Bernie Sanders (Un-)Endorses Cenk Uygur in CA-25 race

[Morning in Atlas]

Excuse me while I vomit.

[Morning in Atlas]

Sanders' judgment when it comes to the people he endorses is questionable, to say the least.
Have we forgotten that in 2016 he endorsed conspiracy nut Tim Canova who later became a Fox News regular peddling the theory that the DNC was behind Seth Rich's murder?
And at the same time he ignored a great candidate like John Fetterman who actually had a chance to win his primary and become a senator.

As someone who was on the ground at the time, Fetterman would have won the general too.

(As an aside, I genuinely can't tell if Canova's a full-on #MAGA cultist now or one of those Gabbard-esque right-wingers who just want to dunk on the establishment. At the very least, he's probably one of those HA Goodman-types who voted for Trump).

[Morning in Atlas]

Apparently there's been some backdraft about old posts about Smith being anti-MFA (specifically that big spat about the speaker shelving MFA). From what I've read, the bill would have been nearly impossible to fund in the first place.

I'm more concerned about her retweeting agents of chaos (I think we can all find ways to criticize Cenk without citing #HillaryOrBusters), but that's just me.

[Morning in Atlas]

Apparently there's been some backdraft about old posts about Smith being anti-MFA (specifically that big spat about the speaker shelving MFA). From what I've read, the bill would have been nearly impossible to fund in the first place.

I'm more concerned about her retweeting agents of chaos (I think we can all find ways to criticize Cenk without citing #HillaryOrBusters), but that's just me.

Who cares about who she retweets lol, it's not like #HillaryOrBust is even outside the Democratic mainstream. Also, Santa Clarita suburban soccer mom doesn't care about her opposing a state level MFA, twitter isn't real life.

Yes, #HillaryOrBust/#KHive Twitter is outside of the mainstream, and not acknowledged/encouraged by figures like a leading Congressional candidate, the leader of the most prominent Democratic think tank. and Hillary herself.

If you're going to condescend to me, at least have some semblance of what you're talking about.

[Morning in Atlas]

https://twitter.com/ChristyforCA25/status/1206288599555035136

I think it's more concerning that Christy Smith would retweet a chaos agent like Mendoza Ferrer. I'm sure you could find dirt on Cenk (and Lord knows there's a lot of it) that doesn't come from someone who would throw the election to Trump if it meant stopping us on the left. These #NeverBernie donut-types should be shunned as the chaos agents that they are, not applauded and platformed.

But hey, real life isn't Twitter! The Mr. Danes and Mendoza Ferrers of the world have no influence from the establishment. Nothing to see here, everyone, move on!

[Morning in Atlas]

Don't know who Mendoza Ferrer or this Danes person are, don't particularly see why I voters should care either.  Certainly see no reason to think they have any meaningful influence.

Good thing I never said they had influence on voters. They do have an influence on the establishment, though.

You can only take a look at the tweet I posted - not to mention Jake Tapper citing the same woman - to realize this. We can also talk about the time that noted disgrace to journalism Brian Williams decided to feature a Donut Twitter troll tweet as a response to #MyBernieStory. Or Neera Tanden choosing to associate herself with raging anti-Semites or apologists for literal Nazi murderers because the victim was a Bernie supporter. M. Mendoza Ferrer isn't as terrible (she's simply engaged in red-baiting and personal attacks against Bernie), but the point stands. The average American doesn't care about these assholes, but the policy-crafters and the media certainly do.

The people who say that "real life isn't Twitter" don't realize that because of social media, real life is being blended into it, and that includes the news. Instead of watching the nightly news or reading the paper, people can simply fetch the news on-demand from whatever sources they see. With Twitter, they can curate their own feeds to see whatever they like. What I'm trying to say is that these people aren't "legitimate news sources". They're glorified letters to the editor, and they erode actual political discourse.

Every time these toxic people are retweeted by an aspiring congressional candidate, it gives them legitimacy. While Christy Smith may not have the same reach as Cenk Uygur, she has more political power and will likely attain more. Neera Tanden, as the president of CAP, has more influence on the Democratic Party than Nina Turner. We don't need to explain Jake Tapper's reach, or MSNBC's. Every time a respected figure extends their reach, it gives them a platform and an endorsement as "real news".

To put it in more establishment-friendly terms, what Christy Smith just did is the equivalent of AOC or Ilhan Omar retweeting one of the Chapo guys. While it may not seem like the Hoarse Whisperers or M. Mendoza Ferrers of the world have influence on the people themselves, they have the ears of those with power.

