That's the same talking point I've heard before, but it falls flat when you remember that the Democrat's strategy has always been to try to reach over the aisle by weakening or flat out abandoning liberal policies. They're ALREADY weakening themselves ABF, right now, during the campaign. You've got Buttigeg flat out lying about health care and trying to ruin support for college for all by saying "I don't want to pay for rich people's kids to go to college" (AOC tore that argument apart piece by piece already, but point is he's running ads using that talking point right now).
If your only argument is that allowing independents to vote would cause candidates to swing to the right- they already are! They have been! And that pressure's there because when the election arrives it's the whole country that needs to vote. Here's how to counter that. Swing voters on the issues, not the candidates. Win them over by convincing them the policies are ones that benefit them rather than trying to claim you're "actually" in support of republican policies and making issues that the left base have been rooting for for years sound like pipe dreams.
Don't abandon the left to win over the right, make the right WANT what the left wants! Frankly, this is the strategy Republicans have been using for decades now, and it WORKS. There are a couple of candidates the dems have right now that are pushing for progressive policies and they have incredible support among the young people. The one flaw with the polls I've seen is they aren't tapping that group of people that traditionally don't vote, and that's the mistake the pollsters made last cycle. You get a firey base excited about things- and that's going to spread to a group that didn't vote because they didn't see themselves represented. Trump latched onto non-voting racists and xenophobes and made them into voters. What is the lesson here?
You know all those news stories celebrating the heroic poor persevering and being generous over trying circumstances?
This man makes a good point here, that's all propaganda from the rich to make us all think our hardship are our own fault for just not being gumptious enough.
Any "juror" who declares, before the trial, that they are going to coordinate with the defense and will not be impartial should be immediately removed from the trial.
Seriously. It's so frustrating. I know it's a given, seeing as how it's a Republican-led Senate, filled with Trump toadies that have misplaced their spines, but do they have to be so OPEN about it?
What system do we have for removing a member of the senate for flagrant violation of constitutional duty as Mitch has shown. I mean, I guess we could get an eagle to pick him up and drop him on a rock... Maybe just get him deported back to Galapagos?
Well, Biden managed to have a decent performance in a debate without going into some senile meandering nonsense. I have to give him credit, he stayed on track this time. Do I think both Sanders and Warren did better? Well, yes, and Warren came onto the stage backed by that recent report basically praising her as a selfless fighter for worker's rights, which certainly helped.
Buttigieg had the absolute worst night, and it's well deserved. Once again he made the pointless claim that he's "the only person on that stage that's not a millionaire", which is only technically true. First there's assets to consider, and secondly rich or not he's getting his campaign funded by rich people thanks to that wine cave business he was up to. He's catering to the rich, he's influenced by them, and his campaign's essentially entirely paid for by them. In other words, he's not a millionaire perhaps, but he's working for them. He's corrupt.
I'm going to have to chop the database up and get a new hard drive just for this thread if that happens.
And my only free one holds 280 TB of porn so that won't do. Hmmm
(21st December 2019, 5:11 PM)Weltall Wrote: [ -> ]Trump is going to be re-elected if Bernie Sanders isn't the nominee.
You've summed up ABF and my own argument for the last I dunno, 5 pages of this thing, at least my contention.
Warren made a big misstep in rolling back on her Medicare for All plan just recently, and she's talking about that tired talking point, "choice", again. You know, the lie. It's disappointing, and I think whoever's advising Warren is doing her a disservice. So, Sanders it is for me.
I know I've said it over and over, but the "only Bernie can win" narrative you people have makes absolutely no sense whatsoever because it's not backed up by any facts. There is, unfortunately, no reason to believe that moving to the left makes it easier to win elections in this country. Would it be nice if Bernie could easily win? Sure! But he can't; quite the opposite, I am just as sure now as I was in 2016 that Bernie has a tougher path to victory than any of our other major candidates, either currently running or withdrawn. The US and UK are different -- look at how in our first election after the 2016 debacles in both nations (Brexit, Trump) the Democrats won big here in 2018, while in the UK the Conservatives won big this year -- but even so, Jeremy Corbyn's failure, running as a quite far left candidate, is at least a little bit like how I think a Sanders campaign would go. He'd have a chance at victory, but with someone that far left it would be MUCH harder than with someone with even somewhat more conventional views. Republicans never attack Bernie because they know he'd be a good target, but if he somehow was nominated, and it's not happening, he would be absolutely hammered by attack ads, and any tiny boost he'd get on the far left would be vastly dwarfed by the number of people in the center turned off by Bernie's anti-capitalist socialism. You do not win in this country by targeting the left alone, that is not enough people! Motivate a small minority while alienating most everyone else and you lose by a lot.
