2016 US Presidential Election Thread Part XI

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Bernie lost. It wasn't close. It never was. You can pull out your casual racism to explain, but the fact is that she was the overwhelming choice of Democratic primary voters.

I'd hardly describe winning by about a 55-45 margin to be "overwhelming" given all the advantages she had going into this and a recent CNN poll of people that voted in the primary had 46 percent preferring the nominee was Sanders compared to 49 percent for Clinton.

Sanders went from an afterthought to nearly getting half the primary votes while Clinton's stock continued to plummet to its current low. Definitely a different set of narratives there.
 
Except that Gore won the popular vote and it was Nader voters who took votes from Gore in critical Florida.

You'll also note that Sanders endorsed Gore in 2000.

So, Gore was entitled to the votes of people that have voted for fringe left wing candidates or stayed home in Presidential elections the rest of their political lives? Clinton is entitled to my vote even though I've voted for a Democrat exactly once, ever?

I also could give a fuck what Sanders argues people should do. If anything, the refusal to get behind Clinton by so many of his supporters shows exactly how they aren't willing to be led by power. We want what Sanders is proposing and if it wasn't him in this election, we'd have got behind someone else doing exactly the same.
 
I'd hardly describe winning by about a 55-45 margin to be "overwhelming" given all the advantages she had going into this and a recent CNN poll of people that voted in the primary had 46 percent preferring the nominee was Sanders compared to 49 percent for Clinton.



Sanders went from an afterthought to nearly getting half the primary votes while Clinton's stock continued to plummet to its current low. Definitely a different set of narratives there.




Given the proportional voting, and looking at the delegate count, it's pretty overwhelming.
 
Good God, these interviews with the Bernie or bust delegates are so excruciatingly bad. It seems pretty clear that most of them are voting for the 1st or 2nd time in their lifetimes. What is striking is that their view of politics is almost totalitarian. Anything less than a total agreement with their policy positions is unacceptable. No compromise. Nevermind that the choice is between a candidate that represents, say 80% of their policy preferences vs. one that represents possibly 0% (hopefully).
 
Delegate count, right...so power brokers within the party get an outsized influence, usually going against the will of the voters, and that's supposed to mean something about the intentions of primary voters? Come on.

Right now, a significant share of Clinton voters are regretting their decision. 46 percent for Sanders, 49 percent for Clinton. That means about ten percent of her voters now think they've made a bad decision while basically nobody that supported Sanders has come around to Clinton being a better candidate in November (and why would they given what we know?).
 
So, Gore was entitled to the votes of people that have voted for fringe left wing candidates or stayed home in Presidential elections the rest of their political lives? Clinton is entitled to my vote even though I've voted for a Democrat exactly once, ever?



I also could give a fuck what Sanders argues people should do. If anything, the refusal to get behind Clinton by so many of his supporters shows exactly how they aren't willing to be led by power. We want what Sanders is proposing and if it wasn't him in this election, we'd have got behind someone else doing exactly the same.




If your so righteous and so concerned about a Trump presidency, and if you didn't want a Bush presidency, you wouldn't have voted for Nader or Stein.

You use that word a lot -- "entitled." You are not so precious. Your vote is a tool.

These Sanders supporters on MSNBC are such credits to Bernie. Oy.
 
Delegate count, right...so power brokers within the party get an outsized influence, usually going against the will of the voters, and that's supposed to mean something about the intentions of primary voters? Come on.

Right now, a significant share of Clinton voters are regretting their decision. 46 percent for Sanders, 49 percent for Clinton. That means about ten percent of her voters now think they've made a bad decision while basically nobody that supported Sanders has come around to Clinton being a better candidate in November (and why would they given what we know?).




You do know, super delegates aside, she still clobbered him.

Polls? 90% of Bernie supporters are voting for Hillary.

I imagine the tantrums tonight and idiot interviews with suicidal uninformed Marxists will sway another 5%.
 
Nevermind that the choice is between a candidate that represents, say 80% of their policy preferences vs. one that represents possibly 0% (hopefully).

She doesn't represent 80% of what the left wants in the slightest. I don't recall the left being big into the Iraq War, TPP, etc.

And you're still forgetting the fundamental point here. Like me, these people aren't Democrats. They aren't part of the same power structure. They want a candidate that closely fits their left-wing values which are far removed from somebody like Tim Kaine.

As this article from today was discussing, a lot of them aren't regular voters and certainly aren't lifelong members of the party. These are not votes that Clinton can easily flip.

