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Is a Bernie nomination is a bridge too far?

Let me start by saying that I do like Senator Bernie Sanders. This assessment is not to be interpreted as personal. This is something that I have been analyzing for a while. Please do not take this as a personal attack. This diary is based on issues and math.

I personally like that Bernie is running. He is pulling Hillary to the left, which is what I think he wanted to at the very least. If he can get her to put a plan in place for a public option, leave the rest to us to hold her feet to the fire. Frankly, I wish Bernie had promised that. Please click the link above and read Joan McCarter’s article here. It’s really good.

I was watching “A Bridge Too Far” the other night. This was the Sir Richard Attenborough film based on the novel by Cornelius Ryan about one of the most disastrous battles in World War II on the Allied side: Operation Market Garden. Market Garden was a hastily put together air and land invasion designed to create an additional point of attack into Germany. Instead of just slogging along one point through France (where George Patton was right up to the German border at the time), the famed British commander, Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, came along with a plan to make a run at The Netherlands and seize Antwerp by capturing a major swath of that country in one lightning move. Once the Allies seized the cities of Nijmegen and Arnhem east of Antwerp and the bridges between them, it would be cut off and be easy pickings for our side. We would have an additional port to supply a new thrust into northern Germany, which when coupled with a resumed effort of Patton’s army from France, would force the Germans to capitulate before Christmas.

The operation didn’t work out as planned. Supply problems and bad communication hampered the entire effort, and it didn’t help that some crack German units were stationed in Arnhem right before the invasion, without the Allies having any idea they were there. The operation ended in failure and most of the gains that were made in the operation were subsequently lost.

As I was watching it and noticing the signs foreshadowing the doom that was about to fall the Allies (mostly the British 1st Airborne Division), my mind began to wander a bit. (This film is decent, but it definitely not anything close to Sir Richard’s masterpiece, “Gandhi”.) As I watch the Bernie Sanders campaign, I see similarities to Market Garden. There are great objectives to be gained assumedly clearing the way for brighter futures for all. Like the film, they are aspirational and hopeful and everyone affiliated with the operation seems buoyant, walking on air feeling that this will be the way to finally wrap all of our troubles into that neat kit bag. It’s going to be a piece of cake.

This is where I see the comparison. I see a lot of great intentions and happy energy, but few realistic viewpoints and some major obstacles in the tall grass. I see a disaster in the making.

First, he has to get elected. I have seen the poll numbers between him and all of other candidates. I see the leads. I also believe that the gains are mostly from independent voters who don’t fully know who Bernie is yet and that it is ridiculously early. I wonder what will happen once the new car smell is gone. He hasn’t really been tested as a candidate yet. Hillary has lobbed a few volleys, but that is nothing compared to what the Koch Brothers will do. There are other issues that I feel will hurt him deeply. I fear that once Bernie starts getting a lot more exposure, the gloves will be off and it will not be pretty.

Let’s talk single-payer. If Bernie wins the nomination, he will get both barrels of “If single payer is so great, why did it fail in Vermont?” I have written about this before in this diary, but the best explanation of this is at Vox.com. Please read it. In a nutshell, Vermont tried to enact it’s own single payer health insurance program. Candidate for governor, Peter Shumlin campaigned on it.

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You really should make one of your stops on the Internet to Vox.com. They have another article about this topic. They really know how to break stuff down.

For the estimation on how big the tax increases were to be (to cover the cost) they used the same economist Bernie references in his speeches: William Hsiao. The numbers on how high their taxes were going to go were off (way off; please read earlier link from Vox.com) and the experiment failed. When people here at DKos say that no one has really challenged him, this is what they are talking about.

Chris Wallace went after Bernie in an interview almost a year ago regarding this point. He seems to have been the only one. He asked him point blank why it failed, but Bernie never really answered the question.

Chris: When it turned out that would have meant 11.5% increases on all business and a 9.5% tax hikes on individuals, the democratic governor of your own state dropped the plan as unfeasible. This is in your own state of Vermont said that we just can't afford single payer.

