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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
It's also bullshit because it's, at best, reversing the cause and effect; media reflects society much more than society reflects media, certainly in regards to violent media.
Clinton says her campaign is talking to Sanders camp about unifying Democrats (Reuters)
edited 31st May '16 5:14:40 PM by IFwanderer
1 2 We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. -KVI'm honestly not sure what she can offer to Sanders that he wouldn't be able to extract by threatening to withhold his endorsement; if he was after a cabinet position, he probably could've gotten one by now. One interpretation of why Sanders is still in the race at this point is that he believes—and not without reason—that Clinton is not going to be able to beat Donald Trump come November, whereas Sanders himself is still projected to absolutely crush Trump; his numbers have seen a slight dip, but its still an absolute massacre, compared to Clinton versus Trump which is neck and neck. That might very well indicate that the old assertion of there being crossover between Trump and Sanders' voting base is true, but not from the side of the aisle that Sanders' detractors believed (rogue democrats). What I'm suggesting is that Sanders might very well be drawing a portion of the working class white demographic, those who feel as if their traditional party has betrayed and abandoned them, rather than any affinity for him as a candidate.hic that has traditionally voted Republican, and which sides with Trump primarily out out a deep feeling tha
edited 31st May '16 5:33:40 PM by CaptainCapsase
I don't think Sanders would be able to draw the Republicans who are leaving Trump. Speaking as a Republican, I dislike both almost equally, and I consider Hillary the only sane person in the race right now (that I know of), which is why I'm tempted to vote for her.
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Because the general election has different demographics than the democratic primary? Minorities have a much bigger presence in the democratic electorate than they do in the general electorate; whereas you can't win the democratic primary without doing well among minorities (ie, if Sanders had done as well with blacks as he had with Hispanics, this would be a very close election right now), Republicans still have a big enough demographic of uneducated whites to take elections.
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I'm not talking about the Republicans fleeing Trump, I'm talking about the ones voting for him chiefly because "fuck the man". I'm talking about the angry blue collar workers who are furious at everything, and whose generalized anger can be easily tapped by both the far right and the "far" left, based on historical precedent. That's sort of what happened during the great depression here. Then you have the flipside, which is what happened in Germany in the same period...
edited 31st May '16 6:06:22 PM by CaptainCapsase
Hopefully yes, but it's not a sure thing simply based on demographics; as 538's David Wasserman points out, it only takes a slight shift for the GOP to break through the "blue wall"; if blacks return to their pre-2014 turnout due to the lack of Obama's presence in the race, the democrats are sunk, for example.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-demographics-will-shape-the-2016-election/
It's hard to say; the presence of Hispanics in the general electorate is overstated quite a bit, and there's always a chance that Trump covers that particular weakness by picking Rubio as his running mate. Even if only a tiny portion of Hispanic voters are fooled by that gesture, it would only take a 3% shift or so to lose the election for the democrats.
Moreover, in general elections its the swing states that matter, and Hispanic voters aren't particularly concentrated in swing states, which is a potential problem. For the democrats to succeed in the general election, they need to either sustain the record high turnout of black voters that we've seen from Obama or to siphon off some of the Republican's traditional voters.
Which is why there's definitely a case that Sanders might be critical to the democrats winning in November; while he's not going to be leading the ticket barring something unprecedented happening at the convention, I'm of the opinion that the democrats need him on it if they want to win the general this cycle. While I still feel like a Sanders/Clinton ticket (or Sanders with Clinton campaigning for him like she did for Obama) would be the strongest possible ticket, that would require either a miracle in California, Clinton stepping down voluntarily, or the super-delegates defecting to Sanders.
edited 31st May '16 6:11:00 PM by CaptainCapsase
Sanders is projected to do well against Trump because nobody outside of Internet nobodies like TPV and Blue Nation Review has bothered to attack Sanders. Clinton's had enough of a lead all along that she hasn't needed to target him, and the Republicans are targeting Clinton because they've been targeting Clinton for years. Sanders has never faced a serious, out-for-blood opponent, and as a consequence doesn't have the twenty-five years of damage that Clinton has accrued.
Were you to put Sanders in the general, things would likely change very quickly. Anyone who thinks Donald Trump isn't going to go very negative, very quickly, has not been paying attention to the election thus far. If he were to somehow find himself in the race against Trump he'd be "Bernie the Communist", "Bernie the gun nut," "Bernie the rapist", etc. It would all be gross exaggerations at best, but it's not like the Republicans have ever needed much evidence to make a BS case, and Trump requires no evidence whatsoever.
