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[neurosisxeno]

I mentally shut down when I see someone insinuate this. I have watched the Democratic party shift very far left on countless progressive issues since my teenage years. I am in no way buying nor anywhere near convinced that the party is stagnated and has 'stopped shifting'. Im calling for proof of that claim, straight up.

Did you miss the 90's when they became Blue Dogs? The Democratic Party has yet to get back to the Progressive Elements it possessed in the 40's-60's. As for shifts, the shifts leftward have been hard fought. The biggest one I can think of is Gay Marriage, and Obama still won in 2008 on a platform that wasn't completely supportive of Gay Marriage, while Hillary straight up supported "traditional marriage". A lot of the other shifts have been less successful, and some of them are outright wild goose chases--like holding Gun Manufacturers liable for Mass Shootings.

For sure. It's actually sorta surprising (although explainable) that it happened so fast. From the start of bush Jr to now a huge shift in public opinion has happened. Gay marriage, don't ask don't tell, support for Marijuana legalization, etc etc

Gay Rights and Marijuana Legalization have been fights that have going on for the past 40-50 years. It's just since the Bush Administration and the flood of Neocons that the Republican party lost the stranglehold it had in the post-LBJ era. As I said above, it wasn't until the last 6 or so years that Democrats really embraced the idea of Gay Marriage, and that was after 20 solid years of hard fought battles by the LGBT community, with little change in the Democrats platform. Marijuana has been building to critical mass since Mass Incarceration started in the 90's, and during the rise of the information era (Internet and Social Media) people had more accurate information readily available dispelling a lot of the myths about Marijuana use.

 

[Poodlestrike]

Seriously, the party and the country as a whole have done a hard shift to the left since the mid-2000's. Maybe not enough for some people, but it's there. No way you can argue the party or the nation has stagnated.

I'mma reference the old diastermouse arguments on this. In some people's eyes, the party's leftward shift doesn't count because it was largely in terms of "identity politics" which just distract from "real" progressive issues like income inequality and free college and prosecuting bankers for technically not doing anything illegal. So when viewed through that super-privileged lense, the party hasn't shifted much at all.

Did you miss the 90's when they became Blue Dogs? The Democratic Party has yet to get back to the Progressive Elements it possessed in the 40's-60's. As for shifts, the shifts leftward have been hard fought. The biggest one I can think of is Gay Marriage, and Obama still won in 2008 on a platform that wasn't completely supportive of Gay Marriage, while Hillary straight up supported "traditional marriage". A lot of the other shifts have been less successful, and some of them are outright wild goose chases--like holding Gun Manufacturers liable for Mass Shootings.

Ah yes, the 40's-60s, when the party was firmly in the grasp of the Dixiecrats. Truly a progressive time.

 

[B-Dubs]

Did you miss the 90's when they became Blue Dogs? The Democratic Party has yet to get back to the Progressive Elements it possessed in the 40's-60's. As for shifts, the shifts leftward have been hard fought. The biggest one I can think of is Gay Marriage, and Obama still won in 2008 on a platform that wasn't completely supportive of Gay Marriage, while Hillary straight up supported "traditional marriage". A lot of the other shifts have been less successful, and some of them are outright wild goose chases--like holding Gun Manufacturers liable for Mass Shootings.

Shit, in 2014 he ran on supporting gay marriage. We've made huge shifts left on issues we've never even been close to being good enough on. We can't go any further left without the court at our backs though.

 

[neurosisxeno]

Ah yes, the 40's-60s, when the party was firmly in the grasp of the Dixiecrats. Truly a progressive time.

It was an imperfect time, but the fact remains they made sweeping legislative changes that reigned in corporations, and helped bolster a powerful middle class while passing major social programs that are still popular to this day. Also, you know, The Civil Rights Act was kind of a big deal.

 

[pigeon]

It was an imperfect time, but the fact remains they made sweeping legislative changes that reigned in corporations, and helped bolster a powerful middle class while passing major social programs that are still popular to this day.

Straight up, if you're going to argue that the party who ran on permanently disenfranchising and allowing the legal murder of black people was more progressive than today's Democratic Party, you are probably going to serve more as an object lesson than anything else.

