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[AnotherDayAnotherDollar]

Thanks for the links, everyone! I think the ones that I saw were more focused on IA and NH as opposed to other states or national. I can see anyone not named Clinton or Biden struggling when no one knows who they are.

Politics is not a zero-sum game. Quick example - if you care one iota about the make up of the Supreme Court, 3 of its justices will be in their 80s by next year. The influence that these justices wield in a life time post at the Supreme Court extends beyond the serving terms of the Presidents who nominate them.

So yes, you should get out and support a candidate whom you are able to find common ground with during the general election. But if you'd rather feel good about yourself and treat your vote as a form of self-validation then that's your prerogative.

I'm well aware of the repercussions for the Supreme Court. It's also no guarantee those judges will retire in the next 5 years, just an educated guess, correct? Which means the next president might not elect a judge? Or someone could retire next year, which means Obama would elect another judge?

Once the general election comes, I'll decide if someone jives with my beliefs or if someone is so horrible that I'll just vote against him/her. I'm not voting in the primaries because I can't, unless I change my affiliation to DNC or GOP, which is unlikely, so that's a non-issue. I probably do want a democratic president to appoint the next few judges, but to be honest, I'll sleep just fine if I don't vote and a GOP candidate wins and elects 3 SC judges.

Hillary is not unbeatable, but it is unlikely the efforts of other candidates that would be able to, in a hypothetical situation, take her down.

Short of game-changing external events (economic crash, major terrorist attack, etc.) or lack of effort/misguided effort from her campaign, Hillary probably won't be beat.

You certainly seem to think she's unbeatable barring some catastrophic event.

 

[vainglorious]

I'll sleep just fine if I don't vote and a GOP candidate wins and elects 3 SC judges.

Spoken like a privileged straight white man.

 

[Euron]

It wasn't until Iowa that anyone thought Obama could possibly win the nomination (actually it wasn't until like may of the election year). Although, one thing Obama had going for him were a tons of debate's that were held the year prior to Iowa. So tomorrow night will be a key factor in how the country sees Sanders, because face it, most voters don't even know who he is yet.

Obama eventually won, I think, because of his stance on foreign policy and war. If sanders goes on to win nomination some how, its because of his stance on economy and inequality of wealth distribution.

Sanders could possibly use corporations like Obama used "hawkish" war thinking, or in Hillary's case with Iraq, following bad information. Sanders has always been for the growth of the middle class, its possible with the cynicism that people have for Hillary that he can plant doubts in their minds about her being really committed to helping out the bottom 80% of the country.

I can see Sanders absolutely killing it in the Democratic Debates. Hell, Hillary's support can possibly be divided up even further among other candidates. What if Martin O'Malley starts to gain traction after the country actually sees him in action on stage? Look at Carson. He went from less than 6% to over 18% after the first debate and is polling next to Trump now.

Sanders needs to start going after Hillary ASAP.

Edit: Was unfamiliar with the hearing's content. Bernie should counter Hillary in a logical manner and of course not through Benghazi bullshit.

 

[zero shift]

Isn't it a good thing if monolitich parties break into smaller ones? Sure the US system does not support smaller parties well with FPTP, but having people able to elect and vote for people that more ideologically represent them sounds good to me.

Just need proportional voting and a parliamentary system !

This is the elephant in the room.

When a candidate is a self described socialist, which is a label that the Democratic Party has been running away from since the 80s, no - it's not a ridiculous issue to bring up.

Bernie isn't even that left wing (he models after Sweden) and he is more than willing to compromise. A left wing equivalent of the Tea Party would be like the socialist party of Venezuela.

 

[lednerg]

Like I said when he first announced his run, I'm voting for him not because he has a chance, but to keep Hillary to the left on as many issues as possible. Period. As it turns out, he's also been able to rile up the base and register voters, which is a good thing for all Democrats running next year - including Hillary.

 

[JustenP88]

Fear-mongering is on point.

