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U.S Elections, The Ides of March; Et tu Ohio?


Bonesy

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In related news, word is that Obama will announce his SCOTUS nomination tomorrow, and that it will be Garland or Srinivasan. With Rubio out and Trump looking stronger than ever, it couldn't be better timing to make the pick; let's see the GOP Senators make the argument that they want Trump picking a SCOTUS nominee.

As for the rest of the night goes, I'm thinking Sanders will end up winning Missouri, but it'll take forever for the race to be called because everyone will want to make sure Clinton didn't rack up a big enough margin in St. Louis to counter him. Illinois will also go late, again because Clinton didn't rack up a big enough margin in Cook County. But I think she will win Illinois in the end, she's winning just enough of the Chicago suburbs and the rural downstate counties. Illinois will be very close either way though, but I wouldn't be surprised if Sanders ended up winning Missouri by +5 or so. Not that it really matters at this point.

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Bonesy, Ohio sci-fi author and raconteur John Scalzi's recent blog post would appear to support your theory that Drumpf may have had something to do with Sanders's loss in Ohio:

Hell Yes I’m Voting for Kasich Today

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If Trump were not the GOP front runner at the moment, this would be another year where I would take the non-partisan ballot. I’m sanguine about the Democratic side of the race; I’d be fine with either Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders in the general so I don’t feel the need to weigh in on that. Let the Democrats sort that out. Generally speaking in most years I feel the same about the GOP side: Not my circus, not my monkeys. If this were just Kasich and Cruz and Rubio at this point, I’d make popcorn and enjoy the show.

It’s not. Trump is, I feel, a legitimate danger, both in who he is as a presidential candidate — an inchoate, grasping, insecure, angry and ignorant blowhard — and in his encouragement of the worst aspects of America that have dredged themselves out of the muck and attached themselves to his mess of a campaign. 

 

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It got brought up last thread but it was locked before I returned but I thought it a topic worth covering:

Tulsi Gabbard: Maybe not as good a candidate as you think

 

She seems fairly hardline on Islam as a religion.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jan/28/tulsi-gabbard-slams-obamas-refusal-to-say-islamic-/

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Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, an Iraq War veteran, issued a scathing assessment Tuesday of President Obama’s refusal to utter the words “Islamic extremism” in reference to recent terror attacks, calling the omission a threat to the safety of the nation.

“This is not just about words,” the Hawaii Democrat told Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren. “It’s not about semantics. It’s really about having a real, true understanding of who our enemy is and how important that is, that we have to understand what their motivation is and what their ideology is — the radical Islamic ideology that is fueling them.”

Ms. Gabbard took umbrage with Secretary of State John Kerry’s recent assertion that the criminal conduct of terrorists with the Islamic State and al Qaeda is “rooted in alienation, poverty, thrill-seeking and other factors,” which she said is flat-out wrong.

 

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/curious-islamophobic-politics-dem-congressmember-tulsi-gabbard

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Appearing with Fox's Neil Cavuto last week, she lashed out at the White House for holding an extremism summit with Muslim Americans, saying it's a “diversion from what our real focus needs to be. And that focus is on that Islamic extremist threat.” She criticized Obama for saying that “poverty, lack of access to jobs, lack of access to education” is contributing to radicalization. “They are not fueled by materialistic motivation, it's actually a theological, this radical Islamic ideology,” she said, throwing red meat to Fox viewers.

To the media, Gabbard is a curious spectacle. She's a Hawaii Democrat, coming from one of the nation's most progressive and dovish chapters of the Democratic Party, but she's also an Iraq war veteran, and she's consistently tried to outflank President Obama and the rest of her party to the right on foreign affairs. Last month she openly mocked Secretary of State John Kerry during an appearance on CNN, saying that he thinks, "if we give them [Islamic extremists] $10,000 and give them a nice place to live that somehow they're not going to be engaged in this fighting."

 

 

And her stance on gay rights was worse then the Obama/Clinton/Sanders-style dissembling from what I've read:

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2004/Feb/20/ln/ln09a.html

(from 2004)

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A bill that would give gay couples the opportunity to receive the same rights and privileges as married couples through civil unions appears to be dead at the Legislature this year, despite more than three hours of impassioned testimony last night from both sides of the debate.

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Those who opposed the bill, who were in the minority among those testifying in person, said civil unions for gay people are no different than same-sex marriage, an issue that had been resolved in 1998 when voters decided on a constitutional amendment not to support gay marriage.

"This is just a different approach to justify same-sex marriage," said Savali Tagovailoa. The state should try to make improvements to the 1997 reciprocal benefits bill if it wants to provide more privileges to gay couples, she said.

Opponents , led by Rep. Tulsi Gabbard Tamayo, D-42nd (Waipahu, Honouliuli, 'Ewa), also held signs in protest outside the third-floor committee room.

