Bernie's chances of winning 2020 primary?

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If he runs, it will likely because he is fit enough & in that case he will likely win. In a crowded field, it will be a landslide win, in a 1 on 1, it would be closer. He won 46% of the Pledged delegates with all the issues in 2016. Just retaining that vote is enough to get past the 50% with more open primaries & young voters (13-17) coming in & older one's dying. The Democratic party is being taken over by Bernie if people are not noticing.

The only person who will make it close is Biden & it may be again a close dragged down primary. Cory Booker & the rest are a joke, I saw Booker next to Bernie when they were introducing the new drug bill & Booker was a complete boy, being poked around by Bernie when he wants - And he is supposed to be the strongest Dem candidate.

I remember there were many clueless folks here who created a false narrative that Iowa & NH were the 2 most liberal states & if Bernie couldn't win Iowa, he wouldn't win anywhere (This is way before & after Iowa & everybody was on this bandwagon! ). You guys can continue to under-estimate Bernie & be humiliated time & again.

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He's probably not going to be a 2 termer but age is a very subjective thing, FDR died in his office at 63, lost the movement of his legs etc but was still kicking ass in the 1940's ! Hillary was younger than Bernie & in much worse shape, could barely campaign continously (needed rests, fewer stops, this health condition or that). There is barely a prominent Democrat who can keep up with Bernie even now with his ridiculous schedule & rallies - As a matter of fact most young journalists in their 20's & 30's were struggling to keep pace with him (he was doing 6-7 rallies a day sometimes in even 3-4 different states).

And he did 14 rallies in 12 states for Hillary in the last 5-6 days running coast to coast. If he is in around that kind of health, that he can travel like mad & campaign, damn right he will run! Jimmy Carter is 92 & is in decent health !

And Reagan had Alzheimer's right which is why he started to decline? But he still got more stuff than any Republican President in history for the "Conservative ideology". As a matter of fact, FDR & Reagan are the 2 most successful (atleast for their parties) & transformative presidents who brought a re-alignment & both were pretty old compared to their times !

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He's probably not going to be a 2 termer but age is a very subjective thing, FDR died in his office at 63, lost the movement of his legs etc but was still kicking ass in the 1940's !

FDR and Bernie Sanders aren't even comparable. President Roosevelt was a formidable politician, not to mention he was relatively young and very charismatic when he was elected President. On top of that, the U.S. was in the worst economic situation in history, and FDR appealed to both the left and the right in 1932. Sanders? Not so much. I've heard the comparison of FDR and Sanders multiple times, and really, it's a bunch of malarkey.

As for their health, FDR's polio barely affected him, plus the press managed to keep it secret. It was the classic presidential aging combined with the largest war in history that caused his health to go under. 99% sure Sanders is not immune to presidential aging.

Hillary was younger than Bernie & in much worse shape, could barely campaign continously (needed rests, fewer stops, this health condition or that).

You have a good point here, but we don't know how Sanders will be when he's two years shy of being eighty.

There is barely a prominent Democrat who can keep up with Bernie even now with his ridiculous schedule & rallies - As a matter of fact most young journalists in their 20's & 30's were struggling to keep pace with him (he was doing 6-7 rallies a day sometimes in even 3-4 different states).

And he did 14 rallies in 12 states for Hillary in the last 5-6 days running coast to coast. If he is in around that kind of health, that he can travel like mad & campaign, damn right he will run! Jimmy Carter is 92 & is in decent health !

This is a bit subjective. There were no substantial Democratic candidates in 2016 besides him and Hillary. I can guarantee Booker, Gillibrand, and Cuomo could have the power to do more than that if they choose to do so. I'd like to see a source on these claims. Also, Carter's health is irrelevant. He hasn't been in elected office in nearly four decades.

And Reagan had Alzheimer's right which is why he started to decline? But he still got more stuff than any Republican President in history for the "Conservative ideology". As a matter of fact, FDR & Reagan are the 2 most successful (atleast for their parties) & transformative presidents who brought a re-alignment & both were pretty old compared to their times !

Reagan had Alzheimer's at the end of his term when he was 77, one year younger than Sanders if he were to take office in 2020. You keep using these presidents who were decades younger than Sanders in 2020 who had health problems at the ends of their presidencies. There's a lot of holes in this argument.

