2020 US Election (Part One)

[Commodore]

There are a couple in the forum, haven't you noticed them yet?

Are they actual Russian trolls though, or are they just getting their information from them and parroting it here?

 

[Patine]

I was referring to things at the personal level.

At the personal level, you and I don't know each other well enough for such frank and honest advice. But I have several friends and one professional that I would (and do) take such advice from. How about yourself?

 

[Camikaze]

By the way, for those who haven't seen, worth pointing out that the 538 forecast is back online following the Super Tuesday results, and it's even more dire for Sanders that you might expect - Biden has an 87% chance of a majority, compared with a 2% chance for Sanders (10% for no-one gets a majority). This realistically means that Sanders will have to rely upon some exogenous change (e.g. Biden having a really bad moment that makes people pull away from him).

 

[Cloud_Strife]

Biden could crap himself on stage and nothing would change

 

[Zardnaar]

Biden could crap himself on stage and nothing would change

Well at least he's not shooting people on 5th Avenue.

 

[Ironsided]

Trump and Bernie fill stadiums. Biden can’t fill half a gymnasium and if he does tell his supporters to vote for someone else = 87% to win. No one putting their fingers on that scale.

 

[Birdjaguar]

At the personal level, you and I don't know each other well enough for such frank and honest advice. But I have several friends and one professional that I would (and do) take such advice from. How about yourself?

My wife of almost 50 years keeps me up to date on all my failings. When I get my facts wrong here, I get corrected and acknowledge it. I get likes on my posts from time to time. Since I retired from a real job, my old employees now love me and take me to lunch from time to time; I pay. My neighbors don't complain about our front yard. I've seen a lot, done a lot and know a lot. What you see here is what you get in person, but with less edge.

 

[Kyriakos]

Congratulations, you earned being another poster at CFC. Much like the rest, you can post what you want, not minding that at any moment there will be people who just see no point in what you have to say.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Trump and Bernie fill stadiums. Biden can’t fill half a gymnasium and if he does tell his supporters to vote for someone else = 87% to win. No one putting their fingers on that scale.

Getting ten thousand people to come out to see you is a measure of depth of support, getting 65 million to vote for you requires breadth of support. They are entirely different things.

Of course - if said non-Canadians are as informed about Canadian affairs as I am about American affairs (a surprisingly high bar). Being informed is part of being able to give such a frank and honest opinion. I don't feel I would be nearly as qualified to give such an opinion about the Vietnamese or Malagasy Governments, for example - and thus I don't.

For an opinion to be considered qualified it has to seen that way by the person receiving it, not the person delivering it. Do you have any indication that your opinions in this matter are viewed as qualified by anyone beyond yourself?

 

[Birdjaguar]

Congratulations, you earned being another poster at CFC. Much like the rest, you can post what you want, not minding that at any moment there will be people who just see no point in what you have to say.

Thanks, but I've known that since Dec 2001. The only times my posts carried real weight were when I moderated NES games and when I was a CFC moderator.
What is your point? Just put me on ignore.

 

[Takhisis]

Are they actual Russian trolls though, or are they just getting their information from them and parroting it here?

I totally cannot tell you that any individual poster is a troll, paid or otherwise, in any public thread because that can be considered worthy of an infraction by any passing moderator, depending on the moderator.

Biden could crap himself on stage and nothing would change

I've just read a headline that says ‘Donald Trump offers boasts and insults’ (at a coronavirus press event). Our standards in ‘democratic’ countries are falling quickly.

 

[Camikaze]

Trump and Bernie fill stadiums. Biden can’t fill half a gymnasium and if he does tell his supporters to vote for someone else = 87% to win. No one putting their fingers on that scale.

Sanders can fill a stadium, but I guess the key for Biden is that he can apparently fill a polling place?

 

[Berzerker]

Has nothing to do with piling up likes. It has to do with the stated recognition by many posters that your posts are usually idiotic or flame bait, one or the other, and not worth exploring to find out which. Most people ignore you, but I see no reason to give you the privilege of polluting the forum uncontested.

