I made up my mind.

I will vote for the most win worthy, pragmatic candidate who does not sell me a pie in the sky or snake oil like Bernie.

@St-Sinner To my mind the sensible approach!

That is not my understanding of moderates. That is your labeling.

Moderates are sensible thinkers. They pick the best from both sides and they are not either extreme and most importantly they are pragmatic.

Trump is concerned with winning period. Winning at any cost. I like that killer spirit. Why do we not at least have a winner spirit? Why our heroes are so lousy like Hillary and Bernie? What happened to the good ones in the population of 330 million?

We Democrats have lost the message just like we did of the family values, patriotism, strong on defense and God loving citizens.

Conservatives again have done a better job of labeling us crazy socialists and extreme left wingers. They have been able to create this perception among voters:

1. Make everybody poor
2. Don't allow success to be rewarded
3. Turn our country into Cuba or Venezuela
4. A place where the government owns everything
5. The big brother will watch over you all the time
6. There will be no individual freedoms
7. There will be no privacy
8. There will be shortages

If this is not socialism, we Democrats have to do a better job of telling what it is really.

@St-Sinner socialism is a winner when it is paid for by everyone, not just a select group or the government.

Good examples: Public education. Social security. True, both are faltering but this is not because they are bad ideas.

@St-Sinner I agree that we really have to do a better job of telling what it is.

@moosepucky

Yes, I heard about those programs in Michael Moor's Sicko movie.

Ideas are shiny but please explain why is Bernie struggling so hard in spite of people giving him so much money and after 2 presidential unsuccessful runs? Is he a bad messenger or we have not a good job telling our story to people?

I was ultra progressive once and I am a moderate today after seeing what extreme left wingism is. It turns me off. When I hear Bernie Sanders, nothing he says makes sense to me. May be we need a better messenger for our movement... somebody like FDR who brought the successful programs you mentioned?

@St-Sinner It is marketed that way by right wing conservatives, but that is not what is being proposed. There is is a difference between communistic socialism and democratic socialism. Yes the candidates needs to do a better job at telling what it is. I don't agree with some of what they propose. Fair laws that levels the field and takes the power out of the big corporations and reversing citizens united are some of the things that I agree with. I don't agree that no one should be millionaires. I want to have the opportunity to make as much money as I can, but believe that I should pay my fair portion in taxes if I am rich and not have so many subsidies and tax breaks for the rich and big muti billion dollar corporations. I don't w as nt free college for everyone. But if someone w as nts to go to college and cannot afford it, that person should be able to ho atca reduced rate that is proportionate to his or her income and perhaps give a few years of public service in return. The military has a similar program. Serve and get your college tuition money.

@noworry28
Don't explain to me. It is the American people who are not buying the message. That is what this poll is about. If we do not accept where we are, we are in denial.

@St-Sinner Bernie, like Hillary are past their sell by dates. Voters are looking to who they will pick as a running mate as very few expect a full term out of either.

We need a barely legal 35 year old candidate with common sense and good ideas who is not beholden to anyone.

@moosepucky
Bernie and Hillary were very bad candidates to begin with.

How is it that we keep choosing, rallying around and chanting around wrong heroes?

Michael Dukakis, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Greta Thunberg?

@noworry28 who are go to be building the rocket ships to the moon and Mars if we appropriately tax the rich?

This is said in humor but.....

@St-Sinner I would have voted for Al Franken for president.

He was just too funny for his own good.

@moosepucky
Al Franken was my favorite. He did not lose because he was funny. He lost because of over enthusiastic Democrats wanting to be Holier than Thou... like Kristen Gillibrand. Where is she these days... our next president of the United States? lol

How about a fanatic socialist vs a fascist?

Why not lay out what Bernie is?

@St-Sinner Bernie is a Democratic Socialist and is certainly not a fanatic.

@jlynn37
Trump supporters say Trump is not a fascist.

What people believe will matter, not what supporters believe.

Right but it did when they were ready for it and more progressive. A lot of people in the world want what we want. It would be a dream come true what the candidates are describing to every citizen of the world but how many countries are ready to digest the plans, how many societies are progressive? The United States is very conservative compared Scandinavia.

Read about the history of the seafaring Vikings (in Danish, the Vikinger) who were a group of people that came from the Scandinavian countries of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden. The Vikings were progressives from the start. They were the first people who gave women equal rights including the right to divorce and the right to go to war. We gave basic rights to women in the 20th century and are still boxing them in traditional roles in the American South.

Wanting is one thing, being ready to want is another. That is exactly what the lying candidates and their blind supporters do not understand. If we were ready, Bernie would not have so much struggle in 2 presidential runs and now dropping from the 1st position to the 3rd and possibly on the way out. A great idea catches like fire when the people are ready.

