US Politics

The Democrats better not split in two at the moment the world needs them most.

As others have said, if a tiny fraction of Bernie supporters who refused to vote Clinton had just realised by not voting they were giving us Trump we wouldn't be here.
 
Don't understand why you folk don't campaign more for electoral reform. The two-party system in America is worse than the UK.

I suppose the chances of anything happen are essentially zero with so many "muh constitution" nutjobs, but every little helps. Fully proportional primaries would at least be a start.
 
Eboue said:
If the Democrats hadn't nominated one of the four people in this country capable of losing to a rapist with a wet log for a brain we wouldnt be here.
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Which part of Hillary got millions and millions more votes in the primary do you fail to understand?
 
berbatrick said:
I haven't bothered to check but I'm sure that's the case.


Also, unrelated:
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Anyone naming themselves after an Ayn Rand character shouldn't be quoted publicly
 
Beachryan said:
The Democrats better not split in two at the moment the world needs them most.

As others have said, if a tiny fraction of Bernie supporters who refused to vote Clinton had just realised by not voting they were giving us Trump we wouldn't be here.
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Very much this.
 
The man will make 3+ SCOTUS nominations. Will be surprised if any form of abortion is legal by the end of his presidency.
Good luck, America.
 
Adisa said:
The man will make 3+ SCOTUS nominations. Will be surprised if any form of abortion is legal by the end of his presidency.
Good luck, America.
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Abortion and same sex marriage are definitely on the table. A very conservative justice nominee would easily reverse Roe v Wade and gay marriage.
 
Raoul said:
Abortion and same sex marriage are definitely on the table. A very conservative justice nominee would easily reverse Roe v Wade and gay marriage.
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What a fecking day that would be. "Elections have consequences" couldn't be more apt
Hopefully it forces Dems to the polls. You don't have to like the candidate. Just vote for the best option.
 
Beachryan said:
The Democrats better not split in two at the moment the world needs them most.

As others have said, if a tiny fraction of Bernie supporters who refused to vote Clinton had just realised by not voting they were giving us Trump we wouldn't be here.
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Sanders and Nader have not helped the country this millennium. If only their supporters had not wasted their votes in 2000 and 2016...
 
Have a feeling Ginsberg is going to be like what's the point? Then she fecks off.
 
Adisa said:
Have a feeling Ginsberg is going to be like what's the point? Then she fecks off.
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She will definitely be gone in the next couple of years - either by way of retirement or passing away. She's too old to stick around for a 2nd Trump term.
 
Eboue said:
Look at naders platform. Basically everything on it is a mainstream dem position now.
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Unfortunately he played spoiler in 2000. Obviously, there are many scenarios that could have led Gorebto victory, but my home state going for Gore with the expected Nader votes would have sealed the election.
 
calodo2003 said:
Unfortunately he played spoiler in 2000. Obviously, there are many scenarios that could have led Gorebto victory, but my home state going for Gore with the expected Nader votes would have sealed the election.
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I think this is the wrong way to look at these things. In a democracy, theres no such thing as playing spoiler. There are candidates who vie for votes from voters and in this democracy in particular, the fact that a third party candidate gets a decent amount of votes is a sign of dissatisfaction with the two main party candidates who could have potentially won those voters over by approaching issues that they care about in a different way.
 
Raoul said:
She will definitely be gone in the next couple of years - either by way of retirement or passing away. She's too old to stick around for a 2nd Trump term.
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The other guy that Clinton nominated is quite old as well. Can't remember is name.
Both should have retired under Obama. The whole thing is a mess.
 
Eboue said:
I think this is the wrong way to look at these things. In a democracy, theres no such thing as playing spoiler. There are candidates who vie for votes from voters and in this democracy in particular, the fact that a third party candidate gets a decent amount of votes is a sign of dissatisfaction with the two main party candidates who could have potentially won those voters over by approaching issues that they care about in a different way.
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You are correct regarding emotions in voting and statements of intent by third party candidates, but there also is the concept of pragmatism to consider. The spoiler moniker in elections is typically not anointed until after the result, it’s not necessarily something a candidate sets out to do, but it turned out that votes for Nader would have translated to votes for Gore. Voting ‘for conscience’ for Nader in that election gifted us Bush and the resulting negative effects of that presidency. A pragmatist would have potentially seen the futility in their election and hopefully seen the negative prospects of their garnered votes. In the months immediately prior to the 2000 election, it was clear how tight the race was. In my opinion, Nader should have thrown weight behind Gore and tried to sway his voters to vote for the lesser of two evils. It’s a bit Pollyanna-ish to throw votes away as evidenced by the razor thin margins in 2000 and 2016. Why take unacceptable chances?

