Democrats

[Phoebe]

Wow. I tire of living among idiots. I hope the gay cooties poison her. Wtf people.

[Phoebe]

I have a number of vehemently pro Sanders friends who believe the DNC is working overtime to prevent Sanders from being the rightful nominee. The fact that the Iowa state Democratic party decided to release initial results with only 62% of the vote in, showing that Buttigieg was winning, when it turns out that he was actually tied with Sanders, is definitely some evidence in favor of this view. So many questions have already been raised about the decisions that led to this fiasco, but the question I'm not seeing raised is why after making people wait so long for initial results, they chose to make the initial release one that showed Buttigieg as the winner, when in fact Sanders did just as well, and had they waited a few more hours everybody would have known that. It is enough to make me want to support Sanders. The rising media hysteria we are hearing about how it's impossible for him to win also makes me wonder if he really can win and people are just afraid of that outcome.

[akiva]

I don't think Sanders can win the general election. I think his leftist views and past comments would be used to make him look very bad, like a socialist extremist, and lots of swing voters wouldn't support.

I'm also afraid of what happens if Sanders doesn't get the nomination. A lot of his voters didn't vote in 2016, which contributed to Trump's victory, and a lot of his supporters this year say they won't vote if Sanders doesn't get the nomination.

Having idiots like Susan Sarandon saying that a Trump presidency is better than a Hillary presidency is scary, and makes Sanders supporters in general look like morons.

[poorpete]

To look positively, I will say that its great that the three top candidates out of Iowa have traits that would have gotten them no where mere years ago. A jewish socialist vs. a gay small city mayor vs. a woman. Chances are high one of these three will be the nominee and a not 0 chance they'll be our next president... pretty cool!

[Phoebe]

This is true! Probably like many people, I'm finding it hard to see the silver lining until we arrive in 2021 with a positive result. I think you are probably right about Sanders overall chances, but it still concerns me that his supporters seem to be the most enthusiastic of the bunch. I defeat that thought by realizing his support is weakest among Latino and Black voters, and their enthusiasm for the nominee is essential.

But then I worry that my perceptions of his support are being distorted by a real effort on the part of the DNC to squelch his candidacy. You might read the Perez announcement as an effort to pry the first contest away from Iowa, but it also is a terrible look to ask for recounting just as we're realizing Sanders tied or won in delegates and won in popular turnout.

[Mike]

[poorpete]

I think my true hope at this point is a Warren breakthrough or a brokered convention. I truly want a unity ticket going into the election and those two are the best hope.

My assumption based on nothing is Stacy Abrams or Kamila Harris, both relative moderates, will either be the likely VP. This means the moderates would pick a moderate, nixing a unity ticket. Warren may pick either, meaning a unity ticket. I'd be surprised if Sanders picks a moderate, hense my leading question earlier, nixing a unity ticket. So if Sanders leads but can't clinch the nom, they will force a moderate on him. And they'll force a Pete, Amy, Mike, or Joe who is leading to pick... Warren.

Tada! That's why I called it my true hope! A pete can dream...

[Phoebe]

Whoaaa watching my first full Democratic debate. This suuuuuucks! Most of them are so rabid and frantic and attacking each other, instead of using this exposure to trash Trump and talk up D policies across the board.
So far Amy gets my W because she's the most positive and leaderlike, and Bernie gets the #2 because if we are gonna be angry, nobody gets angry as well as Bernie. Mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore! And that accent is fire,, wooo!!
I like Amy. Pragmatic, normal, sane.
Pete is a damn kid with absurd ears and I can't deal with how Annooooying he is. Ugh, he's the kid that was always raising his hand too much in class.
Bernie stacks up well vs Trump imo - like here's this horrible lying conman, and you need this crabby oldster to read him the riot act.
Tada, by deep thoughts andcmargaritas, o thank the world for making possible because I would not have enjoyed watching this cold sober. Tell em Bernie, damn right!

[Phoebe]

Yep, was still very "whee, margaritas!" while writing that, but the same impression lingers today. Personally, I like Klobuchar, but she doesn't seem to have that it-factor or zing to really draw people to her. I thought Kamala had it and she didn't get too far, so maybe my zing-detector is malfunctioning. Or maybe KH just realized she was unlikely to win and decided to save the rest of her funds and be a likely VP nom for almost anyone, or focus on 2024-28 by doing her thing in the Senate. Who knows.

Sanders really brings that fire! Mike's observation that he hits a certain ceiling is quite worrisome. Most Ds will support him just to avoid Trump, and some new people will peel off for him, but will he inspire the massive D turnout we need? Some of his true lefty positions are hugely unpopular. He's smart enough not to dwell on them but the other side will do it for him.