[Morning in Atlas]

snip

Except these chaos agents aren't instigating anymore damage on the political discourse because none of them have any real impact on elections and toxic behavior.

Fair enough - they aren't the ones "doing damage". The ones who are doing so are the people in power treating these Twitter rants as legitimate political journalism.

I could go on about people in general being affected by Twitter as well. Recall that the Bernie people basically memed "Kamala is a cop" into a negative talking point, and turned the perception of Beto into what Buttigieg actually is. There's a trickle-down effect from the Twitter types, and we've reached the point where ****posting is being seen as legitimate discourse.

You could county the number of people who have any prominence in shaping the liberal masses of American politics. MSNBC for instance has been fairy neutral on Bernie Sanders, even going far as to have his presence on Chris Hayes show, much to the disgust of the Democratic base. This is more like if Donald Trump started to retweet from Alex Jones or David Duke, real life flame throwing  surregates who want to burn the system.

I think there have been too many isolated incidents over the entire network (the only one I think shows consistent bias is Williams's show) for them to be neutral (the most recent being Chuck Todd mocking Bernie supporters/his racist and sexist dismissals of them on national TV). It's also interesting that half of the time, the ones making these criticisms of Bernie are #NeverTrump Republicans, but that's none of my business.

(About "donut twitter" not having an influence - I also forgot to mention them employing Zerlina Maxwell, who has literally fabricated negative stories about Bernie to set the "Bernie Bro" narrative. But Buttigieg faking black endorsements gets no coverage. FOH.)

If you want to think this problem is rampart look no further than the man who keeps hiring these people. The same man who's staff voted for Jill Stein.

The fact Bernie hasn't denounced Cenk racist/misogynist/antisemtic/homophobic comments shows the true character that hasn't been exposed by the media. A man who surrounds himself more with fratty progressive men than with people who continue to resist against Donald Trump.

For the third time - "what about the Bernie Bros" is not an excuse for your side's behavior, or a political position.

[Morning in Atlas]

Finally, a substantive rebuttal to my follow-up!

- Whatever my views on Sanders, I've never dabbled much in the "but muh Bernie Bros" schtick, but the stuff Cenk said is pretty horrible.  There's really no equivalency between that and what Cenk said.  Cenk's comments rose to the level of horribleness that it is absolutely legitimate to attack Sanders for not denouncing him after the endorsement fiasco (which, if nothing else, certainly demonstrated horrible judgment on Sanders' part).

- Also, Sanders didn't turn Beto into anything.  Beto turned out to be a well-meaning clown who was hopelessly in over his head and consistently embarrassed himself on national television in the debates.  Even if you view Buttigieg as a trojan horse for Clintonite corporatism (which we obviously disagree on), it's pretty clear that whatever fault Buttigieg may have, being an intellectually vapid empty suit isn't one of them.  

I mean, Sanders folks have certainly tried to brand Pete as that, but it hasn't worked because the difference between Beto and Pete is clear as day to anyone who has heard both men speak, much less someone who has seen them share a debate stage.

* Not gonna deny that. I'm not much of a Cenk guy - I just think that (as I've said before) Democrats should have better judgment on who they decide to legitimize. But as you've said, we're running in circles.

* Very true. Part of that is Pete not being tested by the media/other candidates, and part of that is him being a much better politician than Beto or Kamala. If he was "intellectually vapid", he would be out of the race - if not still languishing at the bottom. While there's a large gap in candidate quality, I do think there's a massive double standard wrt how the media has treated Kamala and Pete.

[Morning in Atlas]

Well, Ana Kasparian (using an alt account, but it's obviously her) has doxxed Mendoza-Ferrer and posted the personal information of all her family members including her children.

Great job folks.  Reminder that this woman sawx calls a "chaos agent" has literally just been posting clips of Cenk, on his show, which he chose to put on the internet.

It reminds me of a 2016 SNL bit where Trump says the media is being "so unfair" to him "by taking the things I say, and the things I do, and putting them on television."

Yes, Democrats who spend more time attacking Bernie than Trump (and have pledged not to vote for him under any circumstances) are usually chaos agents.

Or is not being #VoteBlueNoMatterWho okay if it's a leftist you're not voting for?

[Morning in Atlas]

Well, Ana Kasparian (using an alt account, but it's obviously her) has doxxed Mendoza-Ferrer and posted the personal information of all her family members including her children.

