Yes, but nobody told him the Oval Office comes with a comfy chair.
The same one Dick Cheney used to extract confessions from terrorists!
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Youāre not doing your husband any favors, Jane. And oh, by the way, the time youāre spending whinging about how mean the Daily News was to Bernie could be far more usefully spent in locating his tax returns.
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Exactly. Iām not getting where Mrs. Sanders is coming from on this. Iām thinking others here on this thread have a valid point in that Senator Sanders hails from the Great State of Vermont, a small, mostly rural state ā and he has gotten away with not having to be really scrutinized (not on a proposed bill or amendment he supports, etc., but on everything a President must answer to) by national media in the past. Until now, Sanders has largely been just a state or tightly-spaced regional personality. Heās not handling well the bright lights.
edited to add the word āsmall.ā
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You must be getting in a lot of practice this primary season.
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The person who got the āhigh tech lynchingā at those hearings was Anita. I was outraged at the way those male senators treated her. She was very brave coming forward to testify. Doubly outraged when they refused to hear the other women with similar stories. But in those days women were expected to listen to sexual innuendo and worse at the office because āmen will be menā. We have come a long way and not a lot of people remember any more how it was in the last century. I couldnāt even watch āMad Men.ā Stirred up too many bad memories.
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Iām sure it did. I was speaking to my own personal reaction after reading the full text, which was to improve my image of him a little bit.
It actually made me feel good in an old-fashioned, civic-minded kind of way to have someone out there speaking up for these issues.
Heāll make a fine Senator from Vermont!
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Maybe it is āprogressive discourseā but the fact of the matter is he has only rhetoric, no specifics, unable to come up with facts and figuresā¦It was a really bad job.
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Its a red herring, and Bernie knows it is, but continues to flaunt it anyway.
The issue at the time was a very large lawsuit that had taken years to prepare was about to be launched. The target was gun manufacturers and dealers who were selling more guns that was even remotely possible to back up based on the markets they served. They were quite obviously selling guns to people buying them and taking them across state lines to states with stricter gun control laws. The dealers knew it, and the manufacturers knew itā¦but they kept right on doing it.
When they got wind of this lawsuit, they ran to the NRA who immediately went balls to the wall with Congress to pass a law granting all dealers and manufacturers complete immunity from lawsuits.
Bernie was completely aware of this lawsuit, and why the NRA was pushing it.
The answer he offers up now is pure fiction to cover up what was an incredibly odious vote on his part. But the law passed, the immunity went into affect, and the lawsuit died before being launched because of it. Mission accomplished. Thanks Bernie.
Except Bernie didnāt say that. Bernie was unable to name a single law or section of any law, that would give him the ability to break up the banks. Nor was the basis of his answer rooted in Dodd Franks, which clearly gives that power to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, not the President. Indeed, Bernie has repeatedly attacked Dodd Frank and said he would repeal it and replace it with a ānew version of Glass Steagalāā¦without ever going into the details of what that new law would look like (which is pretty typical of Bernie). Its also worth noting that Glass Steagal dealt specifically with banksā¦none of the really big bad players in the crash would have been coveredā¦Not Bear Stearns, Not Lehman, not AIG. None of them were involved in banking. (Dodd Franks covers over institutions besides banks) . One could give Bernie the benefit of doubt that his new version without the details might cover other financial institutions. But its a bit of stretch since he continues to use the phrase new Glass Steagal or 21st century Glass Steagal.
Additionally,his āToo Big to Fail, Too Big to Existā bill is a complete piece of fluff. It does nothing but punt the very same issues down to various regulatory agencies to figure out when,if and how a bank should be broken up. It has a nice title but answers none of the necessary questions and actually does pretty much nothing except tout a nice catchy sounding name. And donāt take my word for it. Google it and read what actual people who regulate the financial markets have to say about it.
The media and the Hillary camp got this one right, when they said he hadnāt done his homework. Compare his answers from that interview to the exact same question when he was asked by Morning Joe about a week later. Then he had an actual answerā¦because he did his homework.
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Agreed. The editors donāt have to engage us in a conversation ā theyāve already written their opinion. Allowing us to offer feedback is the equivalent of writing a letter to the editor, except this way weāre not relying on snail mail.
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You know, isnāt overturning Citizens United a good way to start getting money out of elections? With a court that began to make decisions based on the idea that corporations are NOT people, a lot of the abuse would be mitigated.
I donāt need to have Sanders railing about that. There is a fix thatās quite doable - with a democrat in the White House and the Senate controlled by dems.
Having the House would be triply good, but I guess weāre not there yet.
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Mr. Judis could have written an article allowing comments. The fact that he didnāt is cowardice. It is just that simple.
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What is your point, exactly? What is it youāre āscaredā to say?
Thank you - Thank you - Thank you for explaining that. This context is something Bernie Sanders avoids like the plague ā and itās quite disappointing. Thank you!
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I do think cigarette companies are a better analogy ā which is why I donāt agree with Bernieās position myself for exactly the reasons you describe ā āinternal research on the safety/danger caused by guns,ā shady marketing tactics and the like, just as were uncovered during the discovery process during the historic lawsuit against Big Tobacco back in the 1990s.
That said, I think that for the NY Post to headline their story āBernieās Sandy Hook Shameā is ā how shall I put it? ā sensationalistic in the best tradition of the NY Post, when after all heās really just sticking to what he sees as a principled stance (which, again, I donāt happen to agree with in this case) as heās been lauded for doing for the various other principled stances heās held the line on over a 30-year career.
And while no one can compete with Hillary for doing her homework (this is absolutely the thing she does best, as her colleagues from high school on will tell you) I didnāt think Bernie came across as a rank amateur, either.
So again ā blown out of proportion, though itās certainly the Hillary campās right to play this for all they can. And stop whining, Ms. Sanders ā whining only makes a candidate look bad. I do think that now that weāre back in a ābig boy stateā like NY, Bernie is looking a little out of his league.
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Bravo!
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Agreed with beattycat ā thanks for explaining the background of Bernieās vote to immunize gun manufacturers from lawsuits. This does make him look bad and risks making me view his position more harshly (not that it will change my vote since I already donāt support Bernie).
On ābreaking up the big banksā I totally agree with you ā a return to Glass Steagal is not the way to go, as Hillary and Paul Krugman argue, because it doesnāt take into consideration āshadow banking,ā the mortgage financing companies, financial insurance companies like AIG, and the like. I was only saying that I thought his answer to the questions he was asked were not quite as incoherent or lame as Iād been led to believe.
Every so often I get in the mood to cut the old man a little slack, loveable grump that he is. I guess this is one of those days 
Heās still gonna lose in NY and most of the states where voting has yet to happenā¦
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Look, here is Gabby Giffords on the issue. She says sooo much more than I ever could
"Speaking is hard for me,but come January I want to say these two wordsā¦āMadam Presidentā
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Asking someone to explain something theyāre proposing, isnāt an Inquisition. Seriously, boo freakinā hoo. We saw the video, no comfy chairs, or pillows with all the stuffing on one end, were used.
And not to get too PC about this, but she is aware of what the actual Inquisition did to Jews, right? Because they, and the Moors, would have been happy with an āInquisitionā that Bernie suffered through.
This guy canāt even handle a semi-early meeting with some editors where they GASP! ask him to explain his proposals, and yet he wants to be POTUS? I wouldnāt trust the guy for a coffee run, at this point.
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Nonexistent?
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