Also, the "Bernie supporters think King Bernie will swoop in and change everything" meme is becoming as tired as "Bernie supporters are racist". Sanders has said the exact opposite. That's a real weird way to discount the support of a candidate. "People like the candidate they're supporting? Lol, morons."

Just let the damn election play out. Quit trying to call it so early.

 

[AnotherDayAnotherDollar]

Spoken like a privileged straight white man.

Thanks for assuming what my race, social status, and sexual orientation are.

 

[Arkeband]

Thanks for assuming what my race, social status, and sexual orientation are.

To be fair, three conservative SC justices would set up near to a half century of very conservative rulings, threatening the civil rights of gay people, women, and minorities.

That should give you some pause.

 

[lednerg]

Thanks for assuming what my race, social status, and sexual orientation are.

If you're okay with a more conservative Supreme Court than we already have, then you better be those things. Because you'd be shooting yourself in the foot otherwise.

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

Sanders needs to start going after Hillary ASAP. There's a lot of material to work with, particularly her hearing later this month (I believe it's the 21st)

Are you saying he should further propagate the Benghazi committee's clearly partisan sham of an investigation? Because if so, you're a complete moron.

And yes to people in the thread, Sanders does worse in GE matchups than both Clinton and Biden. If you care about the balance of the SC and dislike GOP policies then "Anyone but Bernie" should be the slogan.

 

[dramatis]

Once the general election comes, I'll decide if someone jives with my beliefs or if someone is so horrible that I'll just vote against him/her. I'm not voting in the primaries because I can't, unless I change my affiliation to DNC or GOP, which is unlikely, so that's a non-issue. I probably do want a democratic president to appoint the next few judges, but to be honest, I'll sleep just fine if I don't vote and a GOP candidate wins and elects 3 SC judges.

Thanks man, I'm sure the people affected by decisions on healthcare, on civil rights, on gay rights, on women's rights, etc. will thank you so much for sleeping fine because you don't actually have to live with the shit. Of course people will make assumptions about what you are, since you're so callous about an institution that is so influential for much longer than the president and current members of Congress.

You certainly seem to think she's unbeatable barring some catastrophic event.

Bad economic news is not a catastrophic event, but it's certainly something that can affect presidential elections. Obama could have won the 2008 election without the horrible news in September 2008, but it certainly helped secure his victory. There's a phrase called "October Surprise" in politics, and it refers specifically to a major event that happens in October right before elections that can influence the elections.

Right now Hillary has a lot of advantages over the Democratic candidates and the Republican candidates both. Those advantages—endorsements, money, minority support, campaign machine, long history (for experience and for vetting), and so on—combine to make a very formidable opponent. Posters point out many times that Obama beat her before, so she should be beatable again, but it's like they forget they're on a gaming forum: when you come back to fight again, you usually come back better and stronger. Particularly for Hillary who faced major failures before and pretty much just got back up and went back to work.

 

[Veritigo_X]

I can see Sanders absolutely killing it in the Democratic Debates. Hell, Hillary's support can possibly be divided up even further among other candidates. What if Martin O'Malley starts to gain traction after the country actually sees him in action on stage? Look at Carson. He went from less than 6% to over 18% after the first debate and is polling next to Trump now.

Sanders needs to start going after Hillary ASAP. There's a lot of material to work with, particularly her hearing later this month (I believe it's the 21st)

So you want Sanders to start adopting Republican talking points? If he even mentions that he would lose all respect I have for him.

 

[Cheebo]

Sanders needs to start going after Hillary ASAP. There's a lot of material to work with, particularly her hearing later this month (I believe it's the 21st)

Bernie is not a Republican. He isn't going to use fabricated partisan Republican attacks against her. You can't be serious.

Bernie is not going to lash out at Hillary, it'd be political suicide for him to do so. Hillary has what, 85%+ approval ratings amongst the Democratic base? Most Bernie supporters like Hillary, attacking her with Republican talking points doesn't do anything.

 

[Euron]

Are you saying he should further propagate the Benghazi committee's clearly partisan sham of an investigation? Because if so, you're a complete moron.

