- Note, all the double and triple entendre “tool” definitions pertain
- Biden victories do not put a lock on nomination, yet (go Bernie)
- Not assured that he will be, but we should be satisfied beating Biden in the general however goofus tool that he is
- If he is the standard bearer doesn’t that say something about the Dem standard?
- Not sure a Biden saves down-ticket federal offices, but it helps
- Arguably, Bernie victory allows the Dems survival instinct to kick in and concentrate on down-ticket
- Nevertheless, let’s light a candle for a tinderbox Milwaukee convention, hang in there Bernie!
Reading The Federalist and TownHall we note some differences of opinion, among them or with us, as to the implications of the results of yesterday’s Super Tuesday Democrat primary election. However, they are worthy in their entirety (links and some excerpts below). We note the universal conservative commentator wisdom that the dominant liberal media will now pivot shamelessly to support Biden, so many having been part of the effort to succor alternatives to Bernie or Biden.
We intend to repeat ad nauseam our irritation with conservative commentators who imply or outright credit Biden primary voters as virtuous in trying to save the party and maybe the country from socialism vis-à-vis Sanders. Some of them ably reported on the pivot to the left of Biden and his ever more extreme positions in order to appeal to Bernie voters. Picking him now was not before and certainly not now a saving virtue for a party which is content with extreme assaults on American constitutional government and culture embraced by all the wannabe nominees.
Most Dem primary voters are just tools, and are open to the nanny state and the government takeover it necessitates, essential globalism and the opiates contained in culture rot — because they have heard little to defend the American Republic and Western values from the dominant liberal media and education and church institutions intent on denigrating it.
The Republican Party’s job is to define Bidenism as just as bad as Bernieism, indeed the Democrat party and all its nominees as fellow travelers with the same mind-set. Ask yourself, what is the essential difference between any of their positions on guns, right to life, government control, health care, higher taxes, etc?
John Daniel Davidson at The Federalist: (excerpts, bold our emphasis)
Joe Biden’s Big Night Won’t Be Enough To Solve Democrats’ Bernie Sanders Problem
The Super Tuesday narrative is that Biden was vindicated and he’s stronger than ever, but the primary map and the upcoming states suggest otherwise.
With a sweep of the south and key victories in Minnesota and Massachusetts, the media narrative today will be all about how Joe Biden is the comeback kid, back from the dead, risen like a Phoenix from the ashes. That sort of thing.
It’s the kind of story the media loves. They love it so much it doesn’t matter whether it’s true, or whether the media was writing Biden off less than a week ago. The surprise comeback, vindicated frontrunner narrative is going to be pushed so hard by the mainstream press and the Democratic establishment in the coming days, you’ll think Biden’s nomination is pretty much a done deal.
What the headlines and the narrative won’t tell you is what any casual survey of the Democratic primary map plainly shows: Super Tuesday didn’t solve the Democratic Party’s Bernie Sanders problem.
Yes, Biden had a good night, but so did Sanders. He won Colorado, Vermont, and Utah, as well as the biggest prize of the night, California, and basically fought Biden to a draw in Texas. He also earned enough votes to pick up delegates in every state Biden won—and he did all this with Sen. Elizabeth Warren siphoning off voters who would otherwise have voted for Sanders, while Biden benefited immensely from the eleventh-hour consolidation of the moderate vote and the endorsements of Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg, and Beto O’Rourke.
. . .
As the smoke of Super Tuesday clears, Biden and Sanders are locked in a battle for delegates, and at this point it’s very unlikely either will have a majority going into the Democratic National Convention in July.
. . .
If Mike Bloomberg stays in the race until then—which he might, if only for pride’s sake, having just spent a half-billion dollars to win American Samoa—that will likely change the outcome in Florida, and not in Biden’s favor. Come March 18, we could well be reading headlines about how everyone underestimated Sanders after Super Tuesday, how in fact he’s been the frontrunner all along. The media are predictable like that.
All of this isn’t to deny that Biden had a big night. He won states he hardly visited, states where he spent almost nothing on TV ads, states where he had almost no ground game or field offices. It was by all accounts an impressive showing, and yes, something of a comeback.
But let’s not kid ourselves that the driving force behind Biden’s Super Tuesday resurgence was the consolidation of the moderate vote just in the nick of time. Who knows whether this eleventh-hour clearing of the field was simply blind luck or the secret machinations of the Democratic Party determined to stop Sanders at any cost, but the effect was to deliver a significant number of delegates to Biden in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Virginia, and elsewhere.
. . .
