https://www.thewrap.com/mike-bloomberg-2020-hollywood-president-trump/ All the rich liberals are happy and starting to support Bloomberg. They love talking about socialist ideas and communal issues until there is a chance a socialist may actually get elected! At least they now know how duplicitous they are. Only the fools that listen to them, the stoners and the counterculture failures that are mad at the world could follow the insanity that is Bernie Sanders.
Do Hollywood studio execs have a history of talking about socialist ideas or supporting Bernie? Or is just another in the long list of strawmen you like to create?
Being the Primary Sponsor of legislation that is actually enacted into law is a ridiculously narrow criterion. Elizabeth Warren has 9 bills that have been enacted into law, but she is considered to be a prolific technocrat that gets a lot of stuff through. There a lot of other legislative activities that matter much more. Even the website you quoted says the same thing: Does 9 not sound like a lot? Very few bills are ever enacted — most legislators sponsor only a handful that are signed into law. But there are other legislative activities that we don’t track that are also important, including offering amendments, committee work and oversight of the other branches, and constituent services.
Those happy rich liberals are certainly duplicitous, but not as much as the bitter "conservatives' that support Trump and his socialism.
How long has Warren been a senator as opposed to Sanders? How is it narrow when I am using it to judge everyone?
This is true - I wouldn't rely on any kind of numerical list of accomplishments there and generally the massive bills we pass these days are the result of a lot of behind the scenes stuff. But we can look at what these people say about their own successes. Here's Bernie's own website talking about his legislative accomplishments: https://www.sanders.senate.gov/legislative-landmarks Click on "Limit to Legislation Passed" and it's ... less than impressive for as long as he's been in Congress. Mostly small amendments and some bigger but not particularly controversial things (who's against a cancer registry?). Bernie's running on a vision for America, and that's fine - but there's a good reason he doesn't talk much about his past accomplishments.
1. Warren - 8 years Senator, Bernie - 14 years. 2. Because the source you cited even said that it is not a comprehensive measure of legislative activity since most laws generally die in Congress and never get passed. Even a meme that was floating around earlier in the election season suggested that many of the democratic candidates had never passed anything based on even more ridiculous criteria. A fact check debunked this meme, you can find it here. And a short excerpt from this link you should read: "Let’s start with the meme’s central claim about bill passage. Each year, only a small fraction of proposed Congressional bills are voted upon and passed — a mere 443 bills were enacted out of the 13,556 pieces of legislation proposed during the 115th congress. That’s an 4 percent success over success rate for the entire U.S. Congress, so the statistics offered in the meme aren’t nearly as egregiously bad as it suggests they are. Also, the meme only included “sponsored” legislation, although lawmakers more commonly co-sponsor bills with other lawmakers." Just because you want to use shitty criteria to evaluate all legislators doesn't justify its efficacy. Pretty clear if you do any level of in-depth research that tracking legislative activity and accomplishments goes much deeper than the number of bills enacted into law by primary sponsors. 3. A simple counterfactual: Bernie passed the War Powers Resolution just last year with bipartisan support in the senate. The bill would have ended US support of the Saudi led genocide in Yemen. The bill was unfortunately vetoed by Trump despite bipartisan support. That bill now never gets mentioned in the narrow criteria on govtrack.us since the bill wasn't enacted into law. And even if it had been enacted, only Bernie would've gotten credit since he was the primary sponsor, despite the fact that he had 2 co-sponsors on the bill that were key to getting it passed.
I can moderately agree with this. And if I'm being honest, I personally don't think it matters much. There is enough in his legislative record to show that A) He gives a damn and B) He has the ability to work with other people when there is some common ground. But ya, he is not some insanely prolific legislator. On a side note, why would controversial things even pass lol? The whole system is built to prevent anything remotely divisive from passing. The War Powers Resolution being vetoed by Trump is a good example. The truth is the president is not a legislator. And if anything, I like Bernie for president since I believe he is a better politician/messenger/organizer/visionary than he is a technocrat/legislator. Especially when compared to Warren. Now if I am looking for a policy-wonk/technocrat, I take Warren any day of the week.