Of course, you never know - Trump seemed to have a tough path to victory, before he managed to thread a needle and "win", after all - but I think Bernie would have an even tougher path that Trump did. If we want a second term, there's no one better to nominate than Bernie.
(23rd December 2019, 6:57 PM)Dark Jaguar Wrote: [ -> ]
(21st December 2019, 5:11 PM)Weltall Wrote: [ -> ]Trump is going to be re-elected if Bernie Sanders isn't the nominee.
You've summed up ABF and my own argument for the last I dunno, 5 pages of this thing, at least my contention.
Warren made a big misstep in rolling back on her Medicare for All plan just recently, and she's talking about that tired talking point, "choice", again. You know, the lie. It's disappointing, and I think whoever's advising Warren is doing her a disservice. So, Sanders it is for me.
What Warren is doing is recognizing political reality, which is an unfortunate but good thing. The chances of this Senate passing Medicare for All is near zero! If Mitch McConnell remains Senate Majority Leader, I'd put the chances somewhere below zero for sure, and if a miracle occurs and we actually manage to take the Senate it'd still be nearly impossible; even if we, say, get rid of the filibuster, no way would every Democrat agree on Medicare for All!
So no, if we want to have any kind of reform soon, and we should something which can happen is needed and that's what Warren has admitted is needed. Grand plans are fantastic, we need them, and we need bold plans because if you're too cautious you give up on any chance of big things happening even when they are needed, but health care? Medicare for All would be a major, MAJOR fight, and we can only win it with a sizable Senate majority, I think. And with the way the states are laid out, we're not likely to get one.
I would like to think that someday (probably well after it is way too late) even Republicans will admit that major climate change legislation and action is required, but a health care bill like this isn't something I see them changing their minds on anytime soon...
So yeah, the Warren plan there is good and important. Mitch McConnell will not be passing Medicare for All; we need things that can be done around the Senate.
We can do those things, if we rally outside state capitol after state capitol. That is, an entirely different strategy, scare congress and the senate into compliance with massive organized nationwide protests. It's about time.
A lot needs to be done, NEEDS to, and if it takes some rather.... unorthodox and- extreme measures then so be it.
Meanwhile, this is what we're up against.
A party that's decided to take the side of the anti-vax movement. It's clear what they're doing here. They're legitimizing medicine itself in order to take a stand against medicare for all.
I reject your reality and substitute my own. "Reality" as a concept is stupid when it comes to human behavior anyway. Human behavior can change. NOTHING is unrealistic when it comes to changing human behavior, because all people need to do is well, do it! All we need to do to stop wars is just stop fighting. That's it. it's as simple as that. It's honestly one of the most physically possible things imaginable when you get right down to it. Nothing in physics forbids it at all, and no new technology is required.
To be clear once again, provided that we can come up with a good implementation of it I am in favor of single payer, but actually getting it passed will be extremely, EXTREMELY hard and we need back-up plans to help improve health care in the interim. All of the major Democratic candidates have plans to improve health care, so we're on the right track, it just needs to happen.
(Even Biden, based on the policies he is running on so far, would be America's most liberal president ever by many measures! It shows how the party has indeed moved at least somewhat to the left since Obama.)
(28th December 2019, 11:47 AM)Dark Jaguar Wrote: [ -> ]We can do those things, if we rally outside state capitol after state capitol. That is, an entirely different strategy, scare congress and the senate into compliance with massive organized nationwide protests. It's about time.
A lot needs to be done, NEEDS to, and if it takes some rather.... unorthodox and- extreme measures then so be it.
