|
Deteriorata posted:Third parties will never have any power to effect any legislation or make any changes in the way the country is run, like it or not. There is no difference between voting third party and not voting at all. I guess that's true if you vote a straight third party ticket, and somehow also vote third party on any propositions or local measures? But that seems like kind of a fringe scenario
|
#
¿
Feb 8, 2015 04:47
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 22, 2024 01:10 |
|
|
Deteriorata posted:Propositions and local measures are not party-based, generally. In a race with a 3rd party candidate, voting third party will have exactly the same effect as voting for no one. That was kind of my point, really. It's stupid to say that if you vote for a third party candidate you might as well not vote, because there are plenty of other things where your vote will have an effect.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 8, 2015 05:00
|
|
|
Enigma89 posted:Am I crazy to think/hope that someone like Gov. Cuomo (NY) or Lt. Gov. Newsom runs? Maybe not for President but cause enough noise to go for VP? I doubt it First, I feel like both of them are party insiders enough to know that Hillary does, in fact, have poo poo locked down. Second, I don't think either of them really makes sense as VP - Cuomo provides no balance at all and Newsom is only a lieutenant gov at the moment. Third, Newsom is... a very strong probability to be the next governor of CA, and while I'm sure he wouldn't turn down a VP slot, I would assume that his plans are more centered around the governor thing. Probably better to just come to terms with a boring-rear end Dem primary
|
|
#
¿
Apr 21, 2015 21:42
|
|
|
Franco Potente posted:Can someone explain why Michael Bennet's name gets thrown around so much for higher office? I've heard him mentioned as a potential presidential candidate a couple times now, and before Schumer got all his ducks lined up, some pundit was even speculating that Bennet would take a run for Dem Senate leader. What is there to him, aside from being relatively young? He's young, he's white, he's marginally photogenic, he has education reform credentials (whether or not that's a good thing policy-wise), he seems to be well-connected within the party, and as others have mentioned, he can raise massive wads of cash. Also, in the specific context of Hillary VP discussions, he's from outside of the Northeast, and seems to have been moderately an Obama person rather than a Clinton person, so he would provide balance to the ticket in those senses.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 28, 2015 21:07
|
|
|
Dolash posted:I'm also curious what specific issues people would want to see Bernie pull Hillary left on, if he can. Hillary will probably continue a lot of Obama's policies on things like allowing gay marriage and marijuana legalization in the states without really pushing them along federally. Immigration's pretty jammed as an issue aside from what Obama's already done executively (short of easing off on enforcement, I guess). Healthcare was a signature issue for Hillary but Obamacare might be as far as things can go while Congress is obsessed with rolling it back. I guess income inequality would be a big sticking point since the Clintons are associated with thrid-way neoliberalism, privatization and corporatism although I don't know what specific points she could be moved on. I suppose I hadn't thought about specifics much. But I guess what I'd hope for is the political dynamic of the race not so much forcing Clinton to commit to specific progressive policy planks, as for it to make it harder for her to do regressive poo poo once she's in office. If she has to make noise about income inequality and all that stuff in the primary because of Bernie, then maybe it'll be a little bit more politically costly for her to cut welfare or roll back Wall Street regulations or whatever awful Clintonite poo poo she might want to do once she's in office. But really, that's more about my fear and pessimism than anything, it's not a real political analysis. I agree that the real value of a Bernie run is in getting the word out and trying to shift the conversation and the internal party dynamics, more than any effect he would have on a Clinton administration
|
|
#
¿
Apr 30, 2015 20:26
|
|
|
FOXDIE posted:Democrats haven't won the presidency after a two-term candidate but twice in all of the modern party's history, first when Van Buren succeeded Jackson, second when FDR won a third term. If you think a trend that has followed the Democratic Party for two centuries can be shrugged off, your political bubble is too dense for anyone to pop. Even if we accept your arguments that the 19th century Democratic Party is hugely relevant to the 2016 election - there's only been, like, what, four two-term Democratic Presidents? I make it Jackson, Wilson, FDR, and Clinton. So the Democrats actually won the presidency after a two-term candidate in fully 50% of the elections where that was possible. Literally your argument boils down to 2000 and Warren Harding. And I don't like Warren Harding much either, but that seems like a little too strong of a conclusion to draw from him winning. You're an idiot. emfive posted:Is the Chris Christie bridge thing that happened today meaningful? Does anybody still care? It's probably meaningful to something, but not really to the presidential primary, I don't think. Dude didn't have a chance anyway.