Why Clinton Might Have A Tough Time Flipping The Sanders Holdouts | FiveThirtyEight


I mean, what you're fundamentally arguing is if a Libertarian candidate ran for the Republican nomination and barely lost, you'd feel that all those voters now need to fall in line with the Republican. But on a logical level, that doesn't make any sense because they aren't even remotely near each other on the political spectrum. Since when are socialism and free market capitalism the same? In the rest of the world, we have Socialist parties, some of which often topple the center-left groups that used to hold a stranglehold on power. And there's a wide chasm between what those sort of parties want...basically, the lack of choice in a two party system is what's generating a lot of this anger on both sides. There's significant enough political differences that there should be a major far left American party, etc.
 
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She doesn't represent 80% of what the left wants in the slightest. I don't recall the left being big into the Iraq War, TPP, etc.

And you're still forgetting the fundamental point here. Like me, these people aren't Democrats. They aren't part of the same power structure. They want a candidate that closely fits their left-wing values which are far removed from somebody like Tim Kaine.

As this article from today was discussing, a lot of them aren't regular voters and certainly aren't lifelong members of the party. These are not votes that Clinton can easily flip.

Why Clinton Might Have A Tough Time Flipping The Sanders Holdouts | FiveThirtyEight


I mean, what you're fundamentally arguing is if a Libertarian candidate ran for the Republican nomination and barely lost, you'd feel that all those voters now need to fall in line with the Republican. But on a logical level, that doesn't make any sense because they aren't even remotely near each other on the political spectrum. Since when are socialism and free market capitalism the same?




That's fine. You just don't get to complain when a Republican wins.

You also are much less representative of the people you claim to represent.
 
They want a candidate that closely fits their left-wing values which are far removed from somebody like Tim Kaine.


Like racism, sexism, and a huge lack of economic understandings?

YOU do not represent "left wing values". Stop pretending.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
 
Of course I get to complain. You nominate someone who can't even hold press conferences and lose to the shittiest Republican since at least Goldwater and what will be your excuse?

Trump is a garbage candidate and the only reason he wins is because of one Hillary Clinton.
 
Like racism, sexism, and a huge lack of economic understandings?

YOU do not represent "left wing values". Stop pretending.

Right, because you call anyone a racist or sexist that doesn't support your preferred centrist candidate and that suddenly means I'm not a leftist. I guess you're the same labeler that considers Clinton to be a historically strong LGBT activist and someone who wants peace in our world as well.

But hey, by the same token, Clinton labeled Kaine a "progressive" and the party faithful has gummed it down as well. Guess whatever the dictator wants is whatever the left is and we'll just have to accept that. Standing up for decades-long held beliefs is just wrong when suddenly Clinton is the nominee. Pointing out the contradictions between her stances and long held liberal ones is just too inconvenient.
 
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Hey, I know a fun game, let's continue arguing the (clear) results of the primary over and over again. Let's try and make the argument that a 55-45 victory is actually a loss and a 4 million vote gap should be ignored because I prefer the loser to the winner.

Your guy lost. Your guy also worked to make the democratic platform the most progressive platform in the history of the party. If you are interested in furthering progressive causes, there is only one logical vote this November, because the alternative would be a devastating blow to progressivism that could take decades to recover from.
 
Of course I get to complain. You nominate someone who can't even hold press conferences and lose to the shittiest Republican since at least Goldwater and what will be your excuse?

Trump is a garbage candidate and the only reason he wins is because of one Hillary Clinton.



You've done a bang up job of convincing people otherwise.

You voted third party in 2000. You don't get to complain about Bush.
 
Hey, I know a fun game, let's continue arguing the (clear) results of the primary over and over again. Let's try and make the argument that a 55-45 victory is actually a loss and a 4 million vote gap should be ignored because I prefer the loser to the winner.

Your guy lost. Your guy also worked to make the democratic platform the most progressive platform in the history of the party. If you are interested in furthering progressive causes, there is only one logical vote this November, because the alternative would be a devastating blow to progressivism that could take decades to recover from.

:up:

I feel a certain song from 'Frozen' coming on...
 
If you are interested in furthering progressive causes, there is only one logical vote this November, because the alternative would be a devastating blow to progressivism that could take decades to recover from.

1) No, Trump winning would further progressive causes since it would leave a wide open field for someone like Warren or Gabbard or whomever to easily coast to victory with what the left actually wants given that their won't be any establishment picks in the way. And that would give us the most progressive platform in the party's history.

2) It wouldn't take decades to recover from a four year Trump Presidency, especially when you just kick his ass out when the time comes. The courts will have more Republican-leaning justices, obviously, but we'd all have Clinton to thank for that, so whatever.
 
You've done a bang up job of convincing people otherwise.

You voted third party in 2000. You don't get to complain about Bush.

I wasn't old enough to vote in 2000, so there's that. Nor did I know where I stood politically.
 
I wasn't old enough to vote in 2000, so there's that. Nor did I know where I stood politically.



I believe you've said you voted for Nader.

But your age explains plenty.