I find it kind of bizarre that Bernie keeps saying this "the people will demand it!" nonsense every time anyone challenges how he'd actually accomplish any of the things he wants to do, as if it's some actual answer instead of what it actually is, and admission that he has no plan to actually accomplish any of his policy goals. Rallies and such are nice and can have an effect when targeted at people who will listen -- mostly people and representatives in your own party or maybe a few undecided voters - but when facing something like the new, fascist Trump-Republican Party and their devoted base I don't see how it would have any impact on policy.
So no, every time Bernie repeats this what I hear is that he has little interest in actually governing, since that requires things like figuring out how to get your policies into law, having backup policies when the ones you want get blocked by the other side, and such. Bernie would be a president constantly at war with congress, to a degree not seen since at least Carter, and I have a lot of trouble imagining it leading to many real breakthroughs.
Quote:Meanwhile, this is what we're up against.
A party that's decided to take the side of the anti-vax movement. It's clear what they're doing here. They're legitimizing medicine itself in order to take a stand against medicare for all.
I wonder if at some point the Republicans will stop constantly getting crazier and crazier (and more and more anti-democratic), but so far it sure hasn't happened. :bummed:
Quote:I reject your reality and substitute my own. "Reality" as a concept is stupid when it comes to human behavior anyway. Human behavior can change. NOTHING is unrealistic when it comes to changing human behavior, because all people need to do is well, do it! All we need to do to stop wars is just stop fighting. That's it. it's as simple as that. It's honestly one of the most physically possible things imaginable when you get right down to it. Nothing in physics forbids it at all, and no new technology is required.
... Just stop fighting and that's the solution to war? Seriously? Have you considered how human nature works?
Let me just ask you this. If Sanders or Warren ended up the nominee, would you stump for them? Would you rally for support of them? Would you vote for them?
And let me go further, if Sanders started asking his supporters to rally outside capitol buildings across the country and protest en masse, would you join them to accomplish things? That appears to be his plan after all, to send his supporters as an army across the country and demand that representatives get on board.
As for my comment on war, I was merely making the point that if it isn't forbidden by physics, it is compulsory. Human nature has changed dramatically over the centuries, we can change it again. This isn't impossible, it's entirely possible. We're not talking about escaping the horizon of a black hole, we're talking about changing public opinion of a bunch of apes on a dust mote suspended in a sunbeam. Don't overstate the problem.
However, you miss a critical point. I want a candidate that actually tries. Biden won't try. He's actively disparaging medicare for all, he doesn't even want the middle ground. He's straight out said that people complaining about things today have it "just fine" and it's thanks to him, so yeah. I would rather try and fail than never have tried at all.
The reality is, any candidate taking money from billionaires is affected by them. Talk about ignoring human nature, if you pretend that that's not true, you're the one ignoring human nature. This video sights a study showing that congress sides with the rich and powerful over the masses 70% of the time. That's the reality.
As a result, YES, I am conducting a purity test on candidates because, well, I CAN!
Biden just said he would consider a republican VP to help win over the right.
That's it, there's no chance I'm voting for a man who may very well die in office if the VP is a Trump backing lying opportunistic Republican. I know the centrists are going to love this, because he's "reaching across the aisle". I see this as a total admission that the centrist part of the democratic party doesn't actually care about the things that matter to the electorate, they only care about winning.
That's not what he said. He gave the politically diplomatic answer to that question by saying 'I would consider it, but can't think of any Republicans who I would consider'. As the "will work with the other side if possible" candidate, this is obviously the right thing for him to say -- get "reasonable/moderate" points by claiming that you'd consider it, but obviously never actually do the thing because there are no Republicans actually worth considering, even if he was looking for one which I very, VERY highly doubt he is.
Quote: Let me just ask you this. If Sanders or Warren ended up the nominee, would you stump for them? Would you rally for support of them? Would you vote for them?
And let me go further, if Sanders started asking his supporters to rally outside capitol buildings across the country and protest en masse, would you join them to accomplish things? That appears to be his plan after all, to send his supporters as an army across the country and demand that representatives get on board.
Vote? Of course, no question. But for the first question I don't often go to political rallies, I don't think I've been to one since like 2014... I haven't even been to any anti-Trump rallies, though I know people who have. It's really not my thing, not with my anxiety and such. I'm not saying that i think that that's not a serious plan of Sanders' because of me though, but because I don't think that that's how you get things passed in this country.
