So many people on DU act so smug.

I won't tell you my first name. It's boring.

I don't mean be easy on her, but make that note secondary to a positive vision that we can achieve for ourselves. People across the spectrum loved him for saying people don't want to hear about the damned emails. They want to hear what we're going to do for America. He should tell us big time! No one will stand and cheer more for crochety criticism of Hillary, but they will for a dream.

Way to represent for your candidate!

And the Hillary crowd wonders why so many of us aren't going to be there for their corpora-crat candidate (well, besides the fact that she is the corporate candidate). FFS...

And how many other candidates gave speeches when they were private citizens?

Most of them.

Good luck to Bernie without it. Not working too well so far.

Oh well.

But that's a hell of a low bar...

Since you responded with actual content,it behooves me to respond in kind. Of course everyone's taking donations. the critical distinction, however, is who are those donations from? Bernie's are from individual Americans, the overwhelming majority of them 99%'ers. Hillary's? Well...we both know the answer to that, don't we?

That Bernie isn't a business-as-usual candidate, beholden to massive corporate donations, is the entire point. If it is truly impossible to win without being bought by the oligarchy, then we might as well break up the Union right now and start over...because the common people are well and truly fucked.

And we know he won't be able to fight the billion or two GOP juggernaut, but it's a moot point.

is fading away.

There is a town hall tomorrow on Fox, but that's not what you are talking about.

Maybe get your facts straight before flinging poo?

comprehensive discussions, Hillary is adroit at playing on emotions, until she's Exposed she will play victim/savior to the hilt, HISTORY and what side has she really been on at every turn.

Why give Republicans ammunition if Hillary is the nominee?

could be hurting him for the general, but goes ahead anyway.

Can't have it both ways.

A candidate whose primary strategy largely revolves around depressing turnout? Yeah, she's really thinking ahead to the general.

forceful.

Avoid damaging her, but being forceful is a very very fine line to walk.

Sanders going off on Fox News would be a completely desperate move. Going crazy when you are behind in the delegate count is a surefire way to look desperate.

Regardless, Sanders going off and acting desperate is not a good look on any station. That never works for candidates who are trailing.

He has an ad about it, that she was for all those trade deals and he was against them and as a result of the trade deals 60,000 companies moved off shore

If Bernie can't win in Michigan with the difference in their records on trade, I don't know he can beat her for the nomination.

ever really explained to the voters in a way they could understand and relate to the voters might really be able to move their reps in Congress to make better deals. Having said that, trade agreements have been with us for a longer time than just since Bill Clinton's administration. Good paying jobs used to depend on markets that we could open abroad for our products. There is nothing inherently wrong with trade agreements properly enforced and leveraged. Just why do you think that small and large businesses fight hard to get the government to make trade deals?

I have zero doubt about that. My guess is she will take the same line on them as Iraq: namely, obfuscate: "Sure, we can talk about trade deals from 20 years ago all we want, but what we need to be talking about is solutions for the problems we face now."

Which is a lot like during the most recent Republican debate, when it was: "Sure, we could talk about whose to blame for the water crisis in Flint, but what we need to talk about are the solutions."

Here is where Bernie could deliver some powerful hits, IMO:
-If he anticipates whatever prep she is doing for the trade agreement questions and has a KO response
-If he finally connects the dots on the Walmart portion of his stump speech to Hillary & Alice Walton (he could also use the Walmart talking point to belie her current gun control line of attack--he had better trot that out now, because gun control is not a good GE issue for either candidate, so there's no time like the present to use it)
-If he directly asks Hillary: "Why do you think big money interests give you money? What do you suppose they think they are doing when they give you yoooj amounts of cash?"
-If he points out the way she has claimed to be the most "transparent" candidate but will still not release the transcripts--and that she has moved the goal posts on it (if she is really prepared, she will have prepped for him to use his current stump speech line about "must be some pretty good speeches," so he should be cautious employing that)
-If he mentions key instances where there has been a conflict of interest regarding the money she takes, such as the Clinton Foundation pay-for-play with repressive Middle Eastern regimes
-If he points out that she has recently disavowed any role in shaping the TPP, despite what has come out in Wikileaks showing the exact opposite
-If he can successfully demonstrate that she is the "No We Can't" candidate (e.g., "This is the country that sent a man to the moon, but you're telling me we can't insure every man, woman, and child in it, just like every other major country on earth? I don't accept that.&quot
-If, more than any of these things, he intentionally softens the blow of the aforementioned jabs by pointing out that this is not just about Hillary Clinton, it's about the Democratic and Republican Party establishments at large, as in: "The only thing Hillary is guilty of is playing the game. I'm saying the game is the problem." This would (again, IMO) come off as classy and depersonalizing, while still demonstrating the problem with the establishment overall. Just hammering on the usual Wall St. connections on its own is not enough because although many people may care about that, they may not care so strongly about it that they would switch their vote to Bernie.

There are probably some more areas he could hit that are fair game (i.e., policy-related), but this is what comes to mind at the moment.

I think Bernie has to stay right on all of it, from NAFTA up through the Columbia free trade agreement from the recent emails and TPP. Maybe a "why do you keep running away from your track record on this issue?" Remind the voters when they evaluate politicians, it is more important to look at what they've actually done than what they say they will do during a campaign. Remind them of Donahue from the Chamber of Commerce saying that he thought Hillary would ultimately support TPP after the election. Make her say she will not support it under any conditions.

That is, "Fine, if the bad policies and decisions you made or pushed 20 years ago don't matter, then I guess neither do your positive accomplishments. Either your record stands or it doesn't. You can't have it both ways."

If he can get her to guarantee she would not support it, full stop, and that's a campaign promise to which she can be held accountable--such as "if I went back on this, I wouldn't seek a second term"--then great. But he'll never get that. She is virtually incapable of answering basic yes or no questions without a lot of ambiguity.

She is always using them, even when asked something as simple as "do you tell the truth"?

is that there is no portion where the candidates can pose questions directly to one another.

IIRC, growing up I remember listening to Bernie do radio debates where this was allowed, and it tended to work heavily in his favor.

"That was 20 years ago, let's talk about the future"

1) go negative himself or 2) just keep on letting his keyboard minions do it for him, preserving his carefully crafted "better person than that" image.

is the fact that since Bernie is paying for that advice, he will continue to take it.

He'll handle it with the usual grace in action.

that's not Bernie's style.

Without some sharp exchanges, the media will bury this debate 5 minutes after it is over.

I hope like heck he proves me wrong.

Sid

It's all over but the petulance at this point.

Plus he should bat out of the park her false meme about effectiveness.

We can hope...

is going to give Bernie the extra energy tonight to knock it out of the debate ballpark like we've never seen...

Bernie knows he is not going to win and he needs to keep a good relationship with the probable next President.

If it were me, hell yes I would but it's not so.... do what you want, Bernie!!

The message is not resonating with the voters.

No need to be anxious or overzealous.

Will the media still be wondering if Bernie is about to get out?

OUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!