Wednesday Open Thread [4.20.16]
NATIONAL—Morning Consult–Trump 46, Cruz 26, Kasich 13
NATIONAL—NBC/SurveyMonkey–Trump 46, Cruz 28, Kasich 19
NATIONAL—Morning Consult–Clinton 46, Sanders 43
NATIONAL—NBC/SurveyMonkey–Clinton 50, Sanders 43
CONNECTICUT—Quinnipiac–Trump 48, Kasich 28, Cruz 19
CONNECTICUT—Quinnipiac–Clinton 51, Sanders 42
MARYLAND—PPP–Trump 43, Kasich 29, Cruz 24
MARYLAND—PPP–Clinton 58, Sanders 33
MARYLAND–US SENATE—PPP–Van Hollen 42, Edwards 33
Congratulations to the winner of the New York Primary and the presumptive 2016 Democratic nominee, Hillary Rodham Clinton. The Democratic Presidential Primary is over. Going forward, in order to promote unity, I will not insult or otherwise attack or criticize Bernie Sanders or his supporters in my comments. And I understand some of you are still in denial and will enter a primal scream phase soon enough, if you are not already there, so I will not engage you over that. Some of you no doubt will proclaim that you will vote for Trump before you vote Hillary. That’s fine, I will not engage, I will let you work through it. And I am sure I am insulting some of you right now because you think this little speech is condescending. So I apologize for that.
What I will do, however, is still post excerpts of the punditry that is relevant to our politics. Some of that may not speak of Sanders in glowing terms. Indeed, there is a Jonathan Chait piece below that some will find unpleasant. But I won’t offer my usual asides and commentary.
National Journal reports that Donald Trump has spent more than $3 million on fuel for his Boeing 757 — more than he’s spent on staff and consultants — so that he can sleep at home in New York or Florida while on the campaign trail.
Martin Longman asks what binds progressives together post-Sanders?
It seems to me that the glue that held conservatives together was a serious of losses, both political and judicial, but progressives are making incremental progress across the board in nearly every area except reversing the trend towards greater income inequality. In any case, people need to be motivated, and it’s hard to predict which parts of Sanders’ platform will be picked up by the next progressive champion and how much their appeal can expand to attract other pieces of the Democrats’ coalition.
[Jamelle] Bouie does a good job of explaining how progressives may lose the battle but win the long war, but he doesn’t do a good job of telling us the “what for.” And I think the lack of a “what for” is the biggest impediment to making that “how” come true.
I got one, and Hillary has already expressed an openness to this: putting the public option into Obamacare. That’s the next step. Then pressuring Hillary on progressive tax reform: reestablishing the mega rich levels on income that existed prior to Reagan. That is the necessary next thing because we will need funding to 1) fund social services and 2) fund infrastructure improvements.
The aforementioned Jonathan Chait says Bernie Sanders has lost the nomination and its making him crazy:
Sanders’s denunciations of the primary system as rigged have merged with his descriptions of the economy and the political system as rigged. In combination with his attacks on Clinton for succoring Wall Street — which are exaggerated but not entirely imagined — Sanders has conjoined Clinton and the Democratic Party apparatus to the shadow nexus of villains that he and his revolution are pledged to overthrow. Jeff Stein traveled to Ithaca, an outpost of Sanders enthusiasm, and found the place almost uniform in its conviction that Democratic voters actually had preferred their man, only to be thwarted by some ill-defined combination of fraud or corporate/media chicanery.
If he grasps the situation clearly, Sanders is no longer running a presidential campaign in the sense that he’s leading an effort designed with the end goal of winning the presidency. He is running a message campaign, using the platform of a campaign and its free media publicity to organize supporters and circulate his ideas. That is a perfectly valid thing for him to do. But does Sanders grasp the situation clearly? When Clinton kept her doomed campaign churning to the bitter end in 2008, even in the face of insurmountable delegate odds, she was driven by delusional advisers who believed an inflammatory tape of Michelle Obama assailing white people was poised for release. Sanders may well be in grips of similar fantasies. Given the shaky mathematical foundations of some of his domestic plans, it would almost be a surprise if he were not.