I wouldn't want to pin beating Trump on:

1. A self-described socialist fighting for the political middle

2. His "base" being made up of very young, very white people who, a) usually don't vote, and, b) are notoriously unreliable when it comes to actually voting
 
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:up:

I feel a certain song from 'Frozen' coming on...

I'm all for letting it go and came around to Sander's loss after New York when he was mathematically eliminated. I'm just making the argument that nobody on the far left is to blame if they don't vote for Clinton in the fall...that's on the party apparatus and the ill informed voters that made a poor decision. You get the votes you ultimately deserve, all things considered.

And the entitlement over votes from Non-Democrats needs to stop. Immediately. If someone is a lifelong party member and then becomes Bernie-or-Bust, fair enough. You've got an argument that they're just being a baby, especially when they've propped up the structure for so long. But why does Clinton automatically deserve votes from people who aren't party members? It's completely illogical. Suddenly the comrades who are printing Socialist Worker newspapers and have never voted for a D must starting voting for Democrats because of a weak candidate problem cooked up by the DNC and its voters? um, no.

The problem is that the preemptive blame is already starting to seep out. I'm already getting sick of "but it's your responsibility!" comments and hearing "But we must strop Trump!" instead of why we should vote for Clinton. Trump really isn't any different from the previous Republican nominees except he doesn't mute his dog whistles as much. If we weren't willing to go out on a limb, we'd have already had President Clinton for the last eight years thanks to people just buying into fear.

This is John Kerry all over again. A cold politician that generates no excitement and gets themselves into hot water with the left for poor decision making in the past and constant flip-flopping of positions argues that they should become President because the other person is so heinous. And look how that turned out.
 
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She doesn't represent 80% of what the left wants in the slightest. I don't recall the left being big into the Iraq War, TPP, etc.

And you're still forgetting the fundamental point here. Like me, these people aren't Democrats. They aren't part of the same power structure. They want a candidate that closely fits their left-wing values which are far removed from somebody like Tim Kaine.

As this article from today was discussing, a lot of them aren't regular voters and certainly aren't lifelong members of the party. These are not votes that Clinton can easily flip.

Why Clinton Might Have A Tough Time Flipping The Sanders Holdouts | FiveThirtyEight


I mean, what you're fundamentally arguing is if a Libertarian candidate ran for the Republican nomination and barely lost, you'd feel that all those voters now need to fall in line with the Republican. But on a logical level, that doesn't make any sense because they aren't even remotely near each other on the political spectrum. Since when are socialism and free market capitalism the same? In the rest of the world, we have Socialist parties, some of which often topple the center-left groups that used to hold a stranglehold on power. And there's a wide chasm between what those sort of parties want...basically, the lack of choice in a two party system is what's generating a lot of this anger on both sides. There's significant enough political differences that there should be a major far left American party, etc.

Things that leftists (should) care about that would be incredibly worse in a Trump presidency:

- Civil rights;
- Women's rights;
- Health care;
- Higher education;
- Multilateralism;
- Immigration;
- Judicial appointments;
- Social security.

I'm sure there are plenty more. It doesn't matter that you disagree with other parts of the platform. Objectively, her platform is closer to a leftist's priorities than Trump's. So choosing not to vote (by abstaining, picking a third party candidate, etc), in essence means one of two things: (i) you are not really a leftist, but just a populist; or (ii) you don't care about any of the issues above. And (iii) that you feel so entitled - to use your word - about your vote that you'd rather use it as an instrument of protest than to actually make a strategic choice that would get you closer to these policy positions.
 
Right, because you call anyone a racist or sexist that doesn't support your preferred centrist candidate and that suddenly means I'm not a leftist. I guess you're the same labeler that considers Clinton to be a historically strong LGBT activist and someone who wants peace in our world as well.

But hey, by the same token, Clinton labeled Kaine a "progressive" and the party faithful has gummed it down as well. Guess whatever the dictator wants is whatever the left is and we'll just have to accept that. Standing up for decades-long held beliefs is just wrong when suddenly Clinton is the nominee. Pointing out the contradictions between her stances and long held liberal ones is just too inconvenient.


False, once again. I'm speaking to your posts, not your support. But nice try.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
 
1) No, Trump winning would further progressive causes since it would leave a wide open field for someone like Warren or Gabbard or whomever to easily coast to victory with what the left actually wants given that their won't be any establishment picks in the way.

You're conveniently ignoring the massive damage Trump could cause in four years. His Supreme Court nominations (one definite, and possibly one more) would shift the court decidedly to the right, and yes, for decades. Not to mention potential laws enacted if they do keep the house and senate. And potential executive orders. This is not just a matter of riding out four years and then going right back to your platform. To think it is that easy is, quite frankly, dangerously naïve.
 
how many goddam times do we have to read the same goddam posts over and over and over and over :banghead: the dnc started today, anybody wanna talk about that?
 