Sanders is one of the least vetted candidates to ever put himself in contention for the presidency. Once an opponent wants to knock him down though, they'll do it very easily. It took me a few minutes to find most of the more negative stuff I've linked here, and I'm a) not a trained opposition research guy, and b) was trying to find mostly reputable sources. A trained opposition research hack working for the Trump campaign? Send a few of those into action and watch Sanders' lead magically drop to a couple points at best.
edited 31st May '16 6:12:45 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
Hillary herself has said that the things her Oppo research team has found out, 80% of it hasn't even been rumored, let alone been reported by the media.
And that's Donald Trump who's been in the spotlight for decades.
Sanders? Ohhhh boy. The GOP probably has things on Bernie that we can't even imagine.
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I'm of the opinion that you're dangerously mistaken about the dynamics of this election. A large portion of the American public is up in arms (metaphorically, for now) in a way that hasn't been the case since the great depression; there's a huge bloc of people who are angry at everything and want nothing more to lash out at "the man"; these are the people who are propelling Trump's campaign, and they don't give a damn about scandals, facts, or résumés. It's the very same sort of generalized rage that's tearing the less affluent countries in Europe to pieces right now, and the same sort of pent-up frustration with the status quo that lead to the rise of fascism. Those very same feelings were also present in America during the same era, but were redirected into something constructive by someone who would have in previous years been a far left candidate based on their platform.
Also, Clinton didn't have to even try to attack him? Don't make me laugh. She, or rather her proxies had to go all out (to the extent you're capable of in a primary where you and your opposition typically have a fairly similar platform), and they still couldn't get the crushing victory they were hoping for (remember when they were expecting to mathematically eliminate him by mid April?).
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Hispanics aren't really a major factor in the general election in the same way Asian Americans aren't; they don't really have enough of a presence in swing states as things currently stand to decide elections.
They've been preparing for Clinton for eight years at this point. At most, they've had a year to come up with a game plan for Sanders. They were under a similar time crunch with Obama, and produced their lamest attempt at swiftboating yet. Regarding Clinton's claims, did it ever occur to you that, like all politicians (Trump doesn't count), everything she says is very carefully and methodically calculated, and may very well have no relation with reality?
Also, read your own article (the one on Clinton's image); Clinton is a heavily vetted candidate, and the vetting unanimously says her capacity to handle scandals is rather poor, and extremely predictable; she has no tactic other than defensiveness, which has understandably made the public very, very suspicious of her. That's why character assassinations attempted on her stick in the public consciousness so well; it's not some grand right wing conspiracy that's targeting her and only her; every other major political figure is subject to the very same gauntlet on both sides of the Aisle, and most of them handle it better than Clinton does. Clinton is notable for having won precisely two elections (three come June), during neither of which did she have a serious competitor. The remainder of her time serving in the government, she's been an unelected official.
Open your eyes; the GOP will have a bombshell for November; they always do, and they've had eight years to prepare with Clinton. Her response will be flat denial coupled with strong resistance to giving the public access to records which would settle the record; that's been her go to strategy since her involvement in politics began, and your article does a great job of explaining why. Trump is not going to let that drop, and he'll do his best to demoralize the democratic base by rubbing it and other scandals in her face; all he needs to do is to get progressives to stay home in frustration and he wins. Sanders is an unknown quantity. It could be a disaster, it could be a flop, and I firmly believe that's a chance that has to be taken; like it or not, without Obama in the race, the turnout of black voters is going to plummet, and none of the other minorities Trump has been targeting have enough of a presence in swing states to win the election.
For some last thoughts, the good folks at 538 are starting to get worried about the general election; the two big concerns are that youth voters will stay home due to not liking Clinton, and that black turnout simply won't be as high as it was in previous years. Either one could spell disaster for the democrats.
edited 31st May '16 7:22:28 PM by CaptainCapsase
Dear god getting Democrats to vote seems like herding cats. Whatever happened to civic duty, wanting to make your voice heard, or ya know not wanting psycoh's to be running the country. Some of this can be blamed on suppression, but a lot of it is just good ol fashioned cynicism and ambivalence.
I Bring Doom,and a bit of gloom, but mostly gloom.Capsase, you really need to stop lecturing people, as if your analysis is the only valid one. Disagreeing with someone is one thing, but speaking to them like a child for having the audacity to look at the same situation and come to a different conclusion than you is annoying as hell to read, and it's not even directed at me at the moment. You're stating your opinion on the matter, just like everyone else in this thread.
On your specific points:
As far as how she handles herself regarding scandals, she's shown that she can handle them — she sat and answered questions about Benghazi for eleven hours and after that Republican poll numbers went down, not hers. Sanders, by contrast, hasn't faced serious opposition. Clinton has been using the kid gloves on him because she doesn't want to fracture the Democratic base, and the Republicans have been leaving him alone because they know that the longer the Democrats are divided, the better it is for them.