Even a message campaign needs something to say about the process — some reason to motivate its supporters to organize and turn out. That becomes difficult when victory is off the table. The problem for Sanders is that his message about the campaign is infecting his message about the country with an angry, self-serving paranoia.
You should also read the Jeff Stein piece linked above in Chait’s excerpt. I would offer further commentary, but I promised I wouldn’t.
Ezra Klein says Jeff Weaver, the campaign manager for Bernie Sanders, put in an amazing appearance on MSNBC last night after everyone, from Brian Williams, to Chuck Todd, to Nicole Wallace to Eugene Robinson to Rachel Maddow to Steve Kornacki, declared the Democratic Primary to be essentially done.
There is, to say the least, a certain amount of tension between two of the arguments the Bernie Sanders campaign made today.
First, Sanders blasted New York’s primary for being closed to independents. “Today, 3 million people in the state of New York who are independents have lost their right to vote in the Democratic or Republican primary,” Bernie Sanders said. “That’s wrong.”
But later that same night, Sanders’s campaign manager, Jeff Weaver, went on MSNBC and said that the campaign’s plan is to win the election by persuading superdelegates to dump Hillary Clinton.
This isn’t the first time the Sanders campaign has previewed this strategy. They began talking about it in March, arguing that if they could finish the primaries strong, then even if they trailed Clinton in delegates, they could use their strong poll numbers, tremendous small-donors fundraising, and general momentum to persuade superdelegates to switch sides and hand them the nomination.
And fair enough. It’s an incredibly unlikely stratagem — superdelegates are the very definition of the Democratic Party establishment, which is why Clinton has an enormous advantage among them — but it’s completely within the rules of the game.
It is, however, a bit unseemly for Sanders to blast New York’s primary for barring independent voters only to have his campaign manager go out and say they’re explicitly planning to use superdelegates to overturn the will of the voters.
Ted Cruz Says America Is Best “When She Is Lying Down With Her Back on the Mat.” Yeah, it eventually dawned on me what the Canadian was talking about, but the first image in my mind was not a good one.
Rick Klein says both Trump and Clinton exceeded expectations in their landslide primary wins: “Trump blasted through his supposed ceiling by reaching a new high-water mark, and in the process kept his hopes of capturing a delegate majority alive. He did not and could not, though, significantly widen his narrow path to a first-ballot win.”
“Clinton dispatched with Bernie Sanders in the state Sanders was born in, and where Sanders outspent Clinton substantially. But neither this nor any likely subsequent wins will end the Sanders challenge, not to mention the issues his candidacy has elevated, to Clinton’s regular discomfort.”
“New York did serve a critical purpose for Trump and Clinton: both will walk away from the state with large caches of delegates, and give them leads that will be practically impossible to overcome.
Nate Cohn says Sanders needed to win New York: “If you had told me one year ago that Bernie Sanders would manage to survive in the Democratic primary race all the way until New York, I would have been surprised and impressed.”
“But if you judge Mr. Sanders by the standard his campaign now wants him to be judged by — as a serious candidate with a shot at the nomination — the result Tuesday night was terrible.”
“New York, like every contest at this stage, was a state he needed to win. The result confirms that he is on track to lose the pledged delegate race and therefore the nomination.”
There are few things older than me still kicking around, but arithmetic is one of them. I'm not certain that gentleman's numbers add up.
— John Dingell (@JohnDingell) April 20, 2016
Matt Yglesias has two pieces on Vox this morning that say basically the same thing: that Bernie Sanders will not be President but that the Democratic Party of the future will be the Sanders Party. I’m fine with that. Whoops, that was personal commentary. Sorry.
Even in defeat in New York and most likely in the overall quest for the 2016 Democratic nomination, he’s already won in another, perhaps more important way: His brand of politics is the future of the Democratic Party.
Sanders is the overwhelming choice of young voters, scoring 67 percent of voters under 30 in New York even while losing overall amidst a set of election rules that were highly unfavorable to his cause. National Reuters polls now show him with a large 56-38 edge over Clinton with voters below the age of 40.
The votes of old people count just as much, of course, but any young and ambitious Democrat looking at the demographics of the party and the demographics of Sanders supporters has to conclude that his brand of politics is extremely promising for the future.