I don't really believe in blindly following precedents for that matter, every human is different & I have seen people in their 80's be much healthier than many people in their 60's (this is anecdotal evidence) & hence can't be generalized. But the point is different human beings are different, there are many exceptions.

And times most importantly change. For one, someone who was 60 in the 1940's will be likely in much worse physical health than someone in the 80's in 2000's because technology, healthcare, everything has changed, people are living longer & healthier & so on. My point is Reagan had a disease which slowed him down but during his time he was the oldest, yet the most transformative President since FDR. His age was a big issue in re-elections, yet from a legislative agenda or otherwise or even in campaigning & debate, he was successful.

The FDR comparison isn't true. FDR lost the use of his legs & much of the details was kept away from the media. As a matter of fact, FDR wanted to give up politics & couldn't campaign, Eleanor Roosevelt went & campaigned for him in the Governor race. And even during execution of the New Deal, Eleanor went around & would give up updates on implementation, I could write essays of Eleanor, remarkable woman.

The point isn't if Booker or Gillibrand is fit or not fit enough. O'Malley was the young guy & Bernie did more number of rallies & travelled more than him too. There is no way to look into Booker's history, but going through Bernie Sanders' schedule, the guy is still doing rallies & travelling, playing hooves, having fun, etc. The point is he at the moment working harder in engaging the grassroots, travelling the country in the heat & cold than any of the so-called future stars many of whom are busy with fundraisers.

We don't know what kind of health he will be, but currently he is in great health outworking people, so we will see in 2019 or 2020 ! Anyways, I will make a separate post about FDR & Bernie !

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@ Admiral - My primary reason for support of Bernie is that he is a once in a 100 year odd candidate, in the mould of FDR, the closest version to what we can get of FDR, what FDR would probably be in today's time.

FDR -

FDR's policies were considered extremely radical. Not just a socialist, many called him a Marxist. The Supreme Court struck down part of his 1st phase of New Deal due to government over-reach. When FDR took over the Income tax rate was 25% (top marginal rate), when he left it was 90%+. As a matter of fact, FDR time & again tried to put a 100% Income tax which would be a maximum wage which Congress vetoed. Now that is a radical idea.

That was a time where people didn't think government was responsible for the welfare of the people & the relation of government with people was changed. I wouldn't go through details of the massive expansion of government that he did. But Social Security, a guaranteed income for seniors was a revolutionary idea. Minimum Wage which would permanently destroy the so-called free market of labour was his implementation (at a time when very few countries did, NZ or Australia where the 1st country to implement Minimum wage).

FDR was a candidate who was the anti economic royalist candidate, railing against the corporate & financial elite when everybody ganged up on him. This was his 1936 speech -

We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace--business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering. They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob. Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me--and I welcome their hatred.

Glass Steagall, Securities & Exchange Commission, Federal Deposit insurance, etc - I could go on & on.

Before he died FDR proposed a 2nd bill of rights (which would have been had he been alive) -

> Employment, Food, clothing, and leisure with enough income to support them
> Farmers' rights to a fair income
> Freedom from unfair competition and monopolies
> Housing
> Medical care
> Social security
> Education

(Guaranteed healthcare, employment, a certain income, housing, education etc)

Loot at FDR & Labour


The National Industrial Recovery Act (1933) provided for collective bargaining. The 1935 National Labor Relations Act (also known as the Wagner Act) required businesses to bargain in good faith with any union supported by the majority of their employees.


FDR faced massive opposition from conservatives in his own party too & he had to abandon his new deal & the result was a recession - The 1938 Roosevelt Recession ! That was before John. Maynard Keynes had proved his Keynesian economics which every country follows now !

Bernie & the current situation - You are right in the way that the economic situation is not the same. The great depression was the worst economic disaster in recent human history. But there are some similarities - Massive concentration of economic power, huge income inequality, stagnating or falling wages for most of the population, banking crisis, economic elites controlling the country, a reckless & out of control financial sector, weak labour sector

Most of Bernie's policies are directly borrowed from FDR. As a matter of fact his foreign policy, so-called democratic socialism policies are all inspired by FDR.

They are different in the sense that FDR came from a famous family, was part of a major party, etc. Bernie is an outsider Independent candidate but in many ways both their policies (both are from New York) & there are many similarities.