The ideas are all shiny but the people are not ready. There is time and a place for everything. Super magnificent ideas at a wrong time or a wrong place are doomed to fail.

@St-Sinner The UK implemented the national health service in 1945 along with welfare. Were we ready for it? Churchill said "no" but kept it in place after regaining office. Was he a socialist? But we did it and also reduced our deficit by 250% in a year.
The truth is that whenever reform is proposed. Be that, freeing slaves, universal suffrage, civil rights or legalizing pot. Someone will say that it is not time. I day say if you look back in history you will find some on both sides of the pond that said in 1776 "America can become a nation but it is not ready for it yet"

@St-Sinner Maybe most of the American people are just suffering from some form of mental illness then.

@Jolanta
Whatever you want to call it. The nation is not ready for ideas like Bernie's. But he will get the credit in the history books for being a pioneer of his social ideas.

@273kelvin
When ideas are communicated properly, have sipped through people's minds well, discussed and debated enough, the ideas go down well. I doubt whether any of the revolutions happened just because somebody talked about it for 5 years. There was deep rooted anger in the society, most were on board etc. Where is America today is very different. Half of the nation is against it vehemently, largely people are content. Among democrats only extreme left wing section is asking for it. The idea is not even popular among moderates and independents. We are definitely missing a lot of ingredients we need for that kind of revolution today.

@St-Sinner
I’m ready.
Are you ready?

@skado
I am ready when you have a sound and well funded idea. I want everything I have, everything others have and everything more I can get. Who does not? But I do not want a lousy plan of giving everything to everybody for free by just taxing the rich like Bernie is proposing. Who is going to believe the cost for middle class will not go up? Is Bernie kidding?

That is socialism doomed to fail. He has to think much much better than that. For his age of 78, it is late for him to learn and come back again. He started immaturely and the only option for Bernie is to stop.

A good soldier follows a good general and the general makes sure his damn horse is strong and can take the run and battle. Here our general is bad and horse is shaking in his knees. I cannot follow this general.

@St-Sinner
I’ll take that as a “no”.

@skado
No so fast.

Yes and No?

Yes for the idea but no for the leader?
Yes for the message but no for the messenger?

@St-Sinner
It takes all ‘yes’es to open the gates, right?

@skado
Yes but Bernie has doomed many yeses like mine who like the idea. I am not sure if I should follow the general, not sure about his leadership skills. What is I say yes and follow him and get butchered inside the castle gate?

@St-Sinner
What plan appeals to you more?

@skado

1. I like wining the power by lying, by hook or crook first
2. I like introducing small plans, palatable plans that can go down throats easily
3. I will twist arms, make sweet deals and get the bills passed
4. I will do dirty politics, expert politics like LBJ did to get what I want in Congress

Nothing succeeds like success.

Here is the run down what I like on both sides:

PROGRESSIVE

1. Reparations
2. Full civil rights and equality
3. Equality at work place
4. Healthcare reform
5. Strict control over capitalism
6. Full gun control, ban assault weapons, eliminate second amendment, prohibit all guns in hands of public, prohibit high power military style weapons with police, make illegal gun ownership punishable with a minimum of 25 years with no parole and make all gun manufacturers fully subject to civil suits with punitive damages by citizens, not just victims
7. Healthcare research funding
8. Eliminate religion from government and from everything that is funded by taxpayers at all levels
9. Remove religion tax exemptions
10. Make every religious worker register and require a license, CPE every year, and ethics course
11. Disallow every abuse at church to be managed inside, every abuse must be reported within 72 hours of an outcry, make special courts to speedy religious abuse trials
12. Increase tax rates above obscene CEO and executive salaries
13. Stop golden parachutes
14. Limit medicare and social benefits after certain high net worth
15. Reduce the estate tax exemption to $3 million
16. Make laws against diplomatic, military or economic relations with dictators or governments with low human rights records
17. Withdraw all funding to Israel and Egypt ($3 billion in total)

CONSERVATIVE

1. Strong defense
2. Fiscal discipline
3. Full Congress approval each year after each country's negative imbalance
4. U.S. must be a positive trade in the net with each country
5. Eliminate all subsidies to - agriculture, auto industry, Boeing, and all else
6. Eliminate all food stamps, free hand outs
7. Totally stop all illegal immigration including asylum laws, deport every single illegal immigrant including DACA
8. Remove the right to citizenship by birth (modify United States Constitution and the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)
9. Encourage merit based legal immigration highly
10. Deport all immigrants who create a public charge, criminal records, 2 or more mortgage failures etc.
11. Build a strong wall from sea to the shining sea with electronic mechanism to catch all crossings
12. Make helping any illegal immigrants in any shape or form a serious crime
13. Ban abortions federally with strong restrictions such as mother's life in danger, rape or incest
14. Implement voter ID laws nationally
15. Withdraw all unnecessary military bases around the world, and make the countries basing the bases pay for all expenses
16. Eliminate income tax and make a higher rate (20%) uniform consumption (sales) tax. Discontinue all state sales taxes.

