Mistakes Bernie Sanders Made

[flexy]

He'd have won if he would've sold himself and is policies smarter.

Some mistakes he made:

* Using the expression "socialism" even if technically it is of course correct. Not even Denmark, Germany etc. call themselves "socialist societies". It implies something which is not the case.

LOTS of time wasted and voters lost eg. with the need to explain to many potential voters "what democratic socialism is". You don't win a presidency when you need to explain "democratic socialism", over and over and over.

* The siding with Clinton at the debate about her emails.

* He did not market himself well with key demographics, Blacks, Latinos...or at least not well enough.

* Probably riding the "revolution" train a little too hard. A "revolution" isn't seen as something positive by many.

A revolution implies a major change in a current system. I don't think that systems in, say, Denmark or other EU countries are "revolutionary" different to the system in the US - they differ in some things but ARE essentially still the same system.

 

[cubby1223]

Hahahahahahahaha!!!!!!

pardon me, I should be more respectful of your mourning...

Bwahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!

Sorry, cannot do it.



The only reason Bernie even had a glimmer of a chance was the Democrats went all-in with a weak candidate in Clinton, and got caught with their pants down. The same mistake won't happen in 2020. It had nothing to do with the way socialism was presented to the American public and how it could have been rephrased better.

 

[compuwiz1]

Sanders was too damn nice to Hillary. He should have just gone out of the gates and Trumped her.

 

[Jaskalas]

Sanders performed well but is still drastically limited by his age.
He needs a younger version of himself to carry the torch.

 

[sandorski]

I don't think he made any mistakes. I think the Voters are just not ready for what he offers.

 

[alcoholbob]

He shoulda said he was New Deal Democrat and wanted to offer a new deal to the American people. Calling himself a socialist, even a democratic socialist, probably scared away alot of people.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

I don't think going on the Hillary email thing would have helped at all. At least from the debates I remember, every time the moderators asked anything touching on that subject at all, they were immediately booed by the audience, and I don't see Sanders supporters online bringing it up very much.

He should have attacked her more strongly on her past though, e.g. "Bringing them to heel" and all that.

 

[DigDog]

what sandorski said

 

[1prophet]

He'd have won if he would've sold himself and is policies smarter.

Some mistakes he made:

* Using the expression "socialism" even if technically it is of course correct. Not even Denmark, Germany etc. call themselves "socialist societies". It implies something which is not the case.

LOTS of time wasted and voters lost eg. with the need to explain to many potential voters "what democratic socialism is". You don't win a presidency when you need to explain "democratic socialism", over and over and over.

* The siding with Clinton at the debate about her emails.

* He did not market himself well with key demographics, Blacks, Latinos...or at least not well enough.

* Probably riding the "revolution" train a little too hard. A "revolution" isn't seen as something positive by many.

A revolution implies a major change in a current system. I don't think that systems in, say, Denmark or other EU countries are "revolutionary" different to the system in the US - they differ in some things but ARE essentially still the same system.

Good post, one can't Progress if you are unable to evaluate what you did right, what you did wrong, and what you could have done better.

I don't think he made any mistakes. I think the Voters are just not ready for what he offers.

The inability to admit one has made any mistakes when one loses while looking to blame someone else (usually the little people) has become a much more common practice in politics and corporate management today.

 

[bozack]

I don't think he made any mistakes. I think the Voters are just not ready for what he offers.

and hopefully we never are.

 

[sandorski]

Good post, one can't Progress if you are unable to evaluate what you did right, what you did wrong, and what you could have done better.




The inability to admit one has made any mistakes when one loses while looking to blame someone else (usually the little people) has become a much more common practice in politics and corporate management today.

It is not blaming anybody. It is merely describing the situation.

 

[flexy]

and hopefully we never are.

Unless you ever lived in a so called "social democracy", aka. in Europe...and can compare the systems, this INCLUDES your ridiculous election system, you're not qualified to form an opinion

Otherwise you're just spouting an opinion based on something you don't know. Aka..the definition of ignorance.

Do you think your current oligarchy (which is so obvious it borders the ridiculous) is the best you can have? If so, pretty lame.

 

[sportage]

He did nothing wrong.
His appeal has always been quite limited.
He appeals to a select segment, younger college kids, and to an extent those that typically support the non-establishment i.e. Ross Perot, Ralph Nader.
His rally's are HUGE, but this crowd has a tendency not to show up at the polls.
If Bernie has a crowd of 27 thousand, that unfortunately is about the number that will show up. Turn out.
That 27 thousand for one rally looks and sounds impressive, but a lot of candidates have had huge rally turnouts and lost big time in the end.
Sanders crossover is too limited.

Bernie did nothing wrong.
He is and has been successful targeting his group. But outside of that, Hillary has much more appeal and more crossover. She can attract republican women (they won't admit it), she can attract Blacks and Hispanics, and she can and will attract huge numbers of working women.
The people she attracts seldom jump for joy or get all excited over Hillary. They just quietly and privately turn out and vote for her.

Bernie's crowd are quite vocal and love a party i.e. rally.
They feel part of a revolution. They are motivated to jump for joy and cheer Bernie as if he were a rock star.
But despite their size in number, thats about it. Quite impressive, but just not enough to do the job.