|
|
#
¿
May 1, 2015 18:41
|
|
|
Bizarro Kanyon posted:If Rubio pulls in the nomination, Julian Castro will be the VP choice in a heartbeat. Yes, I mean, two years in a high-profile post like HUD Secretary, that definitely provides the kind of weighty experience that makes him a shoo-in for a presidential ticket This forum's boner for the Castro brothers seems kind of ridiculous sometimes. They're definitely up and comers, but people seem to expect them to assume the throne of America in the next year or two. They have plenty of time. TheScott2K posted:Is it not obvious that Rubio is running for the next cycle's frontrunner? Not really? I'm sure he has his mind on the long term, but he has a real shot at winning this year and it's not like he's going to turn it down if he gets it.
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 03:16
|
|
|
Cubey posted:That's all fine and well, now show me opinion polls that had him ahead of Hillary in May of 2007. Or Edwards for that matter; in fact, wasn't Edwards the favorite at this point in that cycle? Like I really do hate to make this kind of pedantic point, but you seem to be arguing from different things - no one would say that he was the favorite to win the party nomination, but he was a legitimate threat to the favorite. Obama was certainly not the favorite or the most prominent, well-known candidate, he was an underdog and he had to fight an uphill battle. But at the same time, he did have institutional support and a certain degree of establishment backing (less than Clinton, more than Bernie) and was regarded as a serious contender in a way that I don't think Bernie is. It doesn't really matter what term you want to use for it ultimately, I guess, but Obama's success in 2008 is not really a good model for a Bernie run or a reason to hope. They're very different situations.
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 04:52
|
|
|
eternalname posted:al gore ? pretty sick burn on Bill Bradley, I guess
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 14:56
|
|
|
It's probably fine, as long as they don't live in Ohio, Virginia, or Florida
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 18:07
|
|
|
eternalname posted:one brokered convention with mitt romney as compromise candidate please God, I want to see an open convention so loving bad just once before I die
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 18:12
|
|
|
Corrupt Politician posted:With only one candidate (Clinton) who benefits from having fewer debates, how can they enforce the sanctioned-debate-only rule? If every other candidate decides to just ignore it and do other debates, they can't exactly kick them all out and just have Hillary talking to herself for 90 minutes... I don't think any of the other candidates have any real incentive to be at a debate that Hillary isn't at. So I don't think it would do the other candidates much good to try and defect unless Hillary decides to do so, for some reason God only knows.
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 20:39
|
|
|
Raskolnikov38 posted:Can anyone explain Bernie's article from the 70s? The first column is From what I can tell, the thesis seems to be that patriarchal gender roles are hosed up, and it's good that we are getting away from them, but at the same time it's really difficult to figure out what the hell to do without them, which leads to confusion and disharmony. Also, I think the stuff about rape fantasies is less something that he's, like, advocating, and more pointing to as evidence of a problem with social mores. It's definitely super weirdly written and hippy-ish.
|
|
#
¿
May 29, 2015 05:15
|
|
as gently caress but I honestly can't figure out whatever point he's trying to make.
