overwhelming support from communities of color—for example, about 70 percent of African-American voters cast their ballot for her—Clinton had a firewall that would be difficult for Sanders to breach....

So what would have happened when Sanders hit a real opponent, someone who did not care about alienating the young college voters in his base? I have seen the opposition book assembled by Republicans for Sanders, and it was brutal. The Republicans would have torn him apart. And while Sanders supporters might delude themselves into believing that they could have defended him against all of this, there is a name for politicians who play defense all the time: losers....

The Republicans had at least four other damning Sanders videos (I don’t know what they showed), and the opposition research folder was almost 2-feet thick. (The section calling him a communist with connections to Castro alone would have cost him Florida.) In other words, the belief that Sanders would have walked into the White House based on polls taken before anyone really attacked him is a delusion built on a scaffolding of political ignorance.

sanders was such a weak primary candidate that the Clinton campaign did not use its oppo but trump would have fun destroying such a weak candidate like sanders

I will vote for the nominee of the party but I fear that the nomination of sanders will lead to a Speaker Kevin McCarthy

[Dem Femme Fatale]

23. Old

Rehashed all the same things that's been out since '15.

If there was a bombshell, it would have come out after how the 1st 3 contests turned out & how Super Tuesday looks. No campaign would sit on it while he marched out to an uncontestable lead. Zero logic in that political suicide when you can end his campaign so magically easy with some ethereal scandalous revelation.


If anyone buys otherwise, they're dumb and being led around by their nose out of foolishness & fear mongering.

[Hekate]

32. Welcome to DU, Dem Femme Fatale

You seem to be quick on the uptake of DU history!

[Gothmog]

35. sanders was a weak candidate last cycle who no one bother to vet

Sanders was a very weak candidate who was never vetted. The Clinton campaign treated Sanders with kid gloves because sanders had no chance in the real world of being the nominee. The press did not vet sanders because sanders was such a weak candidate and it would have been a waste of their time Sanders was not vetted and was in fact treated with kid gloves by the Clinton campaign VOX had a good article on the potential lines of attack that Sanders would be exposed to if Sanders was the nominee. http://www.vox.com/2016/2/3/10903404/gop-campaign-against-sanders One of the more interesting observations in the VOX analysis is the fact that Sanders have been treated with kids gloves compared to what Sanders would face if he was the Democratic nominee. I strongly agree with the VOX's position that the so-called negative attacks against Sander have been mild. Form the article:

I have no interest in litigating any of these attacks here. Like any Democrat elected president in 2016, Sanders wouldn't be able to get much done, but he would block attempts to roll back Obama's accomplishments and have a chance to fill a few Supreme Court vacancies.

When Sanders supporters discuss these attacks, though, they do so in tones of barely contained outrage, as though it is simply disgusting what they have to put up with. Questioning the practical achievability of single-payer health care. Impugning the broad electoral appeal of socialism. Is nothing sacred?

But c'mon. This stuff is patty-cakes compared with the brutalization he would face at the hands of the right in a general election.

His supporters would need to recalibrate their umbrage-o-meters in a serious way.

Sanders was treated with kid gloves by the Clinton campaign because of the amusing over-reactions of the Sanders supporters in the primary process. It appears that you are upset that Hillary Clinton did not use all of the oppo research that was available. Sanders was a weak candidate and would have been destroyed if the oppo research was used.

[Hekate]

33. Thanks for the recap of history, though not everyone is keen to be reminded of it, I think...

Trump, iirc, also had a robust oppo file on Sanders, including videos. Basically compiled a file 2 feet thick.

Probably a good thing to be reminded that it exists, was created for Trump, and that Trump would deploy it in a heartbeat. If I were a Bernie supporter I would want to know what it contained.

[Gothmog]

34. Those videos will make great negative ads

Link to tweet

[MineralMan]

19. Who has done that?

[highplainsdem]

26. Unfortunately for the candidate you support (and the Democratic Party if he's our nominee),

your candidate not only has a long history of praising communist leaders and regimes, but he said in the 1970s while campaigning for governor in Vermont that he didn't mind being called a communist. And that was published in the Rutland VT paper at the time.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/1287566598

I can't think off any other Democratic candidate for president -- any candidate that had even a remote chance of getting the nomination -- for whom that's ever been true.

I agree that what Sanders said about himself will help Trump.

Sanders has said a hell of a lot of things that are going to help Trump.

Which is why the GOP has done everything possible to stop Biden, so there's a better chance that they'll get the Democratic nomineee they want -- Bernie Sanders.

Who has vulnerabilities no other Democratic nominee has ever had.

[Jose Garcia]

30. Is it ok to point out a candidate's past support of communists?

[Gothmog]

38. Yes, it is called vetting

trump will be using video clips of sanders making statements supporting various enemies of the United States in negative ads is sanders is the nominee

‘If sanders is the nominee, trump will bury sanders in negative ads and wil 45+ states

We need to vet sanders so that we know what trump will use against sanders if sanders is the nominee

I will support the nominee of the party but I fear that sanders is a very weak general election candidate who will kill down ballot candidates

[Stand and Fight]

31. This coming from a supporter of the campaign that wants to tear down our party.

All whilst calling long time and reliable democrats worse. Laughable.

[LizBeth]

37. Unfortunately you have a candidate called himself this. You can't erase what Sanders has already

put out there. It does not disappear and we all have to deal with it.