US Politics: Show Trials & Tribulations

[Gaston de Foix]

6 minutes ago, DMC said:

I honestly wonder whether/how much any Democratic nominee is going to want Hillary - or Bill - out there campaigning for them in the general.  In Hillary's case, it's not only a self-admitted weakness, she deliberately begged off from campaign events in the heat of the election.  Which was quite obviously a mistake - and I was quite pissed at the time - but if she doesn't even really get out there for her own campaign... 

They can raise money.  I imagine the nominee will want to campaign with the Obamas above all. 

[DMC]

9 minutes ago, Gaston de Foix said:

They can raise money.  I imagine the nominee will want to campaign with the Obamas above all. 

Mentioned this last week, to reiterate fundraising is not going to be a problem for the Dem nominee.  And yes, you want the Obamas out there, not the Clintons.

[Guest]

22 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

My lord, I am sick and bloody tired of the Clinton haters.

 

I can't speak for others, but for me it has nothing to do with hating Clinton. For me, this is unhelpful, counterproductive and plays right in to the perception that "Never Hillary" voters already have of her. Not to mention it's a perfect attack line that Trump will use against Sanders if he were to win the nomination.

As much as I believed that Clinton would have made an extremely competent President, it's stuff like this that makes me wonder whether she would have been competent at all. She knows her policy, and she's gangbusters at fundraising, but it seems like she's terrible at strategizing. Which wouldn't be a problem if she recognized that as a weakness and hired people who are good at it. But she doesn't.

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I can't speak for others, but for me it has nothing to do with hating Clinton. For me, this is unhelpful, counterproductive and plays right in to the perception that "Never Hillary" voters already have of her. Not to mention it's a perfect attack line that Trump will use against Sanders if he were to win the nomination.

As much as I believed that Clinton would have made an extremely competent President, it's stuff like this that makes me wonder whether she would have been competent at all. She knows her policy, and she's gangbusters at fundraising, but it seems like she's terrible at strategizing. Which wouldn't be a problem if she recognized that as a weakness and hired people who are good at it. But she doesn't.

Alternately, she both very much hates Sanders and thinks that he would be a terrible nominee, and is doing a lot to try and submarine him. I don't know that that's a good strategy, mind you - I suspect it is not - but that might be her logic. 

[DMC]

Yeah, like Kal said, she does not want Sanders to be the nominee, has nothing to lose, is not constrained by being a former president, and this is the time to get her shots in.  This is a classic "I'm shocked, shocked to find there's gambling going on in here" case.  If Bernie secures the nomination and she keeps this up?  Then yes, that's a problem.  Other than that, it's just a whole lotta noise.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, DMC said:

Sorry, responded quickly and forgot about this.  He antagonized her by staying in the race long LONG after it was clear he was going to lose.  That's just a dick move - the same dick move Hillary did to Obama 8 years earlier.  And his supporters, and even campaign, definitely antagonized her up until the convention, GTFO with any arguments to the contrary.  That's maybe not "directly" his fault, but he did jack shit to stop it.

I am going to take this moment to remind many of you (not you DMC, you weren't here much then), that

I

F***ING

TOLD

YOU

SO!!!

I kept telling you guys that if Bernie doesn't get out this could create a rift that will last longer after the election, and that's exactly what happened. Old man should have been done after Super Tuesday. Stay in a few more weeks out of pride if need be, but by April, he needed to be out, not out campaigning that the system is rigged. 

[Liffguard]

Does this affair have any material impact at all? The category of "people who would, in 2020, have voted for Sanders were it not for Hillary Clinton's expressed dislike" must be vanishingly small. Does Clinton's opinion particularly matter any more?

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, Liffguard said:

Does this affair have any material impact at all? The category of "people who would, in 2020, have voted for Sanders were it not for Hillary Clinton's expressed dislike" must be vanishingly small. Does Clinton's opinion particularly matter any more?

The most likely outcome is that Sanders doesn't win the nomination, and some Sanders supporters will blame Clinton, further exacerbating the rift among Democrats and making it more likely for Trump to win.

[The Anti-Targ]

When you are playing with potentially tight margins in key states vanishingly small on a national scale could be win or lose in state races.

If the Democrats eat themselves after it become blindingly obvious who the nominee will be (rigged caucuses or not) then they will deserve to be beaten a 2nd time by what should be a pretty easily beatable Trump. It's a different question as to whether the world will deserve that outcome. I do care what happens to the US people, but largely because you all are included in "the world" and I care very much what happens to the world. Ultimately we (collectively) will survive the damage that despots, tyrants and fascists do to society and the planet. But some of us (individually) will needlessly suffer greatly if their period of dominion is prolonged.

