Bernie Sanders appeal is entirely different. For one this is a different context, the backgrounds of the three candidates are entirely different, and their appearance and reflection in the polls are different.

Also, I read Scher's article - nowhere in the piece does he define what he means by liberal - thus to me the argument of whether 'liberal' is good or bad is meaningless until some definition of what the term means is applied.

I think it is also a false assumption that Barack Obama is a 'liberal' - again, without defining what you mean by the term 'liberal' it's a meaningless accusation.....GOP/tea-party portion of the electorate call him a socialist; many in his own party call him a corporatist sell-out, a moderate.....

Sorry, but I thought the above discussion was rather meaningless.

I do wonder where all the anti-war liberals I used to know went to. It seems that once we had a democratic president that war was all fine and dandy once again. Just saying. I would like to see the anti-war liberal movement blossom again. A better phrasing would be an anti-war, anti-austerity, progressive movement.

They shot themselves in the foot. For years and years being a "liberal" was touted on those mediums as something just above child molesting. But they put their stamp of liberalism on anything even barely to left of radical right positions. So today, with the nation embracing things like gay marriage, legalizing marijuana, even the increasing support of the ACA (which was stamped with the term "socialist", even though it was the opposite) the collective population is realizing that those issues that Faux has been pounding into their heads as radical leftist ideals, the liberal agenda...suddenly are regarded as not so radical and even inevitable and welcomed.

That's why I think Bernie has a real shot. The word Liberal, even Socialist, has been so misused and watered down by right wing hate media as to become negligible.