Whether the first Sanders-style nominee is Sanders himself or Elizabeth Warren or someone like a Tammy Baldwin or a Keith Ellison doesn’t matter. What’s clear is that there’s robust demand among Democrats â especially the next generation of Democrats â to remake the party along more ideological, more social democratic lines, and party leaders are going to have to answer that demand or get steamrolled.
The second Yglesias article says:
Bernie Sanders’s 2016 presidential campaign was about starting a revolution. Having lost by landslides across the South and having been defeated in New York and facing the reality of several more closed primaries in unfavorable states, it now looks exceptionally unlikely that his message will carry him into the White House.
But his campaign greatly exceeded expectations and showed that the kind of politics he represents is considerably more viable and mainstream than most of us in the press realized. He showed that there’s a coalition ready to support and finance candidates that embrace a more democratic style of politics than mainstream Democrats thought possible.
It’s a young coalition whose clout and power will only grow in years to come. Now it’s time for Bernie to point the revolution in a new direction and lay groundwork for the future.
“progressives are making incremental progress across the board in nearly every area except reversing the trend towards greater income inequality”
LOL
But progressives despise incrementalism! So is that really saying progressives are failing?
Well keep in mind the factors required for the last time income inequality was addressed….
It took a plunging stock market wiping out a considerable percentage of the nation’s private wealth.
It took 3 years of Republican philosophies to go absolutely nowhere and do nothing to create a turnaround. Instead, Republican actions made things worse.
It took a Democratic sweep giving super pluralities to Democrats as well as replacing the Republican President.
It took 7 years of trial and error, sometimes taking two steps forward, sometimes two steps back.
It took two simultaneous giant wars, either one so gigantic most of us have not seen the likes of since, to cause the top marginal tax rate to go up to almost 100%.
It took 15 years at 70% top marginal tax rates, before they were dropped down to 60%. Then it took 20 years at that until they were dropped to 50%…
It took strong labor laws passed in the Depression to allow workers to bargain on a level playing field with their boss on how much they should be paid.
Considering all the factors that must congeal again to crate the equality of income we thought would always exist in our America of the future, it really is no wonder it hasn’t happened yet, or if it does, how long it must take….
Point is…. If you don’t vote midterm elections…. shut your mouth and pay the MAN whatever he asks of you…. You have no one to blame but yourself. if you vote Republican in midterm elections… you probably will never see this, having clicked out as soon as you saw the word….”inequality”….
” I will not insult or otherwise attack or criticize Bernie Sanders or his supporters in my comments. And I understand some of you are still in denial and will enter a primal scream phase soon enough,”
Not to get personal. But – I have to point out that the second sentence makes you a liar in the first. Get a grip.
Good morning Jason. How are you this fine day? Beautiful weather, isn’t it?
“I will not insult or otherwise attack or criticize Bernie Sanders or his supporters in my comments.” … “And I understand some of you are still in denial and will enter a primal scream phase soon enough, if you are not already there, so I will not engage you over that.” Good thing you put that “in my comments” qualifier in there.
Sanders and his supporters (myself included) will continue to do what we’ve been doing; demonstrate that Democrats in general don’t have settle for moderate/centrist ideology and policy. A growing plurality of voters don’t identify with either major party; that’s a problem. A problem I just don’t see a Clinton administration solving.
I just took another look at Hillary’s issues page, looking for concrete commitments toward incremental improvements, and I was saddened by what i found.
Her Wall Street reforms boil down to promising to appoint tougher regulators but within the framework of existing law, no change.
Improvements in health care are nearly all in the form of increased subsidized payments to private insurers. Hillary “supports” (but will not “fight for”) a public option. There is no commitment for drug price negotiation. Well, there’s this partial statement but it is formulated with her lowest form of commitment (“Hillary believes…”), so she can very plausibly claim “I never campaigned on drug price negotiation.”
I expect to find a similar defense of the status quo in her other issues.
You’re just now looking at her issue page???
Puck, Brian, good to see you. I hope you both are doing well.
Happy 4-20 day
We should focus on what matters – the Donald is coming to Harrington. lol
“Considering all the factors that must congeal again to crate the equality of income we thought would always exist in our America of the future, it really is no wonder it hasn’t happened yet, or if it does, how long it must take….”
