Exactly. Sanders may have been a career politician, meaning his presidency may have been more stable, but the same populist forces that led to the Trump presidency also fueled the rise of Sanders. Largely economic anxiety and a sense that mainstream politicians were untrustworthy.

It seems that most people just think "orange man bad" without trying whatsoever to understand why people would vote for him over a normal candidate.

>That's almost exactly symmetric to the Republican situation

Is it? Do you really think that if Bernie won in 2016 and then lost in 2020 he would call upon his supporters to storm the Capitol?

It’s just completely ahistorical too. Democratic voters picked HRC over Bernie and then they picked Biden over Bernie 4 years later. There was no conspiracy or “party machinery” involved as much as that pains the Bernie wing of the party.

Republican voters overwhelmingly picked Trump - and then turned out millions more in 2020 after they saw what he had done with the Oval Office. Just no remote equivocation between the two parties.

Democratic primary voters were leaning a few points towards Bernie. Then the DNC gave Hillary - and not Bernie - the debate questions in advance. The superdelegates - delegates that didn't come from primaries - also tilted strongly for Hillary. So no, I don't think it's completely ahistorical. It's at least somewhat ahistorical to say that Democratic voters picked HRC over Bernie in 2016. The DNC picked Hillary. The voters? Bernie had the edge, at least before the tilted debate.

Read the actual question that they “tipped” to Hillary - it was literally about lead poisoning in water at a debate in Flint, Michigan.

And read the timeline here:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Democratic_Party_presid...

Bernie never had an edge; he lost 4 of the first 5 contests and finished with nearly 4 million fewer votes. It’s no secret the party apparatus preferred Hillary - to their great detriment given what happened in the general - but it absolutely ahistorical to insist that Bernie was somehow cheated out of anything.

Hmm. It appears that my memory is faulty.

It's just right wing propaganda taking its effect.

You remember that the democrats stole the election from Bernie because the GOP wanted democrats to not be excited about voting for hilary, so they spread the message as much as they could

I don't think it's that simple. I think it was at least as much left-wing propaganda that "Bernie is winning!"

Of course Bernie wouldn't call on his supporters to storm the capital. But then again neither did Trump. That didn't stop some of them from doing it however.

Trump had years of fomenting and approving of violence. Offering to pay legal fees for anyone who attacked his detractors. "Stand back and stand by", etc.

He might as well said "it sure would be a shame if someone was to storm that nice capitol building there"

He told them march to the capitol to make their voices heard, while Rudy demanded trial by combat and other speakers whipped the crowd up into a rabid rage.

But... contrary to what OP states, Trump didn't say that.

"He might as well have" is not accurate either.