Things that leftists (should) care about that would be incredibly worse in a Trump presidency:

- Civil rights;
- Women's rights;
- Health care;
- Higher education;
- Multilateralism;
- Immigration;
- Judicial appointments;
- Social security.

I'm sure there are plenty more. It doesn't matter that you disagree with other parts of the platform. Objectively, her platform is closer to a leftist's priorities than Trump's. So choosing not to vote (by abstaining, picking a third party candidate, etc), in essence means one of two things: (i) you are not really a leftist, but just a populist; or (ii) you don't care about any of the issues above. And (iii) that you feel so entitled - to use your word - about your vote that you'd rather use it as an instrument of protest than to actually make a strategic choice that would get you closer to these policy positions.

Civil Rights: Is Trump going to make an anti-black amendment to the constitution or have Republicans help him ban Muslims? Nope. A lot of people are just hysterical about his words, but they're just words. Freedom of speech and I-could-give-a-fuck. Actions are what matter.

Women's Rights: We've already had Republicans take away abortion access across the country, how would this be different? And how is Clinton who came out about the Planned Parenthood videos and called them "disturbing" before she even knew the facts or her running mate's weak record on abortion rights suddenly the ones to turn to in this manner?

Do we even have to get into the fact that Obama almost sold out Social Security for a grand bargain with the GOP or deported more people than any other President?

Yes, Trump would be awful. But he's like beating the game on easy mode. Unfortunately, you've chosen for us the video gamer with poor reflexes and doesn't even understand the controls. Now, we all have to bite our nails until the November results.
 
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I believe you've said you voted for Nader.

Yeah, and if you paid attention you'd know that he ran in 2004 and 2008 since there was nobody else willing to take up the liberal mantle thanks to the Greens employing their safe state strategy nonsense.

Funny enough, his 2008 bid came out precisely because he thought Clinton would become the nominee.
 
Civil Rights: Is Trump going to make an anti-black amendment to the constitution or have Republicans help him ban Muslims? Nope.

Women's Rights: We've already had Republicans take away abortion access across the country, how would this be different? And how is Clinton who came out about the Planned Parenthood videos and called them "disturbing" before she even knew the facts or her running mate's weak record on abortion rights suddenly the ones to turn to in this manner?

Do we even have to get into the fact that Obama almost sold out Social Security for a grand bargain with the GOP or deported more people than any other President?

Yes, Trump would be awful. But he's like beating the game on easy mode. Unfortunately, you've chosen for us the video gamer with poor reflexes and doesn't even understand the controls. Now, we all have to bite our nails until the November results.

a 9/11-style (in terms of destructiveness) terrorist attack happens in 2018.

are you comfortable with president donald trump making decisions in that scenario?
 
how many goddam times do we have to read the same goddam posts over and over and over and over :banghead: the dnc started today, anybody wanna talk about that?

This is entirely relevant because of Clinton's massive poll slump, and oh, I dunno, the fact that the entire DNC lineup of events had massive booing going on throughout today.
 
I'm all for letting it go and came around to Sander's loss after New York when he was mathematically eliminated.

Then why does it seem we keep having variations on this exact conversation every few pages in these threads?

You're all for letting it go? Then actually do so.

I'm just making the argument that nobody on the far left is to blame if they don't vote for Clinton in the fall...that's on the party apparatus and the ill informed voters that made a poor decision. You get the votes you ultimately deserve, all things considered.

If they vote for a third party candidate that results in giving votes to the opposing candidate, then yes, they do play a role in affecting the outcome of the election.

And there's plenty of Hilary supporters that I'd call far from ill-informed (namely the very people in this forum who support her and have been able to see and discuss both her strengths and weaknesses), but okay.

The problem is that the preemptive blame is already starting to seep out. I'm already getting sick of "but it's your responsibility!" comments and hearing "But we must strop Trump!" instead of why we should vote for Clinton.

I actually agree the party itself should definitely work on doing a lot more to promote her actual voting record and stress the areas where she has championed progressive/left-wing causes, especially during the time when she was surrounded by all the negative press over the e-mail scandal and whatnot. At the very least it would've provided some balance.

But people here in this very forum has stated many examples of her voting record, proof of why she would be a good candidate for the left...only to be dismissed with, "She doesn't REALLY support that stuff, she's pandering, she flip-flopped, etc." People want her to support this or that issue, but then they doubt her sincerity when she does, whether she's been on board with said issue from the start or came on board down the line.
 
a 9/11-style (in terms of destructiveness) terrorist attack happens in 2018.

are you comfortable with president donald trump making decisions in that scenario?

Sure. He's not going to just drop the nuke. So, what's he going to do? Invade the area like we did in Afghanistan? How would they be any different from what Clinton has done and supported?
 
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