reflectivepundit

Bernie and the Tempting Polls

By Brigitte L. Nacos

In spreading the message of economic and social inequality more widely than the Occupy Wall Street movement and forcing the discussion of this fundamental unfairness into the political discourse is and will remain Bernie Sanders’ merit.

But when populists are buoyed by large, enthusiastic, oftentimes fanatic crowds, their egos get into the way of reason. Drawing the “us” versus “them” card becomes the everyday rhetorical diet regardless of the broken dishes left behind.

In justifying his claim that he and not Hillary Clinton can beat Donald Trump in the November election Bernie Sanders relies on poll results. But should he and should we trust those polls?

I do not think so; and here is why: As underdog in the Democratic race Bernie Sanders has not been scrutinized by rivals on the Democratic or the Republican side or by the media. Of late Donald Trump sides openly with Bernie. Since he is assured of the GOP nomination Trump can now watch with glee how Bernie attacks Hillary in his quest to somehow wrestle the nomination away from her. 

I am sure though that Capitalist Trump would love to run against Socialist Sanders knowing full well that even in a crazy election year like this one a socialist will not be elected as president.  

As noted, so far nobody has laid a glove on Bernie Sanders or his closest adviser, wife Jane. That’s the underdog advantage. While reporters and pundits press Trump for the release of his tax returns and Clinton for the transcripts of her Goldman Sachs speeches, nobody seems to mind that Mr. and Mrs. Sanders have not yet produced their 2015 tax return. Nobody has tried to dig out controversies that may have occurred in the past of Bernie and Jane.

Even when events point to questionable actions and result in some news coverage, nobody seems to care. Earlier this week, for example, there were reports of the forthcoming closure of Burlington College in Vermont with references to Jane Sanders and her role in the demise of the tiny private institution. As past president, Mrs. Sanders made allegedly a controversial real estate decision that saddled the college with a heavy and eventually fatal debt burden. Years before the end of Burlington College Sanders departed reportedly with a hefty $200,000 severance package.

Were Trump and Sanders to face each other in the general campaign, the latter and his family would not merely be attacked by The Donald but also scrutinized by the media.

For Bernie, then, the polls would no longer be as tempting as they are today.

When Outsiders Attack the Political Party of Their Choice: First Trump and Now Sanders

By Brigitte L. Nacos

In the last phase of the presidential primary season Bernie Sanders and his most fervent supporters are tireless in their attacks against the Democratic Party, its candidate selection process, the party’s establishment, the platform, and the as of now leading presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

What was once a civil competition between Sanders and Clinton has escalated into a bitter and even violent confrontation at a Democratic convention in Nevada last weekend where Sanders supporters were reportedly “throwing chairs and later threatening the state chairwoman in a fight over delegates.”

Huge and enthusiastic crowds  tend to feed the egos of populists and sharpen demagogic appeals. In the process, populists and their followers lose easily touch with reality.

Self-proclaimed revolutionaries and their movements are not interested in protecting whatever party vehicles they choose to ride to power.

Today, a perhaps irreparable schism seems more likely with respect to the Democratic Party than the Republican Party.

To be sure, Donald Trump fought the establishment of the party of his choice, the GOP candidate selection process, and his more than a dozen primary competitors relentlessly, even savagely, until he was the sole survivor and sure presidential nominee. Many inside and outside the Republican Party predicted the end of the GOP in its current form.

But now the notion of the GOP’s demise seems dead. Ever more party factions and establishment leaders fall in line behind Trump.  

Unlike Trump, Sanders is neither the winner nor the frontrunner in the primary competition on his side. His chances of becoming the nominee are slimmer than slim.

Earlier I questioned here whether Sanders might help Republicans win the White House. As Clinton’s calls for partisan unity are failing, I drop the question mark concerning the consequences of Bernie’s intensified attacks on her and the Democratic Party.

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For someone who grew up in Europe more so than for native Americans the U.S. political system is so interesting because of the differences between the basic institutional and electoral arrangements in liberal democracies there and here.

And nowhere are the differences more profound than in the characteristics of political parties and the candidate selection process as the current presidential primary season once again attests to.

In Europe, you have ideological parties with card-carrying members who support their parties’ platforms. Those who come to disagree with their party’s programmatic stance or reform ideas tend to leave and join or at least vote for another party. Because of the proportional electoral system in Europe that allots seats in legislatures according to popular votes won by each party, there are a multitude of viable parties.

This is in sharp contrast to the American winners-take-all system that favors the two major parties at the expense of minor ones.

As a result, a candidate who should be running under an alternative party banner becomes the insurgents in a major party a la Trump and Sanders.

There are problems in both the American and the European system with the latter often weakened by too many parties.  But that is the stuff for a separate story.

Trump—the Media-Assisted Candidate

By Brigitte L. Nacos

The now certain presidential GOP candidate for the highest office in the land did not spend a lot of money for paid media in form of television ads during the primary months.

He did not have to. Trump got all the free media he wanted to promote his brand—the Donald.

Whenever and wherever he spoke, he got live coverage on the cable networks and plenty on the broadcast networks’ newscasts. In this respect, he loomed from the outset large over all other Republican and Democratic candidates.    

Only when his competitors switched to attack mode, did they occasionally get sudden attention.  And live coverage. Thus, when Bernie Sanders sharpened his criticism of Hillary Clinton, this earned him the same privilege.  

Conflict is what newsrooms are after.

Whenever Trump called into the morning shows, he was granted access—certainly not in order to ask him tough but important questions.

After all, TV executives were and are convinced that Trump’s outrageous rhetoric is driving up ratings and advertising prices.

No journalistic ethics here. 

But nothing demonstrated the news media’s insatiable appetite to showcase Trump than NBC’s decision to move its entire “Nightly News” broadcast on Wednesday night to Trump Tower, where Lester Holmes interviewed Trump and continued to anchor the rest of the program from the GOP’s candidate’s office.

Perhaps, the rest of the TV networks will follow suite and relocate to the Trump building which would save the real estate mogul turned TV Reality celebrity turned presidential candidate trips to TV studios.

Jim Rutenberg, the media critic of the New York Times, wrote today,

“you have to point the finger at national political journalism, which has too often lost sight of its primary directives in this election season: to help readers and viewers make sense of the presidential chaos; to reduce the confusion, not add to it; to resist the urge to put ratings, clicks and ad sales above the imperative of getting it right.”

Film-maker Rob Reiner noted in today’s “Morning Joe Show” on MSNBC that the media gives Trump a free pass simply because he is a celebrity. "The words that come out of his mouth, you'd see a guy in a park, a lunatic in a park on a soapbox and you'd walk right past him."

Indeed! And there is no reason to believe that the coverage will change for the rest of the primary season and during the general election.

Populists and demagogues were always news-makers; but in today’s highly competitive media landscape they are more so than ever before.

That’s one reason why nobody should underestimate Trump’s chances to win in November.