[Guest]

24 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Alternately, she both very much hates Sanders and thinks that he would be a terrible nominee, and is doing a lot to try and submarine him. I don't know that that's a good strategy, mind you - I suspect it is not - but that might be her logic. 

I agree with you that she's utilizing that logic. The problem is that it's short-sighted and self-serving. Unless Clinton starts working to try and walk this shit back, it's going to cause problems regardless of who wins the nomination.

That's what I mean by her being a bad strategist. There is literally no upside here...other than to push documentary views up.

[Fragile Bird]

16 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I can't speak for others, but for me it has nothing to do with hating Clinton. For me, this is unhelpful, counterproductive and plays right in to the perception that "Never Hillary" voters already have of her. Not to mention it's a perfect attack line that Trump will use against Sanders if he were to win the nomination.

As much as I believed that Clinton would have made an extremely competent President, it's stuff like this that makes me wonder whether she would have been competent at all. She knows her policy, and she's gangbusters at fundraising, but it seems like she's terrible at strategizing. Which wouldn't be a problem if she recognized that as a weakness and hired people who are good at it. But she doesn't.

I understand this perfectly.

But for a lot of people outside the US, when they see this bitchiness about Clinton/Sanders and '25% of Sanders supporters did not vote for Clinton' translates into 'this is why Trump was elected'.

And as much as Trump is a nightmare for half of the folks in the US, for us outside the US it's been years of attacks on our countries, our governments, our trade, being threatened, having tariffs or sanctions imposed, treaties blown up, serious issues (like climate change) scorned and whole other heaps of crap dumped on us. Not to mention fears of WW 3 starting. And believe me, lots of people up here in the frozen north put a lot of the blame for 176 dead people on Flight PS752 on Trump and the US. So all the continued bitching about HRC makes me want to say why can't you just STFU.

[Kalbear]

18 minutes ago, Liffguard said:

Does this affair have any material impact at all? The category of "people who would, in 2020, have voted for Sanders were it not for Hillary Clinton's expressed dislike" must be vanishingly small. Does Clinton's opinion particularly matter any more?

I think it's less about that and more about energizing people who are pissed at Sanders to get out and support others. That's more important in the primary anyway - it's less about changing people's minds and more about getting people energized and active. 

[Tywin Manderly]

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/jan/21/amazon-boss-jeff-bezoss-phone-hacked-by-saudi-crown-prince

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Rep Val Demings is a sledgehammer. She just absolutely proved why she deserves to be one of the House managers. 

[The Anti-Targ]

More agriculture industry comment / analysis on the US-China trade deal.

Quote

“As the two sides have agreed based on the market demand in China, in line with market terms, Chinese businesses will purchase $40 billion worth of agricultural products from the United States annually,” said Liu He, Vice Premier of the People’s Republic of China, just ahead of the signing. “If the demand is strong, the companies may buy more.”

University of Missouri’s Seth Meyer said China stating the amount it buys will be dictated by market demand was a bit of a shock the overall markets.

“I think the market was a bit surprised about the emphasis put on at the market purchases, and then the back waiting, which really means, this has to go smoothly for the first 12 months before things get really rolling,” said Meyer. “And on the back end, it’s quite a lot.”

Meyer said currently, the price isn’t right for China on major ag goods in the U.S., including soybeans.

“Right now, we’re not all that price competitive,” added Meyer.

What? The country that champions the free market being shocked that the reality of the trade deal will be affected by market demand?

[DMC]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

I kept telling you guys that if Bernie doesn't get out this could create a rift that will last longer after the election, and that's exactly what happened.

You're right, while I too was annoyed by how long Bernie stayed in, I wasn't posting in these threads at the time.*  But, this is pretty close to a post hoc fallacy - let's not attribute too much causality to Bernie's rise and influence.  Yes, he does deserve credit for taking up the mantle and being the standard bearer for the leftist shift.  But this is primarily due to generational shifts as the millennials and gen z emerge as the dominant force in American electoral politics.  If Bernie didn't exist, that leftist shift in response to the frustrations of the Obama administration - and of course as a response to Trump - would have happened in a very similar fashion anyway.

