2016 US Presidential Election Thread Part V

[Bluer White]

Originally Posted by deep

If Hillary or Bernie gets 269 and and Bloomberg gets 1 or 200, GOP is golden.

But which stable of super PACs will be able to drag their candidate out of the primaries and into the general?

Bernie's or Mrs. Clinton's?

[Mrs. Garrison]

It's really hard to think of anyone more loathsome than Ted Cruz in American politics today. The guy is that much of a disaster. Even Ass Juice and Sarah Palin are marginally better, which is really saying something.

The entire candidate field is really really bad this time around. To hear the GOP tell the story; Romney and McCain were too moderate or RINO's, while people like Cruz and Ass Juice are/were good solid conservatives cut from the Reagan cloth. That's completely laughable because i highly doubt Reagan would even be nominated in today's GOP...he would be deemed a RINO by the extremists who have hijacked the party.

Regarding Palin, a friend of mine remarked recently that the only Palin offspring who hasn't gotten into some kind of trouble with the law is the special-needs child. Of course even i couldn't resist.... "give it time" i said. Sad....but possibly true. Obama really has it out for those Palin's....so im sure he will figure out a way to get the child to do something awful just like the older siblings.

The Democratic side of things is no pancake breakfast either. Hillary (whom i have stated i would vote for) is considered by many to be fake, untrustworthy, dishonest, and many of the other things you would normally associate with her opponents in the GOP. The more people see of her the more people really just don't like her. Bernie seems like a decent guy and very authentic (unlike Hillary), but some of his proposals are a bit of a stretch and i don't see him winning the White House. This all sets up nicely for the GOP if they had the right candidate. Yet in typical GOP fashion, of course, they don't!

So while Ole Joe kicks himself daily and Elizabeth Warren second guesses herself, and all of the other FBI investigation noises surfaces or fades-whichever, one has to wonder if Obama were somehow able to run for a 3rd term (i know that he can't - Captain Obvious)..... just how big of a margin would he win by? Landslide?

[deep]

Long read
to nowhere.

[deep]

I don't want my country back
I don't want free college

I just want America to be great again.

[Axver]

I suspect there is more than a little stirring-of-the-pot going on in this thread right now. Anybody who's serious about claims their chosen candidate will receive some special form of divine guidance has clearly gone off the deep end.

Originally Posted by Oregoropa

Interesting. In the US cash is needed to purchase blocks of commercial advertising in different media markets. Rates vary based on city size and time of day that an ad airs. That's where most of our money goes. Add to that jet travel across a large country. It's the model of our system here, not sure how much it resembles yours.

We have the same considerations here - keep in mind this is a massive country too, and primetime telly doesn't come cheap - but there is very little culture of private individuals donating to parties. Most parties raise their funds via corporate or union donations, which is becoming troublesome but not to the extreme in the US, and public finance to all parties that achieve at least 4% of the vote ameliorates some of the need to fundraise. No doubt part of this is a result of rather different electoral systems: election campaigns here last only about six weeks, and each party already has a leader, chosen by the parliamentary party room rather than this months-long campaign/primary system of yours. There is also no need to "get out the vote" since voting is compulsory and elections must be on a Saturday.

[cobl04]

Originally Posted by LemonMelon

It's a big part of it, yeah.

One of the reasons Bernie Sanders has endeared himself to some is that he's a staunch supporter of publicly funded elections that theoretically eliminate private donations/bribes. But honestly, that's only half the battle. The fact that individuals are spending multiple billions on their campaigns is wasteful. We need to implement a strict cap on campaign expenditure. Even counting inflation, campaigns were never anywhere near as expensive as they are now.

This outlines my two problems with it. 1) the fact that prospective presidents are driven by obscene amounts of donation money is completely fucked, I mean everyone complains about money not being spent in the right areas, is it just me or is disgustingly ironic that everyone's complaining about money and the people who are running for president saying they'll do something about it are only doing so because people are pouring in hundreds of millions of dollars to them?! Am I insane?! Or is that COMPLETELY fucked? think of where the billions of dollars could go if you had a better system? Fuck me. and 2) the fact that if you don't have enough monetary support your campaign's dead in the water to begin with. You could be an incredible candidate but you're fucked if you can't attract enough money, and your competitor just wipes the floor with you because they have more support? it's fucking insane to me. insane.

Ax knows how Aus politics works much better than I do but I don't think our prospective prime ministers even need money to run for office..? I honestly think the only money that gets spent by politicians in election time is on active campaigning, so ads, getting to places to speak, pamphlets to send out, etc. I don't think you actually need money just to fucking live another day.

[nbelcik]

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[Vlad n U 2]

Originally Posted by nbelcik

Attachment 10574


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I was thinking about this same tweet earlier. Shame that sort of attitude has made its way onto FYM too.

[nbelcik]

Originally Posted by Vlad n U 2

I was thinking about this same tweet earlier. Shame that sort of attitude has made its way onto FYM too.

