NOVEMBER 1 TO 5, 2019
NEWS AND VIEWS
THE REASON WHY SO MANY WHO ARE IN POWER THESE
DAYS REALLY DO SEEM TO FEAR AND HATE BERNIE SANDERS IS SPELLED OUT, I THINK, IN THIS QUOTATION
FROM SHAKESPEARE. WE SHOULD ALSO LOOK AT HOW MANY LOVE HIM TO PIECES FOR THE
VERY SAME REASON: HE IS IN MAINLY GOOD CONDITION PHYSICALLY AND MENTALLY, AND HE STILL
THINKS DEEPLY, RAPIDLY, CREATIVELY AND FAIRLY. HE IS STUBBORN ABOUT HIS BELIEFS BECAUSE HE
KNOWS THEY ARE RIGHT AND NEED TO BE PUT INTO ACTION, NOT BECAUSE HE IS RADICAL. GOOD REALLY IS SUPERIOR TO EVIL, AND GREED AND COLD-HEARTEDNESS ARE EVIL. MEANWHILE, GLOBAL WARMING MOVES APACE. NOW, HOW CAN BERNIE ACTUALLY CONVINCE THE CITIZENS OF THE US TO MOVE IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION? BY REACHING THEM ONE BY ONE MENTALLY AND SPARKING THEIR IMAGINATION AND HOPE. GO TO THE QUOTATION:
“LET ME HAVE MEN ABOUT ME THAT ARE
FAT;
SLEEK-HEADED MEN, AND SUCH AS SLEEP
O' NIGHTS.
YOND CASSIUS HAS A LEAN AND HUNGRY
LOOK;
HE THINKS TOO MUCH: SUCH MEN ARE
DANGEROUS.”
CAESAR, SCENE II.
SANDERS CAN’T BE BOUGHT OR
INTIMIDATED, NOT FOR LONG ANYWAY. I HEARD THAT THERE WAS A TIME DURING THE 2016
ELECTION THAT HIS WIFE WAS THREATENED. I NEVER HEARD ANY MORE ABOUT IT THAN
THAT, NOR CAN I VERIFY IT, BECAUSE I WASN’T THERE, AND I ONLY BELIEVE ABOUT
HALF OF WHAT I HEAR ON THE NEWS.
SOME OF THE MANY NEWS ATTACKS THIS YEAR
ON SANDERS, THOUGH, AND THERE HAVE BEEN IN THE RANGE OF A DOZEN THAT I
PERSONALLY HAVE SEEN AND PICKED UP IN THIS BLOG, ARE JUST MORE OF THE SAME OLD
STUFF. LOTS OF PEOPLE MAKE THEIR LIVING WRITING SUCH STORIES. IT’S WHAT THEY’RE
EXPECTED AND INSTRUCTED TO WRITE. THEY’RE LIARS AND THEY KNOW THEY ARE, BUT THE
MONEY IS GOOD, AND THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS EVIL. RIGHT? FAIR IS NOT SQUARE, AND SQUARE IS NOT FAIR. FAIRNESS IS ONLY A CONCEPT, AND ONLY POWER DEFINES WHAT HAPPENS. THE WAY TO BECOME POWERFUL IS TO FORM AN INCREASINGLY LARGER GROUP OF CITIZENS WHO ARE POLITICALLY ACTIVE AND PROGRESSIVE. I HOPE THOSE THINGS PROVE NOT TO BE TRUE AND THAT THE HEART OF PHAROAH WILL BE MELTED,
THE MOST RIDICULOUS AND TINY-MINDED THING
I HEARD SAID ABOUT SANDERS WAS WHEN AT A TOWN MEETING A WOMAN SAID TO HIM THAT SHE HEARD HE WAS
ONLY 5’7” AT WHICH HE MILDLY BUT SARDONICALLY SAID, “NO, I’M ACTUALLY A PRETTY
LARGE PERSON.” ACCORDING TO A GOOGLE SOURCE ON CELEBRITIES, HE IS 6’0” AND
WEIGHS 178 LBS. THEN, THERE WAS THE TWITTER COMMENT THAT SPOKE ABOUT “OBESE” WOMEN AND
SHOWED A PHOTO OF HIS WIFE. NOW THOSE ARE POINTLESSLY HURTFUL AND SILLY; AND FROM HER
EARLIER PHOTOS I KNOW THAT WHEN SHE WAS YOUNG, SHE WAS QUITE LOVELY.