Quote:As for my comment on war, I was merely making the point that if it isn't forbidden by physics, it is compulsory. Human nature has changed dramatically over the centuries, we can change it again. This isn't impossible, it's entirely possible. We're not talking about escaping the horizon of a black hole, we're talking about changing public opinion of a bunch of apes on a dust mote suspended in a sunbeam. Don't overstate the problem.
The amount of war in the world has actually decreased significantly since WWII, we just know about every single thing anywhere because of the internet. However, climate change is sure to make things a lot worse in the future, unfortunately...
Quote:However, you miss a critical point. I want a candidate that actually tries. Biden won't try. He's actively disparaging medicare for all, he doesn't even want the middle ground. He's straight out said that people complaining about things today have it "just fine" and it's thanks to him, so yeah. I would rather try and fail than never have tried at all.
Sure, I don't think anyone here is saying everyone needs to vote for Biden in the primaries, just support him if he wins the nomination.
Not really addressing my issues with Biden on that last one, but it really comes down to this. Yes, so long as Biden isn't as bad as the republicans, I will pick my lesser of two evils. That's me though, it was pulling teeth to get my mom to come out and vote at all, and a miracle she decided to pick a presidential candidate on that ballet once she was there. Picking Biden is going to alienate so many progressives, and the debate here is, do you lose more progressives with Biden or do you lose more republicans with Sanders or Warren? I've been arguing this whole time that on balance, there are FAR fewer republicans that are going to be swayed to vote for Biden instead of Trump than progressives that would be swayed to come out and vote for the first time if they have a candidate they feel is actually fighting for them against tall odds.
And along the lines of those odds, you do realize that at one time Slavery was seen as an insurmountable evil we were "stuck with" right? Fight the good fight, fight against the tall odds.
It’s a shame that some of the founding fathers have such black marks on their reputation, for many it completely tarnishes or overshadows all the good they did.
the founders weren’t governing in a time and place where it was possible to outlaw slavery, even if they wanted to, given certain realities at home and abroad. the least that Washington,Jefferson and co could’ve done is lead by example, and freed their own slaves.
(18th December 2019, 11:13 PM)A Black Falcon Wrote: [ -> ]Any "juror" who declares, before the trial, that they are going to coordinate with the defense and will not be impartial should be immediately removed from the trial.
To say nothing of the guy running the show. The state of things has become beyond disgusting.
I wanted to add one more thing to this notion that Sanders or Warrens bills have no chance of passing. Do you think, for even a second, that Biden's pandering bills are going to pass so long as the republicans run the senate? That's not going to happen either. Right now, it doesn't matter for a single moment WHAT kind of compromise the dems make. The republicans have as a block all decides that dems will never get credit for passing a single bill again so long as they have control. That's Mitch's entire strategy. Even if they literally do every single thing the republicans want, without getting a single thing in return, the republicans will reject it, then submit their own bill, and the dems will pass that one "in the spirit of compromise".
Don't buy into the idea that Biden's bills have a better chance of passing. The ONLY way any bill is going to pass the senate ever again is if the democrats take it. Well, if we're going that far, let's go ahead and make sure to stack the senate with progressives, and try to pass REAL bills, you know, progressive bills.
So I guess we're at war with Iran now... Trump didn't go through congress before he did it either. It doesn't really matter that he didn't officially declare it. Missiles speak louder than words. "Boom!" That's what missiles say.
There's another impeachable offense to add to the list of crimes he's committed. I'm just afraid the democratic establishment won't bother, because Obama engaged in wars without approval from congress either.
Seriously rich people, SERIOUSLY? No, you don't get to have a "PC term" for yourselves and act all upset that certain candidates are refusing to sit down with you and "discuss the terms" of a donation (let's be real here, they're bribes, ALL of them, every last one). You're not being discriminated against, people are just fed up with your privilege. Why do they get rich people on the news to just, randomly talk about which candidates they like or don't like? What makes their opinion so special? None of them are experts, they're just rich.
The whole system's corrupt. It's time to clean house. By fire be purged.
Iran's government is horrible -- they're killing lots of protesters against their repressive regime, horribly oppress women, sponsor many of America's enemies, etc, etc.
