Bernie Sanders: "I Am Prepared to Run for President of the United States"

[Mordecai]

I like Bernie a lot but the idea of Democratic vote-splitting and someone like Scott Walker or Rand Paul becoming President is troubling.

The answer is a True Leftist, Tea Party-style raid of the Democratic Party, not an entirely new entity.

[Mordecai]

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Especially heartened by this:

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Plot twist: He runs as a Republican.

[Mordecai]

Doubt he even breaks 1% of the vote a lot of Dems learned from 2000 the consequences of voting for third party candidates.

Evidently the democratic party hasn't learned the consequences of nominating weak candidates that make people want to vote third party

No way at all does she compare to Gore and there will always be people who want to vote third party, it even happened in 2008. Hillary isn't a weak candidate either, she's one of the strongest candidates in a generation especially considering the incumbent President is of the same party.

[Mordecai]

http://digital.vpr.net/post/sanders-tests-political-waters-new-hampshire

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Also, I highly doubt Sanders will run third party. Unlike the suicidal True Leftists on Atlas and the vain egotists like Nader, he understands the importance of compromise and stopping Republicans.

Looks like I was correct.

I am glad that he is being realistic and pragmatic about this. He is not running a Quixotic Nader-eque campaign, he recognizes that even if he does not win the nomination he can raise the issues of wealth and income inequality and also prompt Hillary to move left

I think this is a major difference between Sanders and other candidates like Nader, Kucinich and Gravel, he has realistic expectations of his candidacy and is using the campaign to draw attention to issues and not just to stroke his own ego. It also helps that he is not particularly whacky or weird, he's pretty grounded and down-to-earth for a socialist. He knows what issues speak to people and how to talk with them and not at them.