*Pretty sure I didn't venture down into the miscellaneous section here until about a week before the general election in 2016.  Before that, I posted on a random, very small forum on ezboard since, like, 1998.  And while it limped along as just mostly dead for many years, I wanted to talk politics randomly online and at that point it was completely dead.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

3 hours ago, Gaston de Foix said:

Honestly her comments were spectacularly ill-advised, if for no other reason, than that doing so on the eve of impeachment has provided counter-programming and/or has been buried underneath the impeachment coverage.  If you are going to shoot for the Bernie, shoot to kill.  

Speaking of impeachment, Adam Schiff destroyed Trump's defenses this afternoon in the first hour.  We'll see if it makes some difference to amending Mitch's resolution...

Unfortunately, impeachment (and trial for removal from office) are political not legal actions.  Unless Schiff’s arguments have significant political impact their legal efficacy isn’t irrelevant.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

3 hours ago, Liffguard said:

Does this affair have any material impact at all? The category of "people who would, in 2020, have voted for Sanders were it not for Hillary Clinton's expressed dislike" must be vanishingly small. Does Clinton's opinion particularly matter any more?

I don't think it matters at all. Sanders isn't winning. The DNC will ensure he won't win, and at this point, I don't really care about that. Clinton is just getting some jabs in because she lost. At the end of the day, this has no impact on anything. Biden will sail into the nomination and then we'll see if he can counter Trump's, um, "rhetorical style." 

Edit: I want to iterate that what Clinton says about Bernie really doesn't matter. Those seeking radical change to the U.S. political system would see the system as rigged if Bernie loses, no matter if Clinton says anything or not. Clinton's opinion matters little in this. I honestly think that Obama's whispers of discontent about Bernie are far more harmful and contribute more to this rift than Clinton. 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

5 hours ago, Darryk said:

 

 

I think the person who did more damage to Hillary Clinton than either Trump or Bernie is Clinton herself. Her history of coziness with Wall Street, supporting Iraq Qar and Patriot Act, and supporting bad trade deals came back to bite her.

If she's upset because Bernie ran against her in a primary and called her out on her past failures then she doesn't understand how an election works. At least Bernie didn't make up stuff about her like Trump did.

 

 

The ACA did a lot of good but it wasn't enough. I'm glad it saved your son but there are many still uncovered under it. It was a half-measure to try get some good done without pissing off the insurance companies.

Going all the way and getting universal health coverage (as does every developed country in the world has and it's a joke that USA doesn't have it) would provide coverage to everyone, but Congressmen are either afraid to go against the insurance and pharmaceutical industries, or funded by them.

 

 

You asked what the point of a Congressman in a Congress is if he doesn't get anything done? The point is to fight the good fights, even if you hardly ever win them, just so you can keep the message out there and give hope to people who want to see those things achieved.

There's YouTube videos going back 30 years showing Bernie Sanders fighting for the right issues long before those issues were popular. In the early 90s he wanted to amount of budget devoted to military reduced and more money used for schools and social programs. He didn't have a hope in hell of "getting anything done" on that score, but it matters that he was fighting the issue. 

Personally I think voters care more about what a person's record in Congress says about their values rather than their legislative achievements. 

 

 

She's got cause to complain about Bernie doing something that she did 8 years earlier? I mean I know politics are messy, but she could at least try to stay consistent.

 

 

I'm really sorry you had that experience. I don't deny there are a lot of bad eggs in Bernie's movement. I just concentrate on what he's fighting for rather than what some of his cultish followers get up to.

Haha, that's funny. You said he was unpopular "in his workplace", well if he's got such a high approval rating in Vermont I don't see how that could be the case. "unpopular in his workplace" is different from "unpopular in congress" as his workplace also includes running his home state presumably.

Being unpopular in Congress is just another point in his favor right now since Congress itself is so unpopular.

 

 

Does that mean Hillary's supporters see her as a demagogue? They're also pretty polemic. The difference is Bernie's support mostly operates through social media, where things tend to get pretty messy and heated; whereas Hillary has her proxies attacking Bernie's character on mainstream networks like MSNBC, with no pushback from so-called journalists.

Agreed with your points. My son had cancer when he was little, and Obama's ACA was integral in him not getting tagged with the dreaded "pre-existing conditions." Conversely, Obamacare didn't stop my school district from saying the employees were using the insurance too much, so the next year, we were "provided" new health insurance with insanely high deductibles and premiums. 

[DMC]

7 minutes ago, Simon Steele said:

The DNC will ensure he won't win

Ah yes, the all-powerful Illumin..I mean DNC.  They're so corrupt and influence Dem primary voters so much.  Ya know what, we really should try to figure out how they do that.  Let's break into their headquarters and..wait a second...