I caucused this morning and we had a civil discussion. I form the “objections” to Senator Bernie Sanders as the Secretary Hillary Clinton's supporters spoke them. I rolled corollaries into generalities infrequently because these were pretty much the issues as expressed.
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Hillary knows the levers in Washington and how to get things done.
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Hillary will with her experience protect us from foreign problems.
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Hillary is more electable.
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She is a woman and has the automatic support of that group for the most part.
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She is a capitalist, not a socialist; Americans are anti-socialist.
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She knows the ways of power and has been “through it all.”
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Hillary promotes incremental successes in politics, which is practical.
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Hillary built ObamaCare, which works and should not be endangered.
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Hillary's solutions can be paid for and are not unrealistic.
These are paraphrases of my neighbors in our very western Washington precinct are those I remember after several hours of shopping for hardware and groceries, avoiding the news. That was successful.
I returned home to find Bernie had the projection that these days counts as “won” in Alaska and Washington. Being a just-caucused pro-Bernie participant I was certain the latter would be true. I want to tell you why.
I want to relate some of the summarized opinions that my neighbors voiced. Though I thought I grimaced and wanted to rebut with “vigorous interruption,” I dared not in the presence of my fellow people. A caucus makes it harder to evade answers to oneself's own doubt. So—I listened. And I learned a few things.
We had 63 folks in our precinct all squeezed into a school library. One side of the room had the Hillarys, all eighteen of them, a short wall of five Undecideds, and forty Bernies. All civil all Democrat and, in fact, participants in quilting circles, genealogical groups, reading clubs, Etc. the fair fruit of our rural American town. At the end, it was twenty-one Hillarys and forty-two Bernies who laid the important eggs of nine delegates and nine alternates into the stew.
We calculated the number of delegates afforded each, Hillary three and Bernie six, from our little precinct and bite of town. We were a bit conservative as a group than the rest of the state, itself still reporting. I am thrilled with first the civility, breadth of skills and knowledge here, the wish to elect a Democrat come to Hell or High Water, the energy, and the new entrants. Many—well two anyway with us—spoke up as having decades ago lost the desire to vote. Bernie changed that for Zach. Welcome home.
There is so much to talk about, but what I heard was a conservative stance well entrenched among Hillary supporters. I would, wouldn't I—hear that? The same was true of we Bernies—no Hillarys nor Bernies shifted. Here is how we tried to change minds, a bit of true humor from the PCC encouraging and acting as wise facilitator. No one objected to his rules, so we started with a Hillary supporter, one of three, alternating until done. I was one who spoke for why the Undecideds should switch to Bernie. I laid an egg I guess because in the end three Undecideds joined the Hillarys and two joined the Bernies. And so on. Then we applied the “round down” rule. A programmer will recognize int((m/n)*d) where m ::= that candidate's total, n ::= all candidate's total, and d ::= the number of delegates our precinct was alloted. A better one than me will have plugged in the figures above and arrived at three and six for Clinton and Sanders.
Hillary knows the levers in Washington and how to get things done
Rebuttal included derogation of that skill itself as a clue to what is wrong with the status quo and the processes in Washington, D.C. Some expressed a feeling that such schmoozing would be ineffective whether Bernie or Hillary and in other “it won't matter” expressions folks suggested that things are “so broken” that the issue was minor
Hillary will with her experience protect us from foreign problems
There was almost nothing but intake of breath. I took it as an imperialistic or fear-filled expression and I believe most others did too. Someone later in a different context expressed a strong analysis of the out of control military budget. But that was later.
Hillary is more electable; she is a woman and has the automatic support of that group for the most part; she is a capitalist, not a socialist; Americans are anti-socialist; she knows the ways of power and has been “through it all.”
I told the story of a close friend who my superior in age, a Hillary supporter AFAIK still, Jewish, and, well, she said in private that no one would vote for an old short Jewish man for president in America. This was way ages ago. I doubt this carries much water anymore outside of rabidly Christian evangelical populations. These people have conjured a belief so deep into world domination through biblical literalism, taking metaphors as real, and Mosaic Law (dominionism, Cruz's forte) as the goal, that the chance of their pondering Hillary v. Bernie seems remote indeed.
Newt Gingrich and Frank Luntz ruined political fluency by scrambling popular meanings. The “socialist” tag was the biggest thing as a feared epithet that Hillary supporters voiced. Second was a stout devotion to women's rights and glass ceiling hammers. These two created the most talk. After we six had spoken we had a civil group discussion. What a refreshing marvel! Another gold star for diversity! The ways of power argument were countered in several obvious ways. Her supporter reiterated the foreign policy experience. I thought that ISIS/ISIL indeed scares people still.
Incrementalism
Cons and pros presented. A pretty passionate plea that ObamaCare had helped so much and do not endanger it came from the Hillary side. Our side countered with examples showing Bernie advanced without endangerment. Several people posed “what if's” that could never satisfy a skeptic, as in something like “How can Bernie save ObamaCare if the Supreme Court … yadda.” Miracle required for Bernie or Hillary unless we can get the puppets out of the seats of congress.
Bernie lacks a payment plan
It is online. I ran out of steam, and I want to get down for the PDT MSNBC two shows worth watching if they are on today, Saturday: Hayes and Maddow.
My observation is that a politician must transcend the despair that must come with knowing that if you think you can't, you won't. I saw a great truth once in a poster in an office someone in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania had on their wall. “Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from poor judgment.” Please just vote. The turnout of neat folks like I saw today is all that matters. The republicans are about to release the fleas and the gnats soon. Let's win. Turn out please to vote.