U.S. Politics: Huff and Puff the Socialism away

[Zorral]

1 hour ago, Aemon Stark said:

There's still a lot of people with poorly controlled hypertension out there. 

But what about all the people chivvied into taking the stuff who don't need it?  That's pretty dangerous, right? Have no sympathies here for the pharma or the so-called health care system.  I'd have been pouring money into the pharma stockholders' accounts and doing myself harm -- if I hadn't been a bad patient, who refused to believe the so-called experts about what I should be doing.

How many patients have the nerve / the determination to hold out against that kind of pressure, even after doing all the research, which was available to me to do?  That's how we have gotten anti-vaxxers, you know.

[Kalbear]

11 hours ago, sologdin said:

i don't dispute your point--but there is a salient difference here. opioids have been developed and generally distributed lawfully, whereas the other items in your list have generally not.  

Heroin was developed as a legal item, as was morphine, and more people are dying from fentanyl (which is also entirely legal, if controlled). Didn't stop black people from being locked up for heroin use. Cocaine was discovered as a legal item. MDMA was as well. Quaaludes and valium were all prescriiptions that were heavily abused. You might have a point...

if we weren't talking about cocaine and pot. Cocaine in particular, which was heavily used by white people but black people got prosecuted for it in spades (pun not intended). The point isn't that the opioid crisis is particularly different - it isn't. The US has had a long history of treating white people with care and getting them rehab and education and second changes on drug charges. We've been doing it since the drug war started and before that. The different thing that stands out is the drug war against American minorities and the prosecution and jailing of minorities that white people do not have as an issue. 

It is frustrating as hell to me because the opioid crisis, modulo jailing the fucking Sacklers and those other big pharma execs that hooked about 1% of the US population on a massively physically addictive drug intentionally, is being handled how you should handle drug users - you treat them, you give them support, you use chemical treatments for withdrawals, and you try and rehabilitate them without jail. This is entirely the right thing to do. And yet we still - STILL - fucking lock up minorities with bullshit drug convictions and take away kids and do all that shit regularly, and then we have the gall to say 'oh, but it's different'. Yeah, it's fucking different, because this epidemic that's killing people is killing white kids trying to get high in suburbs and is killing old people who are trying to score a cheap fix and getting ODed on fentanyl. 

[The Anti-Targ]

Apparently the impeachment is now a "Jew coup." Seems unnecessary to accuse the Jewish community of anything the Democrats do to try to get trump out of office (except maybe if you believe all the white Democrats are being duped, or something). But if 19(?) Republican senators can be convinced to vote to convict (if it gets to that), I might start wondering if some shady organisation is behind his removal after all. Still wouldn't be inclined to suspect a Jew coup though.

[Kalbear]

8 hours ago, DMC said:

I never said it's wrong to consider sexism a factor, I said the over-worry about it and racism that's led to a lot of the electorate leaning towards a white male candidate - and specifically white male candidates with such manifest weaknesses as Biden and Sanders - rather than their genuine preferences is frustrating because it's strategically stupid.  If that's patronizing, so be it.

I think you're vastly understating the power of sexism. Sadly, I think this is pretty pervasive; people are getting a lot better at recognizing common racism and systemic racism and biases, and are still shockingly bad at recognizing sexism. I doubt people even have the tools needed to look for it, or are willing to even think they do have those tools. It's disappointing you still don't. 

I think it's ESPECIALLY true that this is what drives a lot of Trump's voting bloc. I think there are simply a whole lot of people out there who cannot fathom voting for or supporting a woman to lead them, and Trump brand of aggressive sexism speaks to them as an entire thing. I guess a way to say it is this: if Trump had bragged about getting away with calling black people racist names instead of bragging about sexually assaulting women, do you think he'd be elected? 

[DMC]

6 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I guess a way to say it is this: if Trump had bragged about getting away with calling black people racist names instead of bragging about sexually assaulting women, do you think he'd be elected? 

No.  But, um, when did this become the argument?  My original point was that Bernie and Biden are weaker candidates than many of the female and/or minority candidates in the field, and it's frustrating that much of the Democratic electorate seems to be acting like strategic voters by supporting them when in actuality they're doing the opposite.  I'm not blaming any voters for being cynical about the American electorate's capacity for sexism, racism, or any other ism that can be ginned up as an out-group.  What I am saying is I think it's stupid to think Biden or Bernie had or have a better shot at beating Trump than Warren or Harris would. 

