As I survey the wreckage of Super Tuesday, alas, I have the uneasy feeling that we could have done it again, only this time, Massachusetts, we missed our cue. Here's why. With a shift of just 2% or so of the Democratic primary voters, yesterday's headlines would have read "Sanders wins Mainstream Blue State," along with his victories in the Minnesota caucuses, in New Hampshire, and his near-miss in Iowa. Instead of post-mortems on his insurgency, which they would now like to reduce to a symbolic tour, the Times and others would have had to face a crucial fact: while Clinton piles up delegates in red states that she will never carry in November, Sanders is igniting fires in blue states where it really counts.
Would it really matter, though, if we were waking up today to a narrow Sanders victory? Here's why I think so. Trump is beginning to raise the specter of a real threat--say "President Trump to yourself five times out loud--and the reason is fervor: for all the wrong reasons, people are turning out for him in historic numbers, new voters or usual stay-at-homes, galvanized by his unsavory aggressions. [I will return to the question of this perverse appeal in a future post.] Against what could become a juggernaut, Hillary Clinton is a disturbing counter-force. Not many voters really, really like her. But, you say, they will get highly motivated by fear of Trump. Maybe, but turnout to vote against someone is never as effective as voting for your hero. And the turnout on Tuesday showed just that: Trump's actual voter counts reached historic highs, while Clinton and the Democrats were turning out 30% fewer voters than Obama in previous cycles. Think about that: it's a disastrous number.
This is not the fault of Sanders. Everyone agrees he is bringing new voters into the process, importing the kind of true-believer zeal that carried Obama, and could carry Sanders in a general election. Hillary? Not so much. Will she benefit vicariously from all the excitement she squelched six months before the election? Don't count on it.
But all this is just a big what-if, because Sanders didn't quite make it in Massachusetts, and the mainstreamers, always eager to discount Bernie, will now have their way. Yes, Clinton could still stumble, and big delegate pools in Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, California, and the other key states might still tilt Bernie's way. Unlikely, but possible. But IF ONLY Bernie had the momentum of winning a major, certified blue state like Massachusetts, instead of coming close but losing, that feat would be a whole lot less improbable. That's the shame of Massachusetts, and of voters like me who showed up for Bernie but didn't lift a finger to campaign for him. We missed our rendezvous with history, folks, and in November we could be paying big-time for our mistake.
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