Can The Economic Royalists Derail Bernie Next Saturday In South Carolina?

South Carolina's primary is in 5 days. Biden's mammoth, untouchable lead has been touched. The newest state poll, from CBS News. Status Quo Joe is still in the lead, but barely:

• Status Quo Joe- 28%
• Bernie- 23%
• Steyer- 18%
• Elizabeth- 12%
• Mayo Pete- 10%
• Klobuchar- 4%
• Tulsi- 1%

South Carolina is Biden's "firewall" and if he doesn't win there... it all falls apart fast. Yesterday, on Meet the Press, Democratic machine party boss Jim Clyburn announced he will endorse Status Quo Joe on Wednesday. I don't think political endorsements mean much... but Clyburn is an exception among South Carolina African American Dems. Clyburn, a conservative Democrat, was also on ABC’s This Week, where he took a poke at Bernie: "I do believe it will be an extra burden for us to have to carry. This is South Carolina, and South Carolinians are pretty leery about that title socialist."

Democratic establishment hack, Jim Clyburn (who'll be 80 in July and who presides over one of America's most gerrymandered districts) may be about to jump aboard the sinking SS Biden, but today South Carolina's Republican senator, Tim Scott, claimed on CBS' This Morning that Bernie is the Democrat Republicans fear most. Bernie, he said "brings that outside game in a similar fashion that President Trump did in 2016. Think about the similarities. In 2016, Republican leadership, Republican wisdom said that there is no way in the world out of the 17 candidates, Donald Trump will be the president. I think it's very similar... If he's on his game as he was at the State of the Union, I don't think there is a candidate in the country that can beat him. If there is a second choice other than himself, it would be Bernie Sanders... Bernie Sanders is doing something in 2020 that he could not do in 2016, which is getting African Americans and Hispanic voters to take a second look at his campaign. I think perhaps a primary reason is health care. If you look at what stands out the most in his campaign is he is undeniable a socialist, but he is strong and clear and competent on the issues he supports and the issue of health care is a big issue in the African-American community and I think it is the issue for why he ended up with 51% of the Hispanic vote in Nevada." The candidate who would be the easiest for Trump to beat? Scott points right at Mini-Mike.

Meanwhile, Axios reported that the anti-working class sewer money PAC, the Big Tent Project, has sent hundreds of thousands of mailers bashing Bernie Sanders to 215,000 black voters in South Carolina who voted in the state's 2016 primary.

The mailing, which cost around $100,000, charges-- without any proof-- Bernie platform is unrealistic and too expensive, exactly what the economic royalists (and the Republicans) said about FDR and the New Deal. They are also repeating the false claim that has become the Democratic establishment's mantra: "Trump will crush Bernie on taxes and spending... Nominating Bernie means we re-elect Trump."

Although-- like all sewer money groups-- they are hiding their donors from the public, they plan to spend another $700,000 smearing Bernie and his platform in South Carolina this week. Last week Big Tent dropped $200,000 attacking Bernie in Nevada, which seems to have made him more popular and drove up his numbers. Keep in mind that right-wing Democrat, Jonathan Kott, former press secretary for Joe Manchin, is running Big Tent, a pretty clear indication that all of their money will be wasted.

Kott, who was always consider a third rate Hill staffer, told Politico last week that "Despite over 50 years in public life, Bernie Sanders has never been fully vetted. The Big Tent Project will shed light on his record of politically toxic policy proposals starting in Nevada and South Carolina. Voters need to understand that his well-known plans to kick union employees off their health care plans and end all private insurance, raise middle-class taxes and double the size of the government, and his less well-known radical views, like his efforts to dump nuclear waste in Hispanic communities, will repel many general-election voters. Either this stuff is debated now, when Democrats have time to consider it fully, or it will come out in the fall, in a torrent of negative ads by the Trump team that would likely prove politically fatal. Democrats deserve the facts before they choose a nominee."

Want the facts? Check out Marianne Williamson's speech in Austin when she endorsed Bernie on Sunday: