Bernie Sanders and the troubling interview with NY Daily News
mrussel1
Posts: 30,918
Bernie was seeking the endorsement of the Daily News and sat down on April 1 for an interview with the editorial board. Pretty standard stuff. But what came out of it is the crystallization of what some here on the AMT have been saying... Bernie's proposals are great, but how the hell do you do that?? And that's pretty much how it went for his bread and butter issues. I'm usually quite averse to posting someone else's editorial, but after reading the transcript, I thought this was a good summation.
Article: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/bernie-sanderss-rough-ride-with-the-daily-news/476919/
Transcript: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/transcript-bernie-sanders-meets-news-editorial-board-article-1.2588306
There’s little doubting Bernie Sanders’s core political convictions—he’s been saying the same things for decades, with remarkable consistency. But turning convictions into policy is the challenge, and the Vermont senator’s interview with the editorial board of the New York Daily News raises some questions about his policy chops.
Throughout his interview, Sanders seemed taken aback when he was pressed on policy—and not just on the matters that are peripheral to his approach, like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or interrogation of detainees, but even on bread-and-butter matters like breaking up the big banks, the Democratic presidential hopeful came across as tentative, unprepared, or unaware.
It’s striking that there hasn’t been more coverage of Sanders’s policy ideas so far during the campaign, even at this late date, with most of the primary season concluded. He’s even acquired a reputation as something of a wonk, the kind of guy who eschews soaring rhetoric for dry nuts and bolts on the stump—and gets people to love him anyway. The gaps uncovered by the Daily News are not just about pragmatism. (There have, of course, been plenty of accusations, not least from Hillary Clinton’s campaign, that Sanders is offering a deeply unrealistic program. He tends to answer that they fail to grasp that he is building a political revolution.) The question here is not how Sanders would enact policies, but what those policies would be. If the Sanders campaign has shied away from deep dives into policy, this interview might be why: The candidate reveals himself as a far defter diagnostician than clinician.
The most glaring example came early in the encounter, during a discussion of the problem of “too big to fail” banks. There is disagreement among economists on the left over how important, if at all, it is to break up large financial institutions. The board granted Sanders’s argument and asked him how he’d do it, producing an excruciating cat-and-mouse game:
Daily News: Okay. Well, let's assume that you're correct on that point. How do you go about doing it?
Sanders: How you go about doing it is having legislation passed, or giving the authority to the secretary of treasury to determine, under Dodd-Frank, that these banks are a danger to the economy over the problem of too-big-to-fail.
Daily News: But do you think that the Fed, now, has that authority?
Sanders: Well, I don't know if the Fed has it. But I think the administration can have it.
Daily News: How? How does a President turn to JPMorgan Chase, or have the Treasury turn to any of those banks and say, "Now you must do X, Y and Z?"
Sanders: Well, you do have authority under the Dodd-Frank legislation to do that, make that determination.
Daily News: You do, just by Federal Reserve fiat, you do?
Sanders: Yeah. Well, I believe you do.
The conversation detoured sideways a bit, as the board asked about what would happen to employees and investors in big banks and Sanders said, not unfairly, that it wasn’t his problem. But then it was back to how to break up the banks, and Sanders still couldn’t offer a coherent answer:
Daily News: Well, it does depend on how you do it, I believe. And, I'm a little bit confused because just a few minutes ago you said the U.S. President would have authority to order...
Sanders: No, I did not say we would order. I did not say that we would order. The President is not a dictator.
Daily News: Okay. You would then leave it to JPMorgan Chase or the others to figure out how to break it, themselves up. I'm not quite...
Sanders: You would determine is that, if a bank is too big to fail, it is too big to exist. And then you have the secretary of treasury and some people who know a lot about this, making that determination. If the determination is that Goldman Sachs or JPMorgan Chase is too big to fail, yes, they will be broken up.
Daily News: Okay. You saw, I guess, what happened with Metropolitan Life. There was an attempt to bring them under the financial regulatory scheme, and the court said no. And what does that presage for your program?
Sanders: It's something I have not studied, honestly, the legal implications of that.
The interview is full of vague comments like that one. For example, Sanders complains that executives implicated in the financial crisis haven’t been prosecuted. A board member asked him whether there are actually laws that could have nailed them. “I suspect that there are. Yes,” Sanders answered.
Daily News: You believe that? But do you know?
Sanders: I believe that that is the case. Do I have them in front of me, now, legal statutes? No, I don't. But if I would...yeah, that's what I believe, yes. When a company pays a $5 billion fine for doing something that's illegal, yeah, I think we can bring charges against the executives.