However, the American right's 40 year dream of regime change in Iran is a horrible idea because of how awful a war it would be and how unlikely an actual victory would be. And everybody except for very dumb people like Trump and the warmongers who managed to get Trump to almost go to war there know it.
The Bernie cult and their reaction to Elizabeth Warren's probably true story about something Bernie said (about a woman not being able to beat Trump or such) is quite disturbing...
It's a non-controversy. Warren stated Sanders told her a woman couldn't win the presidency. Sanders contradicted this, clarifying that he said that Trump would use Warren being a woman as a weapon against her. He's not wrong, I'm sure. But the point is, this is a subtle enough distinction that it's not unreasonable that both people would remember a conversation from what, a year and a half ago? In a different way. And that Warren could easily draw the inference from Sanders' words that she would have more trouble as a female candidate, enough such that it would cost her the election.
It's all silly drama. I'm more disillusioned by Warren coming out and saying this now, acting combative towards Sanders. Right before the debate. Where she used the opportunity to say how a woman could win, exploiting the news story. NOTE: I didn't see the actual debate and maybe context/prompting of the moderators could change this, but it strikes me as cynical that Warren would use this as a cudgel against her rival, who is clearly very progressive in supporting women.
Yes indeed, believe women... unless they challenge Saint Bernie, patron saint of leftists. Believe most women, but a woman who challenges Bernie, such as Hillary in '16 or Warren now? They're obviously lying, why would he ever do anything sexist?
(15th January 2020, 10:02 AM)Sacred Jellybean Wrote: [ -> ]It's a non-controversy. Warren stated Sanders told her a woman couldn't win the presidency. Sanders contradicted this, clarifying that he said that Trump would use Warren being a woman as a weapon against her. He's not wrong, I'm sure. But the point is, this is a subtle enough distinction that it's not unreasonable that both people would remember a conversation from what, a year and a half ago? In a different way. And that Warren could easily draw the inference from Sanders' words that she would have more trouble as a female candidate, enough such that it would cost her the election.
She says he said it. He says he didn't. There is no reason to believe his version of events over hers, I don't think.
Really, he probably should have admitted to saying something (unless it really was "you can't win" because that's clearly not true), because yeah, sexism IS a big problem in this world, and it does hold back female candidates. Those "but Hillary got 3 million more votes than Trump, women can win!" defenses you heard from Bernie, Buttigieg, and such leave out how sexism surely provided the key edge that allowed Trump to win. Women can win, absolutely, but they have a tougher road, particularly when facing off against Donald Trump in specific. This does concern me, and it's one reason I'm still a bit hesitant about supporting Warren. But "tougher" doesn't mean "can't".
Warren's line after that was pretty good, though -- she pointed out how the four male candidates on stage have lost ten races between them, while the two female ones (her and Amy Klobuchar) have won every race they've ever been in. Good point there!
Quote:It's all silly drama. I'm more disillusioned by Warren coming out and saying this now, acting combative towards Sanders. Right before the debate. Where she used the opportunity to say how a woman could win, exploiting the news story. NOTE: I didn't see the actual debate and maybe context/prompting of the moderators could change this, but it strikes me as cynical that Warren would use this as a cudgel against her rival, who is clearly very progressive in supporting women.
Bernie actually supports people who support him, not women (or men) in general. This is why he was so loath to say anything about Tulsi, etc. But challenge him and Bernie's cult-like internet following will tear you apart, like they are doing right now to Warren. It's sad stuff.
Sure, though, it could be true that she brings it up now in order to try to gain some support, at a time when her numbers are flat and are well under Bernie's. They are politicians, they make political calculations about things. But that doesn't mean it's not true or something worth discussing.
It contradicts everything Bernie has said through his entire life, so it does seem unlikely to me. For my part, I think the news concocted this thing and now the two candidates have been forced into defending these positions. It was also a conversation that happened a year ago and frankly a misunderstanding between the two seems more likely to me than either one of them lying. That said, Warren hasn't specifically stated what Sanders said.
I know you're not a fan of Sanders, but frankly this is a storm created to deligitimize the entire progressive wing of the party. That's the goal, and last night it worked. The end result was a debate where everyone lost but Trump. It was pathetic.