So Warren has done more in less years, great. So what should we use as a less shitty criteria? I never said he passed nothing, my point is that he does not play well with others and he has not gotten much accomplished. This is what his fellow senators thought of him. https://www.politico.com/story/2016/03/bernies-record-220508 “I have been criticized a lot for thinking big, for believing we can do great things as a nation,” Sanders said. Rarely has that thinking translated into actual legislation or left a significant imprint on it, according to Democratic lawmakers and staffers who have worked with him. Several top Democrats say the difference is a complete contrast to another progressive, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who has had a much clearer impact on the financial and inequality discussions in just the three years she’s been in the Senate. As for taking on Wall Street, one of the issues Sanders is most identified with on the campaign trail, former Democratic Rep. Barney Frank said Warren’s done much more to protect the landmark Dodd-Frank financial regulation law in the years since its passage. “She has been more effective at blocking efforts to weaken the bill. [Sanders’]mind-set is that there’ll be a revolution,” said Frank, adding that he doesn’t remember Sanders being involved in any of the affordable housing work he did in the House. “He plants his flag and expects that someday everyone will see he was right.” Liberal Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), a Hillary Clinton supporter who describes herself as a big Sanders fan, struggled when asked ahead of last month’s debate in Milwaukee if she could point to examples of the Vermont senator’s actually influencing the outcome of legislation, other than the much praised bipartisan Veterans Affairs reform he led as chairman of that committee in the Senate. “Um,” she said, pausing for a full eight seconds while thinking, “I’m sure I could. In terms of the things that he talks the most about, is when he was chair of the Veterans Affairs committee. But he actually compromised on a whole heck of a lot. Back in … it’s not coming to my mind right now.”
My point is Bernie does not even do a lot the behind the scenes stuff. So how will build consensus as president?
If he is this why has he not gotten much done with his agenda? The president is definitely a legislator how else will he implement his agenda?
And for the record I don't hate Bernie and would enthusiastically vote for him. I just would like to talk about the issues I see with him getting anything done.
Except if you want to see things like Medicare for All, the Green New Deal and other things Sanders is proposing enacted you do need a President who knows how to work the legislature.
1. A lot of the things Bernie supports are in direct opposition to the special interests that pour money into the political process. M4All, moving to public funding of elections, rapidly transitioning to clean/renewable energy etc. But ya, in some sense he did spend a lot of time in Congress screaming into the abyss, unwilling to shift his principles as the country moved from HW Bush to Clinton to W Bush to Obama. Pretty unpragmatic, but at the same time that fortitude/stubbornness also gives him a lot of credibility today. The whole reason he is running for president is to get more power so that he can use the electoral mandate to fight those interests. Passing any meaningful legislation won't be done just behind closed doors and dealing/compromising with legislators, it will have to be done in conjunction with enormous public pressure that the president will have to fuel/enhance. If you want to get an idea of how Bernie will govern, watch this vid until the from the 12 min mark to the 20 min mark. It will be a combination of using public pressure to accomplish policy goals. 2. I disagree, the President is an executive, in the executive branch.
Well, he's been in Congress for 40 years and has chaired some of the most powerful committees so he definitely knows how it works. And besides, even if you don't think he does he will still have allies like Warren in the legislature who are more wonky/technocratic. But regardless, I would argue building the political-will/public-pressure for the ideas you want is far more important.
This addresses one of the concerns I have with Bloomberg. As noted Trump hasn't separated himself from his business and continues to refuse to release his tax returns also Trump Organization has a private company doesn't have the same transparency as publicly traded companies. If Bloomberg does win the presidency he should be held with as much scrutiny as Trump is regarding his business and his presidency. This is a very good first step. https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/18/politics/bloomberg-business-cnntv/index.html Bloomberg would sell his company if elected president, adviser says
That is important but not that important if you can't control Congress. Consider that issues like universal background checks have a huge amount of support and public pressure yet no progress is made in Congress because of the skill of McConnel.
Just looking at percentage of agreement isn't the whole story. I suspect even though a vast majority of Americans support universal background checks for firearms, it isn't an issue on the top of their list. Healthcare is a much more pressing issue for most Americans I believe.