My country stands at the edge of a precipice from which we potentially will not dig out for decades. We have to look critically at the past elections and not make the same mistakes as 2000 and 2016. There were myriad of issues that went into creating the the election results, all should be studied critically so as not to repeat. I feel that we unfortunately repeated an aspect of 2000 in 2016 and another spoiler happened.
 
Adisa said:
Have a feeling Ginsberg is going to be like what's the point? Then she fecks off.
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Let’s just hope that she lasts a few more years. The fact that this charlatan could make the SC so massively conservative in such a short order for potentially decades is terrifying
 
calodo2003 said:
Nah, Sanders and Nader. I look at both of them through the same spoiler lens.
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Sanders didn't stand in the general election though. Unlike the others, he is responsible for giving rise to the current wave of progressives vying for congressional seats, which is far more than the likes of Stein and Nader have going for them.
 
calodo2003 said:
You are correct regarding emotions in voting and statements of intent by third party candidates, but there also is the concept of pragmatism to consider. The spoiler moniker in elections is typically not anointed until after the result, it’s not necessarily something a candidate sets out to do, but it turned out that votes for Nader would have translated to votes for Gore. Voting ‘for conscience’ for Nader in that election gifted us Bush and the resulting negative effects of that presidency. A pragmatist would have potentially seen the futility in their election and hopefully seen the negative prospects of their garnered votes. In the months immediately prior to the 2000 election, it was clear how tight the race was. In my opinion, Nader should have thrown weight behind Gore and tried to sway his voters to vote for the lesser of two evils. It’s a bit Pollyanna-ish to throw votes away as evidenced by the razor thin margins in 2000 and 2016. Why take unacceptable chances?

My country stands at the edge of a precipice from which we potentially will not dig out for decades. We have to look critically at the past elections and not make the same mistakes as 2000 and 2016. There were myriad of issues that went into creating the the election results, all should be studied critically so as not to repeat. I feel that we unfortunately repeated an aspect of 2000 in 2016 and another spoiler happened.
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I think the issue is framing. Why are you blaming voters who individually had infinitesimally small influence instead of the candidates backed by millions upon millions with all the power in the world?

Instead of "the nader voters cost gore the election" it should be "gore lost the election by refusing to change his platform to appeal to voters on the left".
 
Raoul said:
Sanders didn't stand in the general election though. Unlike the others, he is responsible for giving rise to the current wave of progressives vying for congressional seats, which is far more than the likes of Stein and Nader have going for them.
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I get what you are saying from a progressive standpoint, but looking at raw votes for each, both fit the mold of a spoiler. Nader was far more of a spoiler due to his participation in the general, obviously.
 
Eboue said:
I think the issue is framing. Why are you blaming voters who individually had infinitesimally small influence instead of the candidates backed by millions upon millions with all the power in the world?

Instead of "the nader voters cost gore the election" it should be "gore lost the election by refusing to change his platform to appeal to voters on the left".
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As I stated, there are many factors that go into the results of an election, but in the case of Nader’s campaign having the spoiler effect, it’s cut and dry. Looking at it pragmatically, his campaign achieved very little, its results benefitting Bush.

All issues leading into the loss of an election should be reviewed critically and if there is the potential of a spoiler like 2000 (and, to a lesser tangential Sanders in 2016), it should be looked at objectively and critically. There are times to rally around party and ensure the party is voted into office. For many reasons, the spoiler effect being one of them, we didn’t and we are starting to suffer.
 
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calodo2003 said:
As I stated, there are many factors that go into the results of an election, but in the case of Nader’s campaign having the spoiler effect, it’s cut and dry. Looking at it pragmatically, his campaign achieved very little, its results benefitting Bush.

