Thread by @AlexandraErin

"Why do you need a candidate to speak about helping women in particular if he says he'll fight for everyone? Isn't 'everyone' inclusive? Isn't 'everyone' enough?"

A lot of us have been left behind by plans and policies that were aimed at "everyone".

Every time you dismiss someone's reason for not voting for Bernie -- especially when they're actively looking for reassurance, for reasons to come over -- you're just reinforcing those reasons.

I say again that to win the primary for progressives, we need diplomacy and not defensiveness.

I think Joe Biden's means testing and other aspects of his approach are going to exclude and leave behind way more people than Bernie's solutions. I'm on board with Bernie.

But I understand why people can be turned off by "everyone" with a dismissal of the value of specificity.

I want universal benefits, universal safety nets, universal programs... help for everyone predicated on the belief that it's better to give a hand to someone who doesn't need it than risk anyone following through the cracks.

So I'm for Bernie in this race.

But it's hard to get people on board when the answer to "I am afraid he won't understand my concerns" is "Why does he need to hear your concerns?"

And I think this is more a messaging problem than a policy problem, I really do. I keep hoping we'll see more of a pivot from Bernie on how he sells himself and his vision after Super Tuesday but so far I'm disappointed.

And to me it's just super obvious and logical that between Biden and Bernie, you've got Biden who is definitely not going to bring everyone along, and Bernie who has everyone as his goal, Bernie's more likely to get closer to helping all of us.

But. Situations are complicated.

And something I positively rage about on here, regularly, is how people have lower standards for Republicans than for Democrats because they don't expect better of Republicans but Democrats can disappoint them.

And I think this happens with liberal Democrats vs. left, too.

That is, psychologically maybe some people are less disappointed by the obvious holes in Biden's plans than they are by the fear of holes in Bernie's, because Bernie promises more. Their expectations are higher so the fear is higher.

I don't think that's the only factor, and I hate that is a factor, but I think it is a factor.

And if you think it's silly that someone would let fear of being disappointed that his better solutions have flaws that still probably make them better than Biden's... understand, again, that situations and people are complicated. Almost no one's got just one reason for anything.

But for someone who's on the fence about Bernie for multiple reasons, and among those reasons is they don't find the one-size-fits-all messaging reassuring? That's a thing that could be fixed. And then they have one less reason to be on the fence.

And frankly, a lot of the reasons bleed together and overlap with each other. The Bernie campaign getting a little more reflective and responsive and "listening tour"-y would also help calm qualms about toxicity and about being too personality-driven.

Imagine if instead of cancelling stops in the south, cancelling speeches on race... the campaign replaced them with listen-ins? I can understand why Bernie might feel like giving a speech on race for a Black audience might not be a winning proposition. But there's other options.

I think this whole primary season has shown us that the race is more volatile than anyone likes to think, which means it's not too late to swing the odds with a different approach.

But I don't see that.

And I think a lot of the fencers are also looking for a change in approach, which would just right off the bat by its existence show that the campaign is responsive to the concerns of people not in the base.

Anyway.

Not giving up. Even in the face of distressing poll numbers, I still choose to hope. Hope for a progressive victory, hope for support for progressive policies to continue to grow in a way that makes them from political impossibilities to political inevitabilities.