Cheerful Charlie
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Nutty the Newt? Rick Scott? The mind boggles. Could we really see Newt Gingrich as VP? Have we sunk that low?
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US President 2016 - the Great Horse Race
- Thread starter lpetrich
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angelo
Deleted
Many politicians say whatever it takes to get elected. Once elected, they follow their ideology. We have seen that in every election, yet still many people fall for the oldest trick in the book. Politicians aren't compared to the oldest trade in history for nothing.
George S
Veteran Member
And Trump is not politically correct. Politicians looked at his political incorrectness with scorn, calling him a joke. Who's laughing now. Trump is a populist. He tells his honest view so, importantly, you can agree or disagree. With a politician's political correctness hiding their true stand, we elect those who orate promises never kept, and keep the real deals private.
http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-quick-cuts/watch/paris-mayor-on-trump-he-s-very-stupid-683866691688
Imagine President Trump at a G9 meeting.
Imagine President Trump at a G9 meeting.
laughing dog
Contributor
How do you know Trump is being honest? He has an established record in this campaign of telling lies. He has an established business record of telling lies (Trump University is a good example)
angelo
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The old saying: how do you know when a politician is telling a lie. His/her lips moved!
Jimmy Higgins
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Trump is NOT a populist. He is a rodeo clown.
No he doesn't. He lies all the fucking time and evades the lies. He has already back tracked on taxing the rich, minimum wage hike, ban on Muslims, among other things. Granted, I think he has shifted in the pragmatic direction, but in general, his primary run was that of an Intolerant Businessman who would change things (in a dystopian dictator sort of way). And that is, to say he has changed, at least according to his base or maybe former base, to a set of "PC" positions.
So this idea of 'he says what he thinks' is garbage. I read that one person says he doesn't have 'policy positions' but 'policy moods'. That seems to describe it very well!
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You are just full of wisdom. You should write a blog.
SimpleDon
Veteran Member
There is probably as many different favors of Libertarians as there are people who self-describe as being a Libertarian. It is even more reason why anyone calling themselves a Libertarian will have to explain the depth of delusion that has brought them to applying that label to themselves. However, they seem to be reluctant to do it. This is my experience not only in semi-public forums like this one but also when I have met Libertarians in person.
I am sorry to say that most of the Libertarians that I have encountered use the label of being a Libertarian as a shield against being wrong or responsible in a political discussion, along the lines of "I am a Libertarian. Nothing that I believe caused any of the problems that we see today."
They believe in deregulation but they are not talking about the Republican-movement conservatism type of deregulation that caused the Great Financial Crisis when the deregulated financial sector and their innovations of an alphabet soup of deregulated MBS's and CDS's and CDO's, a ponzi scheme wrapped in a gambling casino that came very close to destroying the world's economy when it collapsed.
Their idea of deregulation is somehow different in some way that can't be explained. Or their form of deregulation wasn't responsible because the deregulation that caused the GFC&R wasn't done by Libertarians because this would have been different in some way that can't be explained.
If anything the people who call themselves Libertarians seem to understand very little of what it means, where it came from or what a broad range of really crazy ideas are under the Libertarian umbrella.
Remember the incredulity when it was pointed out that what we now call "Libertarians" use to be called "anarchists?" As if doing away with the government in the 19th and early 20th century is markedly different than doing away with the government* in the latter half of the 20th century up to today.
* except to enforce contracts
SimpleDon
Veteran Member
Once again, I believe that everyone has to admit that they believe in progress, the simple understanding of the term "progressive." And that liberals, what most mean when they say that they are progressives, aren't responsible for the current mess after thirty five years of movement conservative agenda largely determining what policies are in place, even when male Clinton and Obama were-are president.
But this doesn't mean that liberals wouldn't screw up the country if by some miracle they could finally come up with messaging that would resonate with more than their, what, 20% of the electorate, not even half of the Democratic party.
Yes, the Republicans are hyper-partisan. Gridlock accomplishes the conservative mandate to prevent change. The unrest in the Republican party is because they haven't been able to fulfill their highly destructive, reactionary goals of rolling back the social gains of the last fifty years.
The Republicans have gone over the cliff into being reactionaries and they are staring at fascism in the person of Donald Trump. They are not moderates and they are constantly getting further and further away from being moderates.
But anytime that I have seen them define the term "conservative" they always define it along the lines of "someone who carefully weighs proposed changes considering all of the consequences of each and only supporting the best option," in other words the exact definition of a moderate. Liberals do the samething, they define "liberal" as a moderate.
A conservative is someone who resists change because they fear change, who wants to maintain the status quo. A liberal is someone who sees change as the only option for problems, usually change involving the government, they don't accept that some problems will correct themselves without government interference.
To complete the right, a reactionary is someone who believes that previous changes should be rolled back, usually to a time that was perceived to be better. A fascist is a reactionary who believes only authoritarianism can correct society, centered around a strongman savior from the named internal and external enemies, Jews, immigrants, Muslims, liberals, commies, Chinese, Russians, etc.
On the left, we have radicals who embrace change for the sake of change, bomb throwers. And communists and socialists, radicals who believe that our economic system is the source of all of our problems and therefore it has to change, the difference between the two being that communists are authoritarian.
I have therefore adopted a "radical-reactionary moderate" label for my political views. Extreme wishy washy.
SimpleDon
Veteran Member
Yes, you were. Like I say about others, sometimes I am slow to realize that someone is agreeing with me!
Yes, it is. But one backed by the full force of the US government, who can't go bankrupt as long as its debts are in US dollars. That is if the Congress doesn't stupidly default on the debt.
Jimmy Higgins
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So I was all like, oh... Ben Carson says these people are on Trump's list for VP candidates... who cares what Carson says, why is he even talking about it.
They I was all like, HOLY FUCK! Ben Carson is involved with the selection of Trump's VP Candidate.
After I changed my pants, I started thinking about it again. HOLY FUCK! So like when Carson said Palin was included in the list, he wasn't just saying crazy shit, he was saying shit that was crazy but accurate!
So I ponder at this point, while a Kasich, Christie, or even Rubio VP nod would be pragmatic, Palin and Cruz?! Might as well put the Easter Bunny or Reagan on the list. Fucking Ben Carson?!
This has been paid for by Dr. Tarr and Prof. Fether, Republicans running for President and Vice President.
They I was all like, HOLY FUCK! Ben Carson is involved with the selection of Trump's VP Candidate.
After I changed my pants, I started thinking about it again. HOLY FUCK! So like when Carson said Palin was included in the list, he wasn't just saying crazy shit, he was saying shit that was crazy but accurate!
So I ponder at this point, while a Kasich, Christie, or even Rubio VP nod would be pragmatic, Palin and Cruz?! Might as well put the Easter Bunny or Reagan on the list. Fucking Ben Carson?!
This has been paid for by Dr. Tarr and Prof. Fether, Republicans running for President and Vice President.
Jimmy Higgins
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Meanwhile in Georgia.
The latest polling shows Trump with a 4 point lead over Clinton. While any lead, no matter how small, gets you all 16 electoral votes, it is a small lead. Obama was flirting with Georgia back in '08 and lost by about 5%. 14% are undecided, and the ads haven't started yet.
Honestly, this isn't as important as the Trump v Sanders poll, where Sanders, a person most people in Georgia don't know, is polling 5 points ahead of Trump. This may be the larger warning sign for Trump, where his unfavorable rating is so high that people will choose that hippy from Vermont. Maybe more importantly, that poll only had 11% undecided, potentially giving a feel for which way the undecided will lean in the likely Trump v Clinton general election race. Of course, there has been little negative campaigning against Sanders, so the 5% lead is misleading. However, this is Georgia, a state not known for its socialist roots.
The importance of Georgia is crucial. Most people are unaware of it, but Georgia is the only state, other than Texas that has more than 15 electoral votes. It is a state Trump can not afford to lose, without taking a notable bite in the Northeast. As the polling stands, it'll be worth spending in Georgia for Clinton. And Trump can hardly afford to spend in any state that he has to keep.
The latest polling shows Trump with a 4 point lead over Clinton. While any lead, no matter how small, gets you all 16 electoral votes, it is a small lead. Obama was flirting with Georgia back in '08 and lost by about 5%. 14% are undecided, and the ads haven't started yet.
Honestly, this isn't as important as the Trump v Sanders poll, where Sanders, a person most people in Georgia don't know, is polling 5 points ahead of Trump. This may be the larger warning sign for Trump, where his unfavorable rating is so high that people will choose that hippy from Vermont. Maybe more importantly, that poll only had 11% undecided, potentially giving a feel for which way the undecided will lean in the likely Trump v Clinton general election race. Of course, there has been little negative campaigning against Sanders, so the 5% lead is misleading. However, this is Georgia, a state not known for its socialist roots.
The importance of Georgia is crucial. Most people are unaware of it, but Georgia is the only state, other than Texas that has more than 15 electoral votes. It is a state Trump can not afford to lose, without taking a notable bite in the Northeast. As the polling stands, it'll be worth spending in Georgia for Clinton. And Trump can hardly afford to spend in any state that he has to keep.
Sarpedon
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One of my favorite political toys is this: http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-swing-the-election/
It takes the voting data from the last election, adjusts the demographics to be current, and allows you to change the percentages of party vote and voter turnout for several key groups. I find it rather reassuring, because if you take the group that Trump does best with, Non college educated whites, and move voter turnout for that group up to 100% (which is totally unrealistic), it doesn't result in a republican win. In order to produce a republican win, you have to move the party vote over considerably, which I don't think will happen. Indeed, there's lots of chatter about the republicans losing some religious support, as they've nominated a blasphemous cad.
It takes the voting data from the last election, adjusts the demographics to be current, and allows you to change the percentages of party vote and voter turnout for several key groups. I find it rather reassuring, because if you take the group that Trump does best with, Non college educated whites, and move voter turnout for that group up to 100% (which is totally unrealistic), it doesn't result in a republican win. In order to produce a republican win, you have to move the party vote over considerably, which I don't think will happen. Indeed, there's lots of chatter about the republicans losing some religious support, as they've nominated a blasphemous cad.
RavenSky
The Doctor's Wife
I wonder if Carson will pull a Cheney and decide he is the most suitable VP
southernhybrid
Contributor
I assume you meant that Georgia is the only state in the south with more than 15 electoral votes? I assure you that people in Georgia do know who Sanders is, but Clinton is more popular, especially among the Black population. I've spoken to a couple of my black friends about their votes in the primaries. They voted for Clinton for the same reason I did. She has a lot more experience and she is more pragmatic. They felt that Sanders was promising things that had no chance of ever becoming a reality. I have quite a few young white friends that support Sanders but they will vote for Clinton if necessary. Friends my age ( over 60 ) are almost all Clinton supporters. So far, most of the Republicans I know are appalled that Trump in their nominee, but there are also quite a few Trump yard signs in my own neighborhood. Whenever I ask a Trump supporter why they support him, I get pretty much the same answer. "I like him because he tells it like it is." Or, "I like him because he says whatever he wants." It's totally crazy. The Trump supporters seem to be very low information voters. I have a patient that told me he likes Trump because of the wall. In the next sentence, he told me he likes Mexicans. My patient is mentally ill, so at least he has an excuse.
The problem in Georgia is that we tend to have low voter turnout among Democrats. This is an even bigger problem in the midterms. I know quite a few people here who would vote for the Democrats if they bothered to vote. Most of these non voters are poor and have never voted. I've tried to convince them to register, without success.
But, I suppose it's possible that Georgia could be in play. It's just going to take a lot of effort to get people to register and vote. We have three weeks of early voting here, so there really is no excuse other than apathy. Hatred of Clinton on the other hand is likely to motivate Trump voters to go to the polls.
Jimmy Higgins
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I meant "...that was a Republican voting state."
Yeah... these are the same responses Trump supporters give to the 'intellectual' AM Radio right-wing hosts. "Tells it like it is." I'm still waiting for him to actually do that. Even when given a comfy forum for espousing why they support Trump, they can't... because Trump offers nothing but image, well other than the racist and misogynistic crap... which is another reason he is beloved, but people won't admit too outloud.
The way I see it, Obama lost Georgia by 5% in 2008. Obama kicked McCain's ass. If Georgia is polling likewise for Clinton, the race is over. The big issue will be Hispanic turnout. Hispanics are registering at record levels. That can't possibly be a welcomed sign by the Republicans.
Jimmy Higgins
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Thinking back to Ben Carson, is that a sign of why Trump is incapable of being President? His first big decision and he appointed Ben Carson to help make it?
Being a President is a largely managerial job and we have seen how being a bad manager (W) can really fuck things up. Ben "Poverbs" Carson? A man that made even evangelicals squirm with his Carson/Jesus portrait?
Who will Trump make his Secretary of Defense, Michelle Bachmann?
Being a President is a largely managerial job and we have seen how being a bad manager (W) can really fuck things up. Ben "Poverbs" Carson? A man that made even evangelicals squirm with his Carson/Jesus portrait?
Who will Trump make his Secretary of Defense, Michelle Bachmann?
Well, the good news is that she'll never make it into the Pentagon to do anything because when they tell her it's the big building with five sides, she'll forget to use her thumb while counting and won't be able to find the place.
