Just how far to the right will Republicans go?
Well his son tortured and hanged a dog, so he probably needs to tell himself this."Being a minor means one's judgement is not mature."
That might come back to haunt him.
Well his son tortured and hanged a dog, so he probably needs to tell himself this.
"I would ask Mr. Christie how many lives has it saved? I would ask Mr. Christie how many acts of terrorism have been thwarted simply because the NSA is collecting telephone data on what your grandmother calls, - on calls that she makes or calls that she receives?" Lee said.
"I'm probably the best person to comment on this," the former Pennsylvania senator, who ran for president in 2012 and is on the verge of formalizing a 2016 bid, told reporters on Thursday after his speech at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Oklahoma, according to National Journal. "In January of 2012 I was at four percent in the national polls, and I won the Iowa caucuses. I don't know if I was last in the polls, but I was pretty close to last."
Santorum, who carried 10 more states in 2012 after his surprise win in Iowa, name-dropped some other former candidates whose early national polling strength turned out to be meaningless.
"The idea that a national poll has any relationship to the viability of a candidate--ask Rudy Giuliani that. Ask Phil Gramm that," he said. "You can go on down the list of folks who were doing real well in national polls and didn't win a single state and were not a viable candidate."
"If you're a United States senator, if you're a governor, if you're a woman who ran a Fortune 500 company, and you're running a legitimate campaign for president, then you should have a right to be on stage with everybody else," he added. "So the idea that we're going to arbitrarily--and it's arbitrary, someone at 1.15 is in, someone at 1.14 is out--that to me is not a rational way."
"Carly has to be in it so we can insult Hillary without being called sexist!"
No, but I actually do agree with him. I think it should apply to the general election, though. It really isn't fair that the like 6 or so 3rd party candidates can't get air time because of poll numbers.
What's his non-arbitrary solution? If you say Fortune 500 is enough, then why not any company? It's either draw the line somewhere or put 30 people on the stage at once.
absolutely not. Why should the general election debates features 3rd party candidates who have no chance of winning?
Huckabee is betting the farm on fundamentalist Christians propelling him to the WH. He clearly is not concerned about anything else, because lord knows his defense of a molester who escaped the justice system is weird to most regular people.
I wouldn't be surprised at all if this story takes more turns in the coming months. As I said in the thread, I really don't think it's a coincidence that the father took his son to see a state trooper who just so happened to be a pedophile.
Even if you're right, which you very well could be, you agree Roberts didn't choose to take the case.Unlikely. There's far too much at risk if it backfires with so little to gain. Even with a win, a Roberts style decision could easily open up president Jeb to read it however he wants, and a Kennedy decision could ingrain this new state coercion thing further into law.
Most likely, the 4 conservatives thought they could convince Roberts to change his mind.
Even in the opinion of the 4th circuit, written by a Clinton nominee, it was conceded that the literal reading of the bill favored the plaintiffs, and the government "only slightly" had the stronger position. And if Roberts blocked the mandate before, the only alternative left for health reform would be a medicare for all plan. A block now on a technicality still allows for the replacement to have a preexisting condition/insurance mandate solution tied to much more conservative surroundings.
What's his non-arbitrary solution? If you say Fortune 500 is enough, then why not any company? It's either draw the line somewhere or put 30 people on the stage at once.
Split it up into 2 different groups somehow. You could either use 2 groups straight up or have some sort of game show type thing where the winners advance to a final debate round, or have a GOP jobbers' candidate debate before the main debate with the winners advancing, etc etc.
Winners could be determined by live crowd, the panel, poll testing, donations on behalf of a candidate to GOP, etc (maybe 25% each).
Family Feud GOP style. I'm down.
They stand no chance of winning because the media and money is entrenched in the duopoly, allowing them into the debates would give them exposure that they were denied by the two major parties. I'm not even saying that it should engender support for the 3rd partiers or even that they might be more likely to win. All I'm saying is that if we're going to pretend to be a democracy we could at least pretend hard. Denying them equal standing is antidemocratic.
It's not as if the only purpose of limiting debates to small numbers of candidates is to keep the excluded candidates from getting any exposure. Debates with huge numbers of candidates aren't really debates. You don't get people arguing with each other; you get people shouting out a slogan and then it's on to the next person's answer, competing on attitude and presentation rather than on anything actually relevant. Best-case everyone is criticizing the front-runner from different directions, but usually they're doing so as part of a strategy to feature in five-second highlight clips of the debate.
It'd be a good thing for the media to spend more time on relatively minor candidates, taking them seriously and giving people a chance to decide if they like them or not. But I don't really see why you'd want to hijack debates to do that. The value of debates is in forcing major candidates to answer questions that they otherwise might be able to avoid. You do that best by keeping the events focused on those major candidates.
