2020 Presidential Election

[CJD]

(03-05-2020, 12:52 AM)BmorePat87 Wrote: I don’t know if that’s more correct, it’s just semantics that ends with no private insurance.

I also don’t get the argument that you have to start at the extreme end for a few reasons. The first is that Republicans know a majority of Democrats don’t even support it so it’s DOA. The second is that enough people are saying this so Republicans know it’s not a sincere starting point.

Well, it's semantics where one has a clearly negative connotation ("Bernie wants to take something from you!") whereas the other is either a neutral or positive connotation ("Bernie wants to replace your price gouging private insurance with a more affordable, more expansive public insurance").

As far as the starting farther than what you actually expect to get...it's just a negotiation tool. It's like when you get newly hired from the job and they offer you $50,000. You counter with $60,000, not necessarily because you expect that they just say "okay" but more because you know that if you ask for $60k, they will counter at $55k, which is about what you wanted anyway.

If you start with a counteroffer of $55k, then they'll counter with $52.5k.

It's just a general principal that you should ALWAYS ask for more than you think you can get. It's a framing device. In politics, you can think of it similarly to how you think of the Overton window. 

Asking for more than you think you can get (or doing more than you think you can get away with) is, quite literally, how the Overton window shifts. Trump has been doing it for 3 years for social issues. Bernie has been doing it for 3 years with medical coverage. Without Bernie pushing for Universal Healthcare in 2016, we probably would not be talking about a comprehensive public option as a possibility in 2020.

There's no reason to stop pushing the window left now.