Make military service for every 16 to 18 years old to serve for 3 years mandatory, Fake exemptions to be investigated with public complaints and prosecuted.

@St-Sinner
I can see that it’s not a matter of Bernie not being up to the task of meeting your standards, but rather that Bernie actually doesn’t even claim to represent your values.

Saying Bernie isn’t up to the job is just negative campaigning - trying to smear the guy you don’t like. Truth is, Bernie doesn’t represent your values.

Thanks for telling me what you like, but you still haven’t told me what you plan to do about it, other than smearing the guy you don’t want to win. Who do you want to win?

@skado You act as if these are new ideas. Like nobody had emaciated slaves before Lincoln. The truth is that the US is as usual very far behind the rest of the civilized world. For example, do you know how many other counties that do not give maternity leave to their workers? Just one - Papua New Guinea

@St-Sinner I am sure that there are more people ready for it then you think, however with all that voter suppression going on what can one expect.

@St-Sinner Sound like you are not sure about anything.

@273kelvin
Not sure what you're talking about. I'm pretty sure there were plenty of emaciated slaves before Lincoln.

@skado sorry the reply was meant for St-Sinner

@St-Sinner You act as if these are new ideas. Like nobody had emaciated slaves before Lincoln. The truth is that the US is as usual very far behind the rest of the civilized world. For example, do you know how many other counties that do not give maternity leave to their workers? Just one - Papua New Guinea

@skado
I know my - one person's opinion will not matter but there are millions like me. Do you not agree that...

1. Bernie has not able to sell his message to voters in general?

2. Bernie is struggling in his presidential run for the second time in a row? He was defeated in the first run and he has now dropped from the 1st position to 3rd?

3. Bernie's ideas are not ripe for the times, considering that we are not a progressive society and the capitalists have a very strong hold on the levers of our democracy and our representatives in Congress?

4. Bernie has been an ineffective messenger?

5. Bernie recently had a heart attack and political experts agree that this will be a great impediment he even getting nominated?

6. Bernie does not have a single big achievement to show for his long 45 years in politics?

7. There is nothing Bernie or any candidate can do when we do not have the control of both houses in Washington and currently that looks highly unlikely?

8. Bernie's revolution will not happen because there are some ingredients needed currently do not exist...

   a. High anger among people. Economy is doing very well. Retirement funds are fat. People are generally happy with their health insurance

   b. Charismatic leader. Does Bernie look like a charismatic leader to you? A charismatic leader talks and his message spreads like wild fire and he knows when to capitalize and on what. Bernie does not know either and he is terribly struggling to convince people

   c. Soundness of his policies. People are not buying his plans because his idea to fund to give everything free is just tax the rich. It will not happen in any advanced country. It can happen in Cuba and Venezuela and we have seen what happened there

Therefore, Bernie does not have to meet my standards is not correct. I am a voter and there are millions of voters like me. We are not convinced. If that continues, Bernie is toast. So, yes. Bernie must meet our criteria. Else he will be thrown out.

Here is what I plan to do about what I want as I posted above. I will participate in a discussion, lay out my ideas, contribute to a healthy and productive discussion on what is the right thing to do. I do that all the time through discussion platforms online, Meetup group meetings, blogs etc. I am not a leader, I am just an ordinary worker. This will include telling people how Bernie is not viable and therefore, we should reject Bernie. I think that is a very responsible citizenry.

@273kelvin

There are two things:

1. Comparing historical revolutionary events with Bernie's revolution (lol) -- You are drawing incorrect parallels. All that happened in the history because the ideas could get hold in the ground. There was anger about slavery, the emancipation movement had already started in the Northern states. It was just a question of the North vs. the South. The times are different.
2. Weakness of Bernie's plans - Are Bernie's ideas taking hold, is the public ready? Do his ideas sound and palatable? The answer is no. Although people like reforming healthcare, college education big time,what Bernie is proposing is not viable. No country other than an extreme socialist and communist country will approve funding others by taxing the rich. It will not fly. He wants to give away everything free and people now are beginning to doubt the viability of his ideas. He must come up with some sound policies
3. Possibility of getting anything done in Washington -- Bernie has not said a word about how he intends to get his bills passed when he cannot control the Senate, House. He has not explained why the infrastructure bill has not passed for 11 long years under 3 presidents? What has he done to show that he has the skills, savvy or muscle to get this done? He has not told us what big if anything he has accomplished in 45 years in politics?

There are a lot of question about Bernie but a very few answers.