It's not as if the only purpose of limiting debates to small numbers of candidates is to keep the excluded candidates from getting any exposure. Debates with huge numbers of candidates aren't really debates. You don't get people arguing with each other; you get people shouting out a slogan and then it's on to the next person's answer, competing on attitude and presentation rather than on anything actually relevant. Best-case everyone is criticizing the front-runner from different directions, but usually they're doing so as part of a strategy to feature in five-second highlight clips of the debate.
It'd be a good thing for the media to spend more time on relatively minor candidates, taking them seriously and giving people a chance to decide if they like them or not. But I don't really see why you'd want to hijack debates to do that. The value of debates is in forcing major candidates to answer questions that they otherwise might be able to avoid. You do that best by keeping the events focused on those major candidates.
It's not as if the only purpose of limiting debates to small numbers of candidates is to keep the excluded candidates from getting any exposure. Debates with huge numbers of candidates aren't really debates. You don't get people arguing with each other; you get people shouting out a slogan and then it's on to the next person's answer, competing on attitude and presentation rather than on anything actually relevant. Best-case everyone is criticizing the front-runner from different directions, but usually they're doing so as part of a strategy to feature in five-second highlight clips of the debate.
It'd be a good thing for the media to spend more time on relatively minor candidates, taking them seriously and giving people a chance to decide if they like them or not. But I don't really see why you'd want to hijack debates to do that. The value of debates is in forcing major candidates to answer questions that they otherwise might be able to avoid. You do that best by keeping the events focused on those major candidates.
See, the thing is... what you're describing? People shouting out slogans and moving on? That's what already happens, generally. I mean, you get your exceptions, but a lot of debates are just rehashing the stump speeches at each other. "Please proceed, governor" is the exception, no the rule (because, of course, everyone's afraid of ending up on the receiving end of a "please proceed" moment.)
I see your point, but I don't think the debates actually contribute anything. It's usually what, 1-2 minutes per candidate to answer a question? All you get is pre-written soundbites anyway. The only value is when candidates like Rick Perry or Bachmann either forget their scripted lines ("uh, I forgot the third agency I was going to eliminate," "HPV vaccines cause mental retardation," etc.) so they're basically only to generate gaffes. I've never seen a debate question that a reporter couldn't pose. I just think they're worthless now and at least they'd be more in line with democratic ideals if other candidates were allowed to participate in the usual format. I'd prefer changing the formula so they actually have to give complex answers over the inclusion of 3rd party candidates, though.
Sure, mostly debates aren't very useful. But that's true for basically everything. Debates remain one of the most useful ways for many voters to see how the major candidates stack up to each other because they have this potential for direct confrontation.
A reporter could pose any debate question, but they don't, and they basically never go after candidates for an inadequate answer. I'm not 100% on what happens behind the scenes when it comes to interviewing candidates, but clearly it involves candidates seeking out cooperative journalists, journalists being concerned about getting future interviews, journalists being concerned about appearing biased, etc. Candidates have a harder time refusing to debate than refusing to give an interview and their opponents are highly motivated to criticize bad answers or evasions.
Last round's Republican primary debates are a great example of debates which suffer for including way too many nuts, even if they made for great television. Some of the smaller debates attended by only minor candidates were much better, though the participants were on-average nuttier.
#CaliforniaNightmare
It's sort of a fool's errand to try to figure out why a court granted cert (versus when others didn't), especially when we don't know the breakdown of votes.
Go by polling in the next primary state. So for the first debate take everyone polling well in Iowa and throw them on a stage, then NH, then SC and so on and so forth.
In other, unrelated news:
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Country for the first time since the 60s is not majority socially conservative.
What happened in 2009 to cause the spike (other than Obama taking office)?
Well, not a plurality. Majority is 50+1.In other, unrelated news:
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Country for the first time since the 60s is not majority socially conservative.
Scalia is a hater and a troll; this is not anything new. I don't think he cares. He hates this law and wouldn't think twice about turning his back on his principals in order to have a chance at blowing a huge hole in it.personally, I don't think Scalia would want to take the case because it could be a blow to textualism, his sacred cow.
Scalia is a hater and a troll; this is not anything new. I don't think he cares. He hates this law and wouldn't think twice about turning his back on his principals in order to have a chance at blowing a huge hole in it.
@Atul_Gawande
Devastating @CDC study: 77% of severe vision loss & blindness is in the South; just 0.3% in Northeast http://1.usa.gov/1HA9b2a 1/3
The south....
I just voted no on the fast-track trade bill. If there was an option to vote hell no, I would have done that.
I have vision loss in my left eye due to a herpes infection.
I had health insurance and went to the doctor constantly for months.
Shit was expensive.
Also, there are a ton of overweight, diabetic smokers in the sourh.
I'm so glad for my current job. I pay nothing for health care. Nothing. No co-pays, no premiums, no nothing except for drugs
I don't have a job. Insurance comes out of pocket.
so sorry.
Shit is screwed up
In other, unrelated news:
![]()
Country for the first time since the 60s is not majority socially conservative.