Why are Democrats deliberately choosing the weaker candidate to take on Trump?

[Ken Burch]

23. No, they aren't striking at all. Bernie has NOTHING in common with McGovern

1)Unlike McGovern, Bernie has a lot of labor support. You will not see the AFL-CIO staying neutral in a Trump V. Sanders race in the way they did in '72.

2)Unlike McGovern, Bernie has significant support in all age groups.

3)Unlike McGovern, Bernie isn't facing a Republican incumbent who had the power of the federal government at his disposal to disrupt and sabotage his opponents' campaigns.

4)Unlike McGovern, whoever is selected as Bernie's running mate(if Bernie gets nominated)will not produce the kind of catastrophic embarrassment that McGovern was subjected to, with two Dem senators publicly refusing to accept the slot and then Eagleton's mental health issues(which shouldn't have mattered) being unexpectedly exposed. We pretty much know everything there is to know about the personal lives of everybody in national politics now(whether we want to know it or not).

5)And in a complete reversal of the way things were in '72, the issues that cost McGovern support among traditional dems(LGBTQ, rights, defense of reproductive rights support for a rational, humane drug policy, opposition to police brutality)are now positions on which there is strong consensus support among all Democratic voting blocs(and issues which, as HRC's supporters like to remind us, HRC has been more outspoken about then Bernie in some cases-though Bernie is just as committed to fighting for those issues as president as HRC).

The lesson of 1972 is not that Democrats can't ever nominate an idealist or a crusader. The lesson of 1972 is that you're going to lose 49 states no matter what when Richard Nixon, Spiro Agnew and CREEP are your opponents.