You can also find polls that suggest 70% of Americans oppose abolition of private insurance, an integral component of Medicare for All.  Generally MFA polls well only in surveys where abolition of private insurance is not mentioned.  I'd be curious if you could cite any poll in which MFA polls better than 50% AND abolition of private insurance is clearly discussed in the wording of the poll.  I'm skeptical that any such poll exists.

I'm not saying MFA is a bad idea, simply that a majority of Americans oppose it when they understand what it actually entails.  And it is unlikely Sanders (or anyone else) is going to be able to convince them in the near term.  Remember how easy it was to scare a majority of voters into being opposed to Obamacare?

People fear change.  People who already have insurance fear that the benefits they receive will be worse with MFA. Medicare for retirees did not take away anything, so it was doable politically.   

It's hard to win elections by promising to take away something people already have, even if what they already have is not ideal and is in fact flawed in many ways.  Sanders is foolish to run on such a principle and I fear he will lose if he is nominated.

You can also find polls that suggest 70% of Americans oppose abolition of private insurance, an integral component of Medicare for All.  Generally MFA polls well only in surveys where abolition of private insurance is not mentioned.  I'd be curious if you could cite any poll in which MFA polls better than 50% in which abolition of private insurance is clearly discussed in the wording of the poll.  I'm skeptical that any such poll exists.

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Medicare for All doesn't necessarily abolish private insurance.  You can currently buy medicare supplements from private insurance companies.  That would continue to be possible in a Medicare for All scenario.  Now, if the base Medicare plan is so popular that nobody wants to buy private supplements, then that's the market at work, isn't it?

And fiddling with wording in polls is admitting that you're exploiting peoples' ignorance.  Most of these polls find that once people have explained to them that Medicare for All will be accepted by all of their doctors and cover all of their prescriptions, they don't care about their insurance.  People love their doctors.  Nobody loves their insurance company.

Again, I'd be curious to see a poll in which MFA is clearly explained (including its impact on current benefits/insurance) in which it polls above 50%.   

Regardless, Republicans do exploit peoples' ignorance (and fear).  They are quite effective at it.  Educating people about MFA and persuading them that it would be a better system is something to do after you are elected... it's not an effective way to get elected, since you are giving yourself an uphill climb at the outset.  "I'm going to take away what you already have but replace it with something better" is an appeal that makes people suspicious and fearful.  In taking such an approach, Sanders is handing Trump a golden opportunity to turn people against him.  It's poor strategy, particularly given the fact Sanders is promising something he has no viable means to deliver. 

It's poor strategy, particularly given the fact Sanders is promising something he has no viable means to deliver.  

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Yeah, that would be like getting elected by promising to build a giant wall along the southern border.  Or imprison your opponent.  Or repeal millions of peoples' only means of insurance with only vague promises of a replacement.

Giving everyone access to Medicare, canceling student debt, and making state colleges, community colleges, and vocational schools tuition-free is totally unrealistic, bizarre, and complicated in comparison.

Steve DeYoung wrote: Yeah, that would be like getting elected by promising to build a giant wall along the southern border.

So you're saying Trump's strategies should be emulated and the Democrats should be trying to exploit the naivete and ignorance of some voters?

The point I'm making here is, Sanders is promising something that a majority of Americans think they don't want, so he's setting up the task of having to persuade people they do want it before he can even begin to persuade them to vote for him.  And it will prove to be a difficult task to persuade them, because the Republicans will be effectively using fear mongering and misinformation to demonize the idea and him along with it.  Sanders is endorsing an idea that will cause a lot of people to vote against him who might otherwise consider voting for him.  And this idea he's going to the mat for is one that he will not be able to implement even if he does win the election. 

This strikes me as very poor strategy.  If I'm wrong and Sanders is nominated and wins I will be here November 4th to publicly eat crow.  But I can't see how there's much advantage in this strategy for attracting the voters he needs to get.

By the way, since you brought up student debt, I will add that I do not understand the basis for his (and Warren's) promises there.  Why should student loan debt be singled out for forgiveness, and not credit card debt or mortgage debt, or any other form of debt? 

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One reason is student debt is non-dischargable.  Unlike credit card, mortgage, or others, you cannot declare bankruptcy, deal with the interim period for your credit to reset (7 years, I think), and move on.  It is with you until you pay it off or the rest of your life, whichever comes first.

Another is that by freeing up that burden, today's young adults can do what their parents/grandparents did before them and start getting on with their lives and contributing to the economy.  Instead of contributing to a lender's bottom line for the next 20-60 years while working at Starbucks.

Making education debt non-dischagable on top of  removing the taxes (mostly paid by the 1%) that went to help fund public universities and trades that made higher education affordable in the 1950s-1970s is a classic case of the Baby Boomer's "Fuck You, Got Mine!" mentality that has rotting the USA for the past 40 years.

Bernie or bust.