I doubt Bernie would fall for it, but his best chance is for Hillary to ask and for Bernie to accept as her running mate.
Hillary's problem will be attracting Sanders supporters. If Bernie were her running mate, well maybe she could. But would Sanders supporters fall for that?
Stranger things have happened. Especially this election cycle.
Hillary might as well give it a shot.
At least we would find out if Bernie has a hidden Trump-ish sized ego side to his personality.
Personally, I think Bernie has a HUGE ego.
HUGE
.
.

 

[KB]

Mentioning socialism was the worst offense. Too many people think socialism equals communism.

 

[DrPizza]

* The siding with Clinton at the debate about her emails.

No, not a mistake. That's what got Sanders noticed in the first place by many people. Instead of the crazy, kookie old man, he gained respect as a politician who wanted to engage in the issues, not flinging mud.

 

[88keys]

* He did not market himself well with key demographics, Blacks, Latinos...or at least not well enough.

This is probably the only one that I agree with and he could very well have this election in his pocket had he done this successfully. People continue to underestimate the power of minorities in recent election and Florida has alot of them and is easily the most important swing state next to Ohio.

But other than that I think Bernie Sanders had fared remarkably well. I honestly didn't think he'd stick around this long and I wouldn't mark his efforts as a total loss. He has changed the conversation and has motivated younger generations in a way that I feel will resonate into the future through people demanding better of their leaders.

Mentioning socialism was the worst offense. Too many people think socialism equals communism.

I don't know... I hear that from older crowd but not so much from younger people. For years the G.O.P. has demonized words like 'liberal', and 'socialist' to mean bad things and equate them to communism and fascism. And the better anecdote to that is not to play into it. Be open and honest about what you are and what you believe in. If you have to tiptoe around those things then people will think that you're uncomfortable about it and will begin to question your intentions.

 

[DucatiMonster696]

It is not blaming anybody. It is merely describing the situation.

You made his point for him. Devout adherence ideology (political or religious) blinds one from seeing mistakes made.

 

[Jaskalas]

No, not a mistake. That's what got Sanders noticed in the first place by many people. Instead of the crazy, kookie old man, he gained respect as a politician who wanted to engage in the issues, not flinging mud.

Addressing widespread criminal conspiracy re: classified info is being kookie and slinging mud?

 

[bozack]

Unless you ever lived in a so called "social democracy", aka. in Europe...and can compare the systems, this INCLUDES your ridiculous election system, you're not qualified to form an opinion

Otherwise you're just spouting an opinion based on something you don't know. Aka..the definition of ignorance.

Do you think your current oligarchy (which is so obvious it borders the ridiculous) is the best you can have? If so, pretty lame.

everyone here is qualified to form an opinion just as everyone here is capable of disagreeing with the opinions they do not like.

Regardless it matters not as Bernie is at this point has lost and is now irrelevant

 

[OutHouse]

Mistakes Bernie Sanders Made

running for president and actually thinking he would get elected.

 

[OutHouse]

Unless you ever lived in a so called "social democracy", aka. in Europe...and can compare the systems, this INCLUDES your ridiculous election system, you're not qualified to form an opinion

Otherwise you're just spouting an opinion based on something you don't know. Aka..the definition of ignorance.

thats a bunch of bullshit.

 

[zinfamous]

He shoulda said he was New Deal Democrat and wanted to offer a new deal to the American people. Calling himself a socialist, even a democratic socialist, probably scared away alot of people.

I agree. He actually did remarkably well all things considered to come this close to challenging her. I think much of his success is due to the general tenor of the current race, though. No one really expected the type of insanity that became the republican primary (yeah, it looked insane at the beginning, but the smartypants all agreed that the circus would end by last ~August....it never did).

I don't think anyone predicted this kind of reaction from voters at this time. Both the repubs and Sanders managed to play up very real frustrations and completely fabricated fears facing American voters, and both to remarkable success.

I think it's easy to say in hindsight that he should have blasted Hillary with her "issues," but I don't think that is true at all. Sanders is a smart guy and he preferred then, now, and probably into the future to not play up on false conspiracy horseshit long played out by bitter, uneducated republicans. Hell, you've got a few decades of history of one party squarely focused on trying to take the Clintons down with this horseshit, and all of it has resulted in nothing. A wise person would see that and realize that there is nothing legitimate on those lines with which to attack her, so you have to go with real policy and real voting history, which he did.

Nearly all of his supporters and even detractors point to Sanders and his honesty, and how they respect him for that. Going after Hillary for the bullshit that has long been shown to be nothing but bullshit would have proven Sanders to be a dishonest hypocrite sonofabitch like everyone else in the republican party. They have enough of those over there fighting for the inbred vote.

 

[DigDog]

and hopefully we never are.

you use them in your daily life when you deal with your family, but somehow when you want to apply them to the entire country, they fail.

 

[woolfe9998]

I don't know. I'm reluctant to criticize Sanders' campaign strategy too much, given that his campaign exceeded all expectations by any reasonable measure. Perhaps even his use of the label "democratic socialist" helped him with young liberal voters.

 

[soulcougher73]

The masses just aren't ready for progress. We'll lag behind the rest of the 1st world for awhile longer until rock bottom.