How's this for flamebait, you robbed people and told us that means you're trustworthy. If that was the defense you gave the judge and jury the courtroom must have erupted in laughter.

Maybe his ads screened their as part of his media blitz.

Polynesians also tend to vote a bit more conservative for left wingers and Bloomberg was the most right out of the Dems.

Gay marriage for example doesn't go down that well in the islands.

Same with Hispanics, they lean socially conservative with their Catholicism

That's an accounting trick. Fox News was very much a part of the Trump campaign in 2016, they just didn't bill him because they recouped their losses elsewhere.

Then pro-Democrat media counts toward campaign expenditures

Hillary Rodam Clinton; she did win the popular vote but ran a bad campaign in the Midwest.

Her treatment of the Jill Stein/Bernie crowds cost her the election too, I dont know which was the greater factor.

First you are likely wrong about Biden, but you are entitled to be wrong and time will tell. Every day we get closer to the fact that Bernie cannot beat Trump. Second, your ongoing divisiveness as a non citizen encourages the re-election of the orange baboon among those who will be actually voting. Go be a Bernie supporter, tell everyone how great he is, but stop being a public Biden hater. There is no reason for that except to support Trump and create animosity among democrats.

So like Bernie and keep quiet about Biden?

Pelosi still signed Trump's bills

She refused to hold war criminals accountable for torture during the Iraq War, honor is not among her strengths.

Nothing incriminating but it would appear the Soviets viewed Sanders as a useful idiot.

The Democrats red baited Jill Stein, Bernie, Tulsi and Trump.

^Who do Nytimes see as a useful idiot? The US public, apparently.

They have a habit of lying us into wars

The American people really need more viable parties to choose from. You only have two viable parties, who rig and corrupt the electoral system as thoroughly as Mugabe or Putin, but allow a competitive, two-party only system, similar to old Spanish "Turno Pacifco," or Argentinian or Colombian, "Gentleman's Agreement," where both parties have, and do, fail, screw over, lie to, and betray the trust of, the people, and then watch as the voter crawl back to the ballot boxes to beg one or the other of these two monstrous cartels who should have been voted out as died as parties in a healthy and truly competitive political system, for another term of lies and abuse, like classical domestic abuse victims. And these two parties are interested in covering the high criminals in their number and protecting them from any sort of justice or consequences, and kowtowing to plutocratic oligarchs, than serving their constituents or abiding the Constitution. If the U.S. political system is EVER to improve AT ALL, two things have to go first - the Republican Party of the United States AND the Democratic Party of the United States. Until the power of the Duopoly has broken, the American people will have no true choice in leaders and no accountable government that truly has a reason to care about them or obey the laws they themselves make and enforce on citizens.

But for God's sake dont waste your vote on any 3rd parties

I've put a lot of thought into this, myself, and the only way to do it is with a wildly popular (independent of existing politics, that is) third-party middle-of-the-road candidate with two meh-but-not-horrible R/D candidates that maintains a really solid presidential administration enough to start getting senators, congresscritters, and governors elected under the same label in the next couple elections. If Perot had been sane he might have had a shot.

Ross Perot said the GOP threatened his daughter's wedding and thats why he dropped. I think he got back in after she was married but it was too late. Sadly he would have been a decent president imo and bad for the swamp.

Comically, Joe Biden confused his wife and sister before super Tuesday

I think they switched positions on him, that was his explanation anyway.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

How's this for flamebait, you robbed people and told us that means you're trustworthy. If that was the defense you gave the judge and jury the courtroom must have erupted in laughter.

Stupid, with a strong dash of ridiculous. Thanks for asking, since ridiculing you is one of the many pleasures I get from being part of this community.

 

[Lexicus]

I’m pretty sure most Alabaman Bernie supporters would see the humour.

Well, insofar as many were probably young white people who relatively recently moved to Alabama for work, I guess this is true...

Every day we get closer to the fact that Bernie cannot beat Trump.