 

[BlastProcessing]

It was an imperfect time, but the fact remains they made sweeping legislative changes that reigned in corporations, and helped bolster a powerful middle class while passing major social programs that are still popular to this day. Also, you know, The Civil Rights Act was kind of a big deal.

I'll take today's imperfect time over that imperfect time.

 

[neurosisxeno]

Straight up, if you're going to argue that the party who ran on permanently disenfranchising and allowing the legal murder of black people was more progressive than today's Democratic Party, you are probably going to serve more as an object lesson than anything else.

I'm referring to things outside of the Social Policy, which by the 60's they had started to move on--after 100 years of ignoring the issue. Civil Rights was, obviously, a hard fought battle. A lot of it was a tactical move for the Democrats as well, they decided to start creeping leftward to court minority voters as minority populations started to rise. They were pleasantly on the right side of history, but lets not pretend the Republicans were doing Black Americans a lot of favors in that era. If I recall those same Dixiecrats that in retrospect were a bit of an embarrassment for Dem's had no problem becoming Republicans and helping them make sweeping gains with the Southern Strategy. If the Democrats had fought so adamantly for party solidarity there they would be more like the Republicans socially.

 

[OuterLimits]

Hillary will pretty much have it wrapped up after she wins NY anyway. Hell, she has it won now, but reality will become apparent after NY.

The Republican side will be more interesting. Technically, Cruz will be mathematically eliminated soon as well, but of course will stay in the race to try and stop Trump and win on a 2nd ballot. It will be hard for Trump to get the magic number but not impossible. NY will be key for him. Most polls show him up big in NY, ranging from 52% to 60% of the vote. He will likely get between 70-90 delegates out of 95. It's possible he gets all 95, but he will likely not get a few delegates in upstate. If he gets more than 80, the GOP will likely start worrying again. Especially since Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, West Virginia and California are likely good states for Trump. A big win in NY will likely give Trump momentum again and Cruz could very well come in last in some of the states I mentioned. The closer Trump gets to 1237, the harder it will be for the GOP to get rid of him at the convention. Imagine if he has 1230 and they don't nominate him? Oh boy.

Cruz played by the rules in Colorado and won all the delegates. However, it doesn't look good since most of the state(actual voters) wasn't allowed to vote. Plus Cruz was bragging about the win at the same time the Colorado GOP was tweeting out "We did it, NeverTrump".(They blamed being hacked and later an intern) That doesn't make Cruz(or the GOP) look very good. It will be interesting to see if it has an impact in upcoming states.

Hillary is up big in popular vote and has won more primary states. Both Sanders and Cruz have benefited from caucus states this election. If the Democrats had a few winner take all states like the Republicans, Hillary would have clinched it weeks ago. With the states left, Hillary will just expand her lead.

My apologies for going off topic some talking about the Repub side, but Colorado has been a story last couple days as well. Plus I find the whole process on both sides fascinating and damn complicated.

 

[ultratruman]

The deadline for Democratic Party registration in New York was December 2015.

Hillary's going to crush.

 

[Hellwarden]

It's taking so long for people to accept that Bernie's lost.

It's going to take much longer for people to accept that was because people didn't vote for him.

Bernie's not losing because of super delegates. Bernie's not losing because of the "establishment". Bernie's not losing because Bill Clinton is body-blocking voters at polls. Bernie's not losing because of coin tosses. Bernie's not losing because of voter disenfranchisement that Hillary is totally behind. Bernie's not losing because of Debbie Wasserman-Schultz. Bernie's not losing because "southern" people are "low-information" voters. Bernie's not losing because "high-information" voters got blindsided by voter registration/party affiliation deadlines.

Bernie is losing because Facebook likes are not real-life votes. Bernie is losing because it's far easier to scream about political revolutions and drown out discussion on the internet than it is to convince actual voters why they should vote for him. Bernie is losing because college-aged kids are not a reliable voting bloc. Bernie is losing because he never expanded his support beyond that voting bloc. Bernie is losing because his campaign practically ceded delegate-rich states like Texas. Bernie is losing because low-turnout caucus states aren't the majority of state primaries. Bernie is losing because people want Hillary instead.