It really is a shame that the nation's socialist tradition was basically destroyed by the Reagan Revolution. I don't think many people realize that compared to all of American history, Bernie isn't really that radical. He's pretty much FDR reincarnated.


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[Moonlit_Angel]

Originally Posted by cobl04

I mean everyone complains about money not being spent in the right areas, is it just me or is disgustingly ironic that everyone's complaining about money and the people who are running for president saying they'll do something about it are only doing so because people are pouring in hundreds of millions of dollars to them?! Am I insane?! Or is that COMPLETELY fucked? think of where the billions of dollars could go if you had a better system? Fuck me.

and times infinity.

[Axver]

Originally Posted by cobl04

Ax knows how Aus politics works much better than I do but I don't think our prospective prime ministers even need money to run for office..?

Oh no, you do. Money tends to come straight from the central party; in theory individuals can also spend their own money on their local campaign (there used to be a cap on that but I think it was abolished), but that rarely happens, at least not in any of the notable parties, since the use of central funds bypasses reporting requirements for individuals.

The ALP has a bit of a long-term problem on its hands because the money that underpins its campaign spending comes predominantly from unions, and union membership has been persistently declining for decades. Plus some of the more left-wing unions are now diverting funding to the Greens. You'll definitely also see the Greens ask their supporters for a bit of cash (mainly for primetime TV ads) to try to make up some of their shortfall relative to the ALP and the Coalition, the latter of whom enjoy a considerable windfall from big business and as you know a favourable run in the News Ltd papers.

The main differences are cultural and the much decreased length of the campaign. I doubt we would see this madness in the US if their campaign were compressed to 6-8 weeks in length.

This article is really illuminating on how deeply flawed Australia's system actually is: https://theconversation.com/think-th...stralias-10536 (All that keeps things in check is that there's less at stake here than in the US and the shorter campaign!)

[Vlad n U 2]

Originally Posted by nbelcik

It really is a shame that the nation's socialist tradition was basically destroyed by the Reagan Revolution. I don't think many people realize that compared to all of American history, Bernie isn't really that radical. He's pretty much FDR reincarnated.


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Hell, could you imagine someone like Debs gaining prominence in this point in time? Any criticisms aimed at Sanders would seem ridiculously minor by comparison!

[Oregoropa]

Anybody else play around with www.predictit.org ?

It was crazy to watch the Rubio stock soar after Iowa and then start crashing during the debate.

I'm holding tons of Biden shares for the Dem Nomination. Along with Warren and a few on Jerry Brown. Just in the event of a Hillary implosion or rumors of one.

[anitram]

Originally Posted by bobsaget77

Supreme Court is a big reason why I want Cruz to be our next president. He knows the legal system

As opposed to law professor Obama?

[anitram]

Originally Posted by Headache in a Suitcase

Al Gore being an awful candidate cost Al Gore the election. Blame him.

I also get a bit tired of the Nader vilification. Al Gore would have one had he simply WON HIS OWN HOME STATE. He couldn't even do that much.

[Oregoropa]

[Kieran McConville]

I'm agreed on Al Gore. Nader, I didn't think much of him running the way he did, but I've come to the view that if it was that close that Nader's role reduced the world to waiting on a supreme court judgement over hanging chads or whatever the fuck you call them, then it was too close. Gore campaigned like the inevitable candidate, only he ran like Julia Gillard (Australia) in 2010; with the administration's history amputated from his pitch (since Clinton's personal scandals were not something he wished to be associated with).

[Bluer White]

Originally Posted by Kieran McConville

I'm agreed on Al Gore. Nader, I didn't think much of him running the way he did, but I've come to the view that if it was that close that Nader's role reduced the world to waiting on a supreme court judgement over hanging chads or whatever the fuck you call them, then it was too close. Gore campaigned like the inevitable candidate, only he ran like Julia Gillard (Australia) in 2010; with the administration's history amputated from his pitch (since Clinton's personal scandals were not something he wished to be associated with).

Gore....Mrs. Clinton?

Nader....Bloomberg + a billion ?

[namkcuR]

Originally Posted by Headache in a Suitcase

Hey it's the Nader cost the election fallacy!

More democrats voted for George Bush in Florida than they did for Nader.



Al Gore being an awful candidate cost Al Gore the election. Blame him.

The two party system is a sham. It's time to die a quick and utterly painful death. The candidates for both parties are absolute jokes.

It's not just Florida, Ohio and New Hampshire are two more states that Bush won very closely where Nader had 2+% of the vote. We can't know for sure if either of those states would've flipped, but you can't completely discount it.

And even if Nader didn't cost anything, it doesn't change the fact that Bloomberg poses a threat to the Democratic nominee, especially if it's Bernie.

He is not going to win. His potential candidacy concerns me,

And I strongly disagree that the Democratic nominees are jokes. But then I'm a life-long progressive, so that shouldn't be surprising.




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[bobsaget77]

#gilmentum.
He keeps moving up.


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