You have GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. Seriously?
Tad DevineSanders' senior strategist, Tad Devine, told MSNBC he couldn't comment on the mix-up because he didn't have all the details.
"But I'll tell you this: I know the politics of the New York primary are extraordinarily complicated," he said. "As a lifelong practicing Roman Catholic, I can't even imagine how complicated the politics of the Vatican are, so I'm gonna find out before I say anything on that issue."
Wait a minute. You're the campaign's top guy for strategy and you have no idea about the details of your candidate leaving the country in the middle of a presidential primary?
You cannot be fucking serious.
When asked about protocol, which is absolutely customary for any president or presidential candidate traveling abroad, you did this:
The Sanders campaign referred POLITICO to Michael Shank, a media consultant who works with Sachs and said he "occasionally" handles press relations for Vatican conferences.
Michael Shank is Jeffrey Sachs' press guy. Ummm... doesn't the Sanders Campaign have its own press guy?
Lol.
Folks, this a bumbling, ridiculous, amateur hour clusterfuck. I know some people are going to blame Sanders himself, but I know for certain that a busy candidate has no idea where they are going in the next five minutes, much less anywhere else. A candidate at this level relies on his staff to get it right, make it count, and handle the details. For the Sanders Campaign's top guy to have no idea of what's going on when his candidate is literally leaving the country is profound political malpractice of the first order.
The worst part of it is, despite the sloppy rollout, the candidate isn't even going to see Pope Francis, much less get a photo opportunity. Which means that we are forced to witness a potential president reduced to attending an academic conference like some run of the mill adjunct profressor at NYU.
Which, by the way, is Michael Shank's day job. Wow.