Great job folks.  Reminder that this woman sawx calls a "chaos agent" has literally just been posting clips of Cenk, on his show, which he chose to put on the internet.

It reminds me of a 2016 SNL bit where Trump says the media is being "so unfair" to him "by taking the things I say, and the things I do, and putting them on television."

Yes, Democrats who spend more time attacking Bernie than Trump (and have pledged not to vote for him) are usually chaos agents.

Or is #VoteBlueNoMatterWho only bad if it's a centrist you're not voting for?

Gotta love ignoring the doxing.  

I'll address it when you address your vicious slander of my character (believe it or not, you can criticize a POC/woman without being racist or sexist) and performative allyship.

(There's also the fact that I was specifically addressed by name too)

[Morning in Atlas]

Well, Ana Kasparian (using an alt account, but it's obviously her) has doxxed Mendoza-Ferrer and posted the personal information of all her family members including her children.

Great job folks.  Reminder that this woman sawx calls a "chaos agent" has literally just been posting clips of Cenk, on his show, which he chose to put on the internet.

It reminds me of a 2016 SNL bit where Trump says the media is being "so unfair" to him "by taking the things I say, and the things I do, and putting them on television."

Yes, Democrats who spend more time attacking Bernie than Trump (and have pledged not to vote for him) are usually chaos agents.

Or is #VoteBlueNoMatterWho only bad if it's a centrist you're not voting for?

Gotta love ignoring the doxing. 

Then again, I don't expect it. You never cared about women or POC's agencies in the first place. You care about their obedience to your political beliefs.

Oh damn you're in my head now and know what I think?  Got a real smart guy here.

I don't need to know what you think. Your actions say enough.

Any sort of mild criticism of any establishment-leaning candidate who happens to be a woman or a POC is met with accusations of racism and sexism from you. The EMILY's List thing I can actually understand.  While most of the criticism wasn't sexist, the quip about "emphasizing social issues" was stupid at best and sexist at worst. I've reflected on it since then and changed my views.

But the whole Lujan thing is based off of a claim you haven't presented proof of. Here's the "racist post", for the peanut gallery. A fairly innocuous post criticizing Lujan for flip-flopping on Ilhan Omar's 9/11 comments, as you can see. Everything was going well until you decided to respond with an irrelevant non-sequitur about how Lujan's opponent also flip-flopped one time, and my "silence" on that makes me a racist. You've presented no proof of Oliver flip-flopping on Omar (let alone any issue), and shown nothing to support your assertion. As far as I know, your intentions were to slander me here, since literally nothing else makes sense.

Of course, when Peter Daou switches sides after 3 years, he's a grifter who's just hopping on the socialist train for attention/clicks. The same insult you accused me of being racist, for an evolution over 3 years (as opposed to a few hours), apparently loses its racism when it comes out of your mouth. He couldn't just be a leftist blinded by his strong loyalties to a close friend and former boss. He couldn't actually believe what he was saying. The root issue is that Peter Daou has lost his credibility in your eyes because he disagrees with your beliefs. You might as well be calling him a house slave at this point, since it's clearly what you think he is.

[Morning in Atlas]

-snip-

First, you never said why Lujan  was a grifter, you just decided to throw that term out for no damn reason.  That is why I threw it up as suspect.

 

Also strange you want to call the hispanic man a grifter when the white woman you support does the same things he does.  Hmm I wonder why bro.

https://i.ibb.co/hXt3gNw/jerryarbs.png

Shoutouts to the receipts

[Morning in Atlas]

First, you never said why Lujan  was a grifter, you just decided to throw that term out for no damn reason.  That is why I threw it up as suspect.

Also strange you want to call the hispanic man a grifter when the white woman you support does the same things he does.  Hmm I wonder why bro.

Shoutouts to the receipts

And?  Didn't answer my point at all.

Also for those who can't read the screenshot, I said

I called you racist because you attack the hispanic man who has done the exact things other you have praised have done.

It disproves your reasoning. It's clear from your past posts that you meant Oliver (who is, incidentally, now out of the race)

And for Peter Daou, jesus when have I ever said I like him.  He was a grifter in 2015 and he is now.  He goes wherever the wind and money takes him.  Also what the hell is that last line, just dude.

Right, because the socialists have all the money and not the billionaires or John Delaney.

[Morning in Atlas]

sawx is one of the most annoying posters on this site.  He says outrageous things and defends the indefensible, and then when anyone calls him out he redirects the conversation to his personal gripes and posts outrageous hyperbole until the conversation is completely derailed.