But maybe that last one is the real issue here? Maybe people just can't understand why Hillary is winning? It can't be because voters are actually voting for her. It's because she's stealing delegates! It's because the corrupt establishment is behind her! It's because... it's because...

It's because people like her, want her to be president, and are voting for her. And their votes count just as much as anyone else's, whether or not they're "from the south". If you take issue with that, or just plain can't believe it, get over yourself.

*cough* *cough*

We need to stop saying that.

At least half the country dislikes the current frontrunners. That's not to say they're the most hated, but to call them liked would be stretching the truth.

 

[ivysaur12]

*cough* *cough*

We need to stop saying that.

At least half the country dislikes the current frontrunners. That's not to say they're the most hated, but to call them liked would be stretching the truth.

More people are voting for her than Bernie, so it's not for some reason of lolz.

Also, I did some admittedly imperfect math with imperfect numbers based on something we were talking about before:

So I mathed in another thread, and am going to math a big more because I mathed wrong. D Caucus (state) vote totals:

Iowa: 171,000
Nevada: 84,000
Colorado: 122,000
Minnesota: 207,242
Kansas: 40,000
Nebraska: 20,000->38,000
Maine: 47,000
Idaho: 24,000
Utah: 109,000
Alaska: 10,617
Hawaii: 33,716
Washington: 230,000
Wyoming: 5,000

Now, it's not a perfect system, but let's try to use the % vote to ascribe vote % to these results (again, I know this is not perfect, best we have):

IOWA

C: 85,329
S: 84,816

NEVADA:

C: 44,184
S: 39,732

COLORADO:

C: 49,178
S: 71,955

MINNESOTA:

C: 79,581
S: 127,661

KANSAS:

C: 12,920
S: 27,080

NEBRASKA (using the bigger #):

C: 16,302
S: 21,698

MAINE:

C: 16,685
S: 30,315

IDAHO:

C: 5,088
S: 18,912

UTAH:

C: 22,127
S: 86,873

ALASKA:

C: 1,954
S: 8,664

HAWAII:

C: 10,115
S: 23,601

WASHINGTON:

C: 62,330
S: 167,670

WYOMING:

C: 2,215
S: 2,785

TOTAL:

C: 408,008
S: 711,802

This would give Bernie about a 304,000 in caucus states thusfar, taking Hillary's RCP lead from 2,403,659 to 2,099,659.

 

[eBay Huckster]

It was an imperfect time, but the fact remains they made sweeping legislative changes that reigned in corporations, and helped bolster a powerful middle class while passing major social programs that are still popular to this day.

and all they needed for that economy to completely "roar" was the rest of the world being a bombed-out husk and people with any skin color other than white not being able to benefit from any part of it

 

[Hellwarden]

More people are voting for her than Bernie, so it's not for some reason of lolz.

Well yeah, that's not even a question anymore, or it shouldn't be. (She has 2 million more votes than him I believe?) However it says something about the state of politics that when Hillary wins, and she's gonna win barring a huge upset, it won't be the complete truth to say she won because she was more likable than her opponent.

It will be more honest to say she won because she's disliked less than her opponent.

 

[FyreWulff]

The main defense for Caucuses is twofold. First they are much cheaper to hold. Second is that they level the playing field a bit, allowing less funded challengers to better compete with candidate's with larger war chests.

I can see an argument that having early states like Iowa have Caucuses is a sensible way to start the process. It allows campaigns to get their feet under them without imediately forcing them to scale up.

The fac that they allow for voter intimidation and use peer pressure openly invalidates them entirely as democrative. All voting should be secret ballot.

 

[thcsquad]

More people are voting for her than Bernie, so it's not for some reason of lolz.

Also, I did some admittedly imperfect math with imperfect numbers based on something we were talking about before:

When I use your numbers to calculate new percentages of vote totals based on RCP's numbers, I get Bernie with 43.97% of the vote.

Looking at the pledged delegate count, I get 44.6% of pledged delegates for Bernie.

 

[neurosisxeno]

It will be more honest to say she won because she disliked less than her opponent.

I would go one further and say it's that she won because she was more reliable and a safer bet than her opponent.

 

[Matt]

More people are voting for her than Bernie, so it's not for some reason of lolz.

Also, I did some admittedly imperfect math with imperfect numbers based on something we were talking about before:

Thank you for putting in the work I didn't have time to.