And yes to people in the thread, Sanders does worse in GE matchups than both Clinton and Biden. If you care about the balance of the SC and dislike GOP policies then "Anyone but Bernie" should be the slogan.

So you want Sanders to start adopting Republican talking points? If he even mentions that he would lose all respect I have for him.

Addressing your biggest competition doesn't mean adopting Conspiracy Theorist levels of bullshit and fear-mongering. Anyone that further partakes in the Benghazi bullshit is indeed a moron, and doing so would be betrayal in a way towards the Democratic Party.

There are logical critiques of Hillary Clintion and many qualities Bernie possesses that Hillary lacks, along with historical decisions made. Hillary and Bill promoted legislation regarding mass incarceration that brought about great consequences for the African American Community. Bernie has always been against this. Same with the Iraq War. Yes Hillary has gone back on these but being consistently right about issues such as these is a great strength when your opponent has shifted time and again.

Again, Hillary is Bernie's greatest threat. If he continues to do nothing to counter this, he'll continue to lose all the way to the end of the primaries. Bernie can legitimately criticize Hillary unlike the Republicans because he has always had the right stance with many issues, which Hillary lacked for awhile and the Republicans still lack so they have to create bullshit to attack Hillary.

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

Addressing your biggest competition doesn't mean adopting Conspiracy Theorist levels of bullshit and fear-mongering. Anyone that further partakes in the Benghazi bullshit is indeed a moron, and doing so would be betrayal in a way towards the Democratic Party.

There are logical critiques of Hillary Clintion and many qualities Bernie possesses that Hillary lacks, along with historical decisions made. Hillary and Bill promoted legislation regarding mass incarceration that brought about great consequences for the African American Community. Bernie has always been against this. Same with the Iraq War. Yes Hillary has gone back on these but being consistently right about issues such as these is a great strength when your opponent has shifted time and again.

Again, Hillary is Bernie's greatest threat. If he continues to do nothing to counter this, he'll continue to lose all the way to the end of the primaries. Bernie can legitimately criticize Hillary unlike the Republicans because he has always had the right stance with many issues, which Hillary lacked for awhile and the Republicans still lack so they have to create bullshit to attack Hillary.

None of this explains why you brought up the Benghazi hearing on the 21st. Be honest here.

 

[Veritigo_X]

Addressing your biggest competition doesn't mean adopting Conspiracy Theorist levels of bullshit and fear-mongering. Anyone that further partakes in the Benghazi bullshit is indeed a moron, and doing so would be betrayal in a way towards the Democratic Party.

There are logical critiques of Hillary Clintion and many qualities Bernie possesses that Hillary lacks, along with historical decisions made. Hillary and Bill promoted legislation regarding mass incarceration that brought about great consequences for the African American Community. Bernie has always been against this. Same with the Iraq War. Yes Hillary has gone back on these but being consistently right about issues such as these is a great strength when your opponent has shifted time and again.

Again, Hillary is Bernie's greatest threat. If he continues to do nothing to counter this, he'll continue to lose all the way to the end of the primaries. Bernie can legitimately criticize Hillary unlike the Republicans because he has always had the right stance with many issues, which Hillary lacked for awhile and the Republicans still lack so they have to create bullshit to attack Hillary.

Bringing up that stuff is perfecting okay with me and I think he should. But you specifically pointed to the Benghazi hearing in your post, which is what I was commenting on.

 

[neogaffer1]

Clinton does a lot better in States where Sanders doesn't have organizational infrastructure.
There haven't been many National Wide polls on the possible match ups.
In Iowa and NH where most of the focus has been for Sanders thus far, he does better than Clinton in the potential match-ups.

this election went from "dems are going to win this quite easily" to "man clinton needs to get her shit together"

 

[Yellowtail]

There are logical critiques of Hillary Clintion and many qualities Bernie possesses that Hillary lacks, along with historical decisions made. Hillary and Bill promoted legislation regarding mass incarceration that brought about great consequences for the African American Community. Bernie has always been against this.

Bernie voted for the 1994 crime bill.