Daily News: I'm only pressing because you've made it such a central part of your campaign. And I wanted to know what the mechanism would be to accomplish it.
Rather than learning the mechanism, the questioner earned a lecture about how Wall Street is built on fraud, since Sanders is comfortable talking about why he doesn’t approve of Wall Street’s M.O.
Sanders is the candidate of first principles. That’s a phenomenon that’s been on display repeatedly during the Democratic debates, especially on matters of foreign policy. On the one hand, there’s Hillary Clinton, who has an encyclopedic knowledge of the Middle East, but also backed the war in Iraq, thus botching the most important foreign-policy decision since Vietnam. On the other hand, there’s Sanders, whose answers about the Middle East are often opaque—see his call for a “Muslim army” to defeat ISIS—but whose gut led him to the correct decision on Iraq. Democratic voters may have to choose whether they prefer Clinton’s poor judgment or Sanders’s ignorance.
The latter was on display at the Daily News during an exchange about the peace process. Could he describe the pullback of Israeli settlements in the West Bank he has encouraged? No: “I'm not going to run the Israeli government. I've got enough problems trying to be a United States senator or maybe President of the United States.”
A moment later, he was asked why he didn’t support Palestinians using the International Criminal Court to try to prosecute Israeli leaders. “Look, why don't I support a million things in the world? I'm just telling you that I happen to believe,” the exasperated senator replied.
That’s just the problem, though. It’s important for leaders to know what they believe in, and Sanders has been unusually consistent and forthright about that. But Sanders isn’t running for chief ideologue—he’s running for chief executive, and so it’s also important for him to know what policies he would use to turn those beliefs into practice.
Article: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/bernie-sanderss-rough-ride-with-the-daily-news/476919/
Transcript: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/transcript-bernie-sanders-meets-news-editorial-board-article-1.2588306
There’s little doubting Bernie Sanders’s core political convictions—he’s been saying the same things for decades, with remarkable consistency. But turning convictions into policy is the challenge, and the Vermont senator’s interview with the editorial board of the New York Daily News raises some questions about his policy chops.
Throughout his interview, Sanders seemed taken aback when he was pressed on policy—and not just on the matters that are peripheral to his approach, like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or interrogation of detainees, but even on bread-and-butter matters like breaking up the big banks, the Democratic presidential hopeful came across as tentative, unprepared, or unaware.
It’s striking that there hasn’t been more coverage of Sanders’s policy ideas so far during the campaign, even at this late date, with most of the primary season concluded. He’s even acquired a reputation as something of a wonk, the kind of guy who eschews soaring rhetoric for dry nuts and bolts on the stump—and gets people to love him anyway. The gaps uncovered by the Daily News are not just about pragmatism. (There have, of course, been plenty of accusations, not least from Hillary Clinton’s campaign, that Sanders is offering a deeply unrealistic program. He tends to answer that they fail to grasp that he is building a political revolution.) The question here is not how Sanders would enact policies, but what those policies would be. If the Sanders campaign has shied away from deep dives into policy, this interview might be why: The candidate reveals himself as a far defter diagnostician than clinician.
The most glaring example came early in the encounter, during a discussion of the problem of “too big to fail” banks. There is disagreement among economists on the left over how important, if at all, it is to break up large financial institutions. The board granted Sanders’s argument and asked him how he’d do it, producing an excruciating cat-and-mouse game:
Daily News: Okay. Well, let's assume that you're correct on that point. How do you go about doing it?
Sanders: How you go about doing it is having legislation passed, or giving the authority to the secretary of treasury to determine, under Dodd-Frank, that these banks are a danger to the economy over the problem of too-big-to-fail.
Daily News: But do you think that the Fed, now, has that authority?
Sanders: Well, I don't know if the Fed has it. But I think the administration can have it.
Daily News: How? How does a President turn to JPMorgan Chase, or have the Treasury turn to any of those banks and say, "Now you must do X, Y and Z?"
Sanders: Well, you do have authority under the Dodd-Frank legislation to do that, make that determination.
Daily News: You do, just by Federal Reserve fiat, you do?
Sanders: Yeah. Well, I believe you do.
The conversation detoured sideways a bit, as the board asked about what would happen to employees and investors in big banks and Sanders said, not unfairly, that it wasn’t his problem. But then it was back to how to break up the banks, and Sanders still couldn’t offer a coherent answer:
Daily News: Well, it does depend on how you do it, I believe. And, I'm a little bit confused because just a few minutes ago you said the U.S. President would have authority to order...