It's really weird, because obviously Bernie can't beat Trump if he doesn't become the nominee. But since the election seems to be largely being fought over Democratic primary voters perception of who can beat Trump, the perception simply becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Sort of like what Warren supporters are trying to point out with the "She's electable if you vote for her" thing.

I read an interesting article earlier today that said that the left basically wanted to believe that success in electoral politics was kinda like community organizing, and it pointed out that the campaigns that earned or paid for media space did better than the ones that relied on ground organization and canvassers. I think the article was correct that success in electoral politics for the left is going to rely on building actual organizations of working-class solidarity, mainly the union movement. People need to have some perspective on what electoral politics is good for.

Of course, I blame myself to some extent, I've been saying to myself to feel better that people are fed up and will realize that 2016 showed the folly of thinking that a safe, moderate Democrat can beat Trump. I should have realized that what I knew the moment Trump won was true all along: that his victory would only accelerate the rightward shift in American politics because the horizon of the politically possible would contract to "literally just not having a megalomaniacal would-be autocrat in the Oval Office".

 

[Birdjaguar]

So like Bernie and keep quiet about Biden?

That was not directed at you, but was written specifically for another. You are a US citizen and will participate, or not, as you choose in November. You will suffer or not from the outcome of our election. Be a cheerleader, be a hater, be smart or be dumb. I don't care. You get a pass even if your contributions aren't really worthwhile.

 

[Estebonrober]

I'm starting the Star Trek Party and leaving you numbskulls behind.

https://phys.org/news/2020-03-space-lettuce-nutritious-safe-crops.html

In a new study in Frontiers in Plant Science, Dr. Christina Khodadad, a researcher at the Kennedy Space Center, and co-authors report the successful cultivation of a salad crop—red romaine lettuce of the 'Outredgeous' cultivar—on board the International Space Station (ISS). They show that space-grown lettuce is free of disease-causing microbes and safe to eat, and is at least as nutritious as Earth-grown plants. This is despite being grown under lower gravity and more intense radiation than on Earth.

 

[Birdjaguar]

@Lexicus If Bernie is to win in November, he has to get the nomination and that comes with more support from blacks and those over 45. He is radical enough that just being the nominee may not get him that support later. He really has to earn it now. He has to show his ability to unite the party now, not later. Folks fear that he will not be able to do after the convention.

The NM primary is in June. It will be over by then I'm sure.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

It's really weird, because obviously Bernie can't beat Trump if he doesn't become the nominee. But since the election seems to be largely being fought over Democratic primary voters perception of who can beat Trump, the perception simply becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

From my seat deep in the wings the question seems to be What is Sanders doing to dispel this perception? You are politically savvy, and frankly you stand out against the general presentation by Sanders supporters, be they active or passive, and in fact Sanders himself. The whole 'tight knit movement' thing seems to run actively counter to broadening his appeal to additional voters rather than just deepening the fervor of the supporters that he has, even within the somewhat more open to him realm of Democratic primary voters. Strategists on local campaigns here really do look at his campaign, when confronted by the less tractable general election likely voters, as being liable to just say "___ ___ then, don't vote for me," which is absolute down ballot death for Democrats in this district.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Meanwhile, in an effort to move on from the Super Tuesday post mortem, it is only four days until the all important Next Tuesday. Has anyone else started looking ahead at that?

My opening take:

The slate itself is not good for a Sanders campaign looking to regain momentum. Sanders likely victories in tiny Idaho and North Dakota are offset by an almost certain drubbing in Mississippi. Washington state needs to be a large margin win for the numbers, and Missouri is a critical chance to outperform 2016 with a win in a state he lost then by a narrow margin. Michigan is another place where he not only must win, but he really needs to win by a larger margin than he managed in 2016 for the delegate break to really accomplish anything much.

So again there is a sort of "back to the wall" feeling about this. Sanders needs to outperform 2016 in at least one state while holding the line in the rest to gain any traction at all, I think. Staring down the barrel at Florida, Ohio, Illinois, and Arizona coming the next week...which were all losses in 2016...I think he has to at least break Biden's momentum significantly here to not be in a very bad hole.