MOST ARE INSULTING SLURS, BUT SOME
ARE SMEARS. I NOTICE A GOOD MANY NEGATIVE SPOTS COME FROM THE VT DIGGER, A MONTPELIER
ONLINE SOURCE, BUT OTHERS ON THE SAME STAFF PRAISE HIM. I NOTICED THAT ON THEIR
WEBSITE THEY HAVE A NEWS HEADING TO CLICK, CALLED SIMPLY “BERNIE SANDERS.” AS I
SAID TO MY SISTER, THERE ARE TWO PEOPLE WHO CAN ALWAYS BE FOUND IN THE NEWS ON
A DAILY BASIS, BERNIE SANDERS AND THE QUEEN OF ENGLAND; SO WHEN I SEE A
NEGATIVE OR FALSE STORY ON BERNIE, I GO TO COMMON DREAMS WHO HAVE HIS
BACK, ALONG WITH MOTHER JONES AND ROLLING STONE, OR JUST A RESPECTED FACT-CHECK SITE AND PUT THEIR STORY IN ALSO.
THE VTDIGGER IS AN
INDEPENDENT SOURCE, NOT OWNED BY THE SINCLAIR BROADCAST GROUP (SBG), A FAMILY
OWNED GROUP WHO HAVE BOUGHT UP HUNDREDS OF LOCAL STATIONS, AND WHO PROPAGATE
STORIES OF THE SAME TYPE THAT THE NATIONAL FOX NEWS SHOWS DO. THE DIGGER IS GIVING A
CHEERFUL STORY ABOUT SANDERS HERE. HE’S HAD SOME TOUGH LUCK, BUT HE’S UP AND AT ‘EM
AGAIN WITH A BANG. HE’S DOING SOMETHING THAT IS EASIER ON HIS HEALTH AND ALLOWS
HIM TO GET TO KNOW PEOPLE A BIT, AND VICE VERSA. HE IS ALSO VARYING THE INFORMATION AND SUBJECT MATTER SO THAT HE EXHIBITS MORE OF HIS CONSIDERABLE INTELLIGENCE. IT’S A VERY SMART MOVE. GO TO
THE INTERNET AND SEARCH “BERNIE SANDERS VIDEOS YOUTUBE” FOR SOME OF THOSE SMALLER AND MORE INTIMATE EVENTS.
Sanders has ‘new life’ in New
Hampshire, topping polls and ramping up staffing
By Kit Norton
Nov 5 2019, 9:30 PM | 4 reader
footnotes
PHOTOGRAPH -- Sen. Bernie Sanders,
right, at the Nashua Pride Parade on June 29. Joe Caiazzo, left, the state
director at the time, has been replaced by longtime aide Shannon Jackson,
center. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger
KEENE, N.H. — Two weeks after
Sen. Bernie Sanders shuffled his top New Hampshire campaign staff in September
in an effort to revamp his Granite State bid, the Vermont senator suffered a
heart attack that left many wondering if his presidential bid was doomed.
But since Sanders’ return to the
trail, his New Hampshire campaign has found new life, on the ground and in the
polls, almost doubling its staff from 45 in mid-summer to 90 today and turning
a 12 point deficit in September polls into a 3 point lead over his top
challengers heading into the home stretch.
