Of course Bernie Sanders can win, he has a formidable track record. Here are five compelling bullet points:



* John Nichols in The Nation notes, "Sanders has won 14 elections in Vermont, including ten straight races for the US House and US Senate as the most politically successful and longest serving independent member of Congress in American history."

* In Burlington, VT, Sanders won his fourth and final mayoral election in 1987, against a candidate who was endorsed by both major parties.

* In 1990, Sanders became the first independent elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 40 years, winning with 56% of the vote. He continued to be re-elected with wide margins.

* In 2006 Sanders won the Senate seat with a 2-to-1 margin, and was re-elected in 2012 with 71% of the vote.



The Hon. Bernie Sanders

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* Polling conducted in August 2011 by Public Policy Polling found that Sanders' approval rating was 67% and his disapproval rating 28%, making him the third-most popular senator in the country. PPP notes,

"Of his colleagues on which PPP has polled, the only ones who can claim to be more beloved are Hawaii's Daniel Inouye and Wyoming's John Barrasso, but they serve states with much more overwhelming partisan registration advantages. An independent who caucuses with the Democrats, Sanders' unabashed democratic socialist views have nevertheless served him well with independent voters, 68% of whom like the work he has done for them. Democrats are unanimously behind him, 93-5, and even a quarter of the state's more moderate Republicans give him good marks."

Sounds like a winner to me.