[Altherion]

12 hours ago, mormont said:

And it should really worry people that an experienced senator from arguably the most important single state in the country is gone but the field still has two billionaire vanity candidates.

One point of clarification: while California is arguably the most important single state in many respects, it is most definitely one of the least important states as far as primary voters looking towards the general election are concerned. This is because not even in the wildest general election forecast does literally any of the Democratic candidates fail to win California. Thus, despite it having the most votes of any state, California does not matter at all as far as selecting a primary candidate is concerned.

Of course, it still matters as far as collecting cash and winning primary delegates is concerned, but this is quite likely what motivated Harris to quit: she didn't have the money and it would have been embarrassing to come in fifth in her home state. Also, I don't see any reason to worry about billionaire vanity candidates -- people with that much money can't help but spend it on something outlandish.

[Larry of the Lawn]

18 minutes ago, Altherion said:

One point of clarification: while California is arguably the most important single state in many respects, it is most definitely one of the least important states as far as primary voters looking towards the general election are concerned. This is because not even in the wildest general election forecast does literally any of the Democratic candidates fail to win California. Thus, despite it having the most votes of any state, California does not matter at all as far as selecting a primary candidate is concerned.

Of course, it still matters as far as collecting cash and winning primary delegates is concerned, but this is quite likely what motivated Harris to quit: she didn't have the money and it would have been embarrassing to come in fifth in her home state. Also, I don't see any reason to worry about billionaire vanity candidates -- people with that much money can't help but spend it on something outlandish.

President Donald Trump seems like a solid reason.

[Kalbear]

38 minutes ago, DMC said:

No.  But, um, when did this become the argument? 

When you said that sexism wasn't the main issue in our monthly version of relitigating the 2016 election. It's a way to illustrate that something like that - which combined with almost 20 women who have actively stated Trump assaulted them in some way or another - did not matter in the least. 

38 minutes ago, DMC said:

My original point was that Bernie and Biden are weaker candidates than many of the female and/or minority candidates in the field, and it's frustrating that much of the Democratic electorate seems to be acting like strategic voters by supporting them when in actuality they're doing the opposite.  I'm not blaming any voters for being cynical about the American electorate's capacity for sexism, racism, or any other ism that can be ginned up as an out-group.  What I am saying is I think it's stupid to think Biden or Bernie had or have a better shot at beating Trump than Warren or Harris would. 

I think Biden certainly does. I think Sanders definitely has a better shot than Harris, even in some prototypical ur-Harris that actually doesn't suck at campaigning or standing for things she believes in. I doubt very seriously Warren has a better shot than Biden. But really, why argue this way  when we can quantify it? We have seen consistently that Warren has had a 5 point or more deficit to Biden in the 'who would you vote for' thing. And who polls the worst in that larger group? Harris. Hell, fucking Buttigieg did better than Harris, and he might be a p-zombie. 

A better question I have is - why are you ignoring data that doesn't support your argument? That seems unlike you.

[DMC]

2 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

When you said that sexism wasn't the main issue in our monthly version of relitigating the 2016 election. It's a way to illustrate that something like that - which combined with almost 20 women who have actively stated Trump assaulted them in some way or another - did not matter in the least. 

What?  So if I say sexism wasn't the main factor in Hillary's loss to Trump, I am therefore necessarily saying that sexism did not matter in the least?  Great logic there.

6 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

A better question I have is - why are you ignoring data that doesn't support your argument? That seems unlike you.

What data?  If you're talking about head-to-heads with Trump, said many times those don't mean shit right now, so that's why.  Other than that, you're right, there's not much current data to go off in terms of who would be the best candidate against Trump.  Favorability ratings are pretty much even in the aggregate, both for the primary and general electorate, between Biden, Sanders, and Warren.  They went south for Harris with the rest of her poll numbers, but for a for a time they were there too. 