|
BI NOW GAY LATER posted:He's so precious. Yeah but in TPM store credit, which is dog poo poo
|
|
#
¿
Jun 12, 2015 22:40
|
|
|
nachos posted:What do grandchildren have to do with being gay It's funny that the question he was asked was "Are you gay" and the question he answered was "Are you single" I mean, I don't think it's indicative of anything, it's just weird and kind of amusing
|
|
#
¿
Jun 22, 2015 23:58
|
|
|
My assumption with Webb was that he's in it for reasons basically analogous to Sanders': he wants to drag the party his way. Be a voice for the Reagan Democrats, in his case. Chafee and O'Malley, I guess they're just in it for the publicity and / or Cabinet post bargaining. O'Malley might have thought he could win at one point but surely there's no way now.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 5, 2015 04:03
|
|
|
As others have pointed out in the past, whoever wins the popular vote is probably going to win the election. I mean, you want to talk about needing a six-point swing - well, a six-point swing from the 2012 popular vote puts you at like R 51 / D 48. That's basically just a solid Republican victory. So I find it difficult to believe that the map particularly matters either way. If the popular vote goes against the Democrats, the states that need to be in play for a Republican victory will be in play. I think the map does give Democrats a marginal advantage in situations where the popular vote ends up extremely close. And that's meaningful, but it's not the same as a structural problem for Republicans generally.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 7, 2015 20:38
|
|
|
Shageletic posted:YMMV Well, that quote looks it's coming from the Romney camp, so yes, I'm sure that's what Romney would like everyone to think.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 7, 2015 20:43
|
|
|
Shear Modulus posted:I can guarantee you that if an event occurs that causes Hillary to lose the election, she will lose the election. seems unlikely, IMO Litany Unheard posted:Dead people have won elections before! Never underestimate Hillary's desire for the presidency. It shall transcend even death. Skeleton Hillary 2016
|
|
#
¿
Jul 7, 2015 20:55
|
|
|
Raskolnikov38 posted:Yeah but democrats have 240 of 270 electoral votes pretty much on lock. That doesn't mean poo poo. They still need 270.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 9, 2015 21:58
|
|
|
Raskolnikov38 posted:Gaining 30 is a whole hell of a lot easier than the 120+ plus the republicans need to. That's true on some notional level, maybe, but it's not especially relevant to the actual dynamics of the election, because the remaining electoral votes still basically depend on the popular vote. If the Republicans win the popular vote, getting those 120+ EVs is not going to be a particular challenge; if the Democrats lose it, it's almost meaningless to talk about how easy it is to get 30. It's true that Democrats have a higher floor than Republicans. I don't think it's remotely true that this has any effect on how likely each side is to win an election.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 9, 2015 22:25
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:But this is irrelevant to the fact that a singular position can only have one dude in it. After all, there's been cases in America of appointing a Republican to a token department in a Democrat cabinet or vice versa, or even the case of the Lincoln/Douglas ticket where the President and Vice President were separate parties! It's kind of different in an actual coalition government where the ruling party actually needs the support of the other parties to stay in power. I mean, I agree that ultimately a unitary executive can only have one person in it, but there's a degree of leverage in those situations that's not present when you have a token Republican in a Democratic cabinet.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 11, 2015 04:35
|
|
|
Raskolnikov38 posted:Eh it's not like he's off into the weeds or anything, Obama is pretty solidly in the middle. But it's not unreasonable to say that Bernie would probably be to the left of Obama if elected. Obama's one thing, but it seems pretty weird to describe Bernie as center right in almost any context besides full Marxism. Obviously it's a moot point since Bernie will not be nominated or elected. Joementum posted:The morning after is always rough. This time at the Bedford, NH town dump. That woman seems way too positive and happy for Saturday morning at the dump can you even imagine meeting a presidential candidate when you're just on a trip to the dump. what a loving weird place to visit.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 11, 2015 17:22
|
|
|
Dalael posted:All of them, are now law. That seems to be... extremely not the case. Where are you getting that impression from? I'm sincerely asking It would frankly be loving stunning if he could get a lot of those bills past a Republican Congress
|
|
#
¿
Jul 11, 2015 19:09
