The Democratic primary so far has been a debacle, writes jonathanchait
Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images Here is a science-fiction scenario: Imagine a strange new virus that incapacitates everybody below the age of 75. The virus wipes out the entire political leadership, except one old man, who has survived on account of his age, but may also be too old to handle the awesome task before him.
Neither of these conclusions was actually correct. The Bernie Sanders vote encompassed voters who opposed Hillary Clinton for a wide array of reasons — including that she was too liberal — and were overall slightly to the right of Clinton voters. And political-science findings that general election voters tend to punish more ideologically extreme candidates remain very much intact.
It was a perfect encapsulation of Gillibrand’s campaign, which seemed to be positioning the candidate to be elected President of Twitter. Her campaign posted the clip and got more than 1,000 likes, as well as favorable coverage of the remarks in outlets like Vox, Mother Jones, and the New York Times op-ed page.
The vulnerabilities of this position have been on bright display in every Democratic debate. Neither Warren nor Sanders could supply a coherent response to the question of whether middle-class voters would pay higher taxes or whether they would like being moved off their employer plan. “I’ve never met anybody who likes their health-insurance company,” Warren insisted, eliding the clear reality that most people who have employer-sponsored insurance do like it.
“Responding to a Democratic electorate that has been radicalized by Donald Trump and is still smarting from the 2008 recession, Warren and Sanders have yanked the conversation — and the party — sharply to the left,” exults The Nation’s Jeet Heer, treating the premise that Democratic voters demand a leftward tilt as so self-evident he needn’t bother substantiating it.
But if Biden has this ideological territory to himself, it raises the possibility he could win the nomination simply because his opponents abandoned the field.
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