Bernie: Well, Chris, let's take a look at what's going on the world in terms of…

Chris: Well, sir, if I may, if I may, sir, I'm asking about a specific question of Vermont and..

Bernie: Sure and the answer is...

Chris: And here it was they had a plan to impose a single payer healthcare system in Vermont and the Democratic governor ended up dropping it.

Bernie: Well, for a variety of reasons he did, but the United States is the only country that doesn't guarantee healthcare for all of our people, and yet we are spending almost twice as much per capita. We have a massively dysfunctional healthcare system and I do believe in a Medicare-for-all single payer system, whether a small state like Vermont can lead the nation, which I hope we will or whether it's California or some other state. At the end of the day, we need a cost effective, high quality healthcare system guaranteeing healthcare to all of our people as a right.

You notice he didn't answer the question? That's because he couldn't. It was thought that the taxes on businesses would be around 8% (the Vox article), but it ended up being 11.5%. This canned the plan and is most likely what saved Shumlin from being canned by the voters. Unless Bernie gets his numbers right and gets a very detailed plan out, he’s in for a heap of trouble. Sorry, Medicare-For-All right now is just a phrase. We need to see the rates.

President Obama himself, when he was then candidate Obama, alluded to how hard it would be to convert to a single-payer system. In 2003, he said he was a proponent. In 2009, he had to back off because he saw the realities of taking apart healthcare to establish that system. That’s why we now have the Affordable Care Act. During The Great Recession, healthcare was one of the few positive drivers for employment growth.

Employment in health care has continued to grow even during the current recession: health care has added 559,000 jobs since the beginning of the recession in December 2007.

Bureau of Labor Statics: Spotlight on Statistics, Nov. 2009

Even with the advent of the ACA, which makes insurance companies spend 80% or more on their customers or they get money back, provides low or no cost healthcare coverage for over 18 million people, it still is a very good driver of that growth. Last month it accounted for 52,000 new jobs. That’s 17% of the total.

Many people on this site would love to see the private healthcare industry cut down, completely, which is one of the things Bernie says that he wants to do. The above block quote underlines the problem. A lot of people will be out of a job. Not the nurses or doctors or pharmacists, but administrative staff whose jobs will be eliminated. They won’t automatically go to some government oversight office. A lot of people will flat-out be out of a job. I know that Bernie has other plans to boost employment, but how long will it take to create them? It's not a seamless transition, and that will scare a lot of people. Enough to win an election.

He gets the nod and the next day private healthcare companies will barrel in money to SuperPACs built up by the opposition. They will soak the airwaves with ads saying, “We're going to go out of business. if Bernie gets his way.” Even worse, “The Democrats have even given up on Obamacare. We are going to fight this battle all over again." Remember, back in 2008 no one was sure what Barack Obama was going to do about healthcare. We were too busy wanting to know what he was going to do about the economy, Iraq and a host of other things. When people know that they see their jobs on the line they run to voting booths.

The last time we as a country tried to tackle this the Democratic Party went all in with the Affordable Care Act and a year later, many of their members were voted out into the wilderness, in large part due to the far left that felt “betrayed” by the fact that the country doesn’t have a single-payer system and not because the healthcare industry changed dramatically. That year we lost the House and the Senate, key ingredients to getting what Bernie wants to accomplish. We can get the Senate this year, but a filibuster-proof one?  

First, we have to get around the big gerrymandered wall of Republican districts that have been a great help to that party’s grip on the House of Representatives. Most experts have said that to flip this chamber is going to be an especially difficult feat for 2016.

Here is one forecast from a year ago:

As this cycle begins (and looking only at fundamentals), the most likely House outcome next year would be modest to substantial Democratic gains, ranging from as few as five to as many as 20 seats. Even at the upper limit of that range, the DCCC would still be a ways from the 30 seats the party needs for a majority.

In fact, 30 seats is a big number. Since 1950, gains that large have occurred six times during midterm elections, when partisan waves often appear, but only twice in presidential years, in 1964 and 1980. And that’s an important reason why the GOP starts as the clear favorite to retain control of the House in 2016.