In July, in the midst of a heatwave
across New England, Joe Caiazzo, then Sanders’ New Hampshire director,
played down the importance of winning the key primary contest that launched the
Vermont senator’s challenge to Hillary Clinton in 2016.
“Do we have to win here? No. Do we
have to win anywhere? No,” Caiazzo told VTDigger about Sanders’ plan in New
Hampshire and the path to the Democratic nomination this cycle.
Two months later, in mid-September,
Caiazzo was moved out of New Hampshire to head up the less crucial
Massachusetts campaign, and Shannon Jackson, a longtime Sanders confidante,
took over the top job in the first-in-the-nation-primary state.
Jackson’s message is now markedly
different than his predecessor’s. “We are in it to win it,” he said in a recent
interview.
In the eight months since Sanders
announced he was running for president, his campaign has been pouring its
impressive stocks of cash into all the early primary states.
In California, the Vermont senator has spent $836,706 on salaries, political consulting
and access to voter information, $686,271 in Iowa, $659,981 in South
Carolina, $608,792 in Nevada and $525,971 in New Hampshire,
according to campaign finance data.
Sanders has also spent $450,542 in
Vermont, which Jackson says is largely used as auxiliary for the New
Hampshire campaign — bringing total spending on the primary close to $1
million.
New Hampshire’s primary will be held
on Feb. 11, a week after the equally important Iowa caucuses on Feb.
3.
While Sanders and his campaign
manager, Faiz Shakir, had repeatedly stressed the importance of winning New
Hampshire, Caiazzo had been looking at the large field of Democratic candidates
and strategizing around making sure they won as many delegates as possible — a move straight out of former President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign
playbook.
The staff shakeup came after
Sanders’ New Hampshire steering committee — a group of die-hard supporters who
have been organizing nonstop since 2015 — voiced their discontent with
Caiazzo’s leadership and were concerned Sanders could lose the state,
Politico reported.
In 2016, Sanders won New Hampshire
handily, taking more than 60% of the vote. This election cycle, however, he has remained bunched at the top with
former Vice President Joe Biden and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
Days after the staff restructuring
was announced, a Monmouth University poll on the New Hampshire race had
Sanders trailing Warren and Biden by more than 12 points.
Sanders
PHOTOGRAPH -- Sen. Bernie Sanders
leaves a hospital in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he underwent surgery following a
heart attack in October. Campaign photo
Two weeks after Jackson relieved
Caiazzo of his duties, the campaign was thrown into uncertainty when Sanders
suffered a heart attack on Oct. 1, leaving morale among campaign staff at a low
point.
But since Sanders has returned to
the campaign trail, gaining high-profile progressive endorsements and boosts in
both national and statewide polls, campaign staff in New Hampshire have been
reenergized.
A late October CNN/University of New
Hampshire poll now has Sanders leading the
Democratic field in the Granite State with 21% with Warren just behind him at
18% and Biden at 15%.
“It’s like we have new life,” said
Jackson the week before Sanders would make his first return to New Hampshire
since the heart attack.
That feeling was evident on Oct. 30,
when Sanders was greeted to cheers from hundreds of people packed into an
auditorium on the Keene State College campus.
“Bernie or bust, baby,” one female
super-fan, brandishing campaign signs, chanted as she patrolled a stream of
possible voters who were waiting to enter the event.
Quinton Sneed-Lott, a student at
Keene State College, said he’s not sure how he will vote, but that Sanders
has his attention, even more so now he has come back from a heart attack.
“It goes to show his resilience,”
Sneed-Lott said. “A lot of people would not have gone on with their candidacy,
but he is putting his health on the line for the betterment of our country.”
On Friday, after Sanders officially
filed his candidacy with the New Hampshire secretary of state’s office, the
campaign announced the state staff now numbers 90 across 13 offices. In
July, Sanders had a full-time team of 45 working in the state.
The decision by Sanders to add staff
to his state campaign comes as other candidates are shutting down New
Hampshire operations.