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ETC ETC

@ Admiral - Would love to discuss FDR (& Eleanor for that matter) in details, would be great if we had a separate thread for all that. FDR is my favorite President & Bernie's uncanny resemblence to FDR is one of the reason why I like him !

This was FDR, people paint a different picture as he beat the Nazis & saved people from the great depression. But this was FDR -












Another of your favorite, Harry Truman, who was called a communist & viciously opposed by AMA & politicians because  he wanted Single Payer universal healthcare & campaigned on it. His Fair Deal Letter -

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Harry Truman's 1948 campaign -

You are the government, you decide what sort of government you want. And when you do like you did in nineteen forty-six, when two-thirds of you stayed at home, you get just what you deserve -- you got that good for nothing Eightieth Congress. If you give the Republicans complete control of this government, you might just as well turn it over to the special interests, and we’ll start on a boom-and-bust cycle.

Dewey also campaigned across the country by train. But he showed little of the fire and emotion in his speeches that made Truman's campaign so exciting. Dewey’s speeches were “safe.” Truman campaigned by telling the voters that Dewey did not understand the needs of the average American. He called Dewey a candidate of rich people. One day, Dewey got angry at a railroad engineer because his campaign train was late for a speech. Truman said this proved that Dewey did not understand the problems of railroad engineers and other working Americans. He tried to make the election a choice between hard-working Democrats and rich Republicans.

http://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/american-history-truman-wins-election-1948-127974763/116178.html

Truman & healthcare -

Back in 1945 — a mere seven months into a presidency he inherited from Franklin D. Roosevelt — Truman proposed a “universal” national health insurance program. Truman proposed that every wage earning American pay monthly fees or taxes to cover the cost of all medical expenses in time of illness. The plan also called for a cash balance to be paid to policyholders, in the event of injury or illness, to replace the income those individuals lost.

As soon as the reinvigorated bill was announced, the American Medical Association (AMA) capitalized on the nation’s paranoia over the threat of Communism and, despite Truman’s assertions to the contrary, attacked the bill as “socialized medicine.” Even more outrageous, the AMA derided the Truman administration as “followers of the Moscow party line.” Harry Truman continued to make health insurance a major issue of his campaign platform in 1948 and specifically castigated the AMA for calling his plan “un-American”:

Truman later called the failure to pass a national health insurance program one of the most bitter and troubling disappointments in his presidency

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/november-19-1945-harry-truman-calls-national-health-insurance-program/

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Sanders will turn 79 a month after election day in 2020. By the time his first term would end in January, 2025, he'll be 83 years old. If he's a two-termer, he'll exit office just after his 87th birthday.

The human body really starts to go to pieces after a certain point, and a president who will be in his 80s most of his term is really asking for America to have to get very familiar with a lot of end-of-life illnesses.

Nobody cares...I'd rather have Bernie croak in office than trust a DLC stiff. If anything...Bernie dying might help in getting legislation passed...much like LBJ exploited JFK's death in ramming though a ton of legislation.

Him dead in office isn't the worst case scenario. Him going through a lengthy, debilitating, illness that prevents him from handling the duties of state is.

Yes, the 25th Amendment exists, but any attempt to use it will be denounced as a coup, especially if Sanders isn't himself ready to relinquish the reins.

Why should this issue be discussed in the 1st half of 2017 rather than the 1st half of 2019? People will have a rough idea of Bernie's health in 2019, which I presume would be good enough.

Truman had a lot of problems as well health wise, had trouble reading speeches sometimes due to his eyesight, FDR lost the use of his legs & always had some problem of the other. Most of these Presidents who were older (compared to the 1930's & 40's life expectancy) with age problems were very sharp mentally & with fiery speeches toured the country & tried hard to push legislation.

If Bernie runs, I think it will be because he is good enough to be healthy for 1 term. And he will have a very capable VP. And given his current health & hectic schedule, there is nothing to say he won't. Give it time & discuss in 2019 ! If he can campaign like a madman running around at his age in 2020, then he has every right to be the President !

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It is kind of astounding if you look at all this oppo research & what not on a relatively clean candidate in Bernie. Ted Cruz's 5 mistress scandals & what not never seemed to effect him 1 bit.

And then you have Trump, if oppo research was an issue, Trump would not be the President today. Some people were shocked by 2016 because they have an alternate reality & they will be shocked again in 2020 because they just don't get it !