Election 2016

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Wed Dec 09, 2015 10:04 am

Now it shows, and i agree

Pseudo Stupidity · Post by **Pseudo Stupidity** » Wed Dec 09, 2015 9:37 pm

Even the Republicans I know don't want to vote for any of the Republican candidates. It's gotten that bad.

I really hope Bernie Sanders wins some shit. Come on Bernie, I believe in you.

RobbyPants · Post by **RobbyPants** » Fri Dec 11, 2015 1:52 pm

I've heard random musings that Trump may still run third party if he doesn't get the nomination. I have no idea what the likelihood of this is.

While that would almost certainly hand the presidency to the Democrats, would it be a stronger boost to the Republicans in congress? I know they aren't expected to lose control of the house at all, but I thought that they are quite vulnerable in the Senate this time around. But, if Trump runs independent, would that drive more GOP voters to the polls to try and counter him? If so, it seems that there'd be extra voters casting votes for GOP legislators, regardless of which president they're voting for.

Mechalich · Post by **Mechalich** » Sat Dec 12, 2015 5:28 am

RobbyPants wrote:I've heard random musings that Trump may still run third party if he doesn't get the nomination. I have no idea what the likelihood of this is.

Trump will probably only run third party if he finishes 1 or 2 for the nomination and then fails to succeed at the convention. That's possible in any scenario in which 3 or more candidates acquire actual delegates (ex. Trump, Carson, Cruz, and Rubio). There's really no way to determine whether or not that's in the cards until Iowa at least.

If Trump finishes 1st in the delegate count or popular vote and is not the nominee - which could easily happen if the breakdown is something like Trump 35%, Cruz 30%, Rubio 30%, and Other 5% - then not only will he run, but he should run. I mean, I hate the guy and everything he stands for, but if the RNC openly works against him while he has the most votes that's every justification in the world.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Sat Dec 12, 2015 1:52 pm

Mechalich wrote:If Trump finishes 1st in the delegate count or popular vote and is not the nominee - which could easily happen if the breakdown is something like Trump 35%, Cruz 30%, Rubio 30%, and Other 5% - then not only will he run, but he should run. I mean, I hate the guy and everything he stands for, but if the RNC openly works against him while he has the most votes that's every justification in the world.

If Trump only gets 35% of the votes, then he doesn't have a majority. If you don't have a majority of the votes, having the most votes doesn't mean you represent "the will of the people".

Letting candidates transfer their delegates to someone else is a good thing, for exactly the same reason IRV is good -- it negates the spoiler effect.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sat Dec 12, 2015 4:01 pm

RadiantPhoenix wrote:If Trump only gets 35% of the votes, then he doesn't have a majority. If you don't have a majority of the votes, having the most votes doesn't mean you represent "the will of the people".

This, for all the exact same reasons we should oppose first past the post voting, we should also not ever talk about primaries as if winning 35% of One fucking party entitles you to claim the will of the people.

MGuy · Post by **MGuy** » Sat Dec 12, 2015 5:57 pm

I'm hopeful that Trump does very well in the Primaries and then loses it. I really want the Republican base to then be further splintered and start trying to make their own breakaway third party or start trying to dismantle their own establishment somehow. I think that Trump can be a useful tool for setting the Reps as far behind as possible.

Mechalich · Post by **Mechalich** » Sun Dec 13, 2015 12:48 am

RadiantPhoenix wrote:If Trump only gets 35% of the votes, then he doesn't have a majority. If you don't have a majority of the votes, having the most votes doesn't mean you represent "the will of the people".

Letting candidates transfer their delegates to someone else is a good thing, for exactly the same reason IRV is good -- it negates the spoiler effect.

Ostensibly yes, but the people hypothetically voting for Trump share few, if any, policy commonalities with the other Republican candidates. Trump is largely running directly against the GOP establishment which is pretty much already openly working against him. He really ought to be running as a 3rd party candidate to begin with (and frankly Bernie Sanders ought to be too). The two party system is screwed up - the USA ought to have at least 4 and probably more viable parties - and a major breakdown of the system is ultimately to the good.

Also, because we don't have Instant Recall Voting or anything like it, and the primaries mix delegates according to a twisted mix of proportional and winner-take-all representation, if would be entirely possible for someone like Trump to claim to have won more votes and still have less than a majority of delegates if he won something like 45% of the delegates.