The Sanders wing of the party on Tuesday showed that it cannot be muscled aside, certainly not by Biden and the also-rans, and certainly not before the convention in July.
Therein lies the danger for the Democrats. Nothing about Tuesday’s results suggests any change in the fundamental problem facing the party. It is divided, almost down the middle, between moderates who will do anything to stop Sanders and leftists who will support no one but Sanders. No amount of narrative-shaping by the media or chest-thumping by Biden will change that.
V’PAC Note: Again, there are no moderates running and any enablers have no claim to virtue
Emily Jashinsky at The Federalist (excerpts)
How Would The Media Cover Biden Versus Trump?
Joe Biden is not the media’s preferred Democratic candidate. He never has been. But he’s still a Democrat candidate, which means the press prefers him to Donald Trump.
If Super Tuesday were a primary of corporate newsrooms, Democrats’ nominee would be Beto O’Rourke. (Or Harry Potter.)
Should Biden’s over-performance on Tuesday clear a plausible path to his nomination, the media will be in something of a bind. Thankfully, they’re relatively shameless.
Like Hillary Clinton, Biden is far from a perfect candidate. But a binary with any sentient being opposite Trump makes the choice obvious to the press. That, of course, would involve months of groping for excuses to depict Biden as the clear alternative, which would involve months of downplaying his many, glaring flaws.
Those flaws are not merely political disadvantages, as the “Hunter did nothing wrong” coverage would have you believe. They are substantive, involving establishment entrenchment, policy questions, and fitness for office. That’s not to say Trump doesn’t have flaws, only to note that Biden’s will be treated much differently. The coverage of his son’s relationship with Ukranian gas company Burisma, which was mostly treated as an unserious complaint, is a great example as to why.
In a hypothetical Trump versus Biden matchup, there would, of course, be some great reporting on the former vice president’s flaws, even from major corporate outlets. But there’s no question the press will stretch to defend Biden’s gaffes while also stretching to latch onto any potential slip-ups from Trump.
Against Trump, the media will cast Biden as Affable Uncle Joe. Oddly enough, if he makes it through the primary, Biden will almost certainly enjoy friendlier coverage.
Kylee Zempel at The Federalist: (excerpts)
Media’s ‘Anything But Joe’ Panic Has Done Nothing But Make Them Look Stupid
If the media wants Trump to lose in 2020, they’ll have to walk back their Biden criticisms and come to terms with the fact that nothing they do now can stop an old white man from occupying the Oval Office come January.
We Watched the Media Pendulum Swing
The best part about political media advocacy is that its perpetrators are so unabashed in their support and condemnation. One never need wonder about the media’s presidential preference because the pendulum swings fast and hard.
When Harris was the momentary savior, the press worshipped the ground she walked on. Debate moderators gave her an uninterrupted lane — “Hey guys, you know what? America does not want to witness a food fight; they want to know how we’re going to put food on their table,” Harris lectured, crucifying Biden with the media’s help for his busing policies and 1994 crime bill.
The press would usher Harris all the way to the Oval Office, and bury Biden as a brutal racist, or so they thought. As it turned out, however, Harris was wildly unlikable in a manner that resembled Clinton, if Clinton had also put lots of people in jail. So the media pivoted. . . .
That leaves only one option in the media’s ongoing war to undo the 2016 election and unseat the bad orange man in 2020: hype up Biden. After a year of knocking him down in favor of anyone else, the media must face the music.
Mike Vespa at TownHall: (excerpts)
The Block of Voters That Gave Bernie Sanders Heartburn on Super Tuesday
There has been a debate among Democratic voters: do they want a guy who can beat Trump or someone who runs on their left-wing principles. One has a better shot of winning but is an entrenched part of the Democratic establishment while the other is a revolutionary, ‘burn it all down’ left-winger that risks slaughter in the general. What to do? It seems the former in both of those choices won out on Super Tuesday. . . .
The late decider block is what saved Biden in a lot of places. . . .
Super Tuesday proved that Biden, for whatever reason, is viewed as the safe choice, the choice who can best beat Trump this year, Mike Bloomberg’s money didn’t do anything, and Liz Warren is pretty much sticking around to sink Sanders. Hey, he’s the guy who reportedly told her a girl couldn’t beat Trump. She’s out for blood, a third-place finish in her home state of Massachusetts be damned.
California may be what saves Bernie after this marathon round of primaries. And he should be thankful since a bad showing here could have derailed the Bernie 2020 train, which is already half off the tracks now. What a difference a couple of weeks make, huh?
Side note: We are pleased that the youth of these commentators bodes well for conservatism.
