Discussion for article #244634
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said Wednesday that rival Hillary Clinton's statements suggesting he supported the gun lobby were "mean-spirited and unfair."
"“Sen. Sanders has been a pretty reliable vote for the gun lobby and I have been standing against them for a long time,” Clinton said.
Did Hillary and Chelsea make a bet on who could tell the biggest lie about Bernie this week?
All Hillary Clinton has are unfair tactics and half-truths. Take Hillary’s promise of gun control, with the tea party congress we have now? Obama can barely get them to do the essentials, like raise the debt limit or pass a budget. But she’s going to get Republicans to agree to gun control, because they haven’t all been running on “Obama wants to take your guns!”. What Hillary’s gun control promises will do is energize every Republican to get out and vote against her, and for a congress that will block every move she makes. Hillary has engineered her own failure. Bernie Sanders is the one being pragmatic on the question.
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If we can’t get any gun control done because of congress, how exactly is Sanders going to get anything he says he wants to do done?
What Sanders ,insert policy, promises will do is energize every Republican to get out and vote against him, and for a congress that will block every move he makes. Sanders has engineered his own failure. Hillary Clinton is the one being pragmatic on the question.
Telling easily disprovable half-truths and complete lies about Senator Sanders in order to win the primary nomination, when it is not necessary to do so, are unforced errors by Team Clinton. The real prize is for Democrats to keep the White House for a third term, unprecedented since the imposition of Constitutional term limits.
Even with Der Drumpf doing his damnedest to sabotage the GOP campaign, the Democratic nominee must still run as the underdog, who relys on great numbers of enthusiastic voters to win. Many of these potential voters will be idealistic first-timers; others may be newly converted Democrats or lapsed (Reagan) Democrats spurning Republican candidates who no longer represent them. Depressing their emotional commitment to the Democratic candidate as a viable alternative jeopardizes our chance to make post-1948 history.
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For what it’s worth, I think her mischaracterization of Bernie’s record on guns is at least a little bit more plausible than her utter nonsense on health care. At least on gun control the attack has some factual basis (thoroughly distorted of course, but still, some kernels of truth) and at least it makes some kind of strategic sense.
Democratic primary voters are strongly pro-gun-control and there are at least a few votes she can point to where Bernie wasn’t in line with the mainstream pro-gun-control position. And yeah, of course she’s lying when she says Bernie has been “a reliable vote for the gun lobby” but at least it’s a potentially plausible lie.
But to portray Medicare for All as “dismantling Medicare” and to claim that single payer would “strip millions of people of their health coverage?” I’m sure this would go over great in a Republican primary, but it’s just not remotely plausible to, or in tune with, the vast majority of Democrats and Democratic primary voters.
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I wonder if you can fit…
“We Must Keep Our Dysfunctional Health Care System Intact In It’s Current Form Of Inadequate Piecemeal Government Programs And Subsidized Private Profiteering Health Insurance Giants Even Though It Leaves Tens Of Millions Uninsured And Many Millions More Underinsured And Costs More Than Most Countries Yet Achieves Worse Health Outcomes, Because Right Wing Talking Points!”
…on a bumper sticker?
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Hillary needs to modulate her attacks. She needs to compete with Sanders, who is a basically decent guy, on the facts. She needs to compete with the Republican candidates, who are none of them decent guys, with the kind of tactics they will use. The fight with Sanders is more like sibling rivalry, the fight with Republicans is dealing with thugs and bullies on the street. You would not do to a brother what you would do to a mugger. If Hillary cannot modulate her attacks, she may well win the nomination from a party that is too fractured to allow her to win the general. Hillary may show her abilities to best advantage by running as if she had the nomination and start the general campaign early with devastating attacks on the Republicans who could be the nominee – show us she’s the one who could win the general – and do it with the best ideas.
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