All issues leading into the loss of an election should be reviewed critically and if there is the potential of a spoiler like 2000 (and, to a lesser tangential Scooby e, 2016), it should be looked at objectively and critically. There are times to rally around party and ensure the party is voted into office. For many reasons, the spoiler effect being one of them, we didn’t and we are starting to suffer.
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His campaign moved the Democrats to the left. As I said before, all of his outlandish left wing positions then are the mainstream positions now. Perhaps gore could have adopted a couple of them to win voters.

That's the job of politicians, to win votes.
 
Eboue said:
His campaign moved the Democrats to the left. As I said before, all of his outlandish left wing positions then are the mainstream positions now. Perhaps gore could have adopted a couple of them to win voters.

That's the job of politicians, to win votes.
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Not talking about current political positions, not germaine to the point that his campaign negatively affected the 2000 election and helped Bush get elected. For starters, I would take the positive effect of not being in Iraq and not funding two wars off book over the impact Nader has made on current Democratic politics.
 
calodo2003 said:
Not talking about current political positions, not germaine to the point that his campaign negatively affected the 2000 election and helped Bush get elected. For starters, I would take the positive effect of not being in Iraq and not funding two wars off book over the impact Nader has made on current Democratic politics.
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If you want to talk about strategic voting, why is no one telling at the Clinton primary voters who saw the polling that said Bernie would beat trump and Clinton wouldnt and still voted for her anyway?

I dont blame those people because that's not what voting is about. But why is it only one way? Why dont the people so upset about this yell at their queen who was too much of a dumbass to go to Wisconsin even once
 
Eboue said:
If you want to talk about strategic voting, why is no one telling at the Clinton primary voters who saw the polling that said Bernie would beat trump and Clinton wouldnt and still voted for her anyway?

I dont blame those people because that's not what voting is about. But why is it only one way? Why dont the people so upset about this yell at their queen who was too much of a dumbass to go to Wisconsin even once
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I get that you want to funnel everything back into a condemnation of Hillary (and she certainly deserves a massive amount of criticism) and you will go to the mat every time any aspect of the progressive element of our party gets brought up in a critical light, but to not look rationally back at the negative causation that were caused by both campaigns and to not learn from them is baffling.

Very rarely is there ever a pure ‘if / then’ argument in politics, but if we didn’t have the futile Nader campaign in 2000, we wouldn’t have wasted trillions of dollars on war (not to mention trillions more on other off book Bush boondoggles) and tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of lives would have been spared. Such an negative effect on the potential outcome of the election wasn’t recognized well enough in the run up to the 2016 election and history somewhat repeated itself. To not realize that such events happened and we should be concerned about them going forward is to keep one’s head firmly in the sand.
 
calodo2003 said:
I get that you want to funnel everything back into a condemnation of Hillary (and she certainly deserves a massive amount of criticism) and you will go to the mat every time any aspect of the progressive element of our party gets brought up in a critical light, but to not look rationally back at the negative causation that were caused by both campaigns and to not learn from them is baffling.

Very rarely is there ever a pure ‘if / then’ argument in politics, but if we didn’t have the futile Nader campaign in 2000, we wouldn’t have wasted trillions of dollars on war (not to mention trillions more on other off book Bush boondoggles) and tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of lives would have been spared. Such an negative effect on the potential outcome of the election wasn’t recognized well enough in the run up to the 2016 election and history somewhat repeated itself. To not realize that such events happened and we should be concerned about them going forward is to keep one’s head firmly in the sand.
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The same if/then in 2000 applies to the madness of an electoral college, Gore's campaign, his inability to win his home state, Jeb Bush's voter suppression on behalf of his brother, Pam Bondi's ratfeck stuff, deliberately weird ballots, and a nakedly political Supreme Court which froze a recount.

For reference, I see the right in the US today as ideological children of Bill Buckley. He once deliberately ran a 3rd party campaign in a governor's race to make sure that the moderate Republican cannot win and that cancer (of Rockefeller Republicans) gets existed from the party. He supported Goldwater in his primary campaigns against Rockefeller, and then for president against LBJ. The loss was terrible in 1964 - but the long-term strategy - appealing to white southerners based on racism - has paid off.
His strategy of always hitting from the right no matter how extreme and overlooking sometimes the short-term cost, has won.
 
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