Sure, I know all that, which is why as a realist, I don’t expect miracles. Rather, it is long slow slog. But more importantly, now that you have become a progressive incrementalist? Is the next step in your becoming a pragmatic progressive?
“You’re just now looking at her issue page???”
What I said was “I just took another look at Hillary’s issues page…” but thank you for your Clintonian reading of what I said.
Sorry, guess I’m thinking back to when you didn’t know their gun policies and I had to research it for you.
Clintonian? Keep up the name calling, and I’ll pull out the oppo research on Bernie. I’m feeling a little DD today.
@Pandora “You’re just now looking at her issue page???”
LOL. Well, it’s not like it was germane before the yesterday’s primary.
“Hillary Clinton believes we need to promote competition and leverage our nation’s bargaining power to lower drug costs on behalf of Americans.”
And here is her plan to do just that.
Stop direct-to-consumer drug company advertising subsidies.
Require drug companies that benefit from taxpayers’ support to invest in research, not marketing or profits.
Require health insurance plans to place a monthly limit of $250 on covered out-of-pocket prescription drug costs for individuals.
Fully fund the FDA’s Office of Generic Drugs to clear out their multi-year generic drug approval backlog,
Lower the biologic exclusivity period from 12 to 7 years
Prohibit “pay for delay” arrangements that keep generic competition off the market.
Allow Americans to import drugs from abroad.
require pharmaceutical companies to provide higher rebates in the Medicare low-income subsidy program.
Allow Medicare to negotiate drug and biologic prices.
I can’t even begin to fathom how this could be classified as a “partial statement” “formulated with her lowest form of commitment” One has to wonder if the readers who have a different take on her plan are ESL readers. I don’t know if her plan will work, but it’s not just a belief, it is a plan.
On other blogs I discount many of the comments (and commenters) because they are outlandish, unsourced, blatantly partisan, or they twist facts and data to the point that they create some bizarro universe where up is down and left is right…
As I noted before, Hillary has a “tell” about her level of commitment to an issue.
“Believes…” – pro forma name drop of the issue, no real commitment.
“Supports…” – slightly stronger than “Believes,” but still not willing to identify herself with the issue.
“Will sign if placed on my desk…” – will make sure it is killed or gutted before it reaches my desk.
“Will” or “Will fight for…” – strongest commitment.
How about a substantive response from Sanders supporters about the fact Bernie plans to use Superdelegates to snag the nomination, even though Clinton would have more pledged delegates and a greater vote total? Seems like a shady thing to do…
How does this revelation sit with Sanders supporters? The actions Weaver describes seem to be the nefarious, establishment, DNC-type trickery that was/is continually laid at Clinton’s feet? Do you reject it or embrace it now because it aides your preferred candidate?
I can’t speak for other Sanders supporters, but I concluded long ago that the establishment, the Democratic machine, and the status quo would be the winners for the nomination. Bernie however is still winning the revolution. Meanwhile DD and Pandora continue to dance around the head of John the Baptist.
You’re right Hawkeye! Let’s put his head on a pike and dance the dance of the fire spirit.
Hi DD and Pandora! hope you guys are having a nice day.
All I have atm is a submission for the Dem Unity Anthem. Sorry My Friend, by the incomparable Save Ferris. Hope ya like brass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6MjR9fH98g
This song isnt intended to be coming from any “side” in particular…. Seems to make sense from both.
Commenting on here lately feels like Chinese buffet for dinner… Seems like a good decision at the time, might even taste good initially, but it’s all diarrhea in the end.
My apologies if my asked question fell/falls into the category of “too soon?”…
What kind of response are you looking for? It seems like a desperate thing for him to have said and it isnt realistic. In order to continue as a voice and “issue” candidate, people need to have something to vote for.
Prop Joe, Sanders supporters never point out anything wrong with their candidate – they only attack Clinton, and then complain when they can’t take what they dish out. Seriously, they can say what they want about me about the candidate I support, but no one can question their candidate.