 

[FyreWulff]

You don't think that announcing their intention to pledge a certain way before anyone even voted has a significant effect?

Technically that works both ways, as it can also fire up the other person's base.

 

[BlastProcessing]

The fac that they allow for voter intimidation and use peer pressure openly invalidates them entirely as democrative. All voting should be secret ballot.

Come on, you have to admit that there is something to having the process to choose the next leader of the free world start with a high stakes game of Red Rover.

 

[digdug2k]

*cough* *cough*

We need to stop saying that.

At least half the country dislikes the current frontrunners. That's not to say they're the most hated, but to call them liked would be stretching the truth.

"Half the country" includes a shitload of GOP voters who hate her "because Beghazi". They'd hate anyone the Dem's put up short of the Democrats saying "We like Trump too. Lets both just nominate him". Even then they might start to hate Trump. Its not an important measure.

 

[ivysaur12]

Well yeah, that's not even a question anymore, or it shouldn't be. (She has 2 million more votes than him I believe?) However it says something about the state of politics that when Hillary wins, and she's gonna win barring a huge upset, it won't be the complete truth to say she won because she was more likable than her opponent.

It will be more honest to say she won because she's disliked less than her opponent.

Are we talking the primary or GE?

In the primary, it's unquestionable that Dems prefer her to Bernie.

In the GE, yes, you're right.

When I use your numbers to calculate new percentages of vote totals based on RCP's numbers, I get Bernie with 43.97% of the vote.

Looking at the pledged delegate count, I get 44.6% of pledged delegates for Bernie.

AGAIN, these numbers are SUPER imperfect. But yeah, I don't doubt his delegate count is a tad exaggerated.

 

[ivysaur12]

WAIT. I AM DUMB.

Some of those RCP numbers ALSO include some caucuses (raw vote totals, not county delegates)! Mathing with the ones they didn't have (I'm too TIRED to do territories)

IOWA
NEVADA
MAINE
ALASKA
WASHINGTON
WYOMING

C: 212,697
S: 333,982
-121,290

Which mean Hillary's RCP lead would fall from 2,403,659 to............. 2,282,369.

Sad!

 

[thcsquad]

For those keeping track, that is 43.2% of total votes cast. DWS putting her thumb on the scale for Bernie!

 

[perfectchaos007]

Thank goodness the thread title changed from "maths" to "math". This being an American issue and all, that bothered me.

 

[ivysaur12]

For those keeping track, that is 43.2% of total votes cast. DWS putting her thumb on the scale for Bernie!

Probably a smidge less with the territories, too!

 

[IrishNinja]

It's taking so long for people to accept that Bernie's lost.

It's going to take much longer for people to accept that was because people didn't vote for him.

Bernie's not losing because of super delegates. Bernie's not losing because of the "establishment". Bernie's not losing because Bill Clinton is body-blocking voters at polls. Bernie's not losing because of coin tosses. Bernie's not losing because of voter disenfranchisement that Hillary is totally behind. Bernie's not losing because of Debbie Wasserman-Schultz. Bernie's not losing because "southern" people are "low-information" voters. Bernie's not losing because "high-information" voters got blindsided by voter registration/party affiliation deadlines.

Bernie is losing because Facebook likes are not real-life votes. Bernie is losing because it's far easier to scream about political revolutions and drown out discussion on the internet than it is to convince actual voters why they should vote for him. Bernie is losing because college-aged kids are not a reliable voting bloc. Bernie is losing because he never expanded his support beyond that voting bloc. Bernie is losing because his campaign practically ceded delegate-rich states like Texas. Bernie is losing because low-turnout caucus states aren't the majority of state primaries. Bernie is losing because people want Hillary instead.

But maybe that last one is the real issue here? Maybe people just can't understand why Hillary is winning? It can't be because voters are actually voting for her. It's because she's stealing delegates! It's because the corrupt establishment is behind her! It's because... it's because...

It's because people like her, want her to be president, and are voting for her. And their votes count just as much as anyone else's, whether or not they're "from the south". If you take issue with that, or just plain can't believe it, get over yourself.

goddamn, let me be the 32nd consecutive person to applaud this post