Sanders: No, I did not say we would order. I did not say that we would order. The President is not a dictator.
Daily News: Okay. You would then leave it to JPMorgan Chase or the others to figure out how to break it, themselves up. I'm not quite...
Sanders: You would determine is that, if a bank is too big to fail, it is too big to exist. And then you have the secretary of treasury and some people who know a lot about this, making that determination. If the determination is that Goldman Sachs or JPMorgan Chase is too big to fail, yes, they will be broken up.
Daily News: Okay. You saw, I guess, what happened with Metropolitan Life. There was an attempt to bring them under the financial regulatory scheme, and the court said no. And what does that presage for your program?
Sanders: It's something I have not studied, honestly, the legal implications of that.
The interview is full of vague comments like that one. For example, Sanders complains that executives implicated in the financial crisis haven’t been prosecuted. A board member asked him whether there are actually laws that could have nailed them. “I suspect that there are. Yes,” Sanders answered.
Daily News: You believe that? But do you know?
Sanders: I believe that that is the case. Do I have them in front of me, now, legal statutes? No, I don't. But if I would...yeah, that's what I believe, yes. When a company pays a $5 billion fine for doing something that's illegal, yeah, I think we can bring charges against the executives.
Daily News: I'm only pressing because you've made it such a central part of your campaign. And I wanted to know what the mechanism would be to accomplish it.
Rather than learning the mechanism, the questioner earned a lecture about how Wall Street is built on fraud, since Sanders is comfortable talking about why he doesn’t approve of Wall Street’s M.O.
Sanders is the candidate of first principles. That’s a phenomenon that’s been on display repeatedly during the Democratic debates, especially on matters of foreign policy. On the one hand, there’s Hillary Clinton, who has an encyclopedic knowledge of the Middle East, but also backed the war in Iraq, thus botching the most important foreign-policy decision since Vietnam. On the other hand, there’s Sanders, whose answers about the Middle East are often opaque—see his call for a “Muslim army” to defeat ISIS—but whose gut led him to the correct decision on Iraq. Democratic voters may have to choose whether they prefer Clinton’s poor judgment or Sanders’s ignorance.
The latter was on display at the Daily News during an exchange about the peace process. Could he describe the pullback of Israeli settlements in the West Bank he has encouraged? No: “I'm not going to run the Israeli government. I've got enough problems trying to be a United States senator or maybe President of the United States.”
A moment later, he was asked why he didn’t support Palestinians using the International Criminal Court to try to prosecute Israeli leaders. “Look, why don't I support a million things in the world? I'm just telling you that I happen to believe,” the exasperated senator replied.
That’s just the problem, though. It’s important for leaders to know what they believe in, and Sanders has been unusually consistent and forthright about that. But Sanders isn’t running for chief ideologue—he’s running for chief executive, and so it’s also important for him to know what policies he would use to turn those beliefs into practice.
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Comments
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Well, Trump would have even less knowledge of what to do and Hillary works for those who stand to make the most money so I still go with Bernie. Who ever gets there will have advisors. The president is not a dictator or a god. He or she is our head of state but they don't act alone. They all have had help from advisors, committees, Bono, etc. . I don't want a wacko like Trump there nor someone mean, dishonest, bitter like Hillary there. Bernie will do fine. Hell, we got through Bush.
(Hey, I wanna hear some laughs for that "Bono" thing
) "It's a sad and beautiful world"-Roberto Benigni0 -
Trump would be worse, no doubt. But perhaps the campaign promises CANNOT be enacted.brianlux said:Well, Trump would have even less knowledge of what to do and Hillary works for those who stand to make the most money so I still go with Bernie. Who ever gets there will have advisors. The president is not a dictator or a god. He or she is our head of state but they don't act alone. They all have had help from advisors, committees, Bono, etc. . I don't want a wacko like Trump there nor someone mean, dishonest, bitter like Hillary there. Bernie will do fine. Hell, we got through Bush.
(Hey, I wanna hear some laughs for that "Bono" thing )
How do you rail about putting executives in jail when you don't know if there is a statute to support it? That's pretty fundamental.
How do you say 'break up the banks' in one breath, and then in the next say "I would not order it".
I think there's some cognitive disconnect here between a speech and available action.0 -
^^ I don't recall railing about putting execs in jail. Nor the bank thing.