Weaver’s comments are ridiculous, but the fundraising letters went out in minutes. Fine. Sanders congratulates Clinton on her NY win and then goes on to say the election was rigged, that voters were disenfranchised, etc.. Sanders wins are always legitimate, Clinton’s are not. It’s like playing Candy Land with a young child.
For months I have been calling for a vetting of Sanders. They. Won’t. Do. It. Either they don’t know what’s out there or they’re ignoring it. Go on… ask me.
Yeah, I’m feisty today.
Clinton successfully parried the vetting from Bernie but never developed a response. Normally she wouldn’t have to face challenges on those left-side vulnerabilities from a Republican, but now there’s Trump, who will recast them (with some validity) as populist issues.
“There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.” –John Adams
What? I don’t get the issue. What am I being asked to defend/explain? If the questions is “Why is Sanders going for Superdelegates? I think I’ve already said (7 times now) that Superdelgate votes are an effect, not a cause.
But now I’m done with this thread. So farewell and I’ll go back to not being dragged into tit for tat-ing.
Not going there? I thought so.
Trump will hammer Hillary on Goldman Sach transcripts, TPP, and NAFTA much more effectively than Bernie did, which will put Trump into strong contention for Progressive MVP (note: this is not an endorsement of Trump).
Where? If the questions is “Why is Sanders going for Superdelegates? I think I’ve already said (7 times now) that Superdelgate votes are an effect, not a cause.
I can’t put it on a lower shelf.
Do you guys really not know what’s out there on Sanders? That’s a serious question, btw. Hillary won’t touch it because she needs Sanders’ voters, but the GOP will.
Well that truce didn’t last long. I too will respond again… Since it seems like Pandora had her retort about Sanders supporters ready before anyone actually responded. So here it is….The comments sounded desperate and were wrong. It was the babeling of a campaign manager who knows the campaign is over. Is there a more groveling or anything you need to see or is that a sufficient response?
I know, right? Pandora, why are you commenting as though Sanders is a threat to win the nomination? He isn’t. He is a threat to continue to push the presumptive nominee to acknowledge some basic truths that she has yet to acknowledge – but that is on her.
i’d settle for incrementalism in fixing income inequality. it’s still the most important thing. hillary’s just working the old identity politics. by the way, bernie leads in national polling (maybe somebody already pointed this out). not that it matters.
So put it put there. It’s a poker game, we fold. Take the chips and show your winning hand.
Or just continue with your canned responses about how Sanders supports won’t do this or that. You’re the last one I’d expect to thumb your nose and take a victory lap…. Guess it says a lot about what your average establishment Democrat REALLY thinks about 48% of their party.
Let’s start here:
“A man goes home and masturbates his typical fantasy. A woman on her knees, a woman tied up, a woman abused.
A woman enjoys intercourse with her man — as she fantasizes being raped by 3 men simultaneously.”
Those are Bernie Sanders’ words.
“Michael Briggs, Sanders’ campaign spokesman, said the article was a “dumb attempt at dark satire in an alternative publication” that “in no way reflects his views or record on women. It was intended to attack gender stereotypes of the ’70s, but it looks as stupid today as it was then.”
That’s one of the problems.
Did you really read that as advocating those viewpoints?
Drumph has vulnerabilities with a critical voting segment: women. TPP, and Benghazi and emails can’t quite cover the way he has treated women. Oh, what about tax returns? They can’t possibly ALL be under audit. I would love to review those babies.
If Progressives think Drumph is on their side, think about SCOTUS.
I’ll take a Blue dog dem over any R every day and twice on Sundays
So… Is this how Clinton is going to bring in Sanders supporters? We are doomed. DOOMED, I say!
Right, because the GOP would quote the entire article. Sorta the way everyone calling out “super-predator” goes on to explain context. I found the entire article disturbing. He even said on Meet The Press: he dismissed the article as a “piece of fiction” exploring gender stereotypes—”something like Fifty Shades of Grey.”
50 Shades of Grey doesn’t make his case – It’s about an abusive, sexual relationship. Hardly exploring gender stereotypes.
Sanders’s essay, though awkward, actually deplores the stereotypes you quoted. Have we reached the point where men cannot use the word “rape” in order to condemn it?