So, for now, I have little reason to doubt the candidate that's shown the most consistancy throughout his entire career when it comes to progressive issues. I have a LOT of reason to doubt Biden, a man that's revised history to claim things like Obama picked him because he "does well with blacks". (Obama didn't need help with that, Biden was there to help him do better with racist white people.) Biden also repeatedly encouraged congress to go to war, and has repeatedly tried to undo advances in medicare, social security, and welfare. His history is sketchy. I know which one seems more reliable to me.
Also, Biden publically said the very thing Sanders is being accused of saying in private, and NO ONE is calling him on it.
A small reminder of just what kinds of things we're up against.
ABF, the planet won't wait for combatting climate change to become "politically expediant". It's too late to go slow and steady. We have 10 years. 10 years. That's the countdown. Put it on the clock. It's powered by Australia, the entire country, BURNING DOWN! RIGHT NOW! RIGHT NOW ABF!
Biden won't combat it in any real way. He's a status quo guy. We need actual fighting. Like, "stop using fossil fuels right now or we will arrest you and confiscate your factories and power plants" fighting. This is a battle against actual extinction. No half measures. No compromises, BECAUSE we're in the face of armageddon. This is real ABF. It's real. This isn't a game.
Sure, but I don't know if there is anything that is actually politically possible which will have anywhere remotely near the necessary level of reaction to the crisis. And if you're saying Bernie is the answer (I strongly disagree!), with how he'd spend his entire presidency at war with Congress, Bernie may well get even less done than Biden...
I mean, yes, it'd be fantastic if we could have someone dedicated to fighting climate change as President. I'd love that, and it's frustrating how every debate gives it only a few minutes when it should be one of the main topics. The news media clearly still doesn't get it. But with that said, at least all Democrats believe in trying to take actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and promise to go well beyond Obama's far-too-limited actions. It likely won't be enough, but it is clear that at least on the left perceptions have changed and that's important.
Quote: Also, Biden publically said the very thing Sanders is being accused of saying in private, and NO ONE is calling him on it.
I think the "I didn't say anything like that" lie is probably the bigger issue here, rather than what he said in the first place.
Biden's got troubles, that much is true, and to add another lie to the pile apparently he's now reframing his position on sociel security.
Even if we gave Biden that the video he's talking about is doctored (It doesn't appear to be), there's multiple times through his career when he's gone after social security both proudly and boldly, in some misguided attempt to "balance the budget". (Never mind that that's a rather dumb goal in the first place, as numerous people far more knowledgable about the subject than I have pointed out, and secondly that even if that was such an important thing to do, it's the dems that have traditionally spent far less than the repubs.)
I'm sorry for going off like that- but this is the critical issue of our time. It's not a very enticing proposition to say "Biden's not going to get much done" and then suggest I ought to vote for him. I'd rather try and fail than give up right out of the gate, and frankly "fighting congress" the way Bernie and Warren seem to be indicating they're willing to do has never really been done before. It's certainly worth a try, because the slow and steady route is death now. It's too late to go slow and subtle. We ran out of chances to do that. We go fast and we go tough- or we all die. You can doubt it'll be successful, but don't for a second trick yourself into thinking there are any other options.
Meanwhile, for every answer that frankly isn't entirely satisfactory from Bernie, there's a nonsensical sundowning one for Biden.
Then there's the times people claim Sanders or Warren are changing the subject when they aren't. Income inequality and healthcare are directly related to each other, and climate change is too. All the major issues facing American and the world today are interconnected now. Maybe at one time they weren't, but they're all heavily interconnected now, that's for sure.
More to the point, there's a reason that, while I favor one candidate over the other, I would be satisfied with BOTH Warren and Sanders at the moment. They're not saviors. They're just people who are trying to actually DO something, and that's a base the rest of us can build off of. That's a foundation. Both of them, but Sanders especially, need a running mate as "extreme" as they are so that if the worst should happen, we can rally behind and trust that VP to continue the Great Work ahead.
The end result is sure to be depressing, but in the interim this impeachment trial's fantastic; Adam Schiff and the others are doing a very good job of making the case that Trump needs to go, now.
Quote:"Meet in the middle"
You step forward, he steps back.
The unjust repeats.
