On Friday, January 20, 2017, Bernie Sanders will be sworn in as our nation's 45th president. I explain why Sanders wins the Democratic nomination and presidency in my recent appearance on The Thom Hartmann Program. If you've disagreed with my thought process in the past, just watch the segment and you'll understand why Bernie Sanders is the true Democratic front-runner. American politicians don't set records with 2.3 million contributions (breaking Obama's record), draw crowds of over 100,000 people several months after announcing, and raise more money than every GOP candidate without massive political momentum. Furthermore, nobody in American politics goes from 5.3% support in the Democratic Primary race on March 9, 2015 to over 30% support in December, without media attention (Sanders gets 1/23th the television coverage of Trump) and with pundits giving the candidate little chance of success. The underlying data (money raised, attendance at events, social media popularity) undermines the polling data showing Clinton leading by a wide margin. Remember, Clinton was up by a similar margin over Obama in 2007.
His ascent is genuine, and when Bernie wins Iowa and New Hampshire, the Clinton machine will run into a powerful force called the American people.
The likelihood of a Sanders presidency should increase exponentially in your mind when considering the following scenarios. If you can imagine Hillary Clinton becoming Commander in Chief, after labeling her Iraq War vote as merely a "mistake," and with tens of thousands of her emails the subject of an expanded FBI investigation, then you trust the former Secretary of State with the future of our nation.
72% of Independent voters distrust Hillary Clinton, 59% of all American voters find Clinton "not honest and trustworthy," and there's a foreign donor scandal linked to her years as America's top diplomat. One GOP Congressman wants to impeach Clinton on her first day in the Oval Office, so good luck with "getting things done" and passing legislation amidst such vitriol. Between ongoing controversies and a future of Republicans trying desperately to impeach her, Clinton's presidency could make Obama's tenure look like the height of bipartisanship.
Gore's loss in 2000 is also correlated directly to America's fatigue with the Lewinsky scandal, even though Starr's investigation was politically motivated and Gingrich also had an extramarital affair during the investigation. For Democrats, a Hillary Clinton presidency filled with future scandal could easily lead to a Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio ticket in 2020.
Similarly, if you can envision a racist buffoon named Donald Trump as president after he insulted Vietnam veteran and former POW John McCain (the Donald received four student deferments from military service from 1964 to 1968), then you're comfortable with Trump as Commander in Chief. I wouldn't trust Trump as the mayor of a small town, much less the president of the U.S.
Just watch Comedy Central's Roast of Trump and imagine future generations of schoolchildren learning about this belligerent billionaire turned xenophobic populist in U.S. history class. Then ask yourself if you trust him with America's arsenal of 7,300 nuclear warheads or any decision that doesn't involve his hair or hotels.
Likewise, if you can watch Hillary Clinton explode in laughter while exclaiming, "We came, we saw, he died," after ushering a devastating civil war with a failed bombing of Libya as Secretary of State, then you trust Clinton's guidance and leadership.
Vladimir Putin just labeled the U.S. as a threat to Russia's national security, and I don't trust Clinton or Trump to face renewed tensions with our former Cold War adversary. I'd much rather have Bernie Sanders, who won the Congressional Award from the Veterans of Foreign Wars and voted against Iraq; foreshadowing it's deadly consequences for the Middle East and the world. I'd rather have a man who says "I'll be damned" to more Middle Eastern quagmires, than the foreign policy goals of Trump or Clinton that would lead to an increased number of American ground troops in future counterinsurgency wars.
When Sanders wins the Iowa Caucus and New Hampshire Primary (Clinton already has a Southern "firewall" set up because even her campaign worries she'll lose both contests), the media attention alone with propel him towards wins throughout the South. There's a reason Clinton referred to Iowa and other caucus states as part of the Democratic Party's "extremes" in a private email; Clinton is far too hawkish and conservative for many progressives. In the 2008 Iowa Caucus, Clinton finished third.
Sanders winning two straight contests will enable him to upset Clinton in South Carolina, leading to a complete paradigm shift within America's political landscape. Suddenly, the entire nation will be talking about the fact Bernie Sanders "destroys Trump" by a wider margin than Clinton in the polls.
According to The New York Times, "Mrs. Clinton's advisers, struck by the strength of Senator Bernie Sanders in those two states, have been assuring worried supporters" that her lead in delegates and other perceived advantages will result in a swift victory.
The only problem is that delegates aren't bound by any public announcement, nor were they in 2008 when Clinton's lead in delegates went to Obama.
As a top Clinton aid stated in a 2008 email, "Assuming HRC's lead in super delegates holds and continue [sic] to increase even slowly, she will continue to lead BO in total delegates at every step." Obama won and Clinton lost, despite her early "lead in super delegates."
Clinton's lead in the polls and delegates was also highlighted in a 2007 POLITICO piece titled Hillary the Inevitable. The article states "And in the primary states with the most delegates (Florida, New York, California, Texas, Pennsylvania and Ohio), Hillary has an overwhelming lead." This lead in the polls, and Clinton's initial advantage with delegates never amounted to a win.
The 2007 article titled Hillary the Inevitable goes on to say "Hillary's electoral strength has grown in the last quarter and she is better positioned today than ever before to become the next President of the United Sate." It even goes as far as to say that "Every major poll shows Hillary's lead increasing in the Democratic primary."
Also, President Obama is wrapping up his second term in office, defeating Romney in 2012 even when many polls said "Mittens" would win.
While Clinton has a Southern "firewall," there are other safety measures that aren't so accommodating to the Clinton campaign. Sometime hopefully before Election Day, the FBI will let the nation know if the firewall on Clinton's computer system protected classified data from various hacking attempts.
Ultimately, Bernie Sanders could possibly get a landslide victory in the Democratic Primary if the FBI finds Clinton jeopardized national security. An AP article titled Clinton subject to hack attempts from China, Korea, Germany explains that hackers have already tried to access classified data on Clinton's server:
While the attempts were apparently blocked by a "threat monitoring" product that Clinton's employees connected to her network in October 2013, there was a period of more than three months from June to October 2013 when that protection had not been installed...
That means her server was possibly vulnerable to cyberattacks during that time...
Clinton has not said what, if any, firewall or threat protection was used on her email server before June 2013, including the time she was secretary of state from 2009 to 2013 and the server was kept in her home in the New York City suburbs...
Edward Snowden believes it's "completely ridiculous" to think Clinton's data wasn't compromised by hackers.
The AP article goes on to say that "Any hackers who got access to her server in 2013 or 2014 could have stolen a trove of sensitive email traffic involving the foreign relations of the United States."
Bernie Sanders will become president, and I explain in this video that while people evolve, nobody changes positions on key issues more than Clinton. Between Clinton and Trump, Americans have a Democrat funded by prison lobbyists and a billionaire populist who once identified more with Democrats than Republicans. POLITICO states Trump was "for the Clinton's before he was against them"; which says something about both Trump and Clinton. In 2016, Bernie Sanders is the clear front-runner to become president, and I explain why I'm voting for Sanders in this YouTube segment.