Winning something around 35% of all GOP primary delegates probably means support from 5-15% of the total US voting public. If one believes that their views are not represented by the republican nominee (and on immigration at least they certainly wouldn't be, and that seems to be Trump's only really issue of note) that's more than enough support to justify a third party run. Especially given that I seriously doubt if Trump cares that doing so would throw the election to the democrats.

Eikre · Post by **Eikre** » Sun Dec 13, 2015 5:52 am

There really aren't any countries at all which couldn't be more accurately represented with several parties, but for as long as the United States continues to elects a monolithic executive via one-pass plurality in an electoral college, it simply cannot sustain any more or fewer than two.

The office of Vice President was founded under the suspicion that people would vote to more accurately represent their self-interests (that is to say, only for a candidate from their own state). It was the stupidest fucking thing, and we have literally never tried to do that; it is so incredibly obvious how necessary a caucus is when your opponents have one on the table that it takes even a bunch of people doing it for the first time only about six seconds before they draw a line through the room and start trying to poach 51% of the occupants to their side of it.

Mechalich · Post by **Mechalich** » Sun Dec 13, 2015 7:47 am

Eikre wrote:but for as long as the United States continues to elects a monolithic executive via one-pass plurality in an electoral college, it simply cannot sustain any more or fewer than two.

While additional parties probably cannot be sustained in the current system (I think there's some nebulousness given low voter participation rates, but without changing the voter pool significantly, yes numbers reduce to two sides), I think there is value in their existence, even as stillborn failures, in that they have the power to shake up the current party alignments and also potentially push towards change of the current absurd series of deadlocks.

Trump is a self-serving egotist, but if he was an actual believer in bettering the US through deep immigration restrictions (his actual proposals on this subject are moronic, but there is a real policy issue there) running as a third party, and thereby handing the election to the Democrats, would have a profound impact on the GOP platform from 2017 onwards.

Given the gerrymanded headlock the GOP has on the House this can be done with little risk to long-term outcomes (some prognosticators think that a Trump run would actually improve GOP down-ballot results). A Republican victory in the Presidential election is unlikely anyway. This is asymmetrical - the consequences of a third-party left wing candidate would be far greater and almost certainly not worth doing.

Trump, by launching a third-party bid could potentially break-through, or at least shake up, the central bait-and-switch - policies for the oligarchy, red meat social issues for the masses - that governs the modern GOP. That would be a good thing, for conservatives and the country as a whole, in the long term.

Ancient History · Post by **Ancient History** » Sun Dec 13, 2015 3:05 pm

http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/ ... arco-rubio

I'm not sure what "least-electable" means in a field that still has 14 major candidates, some of whom are polling at a percent or less.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 12:54 am

@Mechalich, I don't if you've read about Adolf Hitler's rise to power (though the Don certainly has), but when that self-serving egoist ran his little party of red meat racism for the masses (with "real policy issues" like who owns the banks and stuff) to shake up the establishment, that was a bad thing for his country, in every way.

Even though he did sort of drag them out of the great depression by instituting major "jobs for everyone" programs like World War II, that also turned out very badly for everyone involved. Spectacularly badly, really. Worst thing ever, perhaps.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 1:12 am

Tussock, what in the sweet fuck are you talking about? If Trump runs third party, he will lose, and he will take the Republican candidate down with him. Having two conservative candidates splits the conservative vote in a way that guarantees neither wins, regardless of how much voter suppression and systematic fraud they manage to implement between now and the election. That is the entire reason anyone who isn't a racist sociopath is excited about a Trump third-party bid.

Blade · Post by **Blade** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 11:29 am

@DSMatticus: In France in the 80s, the Parti Socialiste (left) was really happy about the rise of the Front National (extreme right) since it drew votes away from the RPR (right).
Some even go as far as to suggest that François Mitterand, who was then the French socialist president, helped the Front National (and knowing how scheming that guy was, that wouldn't surprise me).

It might have looked like a good thing back then, but now it has come back to bite us. I hope Trump won't do the same for you.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 1:36 pm

The US electoral system straight-up does not support having third parties. A Trump third-party run cannot end any way except a Democratic landslide.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 3:30 pm

name_here wrote:The US electoral system straight-up does not support having third parties. A Trump third-party run cannot end any way except a Democratic landslide.

