Bernie Sanders’ Rise Prompts Media Meltdown, Establishment Panic: A Closer Look

-Bernie Sanders won the Nevada caucuses in a landslide on Saturday, and now some Democratic

establishment

insiders are

panic

king over the possibility of him being the Democratic nominee. To learn more about this, it's time for "A Closer Look." Bernie has now won the popular vote in the first three primary contests, making him the clear favorite, and now Politico reports that Bernie Sanders has sent the Democratic

establishment

into

panic

. And it shows because the general tenor of coverage on cable news has been something like this... -NBC News projects Bernie Sanders as the winner in Nevada. -What the hell is going on?! -Cable news pundits have been spooked by Bernie's

rise

.

For example, you may remember that after Bernie won the popular vote in Iowa and again in New Hampshire, the story was not that he was winning, but that, using expert math, he was actually losing. -I don't understand how Bernie is considered a favorite. In New Hampshire, 52% of voters wanted Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar or Joe Biden. The moderates are winning. -Why wasn't Buttigieg's victory in Iowa a bigger headline? He has also upset Bernie Sanders in both states. -The story of the night: Amy Klobuchar now in third place. -The story of the Sanders campaign, so far this year, is how much ground he has lost compared to four years ago. -That's right: by winning states, Bernie is actually losing ground.

You see, as all experts know, you don't want to win the first two. That's a rookie mistake, where you seem needy or, as the kids would say, thirsty. You want to throw everyone off by losing a bunch of states, by staying quiet, on the sidelines, until someone finally says, "Who is that guy with no delegates?" Not seriously. No, seriously, who is that? Oh! Alright. Look, according to experts, you don't actually win the first two states like Bernie did. He wants to follow Joe Biden's lead: coming in fourth in Iowa, fifth in New Hampshire and a distant second in Nevada.

And on top of all that, he just strolls through a crucial debate and gives the favorite a hug, you know? That was the first time Biden hugged someone from an angle where they could see him coming. And not only did some pundits insist that Bernie wasn't actually the favorite after winning the first two states, they also created an elaborate mythology in their heads that Bernie was only winning because so-called moderates were supposedly splitting the vote. . And they continued to insist that if moderates were to unite around one candidate, that candidate could be Bernie. -Bernie Sanders may have gotten the most votes in Iowa and New Hampshire, but if you

look

at the numbers more closely, it shows that one candidate is hitting a ceiling.

If you

look

at the combined percentages among centrist candidates, they do much better than progressives. -However, when the totals for Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and Joe Biden are added together last night, that means more than half of the electorate supports a moderate. -Buttigieg, Klobuchar and Biden divided the moderate vote, and their combined percentage exceeded that of Sanders, who obtained 26%. -That's right: if you simply combine the votes of Buttigieg, Biden and Klobuchar, you can beat Bernie. Now, all you have to do is find a way to genetically combine them into a single candidate, called Klobu-Biden-Butti-char. It's that easy.

And then, everything... And then, every time you ask him a question, he has the same answer. What should we do about health care? -We must take a step forward towards the future. -I'm from Minnesota. -CornPop was a bad guy. -Alright. But the reality is that most real voters don't think like experts. They do not divide the candidates into the so-called liberal lane and the moderate lane. In fact, polls have shown that the second top choice among Biden voters is actually Bernie. Polls have shown that Democratic voters are overwhelmingly satisfied with the options. They don't divide them into lanes.

They like each one for their own reasons. They like Bernie because of his consistency on issues like health care. They like Warren for taking on big fights against special interests, like Wall Street. They like Biden because of his eight years as Obama's vice president. They like Buttigieg for his youthful charm and charisma. They like Klobuchar because of his record in the Senate. And they like Bloomberg because he pays people to like him. Still, before Nevada, many in the

media

were desperate to avoid calling Sanders the favorite, and to be fair, only two states, both mostly white, had voted.

In fact, even Bernie bristled at the question of whether he was the favorite during a town hall on CNN. -I think it was just before the New Hampshire primary, I asked him, after Iowa, if he considered himself the Democratic favorite. Now, after New Hampshire, right? -Who cares? -If Bernie is elected, his inauguration will simply be a four-hour open house. Pass, don't pass. He will have cheese and crackers, but maybe eat before you come. Say what you want... Say what you want about the guy, but he doesn't care about status. I guess he has a suit that he irons by running over it with his car.

He throws layups with both hands and has been photographed in the middle seat in coach and that is the only time he has been a centrist. But not even the experts and Bernie himself can deny his clear front-runner status after a landslide victory in Nevada on Saturday, the first diverse state to vote in the primary, in which Sanders appeared to win in virtually every demographic group. -Sanders, in fact, won a landslide and widespread victory, according to our entry poll. He won among men and women, college graduates and non-college graduates, liberals and moderates/conservatives, union and non-union members, early deciders and late deciders.

In short, Sanders crushed it. -Take a look here among self-described moderate or conservative Democrats. That's a third of this electorate in Nevada. This is what you are seeing. Sanders is actually leading. -The NBC/Wall Street Journal poll asked, "Who is he most enthusiastic about or comfortable with when it comes to the Democratic nominee?" Bernie Sanders leads with 65%. -It was driven by young voters, very liberal Hispanic voters, and those who supported Medicare for All. -Fuck, he won union voters, non-union voters, young voters, Hispanic voters, men, women, liberals and conservatives. And, according to this photo, he did well with former vice presidents over 70.