In this thread, for instance, he's said that Ana Kasparian doxxing Maria Mendoza-Ferrer's children is OK, because Maria attacked Bernie Sanders on Twitter so she's a "chaos agent" and deserves what she gets.  This is a deplorable stance.  And it is indefensible, which is why he doesn't defend it!

Instead, when he got pushback, he posted a slew of personal gripes about Peter Daou (??) and Maggie Oliver (??) that has nothing to do with this thread, and accusing other posters of "vile slander."  It's purely a distraction tactic by a guy with zero reputation to lose.

So the doxing came after the "chaos agent" comments. If you want me to formally condemn every single bad thing the Bernie people do at your demands, I'm not going to do that. I'm not "defending" anything because I've already said that doxing for political purposes is in bad taste when Briahna Joy Gray doxed armandodkos.

I said Mendoza Ferrer was a chaos agent because she is a chaos agent. There's a difference between your stance of "I hate Bernie and I'll work my ass off to make sure he loses the primary, but if he wins I'll give my all for him to stop Trump" and "I'll never vote for Bernie Sanders under any circumstances". Mendoza Ferrer objectively takes it a step further than you ever could, and would throw this country to Trump if it means stopping a Democrat she doesn't like. I see no difference from her and, say, Tulsi Gabbard or Nina Turner or whichever people of influence won't vote for Biden.

Once again, you know you can't win the argument, so you've resorted to slandering me and putting words in my mouth that are far beyond my character. Notice how I'm much more civil with X and even James Monroe. Monroe may have similar beliefs to you, but he presents them in a respectful, well-constructed manner. "What about the Bernie Bros" may be one part of the argument, but the other parts are well-reasoned, well-constructed rebuttals that I happen to disagree with. Yours and Jerry's haven't been.

You have absolutely no right to judge my posts in any sort of fashion. You're utterly allergic to personal responsibility, constantly blame others on here for your poor choices and actions (you literally said that the first time you slandered me, I had it coming because of my political beliefs), and constantly personally attack any poster who doesn't share your beliefs. Oh, but if they come at you with the same energy you come at everyone else with? You constantly play the victim about how you're being attacked and you're just an innocent person fighting back against the leftward menace. Newsflash: We don't hate you because of your political views. We hate you because you're a cancer on the forum.

[Morning in Atlas]

"Projection" is just what people say when they want to use the world's laziest insult but sound sophisticated while doing it.

Also I challenge you to find one example of where someone was having an argument with me and I completely ignored what they were saying to redirect the conversation into unrelated personal grievances.  Just one.

See, this is what I'm talking about. At this very moment, you are derailing this thread to gripe about a personal grievance, all while you're complaining about him doing that very same thing. It's irony on a cosmic scale.

My favorite part is how I'm the one with a terrible reputation on the board.

[Morning in Atlas]

"Projection" is just what people say when they want to use the world's laziest insult but sound sophisticated while doing it.

Also I challenge you to find one example of where someone was having an argument with me and I completely ignored what they were saying to redirect the conversation into unrelated personal grievances.  Just one.

Well, Ana Kasparian (using an alt account, but it's obviously her) has doxxed Mendoza-Ferrer and posted the personal information of all her family members including her children.

Great job folks.  Reminder that this woman sawx calls a "chaos agent" has literally just been posting clips of Cenk, on his show, which he chose to put on the internet.

It reminds me of a 2016 SNL bit where Trump says the media is being "so unfair" to him "by taking the things I say, and the things I do, and putting them on television."

Yes, Democrats who spend more time attacking Bernie than Trump (and have pledged not to vote for him under any circumstances) are usually chaos agents.

Or is not being #VoteBlueNoMatterWho okay if it's a leftist you're not voting for?

sawx is one of the most annoying posters on this site.  He says outrageous things and defends the indefensible, and then when anyone calls him out he redirects the conversation to his personal gripes and posts outrageous hyperbole until the conversation is completely derailed.

Please seek professional help immediately.

(Also I can't get a tweet, she's understandably protected her account because of the doxing)

[Morning in Atlas]

https://twitter.com/ChristyforCA25/status/1217820375494512646

**** it, Cenk for Congress. If I want chaos agents and divisive agitators in my government, I might as well take the ones that agree with me.

I've followed Katie Hill's career, and Christy Smith is no Katie Hill. I thought she was better than Caforio, and she proved me right in her short career. Out of all the swing state freshmen, she was one of the two best (and the other's my Congressman). More importantly, while out of Washington, she's used her voice and platform to heal. She clearly does privately support Warren, but is much more conciliatory, expressing her frustration with Bernie's supporters.

