She hates him because he's inexorably taking away her last chance at moving back into the White House, and he's not thirty years younger and a "well-spoken, clean-cut Negro". He hates her because, well, doesn't everybody?
They sure sounded like they hate each other given how aggressively they went after each other last night, although it was hard to focus on their genuine or calculated animus given that it had the dual flavor of "Hey, you kids, get off my lawn!" and any of fifteen conversations in the nursing home dining room when nobody has their hearing aids turned up.
That's something Senators Rubio or Cruz can definitely exploit next fall all by itself, if the Republican electorate makes it back to the land of sanity. But there was plenty of other future attack-ad fodder from which to choose:
[Mrs.] Clinton used her opening statement to needle the senator from Vermont, who describes himself as a socialist, over what she has contended are unrealistically liberal plans for universal health care, free college and other programs.
“I’m fighting for people who cannot wait for those changes, and I’m not making promises that I cannot keep,” the former [commissar] of state said.
Sanders replied that a number of European countries had approved single-payer health-care systems. “I do not accept the belief that the United States of America cannot do that,” he said.
In reality, Mrs. Clinton is right. Even the Donk SuperCongress of 2009-10 could barely shove ObamaCare down the country's unwilling throat, and they couldn't even jam a "public option" into it. And Democrat supermajorities with a Democrat POTUS only come along every third of a century or so, and the next one is probably decades away.
But this isn't the general election, it's the New Hampshire Democrat primary, and her leftwingnut audience doesn't want to hear what's realistic, or what promises can or cannot be kept. They want to hear what they want to hear and that she's going to (does this sound familiar?) FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! for it. Which begs the question of for what she's "fighting" if not what her leftwingnut audience, whose votes she's desperate to get, is demanding - like Weekend Bernie is.
Point, Sanders.
As they had at a town hall forum the night before, the two remaining Democrat presidential contenders also squabbled over the modern definition of the word “progressive,” which has become the preferred term for the Democrat left.
When "communist" is so much more accurate. Which is why I always edit out the former for the latter. I'm a big believer in mandatory truth in labeling.
“A progressive is someone who makes progress,” [Mrs.] Clinton said.
That's a glib non-response. A "progressive" is a communist. She's not willing to admit that, and Weekend Bernie is.
Point, Sanders.
Sanders, who enjoys enormous enthusiasm among the party’s liberal base, continued to make the argument that [Mrs.] Clinton is too heavily dependent on those who have financed her campaign and made her personally wealthy. He said that he does “not only talk the talk, but walk the walk. I am very proud to be the only candidate up here that does not have a super PAC.”
A mixed bag for the Vermont senator, since it bolsters his authenticity, which is the heart of his appeal to Donk voters, but it deprives him of the resources with which to fully compete with La Clinton Nostra nationwide, which is the only reason he's not already the Democrat nominee.
However, Herself can always be counted on to keep coming to Weekend Bernie's rescue:
[Mrs.] Clinton accused Sanders of engaging in a “very artful smear” of her character. She insisted she had never changed her position on any issue based on having received contributions from special interests.
Two words: Clinton....Foundation.
“Senator Sanders has said he wants to run a positive campaign. I’ve tried to keep my disagreements over issues, as it should be. But time and time again, by innuendo, by insinuation, there is this attack that he is putting forth,” [Mrs.] Clinton said.
I bet you didn't know that Senator Sanders was a card-carrying member of the Vast RightWing Conspiracy, didja?
But then I suppose she's right about this in a way: the Empress doesn't always need to be paid to switch issue stances. It just comes reflexively naturally to her.
Remember that all-time classic? Five flip-flops in three minutes and twelve seconds. To the vast degree that Barack Obama wasn't simply a vastly superior candidate to her, this exchange was probably the rest of why she crashed and burned eight years ago. That reputational stink has stuck to her ever since, which is why it is so effortless and obvious a target for even so manifestly non-Obama a candidate as Bernie Sanders. And it illustrates how terrible a candidate she is that she can't even spin out from under the gambit when wielded by such a crazy, wild-eyed, elderly old white bastard that just happens to be blowing her out by thirty points in the Granite State polls.
In the final analysis, I have to say that Hillary probably hates Sanders a bit more than he does her. Why? He took a pass on hitting her on Emailgate, a topic about which the Nutroots don't care in the slightest. Or perhaps it's that he's more interested in kicking her when she's down effectively, rather than indiscriminantly.
In which case, mission accomplished.
UPDATE: The long-awaited Hillary Clinton implosion?:
In the Democrat race nationwide, former [Commissar] of State Hillary Clinton has 44%, with Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont at 42%, and 11% undecided. This compares to a 61% – 30% Hillary Clinton lead in a December 22nd survey by the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University Poll. …
“Democrats nationwide are feeling the Bern as Senator Bernie Sanders closes a thirty-one-point gap to tie [Commissar] Hillary Clinton,” said Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll.
A twenty-nine-point collapse in six weeks, folks. She doesn't have majority support among women voters (though she's still ten points ahead with them). So much - again - for what has always been the core argument of her candidacy: inevitability.
The notion that she was electable was always a joke, and this Q-poll's general election hypotheticals reiterate that as well:
vs Cruz: Sanders +4, Rodham 0
vs Rubio: Sanders 0, Rodham -7
vs Trump: Sanders +10, Rodham +5
An average of 5.3 points better in November. Not insignificant. Just as it's hard not to notice that Rubio does, on average, 5.5 points better than Cruz and eleven points better than Trump. If the idea of an election is to win it - I know, what a novel concept, right? - then Bernie Sanders and Marco Rubio would appear to be the ways to go for their respective parties.
If you're looking for an explanation for the Bern-feeling and Marcomentum, this one makes a whole lotta sense.
UPDATE II: The latest Reuters/Ipsos poll confirms Quinnipiac:
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has erased [Commissar] of State Hillary Clinton's wide lead for the Democrat presidential nomination since the start of year, putting the two in a dead heat nationally, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll. [Mrs.] Clinton leads Sanders 48% to 45% among Democrat voters, according to the poll of 512 Americans, conducted February 2-5 following the Iowa caucus. The poll has a credibility interval of five percentage points.
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