However, the media cannot function, cannot stop peddling false equivalence and normalization of dishonesty and criminality. Sanders can help cut through that by being a bit of a media sensation himself, and his speeches are full of pithy one-liners that zero in on the true BS everyone is upset about. Like GOP is fighting tooth and nail to strip away Medicaid and pre-existing conditions coverage, while handing money away as fast as they can to the wealthiest. Nobody brings the hammer down on that like Bernie.

[poorpete]

Since yesterday at this time we're down four more candidates (including the last african-american which is a bummer), and it looks like eventually we'll be down to six.

Bernie, Pete, Amy, Warren, Biden, Bloomberg.

Steyer and Gabbard are the other two left, and Gabbard will probably agitate from the fringe the rest of the way and then endorse Trump, so who cares.

People have been noting as Warren lost half of her support, most went to Amy while Bernie's numbers remained relatively flat (but first!). Maybe all this time, the fight has been equally a mix of left vs. center, electability vs. executivity, and male vs. female.

I could be wrong, but for all the bummerness of Warren/Amy only getting third place in Iowa/New Hampshire I'm pretty sure that those are the best results ever for women not named Hillary Clinton.

Update: Shirley Chisolm won the New Jersey primary, but seems it was relatively uncontested. But by popular vote, they are already #6 and #7 on this list after one primary
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_f ... ndidates_2

It'll be interesting/great/potentially awful, at a contested convention, to have a socialist, a Gen Y small town mayor, a woman, and a rich man with high executive experience, compromise and unite. We'll see...

[Phoebe]

[Ronster]

I am not sure that this cycle they (Democrats) will be able to coalesce into a single block. IMO one of them must forego the finger pointing and tout their own merits. It would be noble, but most likely fatal. There has to be some energy other than we're not the bad man. A middle of the road moderate would probably do it...again, IMO. The President's victory was a small margin and that can easily change.

[bralbovsky]

At this point, there are still several maelstrom forces to overcome.
There needs to be a moment at the convention where all of them appear together on the stage and promise to deliver their fans in November.

Meanwhile, there will be apoplectic efforts to subvert, delegitimize and head off any possibility of a real election, a la Putin or Assad or Saddam Hussein...Barr is on the case, and since he's been allowing traitors to skate (see Oliver North) for decades, that's more of a worry for me than having doubt about any single candidate being able to unify the party.

One thing about Bernie: I would love to see what happens when he yells in Trump's face at a debate. His anger is genuine, and whoever is the nominee will need to break out their best "retaliate against the playground bully voice." I fear Biden would just grin weakly...

[Tahlvin]

Do you think Trump would actually do any debates this cycle?

[Mike]

[Mike]

Of course your point still stands. Instead of quibbling over exactly how much free health care we want or exactly how much to tax the rich, it would be nice if someone were making their case against Trump. Instead they have to explain to voters what makes them different from each other.

Tom Steyer has said that the most important thing is to get Trump out of office. So just imagine if instead of buying his way onto the debate stage, he had instead spent those millions on effective pro-Dem messages that would have benefited ANY eventual nominee.

Conservatives spent a shit-ton of money on ads to control messaging through impeachment and other events. Would have been nice to have something to counter that.

[Phoebe]

Honestly think the problem is more with the media than with the candidates running what have been relatively restrained campaigns in the primary. The human beings who write stories in the media are collectively so BAD at what they're doing these days. There are bright spots to be sure, but most of the coverage I see has been about meaningless horse race drama, and whatever foolish trail in the wind has been seeded by malicious actors on any particular day.

One reason I like Amy is that, paired with Trump, he comes off as petulant toddler and/or angry, menacing bully, while she's the patient but no-nonsense mom, ready to restore order and take care of everything that feels like it's spinning out of control right now.

Apropos of nothing, I made a disturbing discovery that most of the people I know personally who like Trump have serious daddy issues. I mean, they think Daddy is a role easily occupied by a volatile or possibly even abusive person, so that seems Normal. No, people. Dad is always supposed to be the good guy. And I feel sorry for them that they haven't experienced that, but I don't really care for our nation to suffer under a bad dad.

[Mike]

[Phoebe]

The sample size is small, but composed of people who either were struggling with dad leaving during a divorce, or were themselves the dad who left in the divorce, or who had an actually abusive dad. It's a grim discovery. One exception is my best friend from childhood, who is the most stridently Catholic person I know. And I'm positive she votes for Trump because of the pro-life thing and nothing else. But then, she's not really an exception because she doesn't Like him. Really reflecting only on people who actively Like him. I'm baffled.

[Phoebe]

While no state is particularly dispositive, I think by next week we will know whether Biden really can be the guy. He should be outperforming everyone else by a big margin in South Carolina if he's going to be the nominee, and I'm curious to see both if that happens and who else people in South Carolina would go for if not him.