I just have to go with what I see as the more forthright and honest person. I don't want a crank for president. And besides, the system needs some shaking up. You can't support the big money guys forever and not expect the base to crumble. And ever more importantly, we need someone who is very and sincerely concerned about the planet. No planet, no president, no you, no me. Bernis is more focused that way."It's a sad and beautiful world"-Roberto Benigni0 -
New York is a Hillary territory. I'd be hard pressed to think any newspaper would endorse Bernie here.
Just sayin.0 -
That is true, but not what was troubling to me. It's the limited knowledge of HOW he could implement his agenda. Throw in the fact that he isn't contributing to the down ballot races to build a coalition in Congress, and it casts even more doubt on his ability to push these audacious talking points through the equal branch of gov't.tempo_n_groove said:New York is a Hillary territory. I'd be hard pressed to think any newspaper would endorse Bernie here.
Just sayin.0 -
i agree with you 100% on his inability to enact real change if elected ... i've been consistent with that message ... but it still begs the question - what do you hope for? ... does the status quo inspire you? ... that's what Clinton is offering ... more inequality, more war profiteering, more corporatization of gov't ...mrussel1 said:
That is true, but not what was troubling to me. It's the limited knowledge of HOW he could implement his agenda. Throw in the fact that he isn't contributing to the down ballot races to build a coalition in Congress, and it casts even more doubt on his ability to push these audacious talking points through the equal branch of gov't.tempo_n_groove said:New York is a Hillary territory. I'd be hard pressed to think any newspaper would endorse Bernie here.
Just sayin.
EVEN if Sanders is a lame duck president - maybe his election can start the dominioes falling in the direction they should be ... ??0 -
There are two impediments: the constitutional ability to make the change and then the congressional ability to make the change. From what I can tell, on some of his bigger statements, he doesn't have a real plan for either.polaris_x said:
i agree with you 100% on his inability to enact real change if elected ... i've been consistent with that message ... but it still begs the question - what do you hope for? ... does the status quo inspire you? ... that's what Clinton is offering ... more inequality, more war profiteering, more corporatization of gov't ...mrussel1 said:
That is true, but not what was troubling to me. It's the limited knowledge of HOW he could implement his agenda. Throw in the fact that he isn't contributing to the down ballot races to build a coalition in Congress, and it casts even more doubt on his ability to push these audacious talking points through the equal branch of gov't.tempo_n_groove said:New York is a Hillary territory. I'd be hard pressed to think any newspaper would endorse Bernie here.
Just sayin.
EVEN if Sanders is a lame duck president - maybe his election can start the dominioes falling in the direction they should be ... ??
Regarding HRC, I think she is offering a continuation of Obama's agenda. That's a progressive, incremental agenda that allows change without massive disruption (read stock crashes, high unemployment, inflation, etc.). For me, that is much more desirable than the sexy 'revolution'.0 -
Bernie is the trump of the dems. All words, no idea how to get it done. Playing off hatred and fear to get attention and votes. Just keep repeating the mantra that something isn't fair and it will be better.... Just trust me.....
And neither would be good for the country.hippiemom = goodness0 -
As we get older, we stop asking just "what"... it also is "how", "how much" and "what's the trade off"cincybearcat said:Bernie is the trump of the dems. All words, no idea how to get it done. Playing off hatred and fear to get attention and votes. Just keep repeating the mantra that something isn't fair and it will be better.... Just trust me.....
And neither would be good for the country.
One thing that hasn't been mentioned by anyone is the debt. That's still a growing and gathering threat to our economy, particularly if we are going to start a trade war with China (which both Trump and Sanders both implicitly advocate). They own a lot of our debt.
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not even close ...cincybearcat said:Bernie is the trump of the dems. All words, no idea how to get it done. Playing off hatred and fear to get attention and votes. Just keep repeating the mantra that something isn't fair and it will be better.... Just trust me.....
And neither would be good for the country.
sanders problems are what mrussel1 said ... it's basically a system that doesn't allow for changes because it is already rigged to be controlled by special interests and corporations ... a far cry from trump who basically just rants ...0 -
progressive is relative i suppose ...mrussel1 said:
There are two impediments: the constitutional ability to make the change and then the congressional ability to make the change. From what I can tell, on some of his bigger statements, he doesn't have a real plan for either.polaris_x said:
i agree with you 100% on his inability to enact real change if elected ... i've been consistent with that message ... but it still begs the question - what do you hope for? ... does the status quo inspire you? ... that's what Clinton is offering ... more inequality, more war profiteering, more corporatization of gov't ...mrussel1 said:
That is true, but not what was troubling to me. It's the limited knowledge of HOW he could implement his agenda. Throw in the fact that he isn't contributing to the down ballot races to build a coalition in Congress, and it casts even more doubt on his ability to push these audacious talking points through the equal branch of gov't.tempo_n_groove said:New York is a Hillary territory. I'd be hard pressed to think any newspaper would endorse Bernie here.
