Political Roundtable Part XXVI

[dckingsfan]

I think we can agree that Bernie would have needed to beat Hillary in the Democratic primaries to become the candidate - and he wasn't able to do that. I think we can see that Bernie isn't all that either - he is currently 3rd and sinking. He was always only popular with his following.

This is my only point of disagreement with your above post. Hillary did beat Sanders. But Sanders favorables/unfavorables were better than Hilary Clinton (IIRC no one as high as Sanders who was in the 70s). I had no problem with people who voted for Hillary Clinton if she indeed represented their values. But it was always going to be a more uphill battle for Clinton compared Sanders and probably any other generic candidate, at least that's what some experts were saying prior to the 2016 election.

Ultimately, it was a perfect storm. The states that Hillary needed to win like Michigan and Wisconsin were the ones where Sanders did better than Clinton. Clinton piled up her primary lead in states that ultimately did not matter (Alabama, Texas, California). Not to mention 3rd party candidates like Jill Stein who seemed to draw votes away from Clinton (and may have taken money from Russia).

Overall though, the DNC could have done a better job encouraging more candidates to run. They seemed to treat non-Clinton candidates rather unfairly in the debates which may have discouraged others from entering the debates and the optics were bad with DWS being the head of the DNC, who was Hillary's campaign manager in 2008. Not sure why the Democrats dismissed Howard Dean back in 2008 as the Democrats managed to lose the house, senate, and presidency over the next 8 years.

You hit the nail on the head. It probably shouldn't have been either Bernie or Clinton.

[I_Like_Dirt]

So why nominate someone who people who are not comfortable in defending? Sanders certainly has his flaws, perhaps some bigger than Clinton but people were more willing to support him. BTW, pretty much 75% family supported HRC in the primary's, although it was a 50/50 split with my extended familty.

How on earth are you so sure that people aren't willing to defend Sanders? People were defending Hillary, too. The only real catch there were that Sanders supporters piled onto Hillary and Hillary supporters didn't pile onto Sanders in the same way. Guess who was the target of the misinformation campaign?

And no, I'm not suggesting anyone is more rational than anyone else. If you can't see the issues a rather significant portion of Bernie's supporters have specifically in dealing with any non-Bernie candidate, though, I'm not sure what to tell you because you're not going to be convinced. The evidence has been strong on that side of things for quite some time.

Bernie was never targeted the same way Hillary was. Put the spotlight on him the same way and his popularity tanks, too. The bigger issue that doesn't get talked about, though, is that Bernie isn't a better candidate just because a bunch of his supporters are willing to throw dirt at the other candidates while the other candidates and their supporters don't respond against them in kind. It's been going on already on their end against everyone, though primarily Warren and Biden for now because they're the most popular. Bernie's cult of personality has been both a blessing and a curse for his attempts at the presidency.

Hillary may or may not have been a terrible candidate but Bernie was a worse option at that point. If there was a better candidate than Hillary, they weren't running for the nomination.

[Wizardspride]

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[dobrojim]

re HRC/Bernie retrospective

I keep going back to the late night TV guy who ran 'demonstration' on his
show in which his people did 'person on the street' interviews in which
they created a completely fabricated scandal that was supposedly attached
to HRC and asked the interviewees if they had heard about the latest
HRC scandal. A surprising number of people went right along with it
saying they had heard about it and wasn't it awful...the scandal that
the show's producers just made up. To me this is validation that decades
of right wing propaganda was ultimately effective.

I would never suggest that she was a perfect candidate but in the final
analysis, her failure to win was partly due to how successfully she had
been negatively portrayed, for years, by those who were threatened by
her candidacy. It's not what you are, it's how people perceive you to be.

[Wizardspride]

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[Ruzious]

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Sooooo, they're actually using this fiasco as free advertisement for Trump's resort. Every day, there's another few things added to the list. After his reign... is over, there's going to be a very long book published just listing all the ethical problems - by date - of the WH. That will be separate from the 10 volume set listing all the lies by date from the WH. There will be calendar boxes - with a page of Trump lies for each day. This is part of the Trump cottage industry that he won't be making money from - the Trump cottage cheese.

[Wizardspride]

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[Kanyewest]

So why nominate someone who people who are not comfortable in defending? Sanders certainly has his flaws, perhaps some bigger than Clinton but people were more willing to support him. BTW, pretty much 75% family supported HRC in the primary's, although it was a 50/50 split with my extended familty.

How on earth are you so sure that people aren't willing to defend Sanders? People were defending Hillary, too. The only real catch there were that Sanders supporters piled onto Hillary and Hillary supporters didn't pile onto Sanders in the same way. Guess who was the target of the misinformation campaign?

And no, I'm not suggesting anyone is more rational than anyone else. If you can't see the issues a rather significant portion of Bernie's supporters have specifically in dealing with any non-Bernie candidate, though, I'm not sure what to tell you because you're not going to be convinced. The evidence has been strong on that side of things for quite some time.

Bernie was never targeted the same way Hillary was. Put the spotlight on him the same way and his popularity tanks, too. The bigger issue that doesn't get talked about, though, is that Bernie isn't a better candidate just because a bunch of his supporters are willing to throw dirt at the other candidates while the other candidates and their supporters don't respond against them in kind. It's been going on already on their end against everyone, though primarily Warren and Biden for now because they're the most popular. Bernie's cult of personality has been both a blessing and a curse for his attempts at the presidency.