 

 

http://www.honolulumagazine.com/Honolulu-Magazine/August-2004/Who-is-Mike-Gabbard/

(this ones about her father but her comment here is not encouraging)

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When HONOLULU asked Gabbard in an e-mail to clarify his former relationship with Butler's Krishna group, Gabbard's daughter, state Rep. Tulsi Gabbard Tamayo, sent us an angry e-mail in response. "I smell a skunk," Tamayo wrote. "It's clear to me that you're acting as a conduit for The Honolulu Weekly and other homosexual extremist supporters of Ed Case."

 

The more I read about her, the less I liked her. But obviously it's up to you how you feel about the above.

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This plays into what Myshkin was saying. If you wait for a perfect woman candidate, you'll never get one. Kinda like with men, but we've been "oh well"ing that forever.

Plus, my primary issue is no war for profit. Which is why I'd support Gabbard and do not support Clinton. Or Republicans. And am disappointed by Obama.

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2 minutes ago, Bonesy said:

This plays into what Myshkin was saying. If you wait for a perfect woman candidate, you'll never get one. Kinda like with men, but we've been "oh well"ing that forever.

Plus, my primary issue is no war for profit. Which is why I'd support Gabbard and do not support Clinton. Or Republicans. And am disappointed by Obama.

This is not "perfect women candidate", it's I'm not a fan of any candidate saying that kind of shit.

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Oomph, I had thought pretty highly of Gabbard until reading all that. But other than her stance on Islamic extremism (which I really find to just be rhetorical on a policy level -- not that I'm downplaying the impact words and rhetoric have), how is she trying to outflank the Democratic establihment to the right on foreign policy? I thought her whole issue with Clinton was that Clinton is very far right on foreign policy (and Kerry's certainly no dove himself). She opposes further steps to arm Syrian rebel groups, so she has points going there as well and it seems consistent with the grievances she's aired against Clinton so far.

ETA: On the other hand, she does want to directly arm the Kurds, which isn't a great idea imo.

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Having just listened to however many number of minutes of Ted Cruz speaking...I really need a shower..."I'm the only one who can defeat Drumph...just don't pay attention to the fact that I went 0-5 tonight..."

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3 minutes ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Having just listened to however many number of minutes of Ted Cruz speaking...I really need a shower..."I'm the only one who can defeat Drumph...just don't pay attention to the fact that I went 0-5 tonight..."

He may win Mizzou, its pretty close its been going back and forth between Trump and Cruz.

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36 minutes ago, All-for-Joffrey said:

Oomph, I had thought pretty highly of Gabbard until reading all that. But other than her stance on Islamic extremism (which I really find to just be rhetorical on a policy level -- not that I'm downplaying the impact words and rhetoric have), how is she trying to outflank the Democratic establihment to the right on foreign policy? I thought her whole issue with Clinton was that Clinton is very far right on foreign policy (and Kerry's certainly no dove himself). She opposes further steps to arm Syrian rebel groups, so she has points going there as well and it seems consistent with the grievances she's aired against Clinton so far.

ETA: On the other hand, she does want to directly arm the Kurds, which isn't a great idea imo.

To be fair, her stance on LGBT was in 2004. She did her deployment and changed her views. I realize that this is apparently a Dire Sin to change your mind but it appears legit, and she has since done things like opposed DOMA, praised openly the SC decision for gay marriage rights, and is in general more progressive overall. 

The islamic extremism thing she does appear to have a bug up her ass about currently. 

On the race - Sanders actually has done pretty well, all things considered. A big loss is going to be Florida due to how many delegates there were - his target was -20, and he is hitting -28. That's certainly what the polls predicted but is going to hurt. Ohio got tighter but still ends up being Clinton +13 and it needed to be Sanders +14. That might end up being as big if not bigger than Florida. 

But he outdid what he needed to do in NC - goal was Sanders-20, and he is currently -14 there, and is only a couple points away from his goals in MO and IL. Well, okay, he's 10+ points away in Illinois, but MO looks right on target for him. I haven't run the numbers, but my suspicion is that at this point Sanders will need to be around +10 or +11 over demos to get to a 50%+1 goal now. For 3/22 that would look like the following targets:

  • Arizona - Sanders+16 (no current polls)
  • Idaho - Sanders +26 (current polls are Sanders+2)
  • Utah - Sanders +40 (current poll is Clinton+7)

That Utah one is pretty tough to envision him doing. 

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So how did the various systems of prediction work this time?

Sabato's did fine on Florida, okay on NC, good on MO and IL - and really, really bad on Ohio. 

538 nailed Florida, was pretty close on Illinois and MO, was a bit off on NC (apparently the voter suppression hurt Clinton more than Sanders), and was right on with Ohio. 

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1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

So how did the various systems of prediction work this time?

Sabato's did fine on Florida, okay on NC, good on MO and IL - and really, really bad on Ohio. 

538 nailed Florida, was pretty close on Illinois and MO, was a bit off on NC (apparently the voter suppression hurt Clinton more than Sanders), and was right on with Ohio. 

Who would have predicted differently? Clinton has more of the minority race votes locked up. Voter suppression tends to hit minority races more. Ergo Clinton would suffer more from voter suppression.

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