That’s all ? C’mon winner! Put the rest up. Get it all out of your system. Tell the world why Sanders is horrible and all of his supporters are horrible for ever trusting him. Or better yet, explain what kind of demonstration of submission you would like to see.
Clearly, answering Joe’s specific question regarding a campaign manager’s dumb-ass comment… and also acknowledging the race is over is not enough for you… why do I think this? Because you responded to all of those comments as if we had said “Bernie is still going to win!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So if you need your pound of flesh before we can talk about what kind of nominee Clinton will be, name the cut you would like…. Unless the plan all along was to kick the hippie.. which I would have called form the start. This isnt a damn game.
Sanders is a pro-rape gun lover who is promising dumb kids free college in order to enact his secret agenda of baby killing… not abortion, mind you. He’s REALLY to the right of Ted Cruz on that one. He wants mandatory pregnancy, then kill the baby. What else…. He wants to gift Israel all our nukes and would make Trump is running mate.
sad. Here I was ready to graciously throw in the towel… actually did it early on. I guess it’s more about the fight than the outcome for some people.
“50 Shades of Grey doesn’t make his case – It’s about an abusive, sexual relationship. ”
Maybe you’d better read it again to be sure.
NO.. Dont derail this into a conversation about a total trash piece of literature. It was Twilight-ripoff porno fan-fiction and is not at all what BDSM is about. Do NOT make supporting income equality and pro-active approaches to climate and energy policy anywhere close to whatever the message in that book is. This is why we cant have nice things.
How is everyone doing? Everyone doing well? If not, please go outside on this lovely day and enjoy some sunshine. It’s beautiful out there today.
DD seems to be having a really great 4/20.
Check out Senator Warren giving an epic beatdown to Ted Cruz on Twitter.
Oh how I long for a day when Harry “Muslims shouldnt run for office because they cant win” Reid is long gone and Majority Leader Sanders (unless more of his pro-rape comments come out) along with Majority Whip (and future chief justice) Warren is making sure President Clinton serves the voters who elected her.
LOL, Ben, I am just doing my best to bring peace and happiness to our big liberal/progressive/Democratic family.
Hey Ben, would you compromise on Majority Leader Warren, and Majority Whip Durbin and Vice President Sherrod Brown?
Absolutely! With Warren setting the agenda, even IF Clinton has some big bank loyalties (not going there, just saying if… ) Income inequality would be near the top of the priority list. I have no opinion of Dick Durbin. I remember he had a very significant endorsement of Obama, so as long as he has been forgiven for that….
Now for Veep…. my original prediction was Corey Booker, but it was very telling that Brown endorsed Clinton. Always struck me as a possible Berner. FWIW, his endorsement has done more to make me comfortable with her than anything else.
Just out of curiosity… where do you see Sanders going from here? I imagine this campaign will have taken a lot out of him and who knows if he has more than a term left. I kind of think Treasury Secretary would be the place he could be most effective. Clinton doesnt need to get her hands dirty beating up on the oligarchy. She can just stack her administration with people who have made that their goal.
aren’t you hillary supporters even a little disappointed that you’ll have to vote for this sanctimonious, pandering, hypocritical, unlikable (not even “likable enough”) person in order to defeat the republicans, who are, of course, even worse?
If they are Hillary supporters, then they probably arent all that disappointed… nor do they likely agree with your description of their candidate…. but thanks for giving them a straw-man berniebro to continue hammering.
I do not see Sanders in a leadership position, which is why I commented after you referred to him as a possible Majority Leader. That’s not who Bernie is. A majority leader can set a course and the agenda, but he or she also has to be concerned with the needs and opinions of his caucus. I do not mean this in a negative way, but Bernie Sanders is not concerned about the needs and opinions of his fellow Democratic Senators. He is also not going to be in the Clinton Cabinet, nor should you want him to be. You want him outside of it but in the Senate to shape policy that reaches President Clinton’s desk.