Just sayin.
EVEN if Sanders is a lame duck president - maybe his election can start the dominioes falling in the direction they should be ... ??
Regarding HRC, I think she is offering a continuation of Obama's agenda. That's a progressive, incremental agenda that allows change without massive disruption (read stock crashes, high unemployment, inflation, etc.). For me, that is much more desirable than the sexy 'revolution'.
so, you are ok with continued war profiteering? foreign policies that disrupt sovereign nations? the continued spending of 50% of discretionary spending on the military?
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No, I don't support the military industrial complex. I never supported Iraq or specifically nation building. However, I am not in favor of a total hand's off policy. For example, the US is right to intervene in the Ukraine. For about 20 reasons, we can't allow Russia to proffer large regions of the country, including the major ports. The Russian Bear is a threat and we have to wage the same proxy war they are waging.0
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but ultimately the mic can be fed because stability in the empire must be maintained?mrussel1 said:No, I don't support the military industrial complex. I never supported Iraq or specifically nation building. However, I am not in favor of a total hand's off policy. For example, the US is right to intervene in the Ukraine. For about 20 reasons, we can't allow Russia to proffer large regions of the country, including the major ports. The Russian Bear is a threat and we have to wage the same proxy war they are waging.
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What happened last time the Russians had an empire? Or the Japanese? Or the Germans? All of those were preceded by periods of isolationism.polaris_x said:
but ultimately the mic can be fed because stability in the empire must be maintained?mrussel1 said:No, I don't support the military industrial complex. I never supported Iraq or specifically nation building. However, I am not in favor of a total hand's off policy. For example, the US is right to intervene in the Ukraine. For about 20 reasons, we can't allow Russia to proffer large regions of the country, including the major ports. The Russian Bear is a threat and we have to wage the same proxy war they are waging.
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Their opinions are polar opposite, there methods are the same as is the definition behind their positions.polaris_x said:
not even close ...cincybearcat said:Bernie is the trump of the dems. All words, no idea how to get it done. Playing off hatred and fear to get attention and votes. Just keep repeating the mantra that something isn't fair and it will be better.... Just trust me.....
And neither would be good for the country.
sanders problems are what mrussel1 said ... it's basically a system that doesn't allow for changes because it is already rigged to be controlled by special interests and corporations ... a far cry from trump who basically just rants ...
hippiemom = goodness0 -
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Although their positions on trade are the same. Protectionism and tariffs have never been a good economic policy. And the mass of workers unemployed without the right skills is not unique during dramatic economic changes. The same thing happened at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the break down of the steel industry, coal mining, etc. I'm not saying it's good for individuals. It's not. But automation is just as much of a 'menace' as factory jobs going overseas.cincybearcat said:
Their opinions are polar opposite, there methods are the same as is the definition behind their positions.polaris_x said:
not even close ...cincybearcat said:Bernie is the trump of the dems. All words, no idea how to get it done. Playing off hatred and fear to get attention and votes. Just keep repeating the mantra that something isn't fair and it will be better.... Just trust me.....
And neither would be good for the country.
sanders problems are what mrussel1 said ... it's basically a system that doesn't allow for changes because it is already rigged to be controlled by special interests and corporations ... a far cry from trump who basically just rants ...
I always wonder if people are prepared to pay the massive price increases on consumer goods (iphones, TVs, appliances, etc.) were we really to rebuild mass manufacturing in this country.0 -
Okay so this is saying that Congress would have to pass a new set of laws to break up the banks. That's absolutely true, and absolutely not what Sanders said, The point is that he is unclear on how to execute on his signature policy.cottagesteeze said:
Secondarily they could raise capital requirements to force a break up. I guess that's somewhat true although the Banks have voluntarily (under Fed approval and support) operated under Basel requirements (now basel iii). Raising them to the point to force a breakup (well above Basel) would 1. Make US banks highly uncompetitive world wide, damaging US investors greatly and 2. actually dissolve banks, not break them up. If you can't meet the requirements (as a % of outstandings) in totality, how in the world will the new entities meet them?
I can't really tell if this writer is defending Bernie, doing his research for him, or what. But either way, it really doesn't change the concern. It's his policies. Why does the NYT write a follow up to his flub?0 -
Trump = polar opposite of Sanders? Haha- you guys crack me up.
"It's a sad and beautiful world"-Roberto Benigni0
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