|
|
|
Vox Nihili posted:The polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, where he has been campaigning, are a good start. Maybe those are all ~internet people~ though, who knows? Iowa and New Hampshire Democrats are not necessarily a representative cross-section of the Democratic Party as a whole, unfortunately, which makes it difficult.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 11, 2015 20:18
|
|
|
Vox Nihili posted:He has yet to campaign in states with big minority populations. So far, the people in the states he is campaigning in have liked him, and the media has swung this as "only white people like Bernie." It could also fairly be described as "only people who have been exposed to Bernie are likely to support him." When he starts hitting other states like South Carolina we will see exactly how accurate the media narrative turns out to be Well, it's not entirely a media narrative. We legitimately don't know how popular Sanders is going to be with the base and with minorities. It's an unknown. I think you're also underrating Hillary's appeal; I think it'd be more accurate to say that, outside of the left of the party, people are at least equally excited about Clinton and Sanders. Like it or not, I think the base of the party does have a lot of affection for the Clintons and does like Hillary on a personal level, and that does actually matter. Clinton has massive institutional support, but that doesn't mean that her support is solely institutional.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 11, 2015 20:41
|
|
|
Joementum posted:Good points made on this page about using demographic splits in national primary polls seven months before the Iowa Caucuses to make any sort of case. The better solution is to use demographic splits in Iowa polls to make your case I think we can safely say that the 20 or so non-white Democrats answering polls in Iowa are representative of the entire nation
|
|
#
¿
Jul 11, 2015 22:24
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:One of the Castros is popular thinking for Hillary's veep choice. Is that actually popular thinking, outside of D&D I mean I know it's basically treated as fact ITT
|
|
#
¿
Jul 11, 2015 22:27
|
|
|
Clearly Clinton's superior knowledge of espionage and spycraft makes her the better candidate to protect our country Aliquid posted:^^ a good post I do think he's really going to suffer if he has to stand on a debate stage with Trump, because he is just going to look like a lifeless, inert sack of crap in comparison.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 13, 2015 03:02
|
|
|
BI NOW GAY LATER posted:Fourth. I think Bernie would beat him. Bernie might be able to beat him in a head to head race, but Walker is still more likely to be the next President, as he is much more likely to win his party's nomination.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 13, 2015 20:44
|
|
|
ImPureAwesome posted:Regardless, Nuclear chicken to solve disputes probably isn't something that should be promoted as the cold war can attest You could make the argument that if the cold war attests anything, it's that nuclear chicken is a great method of solving disputes
|
|
#
¿
Jul 15, 2015 07:37
|
|
|
District Selectman posted:McCain has a good story and he used to be ol' Maverick John McCain, but 70 year old John McCain was a bad candidate in 2008. He frankly seemed lost. The party was NOT enthusiastic about him being the candidate in '08. It was another Romney '12 situation where the least worst guy was given the job by default. On paper he is everything you're saying he is, but that was all a long time ago, and he wasn't that guy anymore in 08, and was a lovely candidate who ran a bad campaign and did really stupid things like pick Sarah Palin. Obama won by as much as a black dude named Barack could have possibly won. At the same time, Obama ran a fantastic campaign, and also the economy was exploding and George Bush had just been president for eight loving years. I think it would have been hard for any Republican candidate to win in 2008. I'm not sure how much of that was McCain's weakness as a candidate. And when you look at something like the Palin pick, I would argue he was already losing and would have lost anyway whether or not he picked Palin or someone else.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 16, 2015 07:02
|
|
|
The Nastier Nate posted:Trump has the unique superpower of being impervious to scandal that would otherwise ruin a regular run-of-the-mill politician. Imagine if Chris Christie invited the Clinton's to his wedding. I have no idea what kind of scandal or gaffe could derail the Trump engine at this point. I think, with Trump, the basic fact of Donald Trump being a candidate is so loving ridiculous that once you've accepted that, you can accept just about anything else.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 16, 2015 16:11
|
|
|