Anyway, there are many well-founded empirical reasons for why Warren and Harris should have a better chance of beating Trump than Biden, but the most important one is simply generational.  Biden's coalition is older voters, Warren and Harris have a much better chance at running up - and turning out! - the score with the 45 and unders.  And it's not like the older voters aren't gonna show up anyway.  But, yes, there's also the non-empirical intuitive reason, which ironically was mentioned by Jace.  Most of the time, when you pick the "safe," seemingly most electable candidate as the nominee, that candidate loses the general.  Especially when going up against an incumbent.  The only such nominees that have won the presidency since 1972 are the two Bush's, and neither was facing an incumbent.  As for Bernie, I'm not gonna waste my time explaining why Warren/Harris would have a better chance there.

[Guest]

Did this get posted yet?

How McKinsey Helped the Trump Administration Detain and Deport Immigrants

 

 

 

Quote

 

But the money-saving recommendations the consultants came up with made some career ICE staff uncomfortable. They proposed cuts in spending on food for migrants, as well as on medical care and supervision of detainees, according to interviews with people who worked on the project for both ICE and McKinsey and 1,500 pages of documents obtained from the agency after ProPublica filed a lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act.

McKinsey’s team also looked for ways to accelerate the deportation process, provoking worries among some ICE staff members that the recommendations risked short-circuiting due process protections for migrants fighting removal from the United States. The consultants, three people who worked on the project said, seemed focused solely on cutting costs and speeding up deportations — activities whose success could be measured in numbers — with little acknowledgment that these policies affected thousands of human beings.

In what one former official described as “heated meetings” with McKinsey consultants, agency staff members questioned whether saving pennies on food and medical care for detainees justified the potential human cost.

 

 

To summarize, they made ICE officials say "Is this a bit too cruel?"

 

In other news, it's being reported that Trump was pissed when Rudy said he had an insurance policy on him and that more of a schism is coming between them.  

[Kalbear]

14 minutes ago, DMC said:

What?  So if I say sexism wasn't the main factor in Hillary's loss to Trump, I am therefore necessarily saying that sexism did not matter in the least?  Great logic there.

I didn't say that, so great logic yourself. I said that his statement about assaulting women didn't matter in the least as far as his electability. His assauting 19 women who will go on the record and state as such didn't matter in the least as far as electability. I didn't think this was this unclear, but maybe it is.

14 minutes ago, DMC said:

What data?  If you're talking about head-to-heads with Trump, said many times those don't mean shit right now, so that's why. 

Evidence that they don't mean shit? Or other indications that the polling doesn't matter? Because it might not be great data, but it's better than nothing.

14 minutes ago, DMC said:

Anyway, there are many well-founded empirical reasons for why Warren and Harris should have a better chance of beating Trump than Biden, but the most important one is simply generational.  Biden's coalition is older voters, Warren and Harris have a much better chance at running up - and turning out! - the score with the 45 and unders.

Biden's coalition is also AA voters, and they seemed to have done a big deal for Obama. 

14 minutes ago, DMC said:

 But, yes, there's also the non-empirical intuitive reason, which ironically was mentioned by Jace.  Most of the time, when you pick the "safe," seemingly most electable candidate as the nominee, that candidate loses the general.  Especially when going up against an incumbent.  The only such nominees that have won the presidency since 1972 are the two Bush's, and neither was facing an incumbent.  As for Bernie, I'm not gonna waste my time explaining why Warren/Harris would have a better chance there.

Most of the time when you pick the unsafe entry you get trounced just as badly, if not worse. Goldwater wasn't exactly a winning guy, right? Reagan was hardly an unsafe candidate. Clinton didn't exactly break the mould for being a maverick guy - while he somewhat came out of nowhere, a state governor of a red state seeking blue nomination is about as safe as it goes. I think it's more accurate to say that incumbents win under almost all circumstances. 

[Fragile Bird]

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Guess I was wrong, and you are that ignorant. Oops!

Oh for crying out loud bloody Americans are so self-centered you think everyone in the world knows everything about you.

[DMC]

11 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I didn't say that, so great logic yourself. I said that his statement about assaulting women didn't matter in the least as far as his electability. His assauting 19 women who will go on the record and state as such didn't matter in the least as far as electability. I didn't think this was this unclear, but maybe it is.