That was Obama's strategy. He kept trying it for eight years and it never worked, so yes, I certainly hope that Biden would not just keep doing that, because we know what the result would be -- it'd be what we saw during the Obama administration: lots of ground pointlessly given up to the Republicans for no reason other than that Obama is way too nice and kept hoping they would negotiate in good faith.
Biden certainly relies heavily on mentioning the Obama legacy, but he is very obviously not a Republican, he is a centrist Democrat running a campaign a bit to Obama's left. That he is running as someone more liberal than Obama was shows how the party has moved left over recent years, I would say.
Here's what I would add. Sanders and Warren are uncompromising on their visions. Joe Rogan is- well, he's awful, but he is supporting Sanders out of the blue on his own. Sanders didn't have to "meet in the middle" or comromise one bit. As the video red neck said, Rogan gave something to the progressive side and the progressive side lost NOTHING. This is a wonderful chance to engage that strategy I've been talking about for years. Don't try to pretend you believe what the right wants, CONVERT the right. Make them the left. It's not easy, it's slow, but I am a walking typing example that it's possible, and frankly in the long run it is the ONLY strategy.
(18th December 2019, 11:13 PM)A Black Falcon Wrote: [ -> ]Any "juror" who declares, before the trial, that they are going to coordinate with the defense and will not be impartial should be immediately removed from the trial.
Buttigieg, that guy you want when you're "ready to have someone young", you creepy cougar.
Note the exposure of the "gives people choice" lie that was cooked up specifically to make people think that being able to choose your insurer is somehow more "free" than literally just being able to go to ANY doctor and never having to justify it again.
Health insurance companies don't deserve to exist.
It would seem that in Texus, among conservaties specifically, Sanders is more favorable than Biden. https://www.kut.org/post/lyceum-poll-fin...rump-texas
It would appear that the converatives there aren't fooled by Biden pretending to be one of them and seem to appreciate a candidate being honest even if his policies are far left. Remember that among everything, "Integrity" is listed as the most important quality in a candidate for most conservaties. Yes, Trump is the worst liar we've had in ages, if ever, but he gives off the appearance of authenticity to them.
Quote:I know I've said it over and over, but the "only Bernie can win" narrative you people have makes absolutely no sense whatsoever because it's not backed up by any facts. There is, unfortunately, no reason to believe that moving to the left makes it easier to win elections in this country. Would it be nice if Bernie could easily win? Sure! But he can't; quite the opposite, I am just as sure
now as I was in 2016 that Bernie has a tougher path to victory than any of our other major candidates, either currently running or withdrawn.
Quote:I just don't get the assertion that Clinton is electable; it's a common meme but the evidence does not support it. She's never won a contested election in her life, and just about every general election poll has her performing significantly worse against Trump than Sanders. The fact that an unknown Senator from Vermont is taking her to the wire, with her universal name recognition and dozens of DNC fingers on the scale, sounds to me like a terrible omen going up against someone who's really going to tear into her soft underbelly.
I still say Bernie would have done worse than Hillary did. I'd like to have a chance of winning this time too, and not a near-certain Trump re-election...
Anyway, the Republican Party have pretty much gone full fascist by letting Trump off on impeachment, and liberals respond by tearing eachother apart? I know it's peak primary season, but still. Sure, I'd rather see Warren as president than any of our other remaining candidates (I did that Washington Post issues quiz thing, and got Warren with 11 as the closest match. Bernie was well back in the pack at 8, and Biden was lower at 6.) despite my issues with her foreign policy, but at this point I care a lot more about winning in November than having the perfect candidate.
However, it's all kind of academic because I don't know that any of us here will have a particularly relevant vote this year; I don't live in New Hampshire...
Food for thought: 40% of young voters when asked about the current system want to "burn it all down".
You honestly believe that Bernie is less electable when poll after poll keeps showing Bernie (and Warren for that matter) winning against Trump? Once again, the strategy of trying to reach across the aisle fails. The only strategy left is to win over the young people.
Because if you don't, then that percentage that wants to tear down the system by force is going to become- threateningly high.
The progressive side of the party has an uphill battle. Even you must have noticed how every single news station seems oddly biased against Warren and Sanders and even tried to intentionally orchestrate a rift between them recently (which backfired). It's so bizarre. Now- the day before Iowa, there are endless smears and hit pieces directed specifically at Sanders as though they are desperate to see what sticks. The latest is some claim that Sanders is going to "sway the election" by announcing his numbers, as though he would be the first ever to do it.