And yet, cable news reacted with surp

rise

to Bernie's success in Nevada. For example, as the results came in and it was clear that young voters and people of color were overwhelmingly leaning toward Sanders, an anchor at a caucus site sighed audibly as she reported the results. - Largely, people of color. Of them, the majority are Latino and are clearly, at least at first glance, strongly in favor of Bernie Sanders, with Joe Biden in second place. - My God, with the sigh! She's reporting on Bernie winning a caucus seat the same way you tell your parents why your boyfriend got fired from his job. "He, uh, well, he was using the photocopier and, well, looking at it, it looks like he, uh, photocopied his butt and put it in the break room." And then...

And then, prominent Democratic strategists and pundits began appearing on live television. James Carville, for example, has been appearing nonstop on MSNBC, warning that nominating Bernie would destroy the party and even suggesting that Russian President Vladimir Putin supported him. -It's going to be the end of days, so I'm scared to death. I really am. There is a certain part of the Democratic Party that wants us to be a cult. I'm not interested in being in a cult. I am 75 years old. I'm just not a very cultured person. I am 75 years old. Why am I here doing this?

Because I'm scared to death. That's why. The happiest person right now... It's around 1:15 Moscow time. This suits Vladimir Putin very well. I promise you. He's probably staying up, watching us right now. How are you, Vlad? -Alright. He's not watching, but, if he was, he'd probably think it was a public access puppet show. Seriously, James Carville always looks like he was released naked into a Louisiana Goodwill and given five minutes to pick out an outfit. How does this hat look on me? How does this hat look on me? I'll take it. Is everything squashed like a bug in my head?

Yes. Like it has completely lost its shape? Alright. I'll take it. And, just as a reminder of Carville's record: In 2008, he said that then-Senator Barack Obama was unelectable and attacked him to the point where even Obama responded and said James Carville is well known for always speaking without knowing it. what he is talking about. In fact, Obama was specifically responding to this comment Carville made about Hillary and Obama (and this is a real quote): "If she gave him one of her balls, they'd both have two of hers." Alright. I'm having trouble following the logic here. Does that mean he was starting with three balls?

Yet somehow, that wasn't even the most unhinged response to Bernie's victory. Chris Matthews actually compared Bernie's victory in Nevada to the Nazi invasion of France during World War II. -Last night I was reading about the fall of France in the summer of 1940 and General Reynaud calls Churchill and says: "It's over." And Churchill says: "How can it be? You have the largest army in Europe. How can this end?" He said, "It's over." So I had that repressed feeling. I may not be as wild as Carville, but he is very smart and I think he is absolutely right in this case. -As a general rule, whenever a man Matthews' age begins a sentence with "I was reading last night about the fall of France in 1940," that's his tailgate to get out of the conversation.

He's like your senile grandfather, yelling into the phone on FaceTime: "I got banned from the golf course for not fixing my divots! This is like 1940, when the Nazis...!" Well well. We'll talk later, grandpa. And, somehow... Somehow, this isn't the craziest thing Matthews has said about Bernie. After Bernie's victory in New Hampshire, as you may remember, Matthews had another deranged tear, that he had something to do with the communists who executed him in Central Park or something. He was so incoherent that his fellow presenter Chris Hayes had to intervene to offer some common sense. -I have my own views on the word socialist and I will be happy to tell you and share them with you privately.

And they date back to the early 1950s. I have an attitude towards them. I remember the Cold War. I have an attitude towards Castro. I think if Castro and the Reds had won the Cold War, there would have been executions in Central Park and I could have been one of those executed. And some other people would be there, applauding, okay? So I have a problem with people who took the other side. I don't know who Bernie supports over the years. I don't know what he means by socialism. One week, it's Denmark. We will be like Denmark.

Well. That's harmless. It is basically a capitalist country with many good social welfare programs. Denmark is harmless. -It is quite clear in the Denmark category. -Is he? -Yeah. -Is he sure? How do you know? Did he tell you that? -Well, I mean, that's what he says and that's what his agenda demands. -Just as a reminder, this all started with this... -I have my own views on the word socialist and I will be happy to tell them and share them with you privately. -Chris Matthews is definitely a guy who says he'll share his thoughts with you privately and then talk to you publicly for a full minute.

I'll tell you what I think about this movie later, in private. Stinks! By the way, Bernie is not the first strong progressive candidate to be criticized by centrist pundits in the Democratic establishment. When Elizabeth Warren was soaring in the polls and seen as the front-runner, we got story after story about how Wall Street and Democratic donors were panicking. Cable news shows showed clip after clip of billionaires freaking out over their plans. And that's because they perceive both Bernie and Warren as threats to their livelihoods and their way of thinking. Whatever you think about a particular candidate, if you're an expert, you might want to ask why so many voters are flocking to Bernie Sanders, and yet when you ask them if they're at least curious about why Bernie He's doing so well, they say... -Who cares? -This has been "A

closer

look." ♪♪ ♪♪