You are right about the U.S. being very different from many societies in the world. We are advanced in technology, economy and defense but the U.S. is still a very conservative society, still controlled by capitalism and religion.

@St-Sinner A few things here to take issue with. 1, "No country other than an extreme socialist and communist country" Every country in Europe has universal healthcare and by universal, I mean just that. Unlike one of the points in one of your other comments, it is across the board. In the UK it is funded by a national insurance scheme to which everyone (over £5,000 pa) pays according to their means. From the Walmart cashier to Richard Branson and as such are all entitled to use it. The vast majority do so. You can go private and buy your own ins but that is in addition to your nat ins. So it is not free. Unlike US agriculture, banks and big corporation govt handouts which are financed by debt.
2, As to taxing the rich? At least someone is paying. Germany and all the Eurozone operate on a zero deficit budget. Yes ZERO, no adding another 0 to the national debt and pretending that no one will ever call the bailiffs in.
3. The only bills passed by your govt are those which someone has paid for. This side of the pond says that the only thing easier to buy in the states than a gun is a politician. (I might have trouble buying a gun there). We watch with disgusted incredulity the amounts of campaign funds. Things look fucked up under Trump but that presupposes that there we ok before, they were not. He has raised $175,000,000 this year (maybe more). That's a fucking hospital! So don't tell me the rich cannot afford to pay more. Limit your election funding and take the money off them in tax.
4, You are right in that the US is very different from other counties but bad systems fail. We all saw that with the USSR. If you carry on with your present way of doing things? You WILL be overtaken by other more efficient nations. Already Chrysler has been taken over by Mercedes, Columbia by Sony and more will follow. The less meritorious any society is, the less it will progress. As it will hampering itself by only using a smaller percentage of its human resources. Social democracy is not an ideal. It is an efficient govt engine. Take for eg. the "Breaking bad" character. (yes I know it's fiction but I am sure it applies to many) If he were in the UK then he would have found another challenging job, more suited to his skills. Perhaps developing a new product that would add to the economy. Instead of teaching high school and ..well you know what. Without the need to pay for his and his family's healthcare. Add to that the institutional racism that stifles large sections of your population from social mobility and you are running on 3 cylinders or less.
5, Yes ideas need to take hold before they gain ground but seeds need to be planted 1st and someone has to plant them. Bernie will not win, I grant you but that does not mean he should not set out his stall. Who would have thought that the US would ever elect a black president? America is a great nation but great nations fall too. Take it from someone who lives with the legacy of the biggest empire the world has ever seen. You need to work smart and that means looking at the horizon and beyond. Not just at the bottom line.

@St-Sinner
Do you plan to vote?

@skado
Yes, I vote in every local, state and federal election and I take 2 days off for the presidential elections. When married, I made it a big event and took my little daughter with me (until she left home for college), took pictures outside voting stations and celebrated my voting privilege every time.

I take my vote seriously and I do not vote by the party line.

@St-Sinner
If today was voting day, who would you be voting for, for president?

@skado
As of today, I will vote for Elizabeth Warren but that is just today. If she goes more left and makes free everything promises that are unrealistic, I will vote for Trump. I will at least get stronger control over illegal immigration and he can finish the job with damn China.

I am not a left winger. I am Democrat leaning moderate.

@St-Sinner
Not that I'm predicting that this will happen, but hypothetically, if we end up with a Bernie/Donnie contest, how will you vote?

@skado
Easy. For Donnie with closed eyes.

I do not want us to be worse off than we currently are. I do not want to see another state funeral at taxpayers' expense in Washington. There have been too many because they stay too long until death.

@St-Sinner
Closed eyes indeed. There are no circumstances under which I would vote for Mr. Trump, and if I am forced to vote for Warren, it will be with no enthusiasm for her other than as a way to avoid the destructiveness of another Trump presidency. I'll be voting for Bernie in the primes and, loath as I am to participate in lesser-evil voting, I'll be voting against DJT in the gens.
Campaign on, friend. But not to me, please.

@skado
I understand that Elizabeth Warren has Berniesque talk like offering "Medicare for All without clearly explaining how she would pay the 32 trillion it would cost over 10 years". However, I also know she will move to the center in the general and has many of her other abilities up her sleeve. She often has talked about managing the excesses of the big companies. That is my passion issue too. I prefer her intellect and balance 500 times over Bernie's. Bernie is too unreal and out of touch with the realities in Washington for me. If she does not pan out, I will vote for DJT because he will not stop making America great again.... lol. Stopping illegal immigration itself is claiming our nation back and making it great again.

If you hear about Obama voters turning Trump voters in 2020 again on TV, please know they are talking about me and don't forget to tell your friends that I told you so.

@St-Sinner
"But not to me, please." Thank you.