Re: that 538 article I think it's probably true that Trump has reached, or will reach, the peak of his polling support much more quickly than other candidates because of his massive name recognition, and so the rapidity of Trump's rise in the polls is probably not that meaningful. At the same time, I'm not sure Trump's relative conservativeness is that important because I think he's kind of outside the usual framework for those things. I also think it might be wise not to count on 2016 playing out exactly like 2012 in terms of cycling through alternatives to the establishment favorite, at least until we see some evidence that it's actually happening that way. And I also don't think you can take it for granted that all of the potential alternatives will be complete fuckups the way they were in 2012.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 16, 2015 18:25
|
|
|
ComradeCosmobot posted:The other 25% is people arguing whether a vote for Sanders is okay or horrible. It's closer to people arguing whether a vote for Clinton is okay or horrible. Most people seem to like Bernie, the arguments are more over whether or not he can win the primary, and whether he's actually the last best hope for mankind or a politician running for office.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 17, 2015 07:12
|
|
|
Tempest_56 posted:
It comes down to the same thing as other analyses on the same lines. In order to win the election, the Republicans need about a six-point swing from 2012; in other words, they probably need the popular vote to be something on the lines of 51-48 or thereabouts. That does imply an advantage to the Democrats, in that they probably have an advantage in situations where the popular vote is extremely close. But ultimately, that 51% mark is certainly not impossible to hit, and it more or less still comes down to the fact that whoever wins the popular vote will probably also win the election. It's true that the Republicans need to win a bunch of swing states, but I think it's also true that if they win the popular vote by any meaningful margin, they probably will win those swing states.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 17, 2015 19:13
|
|
|
Aliquid posted:I like that Perry has become the principal anti-Trump. He (or maybe Huck too) is the only one in the pack that has the charisma to trade barbs in a debate with him. Am I crazy in thinking that Perry is one of the better Republican choices from an electability point of view? Whatever chance he has in actually winning a primary.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 22, 2015 20:00
|
|
|
Shifty Pony posted:Perry is vulnerable to attacks on his record of graft, gutting women's health, gutting of education, and selling as much of Texas's infrastructure to private interests as possible (see graft, listed previously). He did well in Texas politics but I don't think he'll let long on the national stage where he doesn't have the Texas GOP graft and good old boy network. Those are definitely the negatives (along with stuff like Texas' economic recovery not being as impressive as it looks) but I'm not sure how strongly that stuff will actually play. Because for a Republican candidate, a lot of that stuff comes close to being policy - gutting women's health is a strong commitment to being pro-life, and the rest of it plays as free-market, low-spending deficit hawk credentials. I'm not saying those negatives don't exist, but everyone in the field has negatives - in many cases pretty much the same negatives that you're talking about here. And he has the upside of looking presidential and seeming decent at dealing with the media, and not seeming totally insane.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 22, 2015 20:31
|
|
|
Lastgirl posted:yes I'm not saying he would be a good president duder Shifty Pony posted:Oh I know I was just responding to someone who was saying he had electability in the general. Perry hasn't been subjected to the sort of skeleton hunting that a nationwide general election brings. It is hard to overstate just how corrupt Texas politics are and Perry was so graft and patronage driven that the rest of the state GOP went "um, tone it down dammit". His admin paid out $222 million to people who hadn't even requested it. That's funny as hell, but I'm still not sure it makes him totally unelectable And really, electability in the 2016 Republican primary is a pretty low bar
|
|
#
¿
Jul 22, 2015 20:49
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 22, 2024 01:10 |
|
|
Veskit posted:Who was the last business mogul to become a president? Someone like trump where they actually worked for their money (in the sense that Trump works his family wealth) as opposed to someone like Bush who passively got money from his family wealth. Carter was a pretty successful farmer, IIRC, and HW Bush made a lot of his money on his own although helped by his family connections. But I think you have to go back to Hoover to get a real self-made business mogul.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 27, 2015 18:52
|
|