Weltall and I didn't forget just how aggressively Hillary went after Bernie in the last cycle. Such hypocracy, such hubris...
We're talking about a candidate in Sanders that has been consistently for the people, for working class, for women and minorities his ENTIRE life. He's almost spotless, so they have to make stuff up, invent a reality where Sanders was the one voting to end social security and Biden wasn't when the history and NUMEROUS videos prove otherwise (I recall when Sanders stood up against Obama and Biden to save social security).
"Adjustments" has, historically, ALWAYS been a term used to hide cuts. The only time it isn't is when the "adjustments" are flatly spelled out in detail, but when you just hear the words "I think x can use some adjusting" without any further detail, you're getting scammed, every single time.
Liberals: "We can't be too left because, if we do, we risk losing the votes of suburban women who switched parties in 2018, even though they voted for Trump in 2016 and will go back to voting Republican the minute he's gone."
Progressives: "The 18-29 demographic might turn out and become reliable Democratic voters for the next 50 years if we give them a candidate who is inspiring and genuine instead of yet another calculating political Android whose only appeal is that the Republican is worse."
Bernie would lose in a McGovern-like landslide. He would win a lot more states than McGovern because things are more polarized now -- he'd win California, New York, etc -- but we'd get absolutely destroyed, and it'd be a drag on hour House and Senate candidates too. It doesn't matter that young people like him more, most young people don't vote! Old people vote, young people don't; that's how it is, and Bernie hasn't changed that. The young people who do vote like him, but that doesn't add up to much really compared to all of the younger nonvoters. If Bernie was actually able to energize the youth to that extent, he'd have won the primary in 2016 and would be about to win this time too, but he lost last time and probably is going to again.
Seriously, there are SO many good attack lines against Bernie that the Democrats are not using this time, and did not use in 2016, because they don't want to alienate liberals and because those attacks would work much better in a general election than in the primary. That he is a self-proclaimed socialist alone renders his victory totally impossible; you don't see Democratic candidates running anti-Bernie ads pushing his socialism -- this alone totally tanks him with most voters outside of the left. And then to hurt his margin with Democrats there are all kinds of things to mention! They could talk about his connections between Bernie and the Soviet Union (yes, they would happily do this while ignoring how now it is they who get most of Russia's support, I am sure), pointing out numerous questionable things he has said in the past about race and such in order to hurt his margins with minorities (some of these would stick!), attacks on his wife for her handling of that college she ran into bankruptcy (again, Trump doesn't care one bit that he's done much worse, he's the most impressive projection master perhaps ever), mention the many many times Bernie has attacked other Democrats in ways nobody in the party would in order to get Dems to not vote for him, and so so much more.
And that is why Republicans, Trump included, once again aren't touching Bernie in any way so far, and indeed offer occasional "poor Bernie, the DNC is treating him so wrong" kinds of comments -- they'd LOVE to run against him, because they know they could easily savage him in an actual general election. That the other Democrats are once again going extremely easy on Bernie doesn't say much other than that the Democratic primary electorate is very different from the general election electorate.
On another note, Bernie also likes yes-men, and seems to surround himself with people who agree with him. This is a dangerous trait for a potential president and is one of the very very many reasons why he'd be a failure as a president, certainly our least successful one since at least Carter in terms of getting anything done. This is where Warren really diverges from Bernie in a good way.
Of course there are good attack lines against any of our major candidates, from Biden (ie the whole Ukraine thing Trump is just being impeached over) to Warren ("Pocahontas") and such, but none of the others are open socialists and unfortunately that is a big deal in this country.
Quote: Weltall and I didn't forget just how aggressively Hillary went after Bernie in the last cycle. Such hypocracy, such hubris...
Bernie and his people said, and are still saying, far worse things about Hillary than she said about them. Hillary as far as I can tell has mostly just spoken the truth about Bernie. Maybe she shouldn't have brought the thing back up this year, since she isn't running (not that you'd remember this from the way the Bernie cronies still are still attacking her! It's horrible and makes them look incredibly bad!) but she hasn't said anything about him that wasn't true, I don't think...
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