Well, yes, those two sentences I quoted were confusing and unclear in terms of what you meant.  Sorry I can only read what you said rather than divine your sentiments.  Regardless, this is still entirely irrelevant to the point I was making.  For, like, the fourth time, I was originally expressing my frustration that many primary voters seem to support Biden/Sanders based on the misconception that they would be the strategically optimal choice - because I think that's a very stupid strategic assessment.  I'm happy you seized on that opportunity to get on your soapbox and express your pathetically sanctimonious disappointment in me, but my point about the over-worry based on 2016 being frustrating and depressing had nothing to do with underestimating the role sexism can play at the national (or any) level.  It's because the 2016 race is a very bad comparison to use for the 2020 race.  Neither here nor there, but there's actually a lot of ink spilled about this in IR subfields.  Regimes taking the lessons from the last war and applying those to the current war - with disastrous results.  As I said to Jace, that's human nature.  But it's also incredibly lazy analysis.  And lazy analysis almost always ends up inaccurate.

26 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Evidence that they don't mean shit?

There's plenty, but just here is sufficient.

31 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Biden's coalition is also AA voters, and they seemed to have done a big deal for Obama. 

And for Obama that was about maximizing their turnout.  Older black voters are gonna turnout.  Younger black voters, more uncertainty.  And Biden's primary AA support does not mean he'll turn out young black voters in the general.  If that was the case, Hillary Clinton would be running for reelection.

34 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Goldwater wasn't exactly a winning guy, right? Reagan was hardly an unsafe candidate. Clinton didn't exactly break the mould for being a maverick guy - while he somewhat came out of nowhere, a state governor of a red state seeking blue nomination is about as safe as it goes. I think it's more accurate to say that incumbents win under almost all circumstances. 

Goldwater was before the nationalization of primaries, bad comparison.  Reagan was the popular candidate heading into the primaries, but the GOP establishment was skeptical about him really the entire way through, which is why Bush got some run as the "safer" choice.  Clinton was decidedly not the safe choice, c'mon the fuck on.  As for incumbents usually having the advantage, well yeah.  I believe there's a term for that.

[Kalbear]

11 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

Oh for crying out loud bloody Americans are so self-centered you think everyone in the world knows everything about you.

Fair enough. Conversely, it's really easy to assume that someone knows all about your situation when they start talking about the situation you're in as if they know all about you, and then when they're proven wrong gets huffy about their lack of knowledge. 

9 minutes ago, DMC said:

For, like, the fourth time, I was originally expressing my frustration that many primary voters seem to support Biden/Sanders based on the misconception that they would be the strategically optimal choice - because I think that's a very stupid strategic assessment. 

In general, going with someone that has demonstrated some success is probably better than going with someone that hasn't. I would agree that this strategy would be a loser if they continued it through, say, South Carolina, but right now? 

9 minutes ago, DMC said:

I'm happy you seized on that opportunity to get on your soapbox and express your pathetically sanctimonious disappointment in me, but my point about the over-worry based on 2016 being frustrating and depressing had nothing to do with underestimating the role sexism can play at the national (or any) level.  It's because the 2016 race is a very bad comparison to use for the 2020 race.  Neither here nor there, but there's actually a lot of ink spilled about this in IR subfields.  Regimes taking the lessons from the last war and applying those to the current war - with disastrous results.  As I said to Jace, that's human nature.  But it's also incredibly lazy analysis.  And lazy analysis almost always ends up inaccurate.

Fair point. At the same time, no one in the US has lost money betting on the sexism fucking us over. Similarly, as I see over and over again, why are black people choosing the old white dude? Because the last time we had the choice, we picked the old white dude - the incredibly incompetent horrible one - over the woman. 

9 minutes ago, DMC said:

There's plenty, but just here is sufficient.

Fair enough! Though interestingly the main point they appear to be making is not that the polling is necessarily inaccurate, it's that things change enough that we don't know what the main issues are going to be. I also find it ironic that the article is largely talking about this because Trump was leading the polls, and they didn't think that he was remotely going to be able to win. Oops! There's another article by 538 that's a bit more recent that uses this as something of an important point as well, which is Trump has an issue about his stable voting. Nate Cohn seems to think entirely differently however - saying that polls taken today are literally as accurate as polls taken a day before the election. I don't think that's accurate, but I don't think that a 10 point inaccuracy means they're worthless. 

