Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders sure knows how to milk a moment, doesn’t he? After a Deontay Wilder-like showing on Tuesday, Sanders called a press conference Wednesday to announce that he doesn’t care if he’s a bazillion delegates behind, he’s going to stay in the fight for the Democratic presidential nomination. He then went on a rant about how the world doesn’t need bazillionaires.
What does all this mean that a bloody and badly beaten Wilder Sanders will take the debate stage Sunday where he plans to challenge frontrunner and former Vice President Joe Biden?
Sanders conceded he’s losing the fight and then pushed a widely held belief that Democrats believe he’s not electable because he shouts a lot and yells at little kids who walk on his lawn after school lets out.
“We have won the ideological debate, but we are losing the debate over electability,” Sanders said, the Hill reports. “I cannot tell you how many people our campaign has spoken to who say they agree with us but will vote for Joe because they believe he’s the best to beat Donald Trump. Needless to say, I strongly disagree with that assertion, but that’s what millions of Democrats and independents say. On Sunday, I very much look forward to the debate.”
The safe money bet was that Sanders was going to concede and we all would’ve been wrong! Biden annihilated him on Tuesday with wins in Michigan, Missouri, Mississippi and Idaho.
It isn’t that Biden has a tremendous lead in delegates; he’s only up 150. It’s that there is no clear path to victory for Bernie. Biden is only halfway to the 1,991 votes needed to win the nomination as polls show Sanders losing in Florida and Arizona, which will vote March 17, along with Illinois and Ohio. And then Georgia, which is in the South and also has a number of black people, votes on March 24.
Sanders and everyone in his camp had to know that holding a press conference, knowing that everyone thought he was about to bow out gracefully only to announce that he was going to stay in the race, was the bait and switch that America didn’t ask for.
The black godfather of the South, Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), has already endorsed Biden and has also noted that the Sunday debate should be canceled, the Hill notes. It’s time for Bernie and his bros to call it quits. He knows it. America knows it.
According to the Hill, “Several top Democratic super PACs have declared Biden the presumptive nominee and have begun refocusing their efforts on helping him win the general election in the fall.”
Which means that they are moving on without Bernie. It might be time for him to pack up all his Nag Champa, his frat family and pick which house he’d like to reside in while we all wait for the coronavirus to pass us by. He can do anything in this house as long as it’s not running for president. He can run for the mailman. He can run after the dog. Just stop running for president.