In the Primary pie fights the Bernie and Hillary supporters both claim they will bring in voters who are not Democrats. Bernie’s argument is that he beats Hillary with Independents and Trump attracts Independents so he will be the best to pick off Trump voters in the General Election. I’ll ignore the logical fallacy of equivocation on the word Independent in this argument and I will take this at face value and show why this is wrong-headed.
Before I came to this site in 2008 I was a moderate Republican. I believed in the reality of climate change and that sometimes you need to raise taxes and was for equal rights for all (fill in the blank). During most of the time I was a moderate Republican the Democrats were a center-left coalition and the Republicans were a center-right coalition. Between the two were Independents and they were politically moderate. What makes a moderate a moderate is not necessarily centrist. What makes a moderate is being process-focused rather than outcome-focused. This focus manifests itself in the issue of race by white moderates generally being more sensitive to systemic racism than white liberals because systemic racism is a process and the solution to this is a process. We need a strong Federal Government to protect oppressed minorities from being continually oppressed. White liberals this cycle treat the Republican and Democratic establishments as nearly equal and it is the Democratic establishment that has stood against systemic racism while the Republican establishment that has done the polar opposite. Blowing up both establishments risks the protections that have gained and also any future progress. White privilege shields us from the possible negative effects of radical change. We can tolerate a bigger downside to possibly gain a bigger upside. Moderates are different from centrists in that moderates don’t necessarily believe in a so-called “golden mean” particularly in post-2008 World. We test the World based on evidence and not on ideology. Since the Republicans have completely left the reality-based community the only real choices are on progressive side of the ledger and as for our goals they are nearly identical. The only real difference is tactical.
In 2008 the World changed. I voted for Obama because he was the better candidate. McCain’s choice of Vice President and his “suspending” his campaign proved himself not qualified. But, it was the deep racism that I became sensitized to that made me change parties. I told my Democratic friends in 2008 that Republicans weren’t really like what was happening at the Palin rallies. I soon found out I was horribly, horribly wrong and left the Republican Party for good. Since my internal sense was completely off I have spent the last seven years listening to all kinds of minorities. My vote in Colorado was deferred to what they say they want and was why I ended up voting for Hillary. This was complicated by the fact they have a similar generational difference that non-minority voters do. So, it ended up being a preference rather than a binary. I am comfortable with it going either way where one candidate has a large following with white liberals and the other with racial and ethnic minorities. Whomever is ascendant should be our nominee.
Now back to the issue of so-called Independents. The Independents that vote for Trump and those that vote for Sanders are completely different. Exit polls from Michigan shows that the entirety of the Republican vote was not liberal. There were so few liberals voting on the Republican side that no crosstabs could be gained for them. Bernie’s Independents are not only liberal but very liberal. I don’t see either Bernie or Hillary getting the votes of Trump's racist base. Note to Hillary supporters: do not use the BernieBro epithet because his Independent supporters are not racially driven like the Trump supporters are. While Bernie does well with Independents Hillary on the other hand did well in the exit polling with moderates some of whom crossed over to vote against Trump to Hillary's detriment. This will probably repeat in Ohio today. Moderates are shocked by Trump followers’ racism and violence. These are the ones that Hillary can pick off in the General Election. When I talked with a Republican colleague he bemoaned how everybody (including Bernie) was extreme. I mentioned to him that Bernie accused Hillary of being a moderate. His reply: "what's wrong with that?". Even though he was viscerally against her or any other Democrat the seed was planted.