But even then, you've repeatedly mentioned other articles and studies about how women have a harder time - harder winning elections, harder in executive roles, harder being 'likeable', 'electable', etc. We can talk about what comes first here, but ultimately it doesn't matter - it is simply a higher difficulty level for Warren than it is for Biden, and that's largely going to be due to her gender. 

9 minutes ago, DMC said:

And for Obama that was about maximizing their turnout.  Older black voters are gonna turnout. 

They didn't for Clinton, at least not as much. And not in the places that mattered. 

9 minutes ago, DMC said:

Younger black voters, more uncertainty.  And Biden's primary AA support does not mean he'll turn out young black voters in the general.  If that was the case, Hillary Clinton would be running for reelection. 

At least right now, there's very little indication they'll turn out for anyone other than Biden. 

9 minutes ago, DMC said:

Goldwater was before the nationalization of primaries, bad comparison.  Reagan was the popular candidate heading into the primaries, but the GOP establishment was skeptical about him really the entire way through, which is why Bush got some run as the "safer" choice.  Clinton was decidedly not the safe choice, c'mon the fuck on.  As for incumbents usually having the advantage, well yeah.  I believe there's a term for that.

Clinton wasn't the party candidate - is that what you're talking about by 'safe'? But he certainly was not a particularly huge outlier in who tends to win elections. I guess that would be another way to go about it - is the person a senator for more than one term? They are totally, utterly fucked. Is that correct as far as 'safe' vs' dangerous'? Probably. It certainly has fewer 'but whatabout' rules than your idea of a nebulous safe candidate. 

 

[DMC]

9 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

In general, going with someone that has demonstrated some success is probably better than going with someone that hasn't.

Sure.  Like I said, I'm not blaming the voters for doing so and that's almost the definition of rational voting in terms of using heuristics.  My frustration is that I think this inclination - that is particularly prioritized among primary voters without knowing what the fuck they're talking about - now looks very likely to result in the Dems nominating someone with a decidedly worse chance of beating Trump than other candidates.  Jace was right to say it's patronizing to the voters for me to say that.  I'm not going to deny that I'm patronizing to voters, or that I'm an elitist in general when it comes to this subject.

20 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

But even then, you've repeatedly mentioned other articles and studies about how women have a harder time - harder winning elections, harder in executive roles, harder being 'likeable', 'electable', etc. We can talk about what comes first here, but ultimately it doesn't matter - it is simply a higher difficulty level for Warren than it is for Biden, and that's largely going to be due to her gender. 

Of course, the myriad of difficulties women candidates have to overcome are well documented and I have indeed cited, repeatedly.  And while that's informative to evaluating the chances of the four candidates in question (Biden, Harris, Sanders, Warren), it's also hardly the only consideration one should take into account.  Doing so would be textbook ecological fallacy.

26 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

At least right now, there's very little indication they'll turn out for anyone other than Biden. 

There's really no indication they'll turn out at higher levels than they did for Hillary with any candidate, Biden included.  Like I said, some of this is not empirical but intuitive/instinctive, I'm happy to admit that.

29 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Clinton wasn't the party candidate - is that what you're talking about by 'safe'?

Well, not really.  The 1992 Dem primary was kind of a shitshow.  Tsongas was the party candidate at the beginning, but that waned.  Clinton wasn't the safe candidate because he already had sex scandals going on with Flowers.

33 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I guess that would be another way to go about it - is the person a senator for more than one term? They are totally, utterly fucked. Is that correct as far as 'safe' vs' dangerous'? Probably. It certainly has fewer 'but whatabout' rules than your idea of a nebulous safe candidate. 

Meh the whole senator thing might have some merit in terms of having a record the opponent can exploit, but on its face that always seemed like a spurious relationship to me.  If Obama didn't run until now do you think it'd matter much that he'd been a senator for 16 years instead of 4?  Defining a "safe" candidate is admittedly nebulous, but I bet if I could get responses from ~30-40 experts I could construct a statistically reliable IRT measure - meaning identifying such "safe" candidates would be generally agreed upon. 

