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Bernie Sanders
The polling is all over the place, but generally Biden is in first place, with Sanders or Warren in second. In early primary states, it’s generally Biden, but only slightly ahead of Sanders.
The clear truth about Biden is that he’s senile and gaffe-prone. Even if you like his politics (which, obviously, I don’t), this is the case. He’ll be a bad candidate in the general–I think Trump will eat him alive. Yes, Trump is senile also, but Trump is channeling some genuine anger and hatred, whereas Biden is channeling his elite entitlement, along with “Can’t we go back to Obama?” My suspicion is that the first wins.
As for Sanders and Warren, whichever one isn’t doing well in the early primary rounds had better drop out fast and endorse the other, otherwise it’ll be Biden.
All that said, who the hell knows? Things change and perhaps one of Biden’s senior moments will get through to people and they’ll realize that he’s no longer all there.
I prefer Sanders over Warren. Warren wants to save capitalism, she’s been very clear on that. Markets aren’t working well, and she wants to fix them. That’s her raison d’etre, that’s why she was a Republican most of her life, and why she switched her party to Democrat: Republicans were fucking up markets. She’s clearly said, for example, that she wouldn’t nationalize utilities, which is actually an extreme position among market disciples; many would say these are natural monopolies and should be owned by government.
This isn’t to say Sanders is anti-markets. He isn’t going to replace them or any such thing, he’s just a social democrat. He’ll modify them, make them more democratic, put more under public control, and so on.
He also seems the most credible on strongly tackling climate change. One might say that makes him a “must vote.”
As I’ve said before, I trust Sanders more. He’s been very consistent over the years, he’s not going to take oligarchs’ money even after the primary (Warren’s position), and he doesn’t think things were substantially “okay,” even in the 80s. (They weren’t, or we wouldn’t be here.) None of this is to say he’s perfect; he’s bad on some people’s key issues and not great on foreign affairs.
He’s still, in my opinion, better for ordinary people than anyone else, including Warren.
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