This... this is beyond the pale. There's a massive difference between "Hey Bernie cultists, can you not be divisive?" and "Bernie has no class or substance." There's even a starker difference between "Biden and I wouldn't be in the same party in another country" and "Bernie has no class or substance". It sucks that I'm going to have to go back and support a man with so many warts, but our Congresspeople shouldn't be platforming divisive screeds bashing another candidate, let alone posting their own.

[Morning in Atlas]

https://twitter.com/ChristyforCA25/status/1217820375494512646

**** it, Cenk for Congress. If I want chaos agents and divisive agitators in my government, I might as well take the ones that agree with me.

I've followed Katie Hill's career, and Christy Smith is no Katie Hill. I thought she was better than Caforio, and she proved me right in her short career. Out of all the swing state freshmen, she was one of the two best (and the other's my Congressman). More importantly, while out of Washington, she's used her voice and platform to heal. She clearly does privately support Warren, but is much more conciliatory, expressing her frustration with Bernie's supporters.

This... this is beyond the pale. There's a massive difference between "Hey Bernie cultists, can you not be divisive?" and "Bernie has no class or substance." There's even a starker difference between "Biden and I wouldn't be in the same party in another country" and "Bernie has no class or substance". It sucks that I'm going to have to go back and support a man with so many warts, but our Congresspeople shouldn't be platforming divisive screeds bashing another candidate, let alone posting their own.

Dude, no offense or anything, but part of having Bernie being taken seriously is that people are gonna come at him much harder.  You'll give yourself an ulcer if you get this riled up over every tweet implicitly criticizing him. 

Tbh, it remains to be seen whether Sanders or Warren was lying.  My guess is Bernie said it in what was understood to be an off-record conversation, but Warren strategically leaked it as a Hail Mary hoping to create a "moment" during the debate.  But the truth is that we don't know and neither Sanders supporters nor Warren supporters should be talking about the incident with the level of certainty they have been.  Sometimes politicians lie, even ones we may really like. 

Beyond which, Sanders endorsed frigging Cenk, a misogynistic, genocide-denying two-bit con artist.  In other words, he tried to f*** over Smith for no discernible reason and arguably made it harder for Democrats to hold the seat in the process. 

I think I'm pretty good about not doing the whole "muh evulz Bernie Bros" thing some folks here do, but Bernie really started this.  Christy Smith doesn't owe him jack and frankly, I wouldn't have blamed her for attacking him using much stronger language than she did here. 

You've said a few times "we [Sanders supporters] tend not to forget" or words to that effect.  Well, that sort of mentality cuts both ways.  Folks tend not to forget when Bernie screws them over either, if you see my point.   

I have a lot of thoughts on this, and was busy the entire day. Now that I've had a day to chew it over, I'm strting to agree with some of what you said, but I've changed my viewpoint. There are ways to criticize and make the same points without sowing division and hate. How Christy Smith went about it is not one of those ways.

* It's very clear from my posts (and messages towards you) that we have two dramatically different viewpoints of how the Sanders/Warren fight went down. It's very simple: I believe that due to Bernie's previous actions and words, it didn't happen. I don't know what was said, but I can say with relative certainty that Bernie saying it would be extremely out of character. At best, I believe it was exaggerated and leaked for political purposes. I understand that sometimes, politicians we like lie. It's why I'm so angry about Warren.

* I can agree with your point. Now that I've slept on it, I can put myself in her shoes and connect the dots to understand her thinking. That being said, believe I was focused on the wrong thing. There are many, many attacks that you could have made without explicitly attacking our movement as sexist.

You'll find that if you describe Cenk Uygur to the average Bernie supporter, most of us would disavow him. If I liked Cenk, I would have enthusiastically backed him months ago. Smith was close enough to us, she had the support of someone we trusted, and she was at least better than the last one. Christy Smith is not all that far away from the average Bernie supporter, especially if she's more open to backing Warren than Biden or Buttigieg. We just happen to have a disagreement on how America's healthcare system should be run.

Attack Bernie all you want. There are many understandable reasons why Smith would. But there's no need to demonize our movement. There's no need to attack 20-25% of your electorate, and there's no need to write us off because we disagree with the way to go about casting off our corporate chains. Between this and retweeting #EstablishmentOrBust people (far worse than Neera Tanden, who will become a Bernie hack if he wins because she's a team player), it casts a massive shadow on her campaign that I can't ignore any longer.