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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
It is striking that we are in a political environment that is so toxic that no responsible, thoughtful Republican should want to run for office on a Republican ticket.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Ben Carson's campaign manager and communications director have resigned.
Carson has been raising substantial amounts of money although he's fallen way back in the polls. Is this a sign that we're marching to the end of it?
We've always held that he's not a serious candidate, but the media hasn't gotten the message.
edited 31st Dec '15 10:14:36 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"The counterclaim is that Obama did the same, and that generally, Presidential candidates who hold legislative office avoid major votes simply to prevent the controversy attached to them from rebounding on their campaigns. It sounds hypocritical but I don't want to pass definitive judgment. It is undoubtedly the case that Rubio has seemingly little ground game, relying on ads over offices.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Thing is we're looking at a lot more candidates, we've still got 12-14 (some polls had guys who have now dropped out), while comparatively for 2012 there were only 6-7 candidates at this point. So let's compare the 7 2012 candidates to the top 7 2016 candidates, using the You Gov polls for December.
2012: Santorum (4%), Perry (5%), Huntsmen (6%), Bachmann (8%), Paul (13%), Romney (21%), Gingrich (27%), Other (1%), Unknown Remainder (15%).
2016: Paul/Christie/Fiorina (3%), Bush (5%), Carson (7%), Rubio/Cruz (16%), Trump (37%), Other (6% plus three 0%s that probably add up to something), No Preference (3%).
So Trump does defiantly have a bigger lead then Gingrich did over Romney, however it's still not enough if the race narrows to three candidates eventually, like it did in 2012. In that case it will be Trump, an establishment candidate and Paul. It comes down I think to if Trump can pick up the votes of others as they drop out, if everyone falls in behind Rubio of Cruz then Trump will loose, but if Trump can grab the Carson vote and a little bit elsewhere it's a toss up.
Edit: State wide polls are interesting. Trump is neck and neck with Cruz in Iowa (50-70% of the vote split evenly between them) Rubio is third (10-15%) but there's also a 5% margin of error and still plenty of votes amongst the other candidates that could go in any direction.
Edit 2: New Hampshire is pretty interesting to. The 'moderate' candidates are all polling strong (well strong for this race), if Rubio, Kasich, Bush and Christie roll their votes together they've got somewhere in the realm of 37-47% of the vote, but they'd have to all roll behind one candidate, Trump is seeing 21-32%, so if two of them stay they could still end up with someone winning out against Trump.
Thing is both Iowa and New Hampshire are proportional with their votes. It's not until South Carolina that we get a winner takes all state.
Carson dropping out and sending his voters to Trump could pull Trump into a solid lead in a few states however, in particular South Carolina.
It's gonna come down to who drops when, in 2012 it was down to 4 candidates by South Carolina, with Romney, Gingrich, Santorum and Paul. If we end up with a 4 stack of Trump, [generic RNC puppet], Paul and Carson then the RNC should win, but that requires either Cruz or Rubio to drop. If they both stay and it's a 5 stack then who knows.
Still my prediction is that by South Carolina we'll have either a 5 or 4 stack, possibly after a embarrassing split vote in New Hamsphire causes the 'moderates' to all fall in behind one candidate.
edited 1st Jan '16 3:05:02 AM by Silasw
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranI don't think we can really call Cruz an 'establishment candidate'. He's about as far-right as the congressional Republican Party goes (with Trump here defined as a very welcome outsider who said what a lot of Republican voters wanted), and to know him is reportedly to loathe him
.
Thing is, if Cruz is that pig headed, the 'moderates' may have to fall in behind him. A three way race between Cruz, Trump and a 'moderate' could give it to Trump, and getting Cruz to drop out is going to be hard if he's that power hungry, especially as he's liable to do well on Super Tuesday with Texas being there.
The more moderate wings of the Republican Party aren't going to get heard after New Hampshire, Super Tuesday is going to be dominated by deep red states. The larger more moderate areas like Calafornia, New York, Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania aren't until later on. If there's a serious three way race even after Super Tuesday everything is gonna go to hell.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranWell, this is interesting. A new Wall Street Journal article
, sadly behind a login wall, says that U.S. intelligence intercepted information indicating that Benamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister, conspired with and possibly bribed Republican Congressmen to send that infamous letter last year that attempted to undermine Obama's nuclear negotiations with Iran.
Democratic opinion rags are screaming "treason", but I have to wonder if this isn't pretty close to that.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Given the aim was to harm Iran rather than the US, along with undermining the President, I'd say it's close but not quite the Oxford definition, especially since they don't technically owe loyalty to the president, and certainly don't claim to.
The US legal definition is as follows
"Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason..."
To make a legal treason claim you'd need to argue Israel's an enemy.
In more informal use, "[treason can be used] against officials in power who are perceived as failing to act in the best interest of their constituents.", which certainly fits but wouldn't be possible to prosecute.
I'm baaaaaaackThe aim was to undermine the sitting President's executive authority, and it's also pretty clear that Israel is not acting in the U.S.' interests. But taking bribes from foreign officials is a prima facie felony regardless of motive.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Israel, like everyone else, is acting in their own (perceived) interests.
USSR? The Israelis certainly weren't pro-Soviet pre-1991.
edited 1st Jan '16 8:34:27 AM by Greenmantle
Keep Rolling OnIf that is treason, than the shenanigans Teddy Kennedy pulled with the Soviets are surely even worse. But this country has a very strict definition of treason for a reason.
I think he was talking about the Senators. But yeah, the Israeli's are certainly not good allies. Even before this latest spat they went out of their way to maintain good relations with the USSR, including possibly trading our secrets to them.
Edit: And, if I recall, when we sell Military technology to them, the assumption is always they will sell the technology to other countries. And of course their is the USS Liberty, or rather Israel's instance that putting up a memorial to the survivors is somehow anti-Semitic.
Teddy Kennedy's attempt to make a deal with the Soviets.
edited 1st Jan '16 8:35:26 AM by JackOLantern1337
I Bring Doom,and a bit of gloom, but mostly gloom.Whelp, both the Anti-Whistleblower and Voter ID laws in NC go into effect today. The former pretty much criminalizes any documentation of workplace conditions by an employee and allows the employer to sue them. This includes documentation of illegal activity and abuse committed by places such as nursing homes and factory farms.
Wow... How in the hell did that get passed the courts let alone the fact that those are federal regulations? Ugh, boy this country always surprises me on its stupidity.
Clearly we need more guns so employees can just shoot their employers when they pull shit instead of reporting them.
edited 1st Jan '16 10:05:32 AM by Memers
Mmm, it impacts a few cases that are rather close to home for me; there's a home for people with severe cognitive disabilities that's been under investigation for physical/emotional abuse and theft of care packages and financial stipends sent by family members of the patients. A lot of the evidence in it relies on statements and recordings made by employees. . .

@ Fighteer: Maybe Rubio (now) doesn't really want to be elected?
edited 31st Dec '15 8:09:11 AM by Greenmantle
Keep Rolling On