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

this election went from "dems are going to win this quite easily" to "man clinton needs to get her shit together"

It's pretty much all tied to the legitimacy the e-mail story gained outside of the usual right wing media. Despite the story coming out that the committee behind Benghazi is only interested in partisan attacks against Clinton, the damage was done.

 

[Cheebo]

Addressing your biggest competition doesn't mean adopting Conspiracy Theorist levels of bullshit and fear-mongering. Anyone that further partakes in the Benghazi bullshit is indeed a moron, and doing so would be betrayal in a way towards the Democratic Party.

There are logical critiques of Hillary Clintion and many qualities Bernie possesses that Hillary lacks, along with historical decisions made. Hillary and Bill promoted legislation regarding mass incarceration that brought about great consequences for the African American Community. Bernie has always been against this. Same with the Iraq War. Yes Hillary has gone back on these but being consistently right about issues such as these is a great strength when your opponent has shifted time and again.

Again, Hillary is Bernie's greatest threat. If he continues to do nothing to counter this, he'll continue to lose all the way to the end of the primaries. Bernie can legitimately criticize Hillary unlike the Republicans because he has always had the right stance with many issues, which Hillary lacked for awhile and the Republicans still lack so they have to create bullshit to attack Hillary.

you brought up her Benghazi hearings as a reason to attack her. When that is a pure partisan witch hunt.

 

[vainglorious]

I can see Sanders absolutely killing it in the Democratic Debates. Hell, Hillary's support can possibly be divided up even further among other candidates. What if Martin O'Malley starts to gain traction after the country actually sees him in action on stage? Look at Carson. He went from less than 6% to over 18% after the first debate and is polling next to Trump now.

Sanders needs to start going after Hillary ASAP. There's a lot of material to work with, particularly her hearing later this month (I believe it's the 21st)

You're encouraging Sanders to align himself with Bengazi Committee tactics? Especially after Kevin McCarthy and ex-staffers on the committee have exposed it as a 4.5 million dollar tax payer funded partisan witch hunt against Hillary Clinton?

What?

Sanders will never pivot in that direction.

 

[KHarvey16]

this election went from "dems are going to win this quite easily" to "man clinton needs to get her shit together"

No it hasn't.

 

[Euron]

None of this explains why you brought up the Benghazi hearing on the 21st. Be honest here.

Bringing up that stuff is perfecting okay with me and I think he should. But you specifically pointed to the Benghazi hearing in your post, which is what I was commenting on.

I wasn't aware that it was the Benghazi hearing. I thought it was regarding the email controversy. If it's entirely about Benghazi then my mistake. My point was the fact that certain controversies are occurring are a cause for lessening confidence in Hillary (not destroying it of course but just making things a bit uneasy)

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

I wasn't aware that it was the Benghazi hearing. I thought it was regarding the email controversy. If it's entirely about Benghazi then my mistake. My point was the fact that certain controversies are occurring are a cause for lessening confidence in Hillary (not destroying it of course but just making things a bit uneasy)

Where do you think the e-mail revelations got their start? It's all connected to Benghazi.

 

[vainglorious]

No it hasn't.

They didn't know who Barney Frank was, don't bother.

 

[Cheebo]

I wasn't aware that it was the Benghazi hearing. I thought it was regarding the email controversy. If it's entirely about Benghazi then my mistake. My point was the fact that certain controversies are occurring are a cause for lessening confidence in Hillary (not destroying it of course but just making things a bit uneasy)

The Benghazi and email thing are the same thing. The fact you thought the email-gate nonsense was worth going after her about is baffling though. Why would Bernie used Republcian partisan nonsense (which the email thing is) to attack her?

 

[neogaffer1]

No it hasn't.

wasn't she winning in pretty much every head to head before the gop debate?

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

wasn't she winning in pretty much every head to head before the gop debate?

Ben Carson is doing well against every Dem matchup. There's something bigger going on here.

 

[BamfMeat]

Thanks for assuming what my race, social status, and sexual orientation are.

Are they wrong?