Basically, Clinton has been taking a beating from Republicans for years, and has emerged bruised but not defeated. Sanders, on the other hand, is simply untested. For Clinton, we already know the Republican playbook, because we've been watching them in action against her. Sanders, we don't know what they'll throw at him or how he'll react.
The GOP has had twenty-five years to break Clinton. They've failed. None of the so-called scandals of managed to stick, and whatever damage is done is done. The Republicans have spent the last several years trying to kill her with Benghazi and it didn't work. They've continued to hype on the email nonsense and, despite ample assistance from various anti-Clinton left-wingers, they've still failed to knock her out of the race.
Clinton's demonstrated that she's all but immune to scandal. People may like to talk about her unfavourables, but it rarely stops people from actually voting for her, which is by far the more important thing. The GOP attack machine has scarred her, but it's never managed to cripple her. Could they possibly find something that will kill her chances? Maybe. But there's the possibility they could find something that would kill anyone's chances. In Clinton's case it would have to be a hell of a thing because they've already accused her of everything else under the sun.
As for Sanders, the reasons he'd ultimately be a weak candidate in the face of the Republican propaganda machine are myriad. He's been elected numerous times, but never in a heavily contested race, which has left him acting as though he's entitled to people's votes—and reacts badly when he does not get them (half the idiotic things to come out of the Sanders campaign seem to have been the result of Sanders not winning a constituency his followers thought he deserved to win). He's prone to shouting and finger-wagging when someone says something he doesn't like, both traits which are frankly far worse than Clinton's tactic of just trying to ignore the idiocy. He's got an army of unvetted skeletons in his closet (if I'm Trump I hammer him on the nuclear thing. "I may wanna deport you, but Bernie wants to irradiate you"). Worst of all, though, he's worked so hard to position himself as the morally superior candidate that any scandal, any chipping away at that image, could easily prove damning. When you set yourself up as a messianic figure, you can't reveal your flaws. Attacks that would hurt Clinton but not kill her could easily wind up being lethal to Sanders because his own stance of moral superiority makes him more vulnerable.
As to the idea that having Sanders at the top of the ticket would be the only way to for sure beat Trump...that strikes me as faintly ludicrous. I'm picturing a Trump/Sanders debate, and good lord that is not a pretty sight. If Sanders wants a VP slot, so he can try to leverage some of his young, angry, white men into voting Democrat, that's fine by me, but he does not belong at the top of the ticket.
I'd agree with this. I like a lot of what you have to say, Capsase, and your opinion is usually interesting, but it's not the only valid one. I don't mind what you say, but the tone is starting to get a bit strident.
edited 31st May '16 8:07:35 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
That was based on polling back in Febuary; though it was national so I don't see why it would've changed that much.
As far as the second point, maybe you're being too generous; "angry white man" is more or less slang for racist in the United States in the same way superpredator and thug were used as slang for young black men in the 90s. While he's not from the US, I'm fairly certain that particular euphemism is also present in Canada.
edited 31st May '16 8:14:20 PM by CaptainCapsase
The most fanatical Sanders supporters—the ones we'd actually have to be afraid of staying home—are young, angry, white men. Are there other demographics he does alright with? Yes. But for the most part, those demographics aren't the ones threatening to stay home. They're not the ones who are, as a group, screaming about Clinton being a tool of the establishment (Rosario Dawson aside) or railing about the corruption in the DNC like it's the most important thing ever, or threatening to vote for Trump so they can have their precious revolution. When you look at the people involved in the Bernie or Bust craziness, the vast majority are young, white and male.
Does Sanders have Latino supporters? Yes, but (leaving Rosario Dawson out of this again) they're not likely to vote for Trump, or even stay home given all he's done to antagonize their community. Does Sanders have African-American supporters? Yes, but given that Trump is virtually a member of the Klan, I again, wouldn't expect them to stay home or vote for Trump. The guys who threaten to that are almost entirely white men. Which means that, in effect, the demographic Sanders brings to the table is white men.
Self-preservation and the madness that is Trump will deliver a majority of ethnic, cultural, and sexual minorities to the Democrats. The only demographic that Sanders can threaten to hold hostage is the young, white male demographic—a demographic that skews towards Republicans most of the time anyway.
EDIT:
I've got a newflash for you—if I want to accuse somebody of being a racist, I'll damn well call them a racist. For the most part I've refrained from using that term to describe Sanders and his supporters because while some of them absolutely are racist (the guys who chanted "speak English" at Dolores Huerta being a good example) most are just tone-deaf, like Sanders himself.
edited 31st May '16 8:18:49 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