California Sen. Kamala Harris closed her Granite State offices as she has decided to go all in on Iowa and Julian
Castro, the secretary of housing under former President Barack Obama, also
made plans to fire his New Hampshire staff, according to Politico.
“We have been steadily building the
ground game needed to win in New Hampshire,” Jackson [Shannon Jackson, a longtime Sanders confidante] said in a
written statement. “Granite Staters expect candidates to work hard and
earn their votes, and that’s exactly what we are doing,”
About Kit
Kit Norton is the general assignment
reporter at VTDigger. He is originally from eastern
Vermont and graduated from Emerson College in 2017 with a degree in journalism.
In 2016, he was a recipient of The Society of Environmental Journalists'
Emerging Environmental Journalist award. Kit has worked at PRI's weekly
radio environmental program, Living on Earth, and has written for the online
news site Truthout.
ON BERNIE AND THE RACE AT THIS
POINT, SEVERAL THINGS CAN BE FOUND AT THE BALLOTOPEDIA SITE. MOST OF IT IS
ABOUT THE CAMPAIGN AND ELECTIONS IN GENERAL, BUT THERE SOME THREE PAGES DEDICATED
TO SANDERS’ RACE SO FAR, INCLUDING A LIST OF HIS ENDORSERS, WHICH I THINK HAS
NOT BEEN UPDATED ON THE LAST ONE OR TWO, BUT OTHERWISE IS VERY HELPFUL.
ONE OF HIS ENDORSERS IS THE GOOD SENIOR
SENATOR FROM VERMONT SEN. PATRICK LEAHY. FOR THE LIST, SEE https://ballotpedia.org/Bernie_Sanders_presidential_campaign,_2020
FOR ANOTHER INTERESTING STORY ON
SEN. LEAHY, SEE:
https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/pressrel/press-releases/letter-addressed-to-senator-patrick-j.-leahy-appears-to-contain-anthrax.
LEAHY IS ANOTHER ONE WHO IS SO GOOD THAT SOMEBODY WANTED TO STOP HIM. HUMAN CORRUPTION
REALLY IS SO VERY SAD. THIS IS ABOUT A “DISGRUNTLED WORKER,” OR SO IT WAS
BELIEVED, THOUGH THE IDENTITY WAS NEVER PROVEN TO A CERTAINTY.
ABOUT THIS WEBSITE, UNFORTUNATELY I
DIDN’T FIND THE ONE THING THAT I WAS LOOKING FOR TO BEGIN WITH: A COMPREHENSIVE
LISTING OF LOCAL ELECTIONS FOR THE PRIMARIES. I WANTED IT FOR A REFERENCE
SOURCE ON WHICH THE “EARLY STATES” ARE GIVEN, AND THEIR ELECTION DATES; AND OF COURSE
THE FLORIDA EARLY VOTING TO PRIMARY ELECTION DAYS ARE OF MOST IMPORTANT TO ME. I GUESS I’LL HAVE TO
CALL MY LOCAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY HEADQUARTERS TO FIND OUT. HOW QUAINT!
THAT INFORMATION IS PROBABLY LISTED
SOMEWHERE ON THE SITE, BUT IT WOULD BE SO MUCH BETTER IF THEY WOULD JUST PUT IT
ON THE FIRST PAGE AND BE DONE WITH IT. STILL, THE SITE DOES HAVE LOTS OF GOOD
STUFF ON IT, AND THE HUGE NUMBER OF YOU YOUG PEOPLE WHO ARE MORE ADEPT THAN I
AM ON INTERACTIVE COMPUTER SITES WILL FIND IT IMMEDIATELY, I’M SURE.
23 AND 23 IS 46 PLUS 20 IS 66. THERE ARE A LOT OF UNCONTACTED OR UNDECIDED PEOPLE IMPLIED HERE, OR THEY DIDN’T CALL OR COUNT
THOSE WHO ARE REPUBLICAN OR INDEPENDENT. LET’S WAIT LONGER TO SEE WHAT HAPPENS.