[Kalbear]

5 minutes ago, DMC said:

Meh the whole senator thing might have some merit in terms of having a record the opponent can exploit, but on its face that always seemed like a spurious relationship to me.  If Obama didn't run until now do you think it'd matter much that he'd been a senator for 16 years instead of 4?  Defining a "safe" candidate is admittedly nebulous, but I bet if I could get responses from ~30-40 experts I could construct a statistically reliable IRT measure - meaning identifying such "safe" candidates would be generally agreed upon. 

I suspect given the sample size you'd essentially end up with a very odd and textbook example of overfitting. Ultimately the 'safe' candidate is the one who has already won it once. 

As to the senator thing failing, part of it is record, but part of it is that if they're senator they're probably not particularly important enough to run for anything else. Being a senator isn't nearly as powerful or prestigious or lucrative as being a governor, especially now that pork barrel politics are done, and if you couldn't cut it as governor you're probably not gonna do well as a POTUS either. Same thing with campaigning - senators aren't quite as set in stone as house members these days, but there are a whole lot of states that are going to be basically having their primary as the decider on who will be the senator. That's not a great sign for broad appeal in a state, much less nationally. 

But from a record standpoint? It's pretty tough to argue. We had what, Mondale, Gore, Kerry, HRC - all failed. McCain too. Ford was from the House! Romney somehow managed to use his power of Senator to infect his candidacy before he became senator. That's pretty powerful - not only are you doomed if you're a senator, you're doomed if you become one. 

[DMC]

54 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Ultimately the 'safe' candidate is the one who has already won it once. 

Obviously incumbent presidents running for reelection would be omitted.

54 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Being a senator isn't nearly as powerful or prestigious or lucrative as being a governor, especially now that pork barrel politics are done, and if you couldn't cut it as governor you're probably not gonna do well as a POTUS either.

I don't think that's necessarily true - the prestige factor.  Some of that's dependent on the state.  If you're from a small state, I'd argue governorship is substantially less prestigious than getting into the US Senate and building a career.  Where would Joe Biden be if he just ran for governor of Delaware?  Even in big states, I'm not sure the difference between senator to governor is all that much.  Clearly you're right that governors have been more successful winning the presidency than senators since JFK.  But of course we just elected the first guy that didn't hold any political office beforehand outside of military generals.  So, definitely gonna take a skeptical view on any solid relationship there under the current environment.  

54 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Same thing with campaigning - senators aren't quite as set in stone as house members these days, but there are a whole lot of states that are going to be basically having their primary as the decider on who will be the senator. That's not a great sign for broad appeal in a state, much less nationally. 

If the state is one party dominated, and thus decided by the primary, why wouldn't that be the same for both senators and governors?  If you're saying there's a difference there between the House and the Senate, I guess that could be an interesting comparison.  But how many presidents have been elected with their last job being a member of the House?  Ford's was, but he was never elected...honestly I'm sure there are other examples, but off the top of my head the only one I can think of is Garfield, I think.  ETA:  Lincoln you goddamn idiot!

[Kalbear]

7 minutes ago, DMC said:

If the state is one party dominated, and thus decided by the primary, why wouldn't that be the same for both senators and governors?

Because it...isn't? It's weird, but governors seem to be somehow oddly immune to the partisanship that happens elsewhere, or at least curtailed. Clinton is a good example of this, of course, and so was Romney, but right now the most popular governors are all Republicans in somewhat blue or deeply blue states.

I don't pretend to know why, but governing appears to have a bigger need to cater to everyone instead of a party. 

7 minutes ago, DMC said:

  If you're saying there's a difference there between the House and the Senate, I guess that could be an interesting comparison. 

I wasn't; I was saying that the further you go up the chain of not allowing your party to shield you from gaining common ground, the more likely it is that you'll have broader success. I know you said Trump isn't an example of that having held nothing, but he is something of an example in that his party didn't shield him from having to carve out other coalitions. 

