Sanders Doesn’t Have a Revolution Yet

The Lid: “There’s absolutely no question that he’s built a formidable coalition that’s making him a real threat to the establishment. But if ‘revolution’ by involving a massive amount of new people in the political process is the goal, the two nominating contests in the books already aren’t slam-dunk advertisements for the plan so far. Democratic turnout in BOTH Iowa and New Hampshire was DOWN from 2008. New participants made up 44% of the electorate in this year’s Democratic contest in Iowa, down from 57% eight years ago. In New Hampshire, newcomers participated at about the same rate as in 2008.”

“Yes, he’s raising massive amounts of money from small donors, which is an important data point here too. And yes, we’re only talking about the first two states, and there’s a lot of politicking left to come. But we’ll have to see some more raw vote totals — and an expansion of Sanders’ coalition in more diverse states — to be convinced that his movement is surpassing the scale of what Obama put together eight years ago.”