 

[noshten]

Ben Carson is doing well against every Dem matchup. There's something bigger going on here.

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

Is this supposed to mean something or are you just bored?

 

[djplaeskool]

Just let the damn election play out. Quit trying to call it so early.

Waiting for Nate Silver to swoop in and restore order

 

[neogaffer1]

Ben Carson is doing well against every Dem matchup. There's something bigger going on here.

which, if i had to guess, is the fact that more people are aware of the republican stances and who they are now than they were previously when clinton was trouncing them. to offset that, clinton just needs to put herself out more and make her positions not only more clear but as present as trump's or carson's.

in other words, she needs to step her game up, as i said previously.

 

[B-Dubs]

Ben Carson is doing well against every Dem matchup. There's something bigger going on here.

General election matchups are absolutely worthless at this point in the calendar. They'll only start to matter after the new year starts and the actual voting is on the horizon.

 

[KHarvey16]

wasn't she winning in pretty much every head to head before the gop debate?

If you're expecting head to heads from mid-late 2015 to tell us anything useful you're gonna be disappointed.

 

[DarkKyo]

who?

How can you care enough about politics to post in this thread but not know who Frank is? Damn.

 

[Cheebo]

Waiting for Nate Silver to swoop in and restore order

He has already weighed in. He has said many many Hillary will win the Dem nomination. Just this week he said Rubio is the most likely Republican nominee.

 

[Kusagari]

I refuse to support Hillary until Debbie Wasseman Schultz is removed as DNC chair.

 

[Veritigo_X]

He has already weighed in. He has said many many Hillary will win the Dem nomination. Just this week he said Rubio is the most likely Republican nominee.

To be fair, I think Nate is way off base using his current formula to predict the republican nominee. You can't use stuff like "logic" and "reasoning" and "statistics" in this race. You have to use your heart and feelings to predict who will win. There's no formula for that.

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

I refuse to support Hillary until Debbie Wasseman Schultz is removed as DNC chair.

Sounds like it's all personal to you.

 

[Kieli]

meh

 

[User 463088]

Anyone see the newest CNN polls that came out today? They reinforce why Bernie won't win the nomination. He's still getting destroyed with minorities. Without Biden in the race, Hillary has a 50 point lead in South Carolina. Even with Biden in the race, she has a 50 point gap over him in non-white voters. Sanders has managed to crack 6%.

The first two primary states are heavily white. They favor Sanders. He'll definitely win New Hampshire. I think that Iowa will be a close Clinton victory, but statistically insignificant. (Due to proportional delegate math.)

Also, the reason Hillary lost in 2008, well a big part of it, was her campaign's insane inability to figure out how a caucus allocates delegates. She's got Obama's people this time around to handle that. There's no way she'll end up winning a primary, but getting fewer delegates than the loser (ie Texas 2008).

 

[Cheebo]

Bernie's base is young white people. They dominate the internet, but you can't win the Democratic nomination for President without majority support of African Americans. It just will not happen.

 

[neogaffer1]

How can you care enough about politics to post in this thread but not know who Frank is? Damn.

i'm 18 and only started caring about politics a year or two back when obama was up for reelection.

 

[Cheebo]

i'm 18 and only started caring about politics a year or two back when obama was up for reelection.

Wow, this makes me feel old. There are posts still here on this board that date back to the 2004 election I posted in. When you were 7.

 

[Kusagari]

Sounds like it's all personal to you.

She's the worst politician in America and it's beyond obvious she's trying to stifle debate as chairwoman so that Hillary's obvious nomination becomes even more obvious.

Honestly, the mere fact that a politician that goes out of her way to sabotage her own party so that her Republican friends can stay in office is its chairwoman is so stupid that it makes me want to reject Democrats as a whole.

 

[XenodudeX]

this election went from "dems are going to win this quite easily" to "man clinton needs to get her shit together"

What?

Hillary still has the best chances of ANY presidential candidate on the field to be elected. Don't get it twisted, unless some bigger scandal breaks out, she will most likely be the next President.