This is according to Barbara Boxer. I realize the Bernie fringe element has shoved her so far under the bus she has motor oil in her hair, but I think the rest of us might just start breathing a (careful and tentative) sigh of relief that Sanders may not go marching, marching to Shibboleth after all.
I wrote a diary last night (actually, 4 AM this morning) about Sanders and the Democratic Senate leadership apparently engaging in some cautious make-nice overtures. That is very tentative and as yet unconfirmed. But now some prominent Dems are signaling that Sanders may be climbing down off the political ledge. He met with Boxer Tuesday night to discuss the Nevada debacle, and while his public pronouncements are as combative as ever, it seems his private discussions are anything but.
Boxer said she conveyed her concerns to Sanders in "a really nice talk" with him Tuesday. "I told him how bad it was in Nevada. He said he was distressed about it, and he expressed chagrin about it. I told him 'Bernie, you need to get a hold of it,' and he said he would.''
"He said, 'I can't believe my people would do this,'" said Boxer, who is stepping down from the Senate in January. "He got the point."
Boxer isn’t the only one giving Sanders air kisses. Dick Durbin is making reassuring sounds as well.
Durbin, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, came away from the conversation on Wednesday convinced that Sanders, who has all but lost the presidential nomination battle to Hillary Clinton, understands the need for party unity and will do his part to defeat presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.
"We talked about the demonstrations and such," Durbin said Thursday in an interview. "I am convinced, as Bernie has said repeatedly, he is going to be on the team to defeat Donald Trump. I don't have any question in my mind."
Tim Kaine does the carrot-with-stick approach very deftly.
Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia, a Clinton ally and former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, indicated that patience is wearing thin.
"It is time for the rhetoric to start to come together around helping our team win,'' he said in an interview. "I think it was very plain after the results of this week that Hillary will pass the threshold, and likely by a lot. She'll be the nominee under the rules that everybody understood were the rules when we started this."
[...]
Sanders will “have a lot of torque here," Kaine said. "Not just because of his seniority but because of the way he's run his campaign. It's going to give him tremendous influence."
And then there’s this.
Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut predicts the divisions between Sanders supporters and Clinton supporters will be erased over time.
"Frankly, Donald Trump is going to be a fantastic unifying force within the Democratic Party,'' he said. "I just don't see this in the crisis terms that many people see it."
We already know that the DNC has offered Sanders seats on an important platform committee (though I didn’t know it when I wrote the earlier diary; Greg Dworkin pointed it out in the comments. My hat tip response to him got lost in hyperspace). Whether the good senators are telling it straight, or faking it in hopes that Sanders will make it, I don’t know. But I know that the unity vibe is strong in that portion of the chamber.
I’ll admit it. As harsh as I’ve been (and will continue to be) towards the small number of purity clowns on the fringe of the Sanders “movement,” I want Sanders and his backers to play an important role in the upcoming Democratic festivities. I’ve written before that while Clinton is the presumptive nominee, she needs straight-up leftists like Sanders, Merkley, and the millions of passionate, principled Sanders supporters to keep pushing her leftwards. She can, and likely will, dip rightwards on one issue or another if she isn’t consistently pressured to stay on the proper side of things. It’s why I voted for Sanders in my state’s primary — the more votes Sanders gets, the more she understands (or had better understand) that there are a bunch of us out there who intend to keep her honest.
But getting her into the White House is the first goal. Chris Murphy is keeping his eyes on the prize, and keeping it optimistic.
"Frankly, Donald Trump is going to be a fantastic unifying force within the Democratic Party,'' he said. "I just don't see this in the crisis terms that many people see it."
I so want him to be right.