Bernie Sanders is playing a dangerous game. If he and his campaign continue their scorched-earth attacks against the Democratic Party, they will succeed in only one thing: electing Donald Trump as president.
That is the first paragraph of Robinson’s Washington Post column today, one titled Sanders’s scorched-earth campaign is a gift to Trump, written by a person whose next words are that he shares much of Sanders’s political philosophy, including seeing health care as a right, and who acknowledged the remarkable campaign run by the Senator from Vermont.
But consider that description: scorched-earth attacks and his warning that the result could well elect Trump.
There are others who have written on the apparent willingness of the Sanders campaign to hurt Clinton in the attempt to win California, even while avowing a commitment to defeat Trump. But Robinson puts it bluntly: for all his campaign has done, including having brought so many young people into the process,
But he hasn’t won the nomination.
And the reason is simple:
The will of the party is clear: More Democrats prefer Clinton over Sanders as their nominee.
And then the Pulitzer winner for commentary puts it in a way that I am sure will bring some loud protests:
Instead of accepting this obvious fact, the Sanders campaign is behaving like a 2-year-old who can’t have ice cream for breakfast. All along, Sanders and his aides have claimed that the party establishment was unfairly tipping the scales in favor of Clinton. Now the Sanders people have gone further and are deliberately stoking anger and a sense of grievance — less against Clinton than the party itself. This is reckless in the extreme, and it could put Trump in the White House.
Robinson offers a serious warning:
This is reckless in the extreme, and it could put Trump in the White House.
Let me stop for a moment.
At this point it is stupid to dismiss what Robinson has to say because he works for a newspaper that supported the war, or that it is owned by Jeff Bezos, or that it is in your eyes a tool of the establishment. This is a major liberal voice, one that gets amplified by his regular appearance on MS-NBC, where he serves as a political commentator as well as his duties as Associate Editor of the paper.
Further, attacking me because I post about it does not make the words go away. I post about what Robinson writes on a regular basis, and was doing so well before there was the morning Abbreviated Pundit Roundup where he is often featured, because he is a graceful writer and often has interesting things to say. I refuse to change my patterns, which are NOT in any way a matter of “spiking the ball” and at this point my reaction is several fold
- posting about important voices so that others can see what they have to say is a regular part of this site
- some of those who complain about what I post say I only post things that hurt Sanders, to which I respond that (1) I post things that are positive about Clinton (2) I don’t see you complaining about people who regularly post things that are critical about the Clintons
I would also note that I have an increasing concern with what the Senator is saying. At the same time he ramps up his rhetoric about Clinton, he ostensibly offers a balance by saying he will do all he can to keep Trump from becoming President. What is striking is he never says he will do all he can to elect the Democratic nominee, and I have to wonder if that is because he does not really, even after having actively sought its nomination, consider himself a member of the party, especially since his rhetoric about a corrupt political system increasingly includes his attacks upon that very party.
Like Sanders has been, I am not a registered Democrat. That is because I live in Virginia, a state which does not have registration by party, and in which therefore all primaries are open. In March Sanders lost our open primary when Clinton drew 64.29% to his 39.20% statewide. And lest he dismiss that as a factor of our being a “Southern” state, I remind people that Obama carried the state twice and that all three of our statewide elected officials are Democrats. Further, while we have a substantial African-American population, that is concentrated in a swath that stretches from Richmond to Tidewater currently crammed into one Congressional District that will as a result of court orders after this election be parts of two districts that will elect Black men to Congress. So that does not explain why the very liberal Northern part of the state voted like this:
Alexandria 69.45 -29.44
Arlington 66.83-33.82
Fairfax City 59-35-45.70
Fairfax County
8th CD 65.81-33.66
10th CD 63.99-35.50
11th CD 60-93.-38.44
Falls Church 61.17-38.52
Returning to Robinson, he spends a chunk of the column going through why we need to be concerned about Trump, despite electoral advantages with which the Democratic nominee — which will be Clinton — will start. He notes especially the palpable anger across the country — something which I would note has escalated as a direct result of the lack of accomplishment flowing from the deliberate attempts of Congressional Republicans to keep things the people want and need from getting done. People are clearly “anti-establishment” and Robinson wonders if their disgust is so great they would be willing to risk Trump as President.
He hopes that is not the case, then warns all that could stand between Trump and 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is the Democratic nominee — and again I repeat, it will be Clinton. Even some of the fiercest Sanders supporters on this site acknowledge that.
It is in that context that Robinson writes
It is possible to believe Clinton would be far from an ideal president and also believe she must be elected because Trump would be an unthinkable disaster.
I can already predict SOME of the responses, which I have seen multiple times. I will not bother to repeat them. But please consider what Robinson writes next:
Given this context, Sanders and his campaign are being shamefully irresponsible. Rather than accept defeat, they claim loudly that the party’s nominating process was rigged against them. They display a degree of entitlement that they have not earned.
They have not earned it because they have put their case before the voters and it has been rejected, repeatedly, by millions of votes, resulting in an elected delegate advantage for Clinton that is overwhelming and is not going to change, not unless you believe that Sanders will win California, NM, NJ and DC each by 30 points.
And now Robinson sums it up in a way that one can only hope Sanders advocates and the Sanders campaign will recognize:
Sanders has every right to continue his campaign until the nominee is officially chosen at the convention in Philadelphia. But if he means it when he says he will do everything in his power to keep Trump from being elected, he has to do more than just modulate his rhetoric against Clinton. He and his campaign must stop attacking the Democratic Party in a way that might discourage voters in the fall.
Please note — in 2008 I said that Clinton should continue until the end of the campaign, even though she could not win, because it would give her supporters time to accept their loss, and it would build support in two states in particular — IN and NC — that the Democrats might not otherwise carry but could — and Obama did. This time I have consistently said similar thing about Sanders continuing, adding that the additional turnout in CA which is simultaneously holding its top two primaries could help Democrats keep or gain Congressional seats.
One of the criticisms some have thrown at those of us who have posted pieces that offer voices critical of Sanders is why don’t we simply advocate FOR our candidate, rather than attacking Sanders To that I respond, why is their candidate and his campaign not simply advocating for himself and his policies, rather than running what Robinson rightly describes as a scorched earth campaign against Clinton and against the Democratic party?
I note again, that where we have exit polls, Sanders has won Democrats only in his own Vermont and neighboring New Hampshire.
He has yet to convince the majority of Democrats that he is committed to DEMOCRATIC success in November. It is about time that he make that commitment, to say he will do all he can to ensure that the DEMOCRATIC nominee is elected this fall, even if it is not him.
If he does not believe that, then why is he running in a DEMOCRATIC primary contest?
I think Robinson’s words today are spot on.
That is why I wrote about them.
Go ahead and respond however you want.
I am going to eat breakfast and then go teach school.
I will read the responses.
But I will not respond to the usual baloney I have seen. It’s old, it achieves nothing except allowing those offering it to vent and bloviate.
And as Robinson put it so aptly, it is behaving like a 2-year-old who can’t have ice cream for breakfast