I expect Bernie to continue to serve as a Senator, but with an enhanced profile. As Jason or someone pointed out, he is now a leader of a wing of the Democratic Party. He has a significant following, both in and outside the Senate caucus. As such, his voice will matter. He will be involved in negotiations on legislation and administration appointments. He will not be ignored, assuming of course he works well with his fellow Democrats. If he goes scorched earth against Hillary or the entire Party, well then he will be ignored or marginalized (Clinton will just have Brown and Warren be the voice of progressivism). If he works within the Senate and the caucus for his vision of a more progressive America, then real progress will and can be made.
i don’t give a shit about berniebros. i just want some action on income equality.
Ben, anonymous has a point. I do think Clinton supporters continue to be edgy because, deep down, they know she is a deeply flawed candidate. You’d need a tranquilizer gun filled with truth serum to get that out of them, but if you read between the lines you can tell. They are nervous, and for good reason.
Trump (ironically being a billionaire) is going to run straight at the banking cliques, rigged economy, stuff that Clinton is so vulnerable on. She may win, but it is going to be nauseatingly close.
Hey anonymous, I am ecstatic that I get to vote for Hillary as President. I actually like her. She is a great person. Your feelings of her are based on a false caricature of her assembled by Republicans and embraced by the Sanders campaign.
Jason, stop fucking speaking for me or any Hillary supporter. Do not pretend to know what we think or how we feel. First, it makes you a fucking liar. Second, you don’t do it well.
Lotta salt in here. lotta salt.
Ben, I don’t need anonymous to bitch at when I have this asshole named Jason330
For VP, I would focus on who will help the outcome in November. I’m not certain she needs a Hispanic, although it wouldn’t hurt. But she seems to be the weakest in the flyovers and maybe the West. But I wouldn’t want just a name or a face.
I haven’t given VP much thought since I am more concerned about the 2 – 3 SCOTUS vacancies that are likely to crop up during her term.
Sherrod Brown, A PROGRESSIVE FROM OHIO. I think that helps in November.
DD, I agree with you to an extent… I do think there are some bad apples in the party… this isn’t coming from a purist perspective… But I do think there are people in leadership positions now that souldn’t be the voice of the party, or leaders in the party.
Basically the test for me is “do you still believe the republicans are negotiating in good faith and will you continue to allow them to take hostages to get the insane crap they want?” if the answer is yes (and we all know who those people are), they should be worked around, primaried, or otherwise removed from the decision making process.
Luckily, the incoming president has 30 years worth of vendetta(S?) against that party and doesn’t naively think, like the current president did, that there is any real way to work with these people.
Basically the test for me is “do you still believe the republicans are negotiating in good faith and will you continue to allow them to take hostages to get the insane crap they want?”
Good test. If you want someone who plays hardball against Republicans, as you say, Hillary has a lot of experience with it. Obama was naive, and his first term was marred by that naivete.
Someone get my a tranquilizer gun filled with truth serum.
Someone just get me my shotgun.
Without the Republican party in comparison, the Democrats have little appeal to me. I would vote Green Party if it wasn’t a throw away
if by “shotgun” you mean, “soon-to-be-legal-plant” delivery method… then I would say… yes, there seem to be a lot of people who need exactly that.
Against Fortress Liberalism
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/04/bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton-dnc-primary-moderates/
dd: i can interpret hillary for myself, thank you. i don’t need republican talking points or sycophantic points from democrats either. hell, i’m gonna vote for her. what else do you want? as for likable, barack obama is likable. and classy. too bad we democratic voters won’t have that going for us this time.
You know, if you can speak and interpret for yourself, grant me the same fucking courtesy and assume that I can do the same. You will be treated as you treat others here. If you give no respect you will get none.
yes, principal dd. you assumed that’s what i was doing, so why shouldn’t i assume that of you?
@Ben “Just out of curiosity… where do you see Sanders going from here?”
Probably as VP.
Hillary wants to win more than she dislikes Sanders. She will court him.
Sanders wants to remain in the limelight more than he dislikes Hillary. He will probably accept.
As posted on the Trump in Harrington thread, a protest organized there Friday under the DelLib banner would seem to present an opportunity for unity.
you really think so, LE? I can see no better way to make Sanders ineffective than to make him VP. My money is on Brown or Booker. Sanders could resurrect the Bull-Moose party.
Hah! said by a co-worker… the silver lining in accepting that Clinton is the nominee, my expectations are so low that it will be virtually impossible to be let down by her presidency. Not exactly my sentiment, but it’s something to hold on to.
