Hillary deserves some congratulations for pulling off a major upset.
I know upsets usually imply being behind, but no one...no one expected what happened here. There was a narrative set by the media, keeping expectations high with a chance that the story would change when Bernie closed in on primary night. But the exact opposite happened. A higher AA turnout than even Obama, and she won most demographics.
This is a really scary thought. Where were the people? It may be tempting to go with the narrative that Hillary doesn’t inspire, but with 271,514 to 95,977 you cannot put all the blame on her.
Where are all of Bernie’s supporters? It has been said time and time again, but it is worth repeating. Where are the millions of new voters?
This isn’t rocket science, it doesn’t take a million new voters to win a primary. But in a primary in a state like SC, if you can’t even get half as many people to the polls as your opponent, I have to wonder where this message is going.
I also don’t want to hear any of the nonsense about if she wins the nomination all of Bernie’s supporters will stay home. Looking at the past two states a majority of them are already staying home.
I talked to a couple of friends who are avid Bernie supporter’s who stood in line this weekend to see Bernie since he was in town. Not a one of them had actually planned to go vote on Tuesday in Texas. The closest answer was “they might make it out depending on what’s going on, but they really want to”.
So say what you will. I have already seen a couple of people since yesterday insulting AA voters for being “stupid”, “low information”, “uneducated”, or “misled”. I don’t see that as being a winning message here, and it sure didn’t help yesterday.
I wrote a diary about it before, about Sanders giving up on the non white vote. That was definitely not appropriate to say. However, that is the narrative now after his disappearance from SC leading up to the voting, and now in other southern Super Tuesday states. He is focusing on 5 states he has a better change of winning, which are more “liberal” and “white”, as he does better there.
No offense to anyone, but that is not the candidate I want for the democratic party. I want a candidate who inspires every non white demographic as much as the white demographic.
Hillary started making gains in that in Nevada, and now in SC. She also did not do poorly with the youth AA vote last night. There is hope she will be able to bring in even more youth voters as we proceed into March.
I just don’t see Bernie having the ability to bring in as many demographics as her, not based off ideology, but based off what we have seen in the last 4 races.