2016 Postmortem

BUT I agree that Bernie did more to get other Democrats elected than some "faithful" Democrats.

Case in point, the sad attempt to pin Russ Feingold's loss on Bernie. Russ got the vote of essentially every single Democrat who voted (only 2000 difference between he and Hillary). Wisconsin, however, was the state where local Democratic Party leaders begged Hillary to come out, told her that the state was vulnerable, and told her that Wisconsin Democrats felt abandoned.

As for the election, I am going to have to disagree.

Hillary only had "baggage" for people who had never voted before, for either party, and/or were hopeless misogynists. Recognizing that I use the absolutist term "only" as hyperbole (as opposed to literally), the fact is that, even if we take every single piece of "baggage" as true, it was no worse than basically every single male candidate who has ever run for the presidency. "Cozy up to Wall Street?" Which male in the past hasn't. "Rich white person with intertwining financial/political interests?" Again, which male in the past hasn't? Anyone who had ever voted in a prior election who refused to vote for Hillary claiming she had too much baggage had issues with something other than "baggage." She was not a "bad" or "damaged" candidate.

Here is why I don't think Bernie would have won.

First, assuming that he would have been running against Trump, his appeal to working class voters would not have put him in a better place than Hillary. Hillary got the <$50K working class voters (very possibly because Bernie did come out and pound the pavement for her). That raises the question whether Bernie had another demographic where he would have done better than Trump? I don't see it. Trump won thanks to racist suburban whites making $75K+. Bernie had no message for them. In fact NO DEMOCRAT has a message for them, NOR SHOULD WE.

Second, if Bernie had looked like he was going to win the Democratic party nomination early on, Trump would have never got the GOP nomination. You can cite meaningless pre-election polling all you want, but I worked for Bernie and I am telling you as a fact, not an opinion, that Bernie would have had major problems running against either Rubio or Bush. The same suburbanites who flocked to Trump's message of hate would have flocked to a message of "no socialism."

We are in a tough situation as a party, a fatal one if this social vs. economic liberals war doesn't end today. We "can" win every national election by aligning oppressed groups. We WILL lose every election, however, if we continue to pin our hopes on attracting the so-called "Reagan Democrats" with middle of the road economic AND social policies. They are lost forever.