Hillary may or may not have been a terrible candidate but Bernie was a worse option at that point. If there was a better candidate than Hillary, they weren't running for the nomination.

I'm just quoting you in saying that people were "uncomfortable" in defending Hillary. Although to be honest, I know plenty of people who defend Hillary but they don't do it a public manner like Sanders or even Warren supporters. I'm just saying the enthusiasm wasn't there online like it was for Obama and Sanders.

Agreed that Sanders didn't see the same scrutiny. Neither did Obama until 2008 but overcame it. I think Sanders was better than Hillary but not ideal, so I see your viewpoint. That being said, I will take my chances with the candidate that started out as more favorable no matter how much dirt they threw on Hillary Clinton (which never was as bad as what Trump supporters did either).

[Wizardspride]

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[pancakes3]

hilary was a perfect strong/weak candidate. that's why it's still good bs fodder to relitigate 2016. defenders of hilary have valid points. critics of hilary have valid points.

after 2 terms of obama, historically speaking it's a long shot to win a 3rd term for the incumbent party, so it makes sense to put out a weaker candidate. plus she has baggage and general unlikeability - for a myriad of reasons, including irrational ones like implicit sexism.

however, with an even weaker republican field of nominees, headlined by a joke candidate, hilary's credentials and political cache made her a relatively strong candidate.

so you have this candidate with immense political capital within the party willing to spend it all in a bid for a throwaway election, it made sense that the DNC chose her over the firebrand Bernie - especially considering that the former is a centrist good soldier willing to toe the noncommital party line.

[Pointgod]

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Great news for coal miners in Pennsylvania. MAGA!

The corruption is just blatant and out in the open now. They really don’t give a ****. Where’s daoneandonly to tell me that Trump was the most ethical lol

[Wizardspride]

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Great news for coal miners in Pennsylvania. MAGA!

The corruption is just blatant and out in the open now. They really don’t give a ****. Where’s daoneandonly to tell me that Trump was the most ethical lol

And to think SD20 was complaining about the Obamas writing books..

[doclinkin]

I think he’s just in the mindset now to steal or ruin whatever he can before they kick him out. To fast forward the requests of his Russian masters and set up his business deals and favors for after his presidency.

[Kanyewest]

I wonder if he plans on moving to Russia if things really fall out. Then again, it still feels like congress is moving at a snail like pace that Trump will only be leaving office via an election. Or worst case, finishing out his 2nd term.

[G R E Y]

I went back a couple of pages and didn't see this posted. Looks important:

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[G R E Y]

Macabre:

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[montestewart]

This is part of the Trump cottage industry that he won't be making money from - the Trump cottage cheese.

That's the large turd cottage cheese, right?

[pancakes3]

I went back a couple of pages and didn't see this posted. Looks important:

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This, I think, is actually poor journalism (fake news).

It looks like it just cherrypicked some large trades made at the end of the trading day and found Trump tweets that coincided with it, and wrote an article.

Large hedge-bets are often made at the end of the day, so nothing too shady there. There's no information on who's making the trade, or even if it's the same trader making those trades. It could be a big deal, but the article as written is grasping at straws. If this was potential fraud, the SEC/FINRA would be up on it and there would definitely be more to the story than just chronicling the transactions measured against Trump tweets.

[dobrojim]

I think he’s just in the mindset now to steal or ruin whatever he can before they kick him out. To fast forward the requests of his Russian masters and set up his business deals and favors for after his presidency.

Some have suggested or hoped that once he leaves office he might end up in a very
different publicly owned facility assuming Barr or another GOP toady is no longer AG.
He has committed actual crimes that we know about and it's not hard to imagine that once the
stonewall preventing more information about his past breaks down completely, he could be
facing much more legal liability assuming the statute of limitations has not
passed on some of them.

[I_Like_Dirt]

I'm just quoting you in saying that people were "uncomfortable" in defending Hillary. Although to be honest, I know plenty of people who defend Hillary but they don't do it a public manner like Sanders or even Warren supporters. I'm just saying the enthusiasm wasn't there online like it was for Obama and Sanders.

Agreed that Sanders didn't see the same scrutiny. Neither did Obama until 2008 but overcame it. I think Sanders was better than Hillary but not ideal, so I see your viewpoint. That being said, I will take my chances with the candidate that started out as more favorable no matter how much dirt they threw on Hillary Clinton (which never was as bad as what Trump supporters did either).

I'm not saying people were uncomfortable in defending Hillary. I'm saying they are now because the narrative has been twisted exactly as you're describing it so people just give up as it's pointless now anyway.

Compare Hillary to Gore and Kerry. Hillary did way better. Trump basically got the same amount of votes as Bush Jr did in his second term while Hillary got almost 7 million more votes than Kerry did. Hillary was undone by the increasingly partisan nature of politics at this point and how a lot of rural areas have a disproportionate amount of electoral college seats and disproportionately are unshakably Republican. Kerry wouldn't have done much worse. Now you can talk about how Kerry wasn't a great candidate, either, and I'd agree. But that's sort of my point. When you go down the list of historical presidential candidates, Hillary isn't actually that bad. She's just made out to be one of the worst candidates ever now in order to fit certain narratives people want to push.