THAT’S HOW ELECTIONS ARE DONE. ANOTHER PROGNOSTICATION NEVER WON AN ELECTION. THE
FINAL PARAGRAPH DESCRIBED THE GROUP OF ONLY 345, ALL OF WHOM ARE EITHER DEMS OR
LEANING DEMOCRATIC. THAT’S SO FEW PEOPLE THAT IT DOESN’T LOOK TO ME LIKE A
LARGE ENOUGH SAMPLE TO REPRESENT WHAT IS LIKELY TO HAPPEN IN A VOTE.
IT ALSO MAKES ME WONDER HOW THE
PEOPLE WERE CHOSEN TO BE CALLED. WHERE ARE THE REPUBLICANS AND REPUBLICAN LEANING
INDEPENDENTS? HOW MANY WERE THEY IN NUMBERS AS WELL AS IN PERCENTAGES? HOW MANY OF
THEM PLAN TO VOTE FOR TRUMP? HOW MANY AMERICANS WILL VOTE IN TOTAL? IT SEEMS TO
ME TO MATTER THAT IN AN ACTUAL ELECTION, ESPECIALLY WITH THE GOAL OF BEATING
TRUMP, MOST OF THOSE DEMOCRATS WILL VOTE FOR THE SELECTED DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE,
WHICH IS PROBABLY GOING TO BE BIDEN, BECAUSE HE ISN’T PROGRESSIVE, WHICH IS THE
CRITERION THAT REALLY MATTERS, I’M AFRAID.
National poll: Biden, Warren and
Sanders locked together at top of primary
The new Monmouth survey shows Biden
and Warren at 23 percent and Sanders at 20 percent.
By ZACH MONTELLARO
11/06/2019 11:00 AM EST
PHOTOGRAPH -- Bernie Sanders, Joe
Biden, and Elizabeth Warren. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
The Democratic primary has no clear
leader, a new national poll conducted by
Monmouth University shows, with former Vice President Joe Biden and Sens.
Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders locked in a tight race.
In the poll, a full two-thirds of
voters back one of the top three candidates. Biden and Warren are each at
23 percent support, while Sanders is at 20 percent. No other candidate is in
double-digits, a clear dividing line between the top three candidates and the
rest of the field.
South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete
Buttigieg sits at 9 percent, Sen. Kamala Harris has 5 percent and Sen. Cory
Booker and Andrew Yang are at 3 percent each. All the other candidates are
below that mark.
The results represent a 5-point
increase for Sanders and a 4-point bump Buttigieg over their results in a
September Monmouth national poll. Warren dipped 5 points, while Biden and
Harris remained largely stable. All of the candidates' movements are within the
poll's margin of error.
However, Warren and Sanders were
both able to close an "electability" gap in the mind of voters
between themselves and Biden.
Democratic voters were asked to
rate, on a scale of 1-to-10, a candidate's likelihood of defeating President
Donald Trump. Biden's average score was 7.3, while Warren's was 7.1 and Sanders
was 7.0. Biden's average score slightly decreased since a Monmouth poll asked
that question in June, while both Warren and Sanders' score increased.
The poll did not help any candidates
qualify for the November or December Democratic presidential debates.
Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard did not
pick up the fourth poll she needs to qualify for the debate on Nov. 20. Candidates
need to hit 3 percent in four polls approved by the Democratic National
Committee and receive donations from 165,000 supporters. Gabbard,
who has already hit that mark in three polls and has publicly said she has more
than that many donors, garnered less than 1 percent support in the Monmouth
poll. Qualification closes a week from today, on Nov. 13.
The Monmouth University poll was
conducted from Oct. 30- Nov. 3 and surveyed 345 voters who identify as
Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party. Those results have a
margin of error of +/- 5.3 percentage points.
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