 

[mormont]

14 hours ago, DMC said:

Third, let's not discount the clear failures of Harris' campaign.  I think it's ridiculous to try to blame the media here.  She got great coverage both after her very successful rollout/announcement and after her Biden moment - until her campaign flubbed the aftermath on that.  Same goes for fundraising.  Other than the top 4 candidates, she raised much more money than any other candidate.  As of October 15 (the last filing deadline), she had more cash on hand than Biden.  Her ability to raise money has dried up since, but that's because she's tanked in the polls.  That's not sexism or racism, it's politics.

I think this is both missing my point and begging the question. The issue is not whether Harris' campaign had clear failures. The issue is whether the effect of those failures is magnified for a female black candidate in a way that does not apply to male white candidates. That seems to me undeniable. You talk about Harris' campaign being 'done' the moment staffers started expressing dissatisfaction with how it was run: meanwhile Sanders' campaign has been sued by multiple former employees, accused of (among other things) retaliation for union activity, gender and race bias, and it barely registers in the press. 

The point is, if you're a black woman candidate you have to be perfect or it's over. If you're a white guy, people will make excuses for you. 

[DMC]

2 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Because it...isn't? It's weird, but governors seem to be somehow oddly immune to the partisanship that happens elsewhere, or at least curtailed. Clinton is a good example of this, of course, and so was Romney, but right now the most popular governors are all Republicans in somewhat blue or deeply blue states.

I don't pretend to know why, but governing appears to have a bigger need to cater to everyone instead of a party. 

Oh definitely, there's often a significant difference between a state's "partisan lean" in terms of a national comparison and the sometimes rather eccentric party affiliation of their governors.  That's federalism at its finest, I suppose.  But I don't think Larry Hogan has any illusions of his ability to win the GOP's presidential nomination, ever.  And Steve Bullock just figured that out.  Also, not to be pedantic but you've been fun to talk to - I don't think Clinton is a good example of that.  Arkansas was still in realignment at the time and there was still a palpable tendency to just vote for the Democrat.  Manchin still reaps the benefits of this phenomenon, which I guess just goes to show how far behind West Virginia really is.

Anyway, while there certainly are differences between gubernatorial as opposed to US Senate bids within certain states and you're right to point that out, those type of outliers are increasingly rare.  I think there'll always be a handful of those types of governors, but right now they're on the endangered species list.  Really, analyzing that also gets into state politics - e.g. one party has dominated the governorship for so long the electorate is just fed up - which I try to avoid at all costs.

16 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I was saying that the further you go up the chain of not allowing your party to shield you from gaining common ground, the more likely it is that you'll have broader success. I know you said Trump isn't an example of that having held nothing, but he is something of an example in that his party didn't shield him from having to carve out other coalitions.

Conceptually, I just don't see how you can't also cultivate that type of reputation in the Senate as well.  Whether accurate or not, McCain rode that type of "maverick" rep to a nomination.  May have been a pyrrhic victory, but still.

18 minutes ago, mormont said:

The issue is whether the effect of those failures is magnified for a female black candidate in a way that does not apply to male white candidates. That seems to me undeniable. You talk about Harris' campaign being 'done' the moment staffers started expressing dissatisfaction with how it was run: meanwhile Sanders' campaign has been sued by multiple former employees, accused of (among other things) retaliation for union activity, gender and race bias, and it barely registers in the press. 

The issues with Sanders campaign largely stem from complaints about 2016, not the current campaign.  That's why he did a mea culpa.  I'm pretty spent so maybe I'm just remembering wrong, but how much of that has been brought up with his current campaign, and/or after he apologized?  Regardless, that's not similar at all to what I was referring to with Harris' campaign.  Legitimate worker complaints from staffers is distinctly different from high-level operatives consistently giving non-attributable quotes on the strategic mismanagement of the campaign. 

26 minutes ago, mormont said:

The point is, if you're a black woman candidate you have to be perfect or it's over. If you're a white guy, people will make excuses for you. 

Agree whole-heartedly.  I just don't think you can credibly blame this on Harris' media coverage or fundraising efforts.  I mean, if you want to say there were plenty of leftist media outlets that were plainly out to get Harris - like the Intercept or Krystal Ball (who should really just change her title to Bernie Sanders' button-woman) - then I have no argument.  But you're gonna have to give me examples of the media being unfair to Harris in relation to any of her Dem competitors, because I honestly didn't see it.