Can Democrats Win the House in 2016?” by Stu Rothenberg, Roll Call, Jan. 13, 2015

As for the Senate, the prospects for change are very good. There are 23 seats currently held by Republicans that are in swing states.

The makeup of the new landscape is a direct result of Republicans’ dominant performance in 2010, picking up six Senate seats in a wave election. But that GOP class now faces re-election and constitutes the most endangered seats — thanks at this point, without challengers yet, to each states’ current partisan leanings.

That includes first-term Sens. Mark S. Kirk of Illinois, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Patrick J. Toomey of Pennsylvania, Rob Portman of Ohio, Marco Rubio of Florida and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire.

Script Will be Flipped in 2016 Senate Majority Battle” by Kyle Trygstad, Roll Call, Nov. 6, 2014

Add to this the fact that Marco Rubio will not be seeking re-election in 2016, and the odds are very much in favor for a Democratic takeover of the Senate, but you will need more than that to ensure that Bernie Sanders accomplishes what he is setting out to do. He will need a filibuster-proof majority. That means we need to take 16 or more seats in 2016. That’s a very tall order.

Imagine another angry, fear-driven campaign against single-payer, this time with jobs instead of coverage on the line. I would bet $5 to get $10 that the Tea Party is already girding for a pre-emptive strike, if Bernie gets the nod.

In 2008, Obama never promised single-payer. He likes it, but selling what he likes to the entire country? He knew he would have lost, which is what will happen to Bernie if he gets the nomination.

Now, let’s talk about his promise to break up the banks. To do that would probably require some kind of lawsuit, much like what Teddy Roosevelt did when he broke up the trusts. If the next president tries to break them up it is assured that a case (or cases) will go directly to the conservative-leaning Supreme Court challenging it. Do you really think that they’ll side with a President Sanders in this case? When Teddy Roosevelt broke up the trusts in 1904, he was able to get the Supreme Court to rule in his favor because two of the justices on that court were appointed by him, including the great jurist, Oliver Wendell Holmes. How many conservatives do you think the next president would need to replace by the time he gets his hearing there? Unless there are some well-placed heart attacks in the coming years, the prospect of getting even a moderate court are infinitesimal.

The biggest stumbling block that Bernie has is that he is an avowed socialist. He tries to qualify it by putting “democratic” in front of it, but I don’t see that helping at all.

Just 47 percent of Americans would vote for a socialist if their party nominated one, while 50 percent said they would not, while 58 percent said they would have no problem voting for an atheist in their party. Read more: www.politico.com/... 

How exactly is he going to win with this kind of headwind?

The Republicans would love a Bernie nomination. They are holding back their fire on him because they know they can unleash holy hell if he is the nominee for President of the United States. Bernie has made a pledge not to accept PAC money. That’s admirable, but naïve. The opposition will have at least twice the money. They will have people all over the country fighting like hell for whomever the nominee is, even if their nominee is Donald Trump because what Bill Clinton says is true, “Democrats fall in love. Republicans fall in line." If they think they can get overwhelming power through Donald Trump, they will fall in line behind him. Remember, all of those polls about matchups are early. No single vote has been cast, yet.

Bernie has not even remotely been road-tested. He’s never had to run a national campaign. The first big scandal that hit his campaign regarding a data breach was handled very poorly by his campaign manager. They threw their data person under the bus accusing him of being a plant. (Seriously?) There is an old saying in politics, “When you’re not playing offense, you’re playing defense.” With Bernie’s campaign manager, the way he plays defense is using conspiracy theories. That’s not a winning strategy.

It’s not that I don’t like what Bernie wants to do, I just find it will be pretty much impossible to accomplish, especially with healthcare, with him at the helm. The Affordable Care Act is working and getting better every year. The Medicaid expansion is a success. Is it perfect? No. But what in this world is perfect, especially in a democracy?

Please, do not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.


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