Hillary Clinton. Americas Margaret Thatcher. Hrumph!
@Ben “I can see no better way to make Sanders ineffective than to make him VP.”
Isn’t that what he already is? But he really could help the administration…
“My money is on Brown or Booker. Sanders could resurrect the Bull-Moose party.”
No way. She’s already got the black vote. She needs the Sanders voters.
And she doesn’t even need to like Sanders. Do you think that JFK liked LBJ???
I cant tell if you’re being glib or not… please clarify so i can tailor my response accordingly.
assuming that was genuine….
When it’s all said and done, Id rather not lose a progressive from the Senate. Most of the conservadems i have problems with are (and were.. until 2010) Senators. If Sanders is VP, he wont be making impassioned speeches on the senate floor. He’ll need to make sure he stays publicly on message with the administration…. as a Senator, he’ll be free to be critical.
I dont think Booker would be about the black vote… Hillary has that by not being Trump…. and not to reduce an entire group of people to one archetype… but Obama will be campaigning for her. I think Booker would be young, energetic and has a pretty high likability factor (didnt he save someone from a burning building?) and would represent a “next generation” of party leaders. She needs to pick a VP that can run in 2024.
I have spoke to maybe 20 black people about who they will vote for and most have said Trump. It’s a small anecdotal sample but a disturbing trend
No way. She’s already got the black vote. She needs the Sanders voters.
Which is pretty much why everyone said Obama needed Hillary as VP. And he selected someone that they could market as a governing team — someone who could address what everyone said was his biggest weakness.
I’m interested in hearing from a Clinton supporter as to what her biggest weakness is.
I think Clinton’s greatest weakness, is that she perceived as an insider; part of an imperial hierarchy, who has been in DC for decades. Of course that is also a strength in that she knows how to operate. Still, in the age of the populist outsider, she is not one.
Her second weakness is that she has command of the intricacies of how government works, who does what to whom, which will hold her in good stead when it comes to dealing with Congress and the many NGO that play in the political game (AIPAC). However, people have short attention spans. So how is going to get them to pay attention while she rattles off fact, figures, plans, and policies?
“So how is (she) going to get them to pay attention while she rattles off fact, figures, plans, and policies?”
Trump will be willing to sound like a clod, because it is going to make Clinton sound like some kind of out of touch egg head.
Clinton is clearly one of the most prepared and competent candidates ever but there’s a vision thing that she isn’t conveying. Trump offers to blow up an entrenched and obviously corrupt system. Trump could take a lot of votes from frustrated people. I won’t vote for him but it does have a certain appeal. Clinton needs to speak for someone beside the 1% class in a way that conveys that she will actually do something
I’m interested in hearing from a Clinton supporter as to what her biggest weakness is.
She has a big weakness, and I know you all will roll your eyes at this, but it is that she is a woman. Seriously. Even among the most enlightened liberal feminist men, even among the modern day woman, there is this unconscious unintentional bias against women in authority. If someone asks another why they don’t like Hillary Clinton, some will offer genuine policy differences. But still others will really have no reason they can put into words, so they fall back on “she’s shrill, she shouts, etc.” Being a woman I think is a far bigger obstacle for Hillary than being black was for Obama.
So I feel that is her biggest weakness because there is nothing she can do about it. Her high negatives now will actually improve over the summer as many Sanders supporters come back to liking her again now that the passion of the primary is over. And it will happen because it happened before, in 2008. Sure, some Sanders supporters will still hate her and not vote for her, and still others will hate her but hold their nose and vote for her, but the majority will come back to liking her again, especially when she is compared to her opposition, when it will be Trump or Cruz.
Her being too cautious, in both style and substance? Not a weakness. In fact, I view it as a strength.
Her not being a natural politician with the campaigning skill of her husband or Obama? I think she has been actually getting much better at being a politician, and she does use it to her advantage effectively.
Thank you for your honest answer. Unsurprisingly, I disagree with some of it, but there’s not really a point in arguing.
The next couple weeks are going to be very important. The media also seems to be developing amnesia about Trump…. Which is horrifying.