For President, yes. It's first past the post, winner take all, no runoff, plurality only, final destination. But down ticket, things get muddier. Obviously Trump's brutal nativism appeals to Republican voters much more than it does to Democratic voters. But Trump would pickup a non-zero number of Democratic votes as well. There are angry white men who traditionally vote for Team Blue as well. In congressional elections, who are those people going to vote for, if they are pulling the lever for Trump?

During the 1968 Nixon landslide, the Republicans only picked up 5 house seats (not enough for a majority), even though the candidacy of George Wallace effectively broke the Democratic party. In 1992, Clinton won. He won by a lot, and the candidacy of Ross Perot was enough to make it not even remotely close. But in the congressional elections of that year, the Republicans picked up nine seats. Trump running third party would mean the Republicans can't possibly win the White House, but it might be very good for Republican positions in legislative and state-level seats.

I would much rather that the Republicans just went with someone shitty and unelectable like Jeb! or Trump with no third party spoilers than to have them do something really weird and try to split the vote pie three ways.

-Username17

Ancient History · Post by **Ancient History** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 4:05 pm

And don't forget it cuts both ways; Nader siphoned off a bit of the Democratic vote when he ran against Gore. It would be interesting (not going to happen, but interesting) if we had a four-way split with Bush and Clinton for the Republicans and Democrats, and Sanders and Trump running as independents.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 4:13 pm

So, Bernie Sanders? The only reasonable Man? He is completely out by now i guess?

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 5:09 pm

Stahlseele wrote:So, Bernie Sanders? The only reasonable Man? He is completely out by now i guess?

He's about where he's always been - with about 35% of the Democratic vote. He's very popular with self-identified white liberals, which is a demographic that is a bit over a third of the Democratic party. He's from Vermont, and has had little contact with major minority pressure groups. He is quite simply late to the party in ingratiating himself with black, asian, and hispanic policlubs. Clinton, on the other hand, has been making nice-nice with those brown people groups since she was first lady of Arkansas.

Hillary Clinton got invitations to visit Mandela in his home, a level of cred with black people that you cannot get by talking a good game about economic inequality and healthcare funding.

So basically Bernie Sanders says things us liberals like to hear, but he doesn't have the decades of coalition building under his belt to have a demographic ceiling much over 40%. That being said, he's also a sane person, which means that when he inevitably loses to Clinton in the great sorting, he is going to take his delegates and do something productive with them. Like demand (and get) various taxation and healthcare proposals into the Democratic party official platform. And not do something retarded, like stage a convention walkout or run as a third party.

-Username17

Eikre · Post by **Eikre** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 5:33 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:Obviously Trump's brutal nativism appeals to Republican voters much more than it does to Democratic voters. But Trump would pickup a non-zero number of Democratic votes as well. There are angry white men who traditionally vote for Team Blue as well. In congressional elections, who are those people going to vote for, if they are pulling the lever for Trump?

If, classically, they vote for Democrats? They will vote for more Democrats. When Ross Perot ran, the vast majority of the Democrats that were elected to congress actually earned more votes than Bill Clinton did, in their districts. If Trump votes, he may pull his share of wannabe Dixiecrats at the presidential level, but those guys will still vote for the local blue if that's what they were doing anyway.

The trouble that the Democrats always have is not with losing votes to the other guy; it's that their constituents just don't fucking show up at all. The Presidential elections have a powerful quality of celebrity which brings those assholes to the ballots every four years, and on the off-years they stay home because once they've been aggressively engaged with an Ultimate Competition of Earth-shattering Significance, the state and local elections just can't get their dicks hard.

If the national consensus were that the presidential election was already in the bag, it would have a depressive effect on the turnout of that kind of voter. That doesn't stop the landslide from coming down on the side of the Democrats, but it does deprive the down-ticket candidates the votes that they might otherwise receive from straight-ticket ballots.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 6:06 pm

@Frank
Thanks
I kinda always forget that it's not the HIM Clinton we are talking about nowadays but the HER Clinton.
Also, i wish people would look over stupid things like party allegiances and promote people by merit <.<
Can you imagine the hullaballoo she'd cause if she took Bernie as her 2nd/Vice in command if she makes POTUS?

erik · Post by **erik** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 6:19 pm

I think the hullabaloo if she took Warren for VP would be even greater.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 6:52 pm

Currently, betters on PredictIt are putting more of their money on Julian Castro, the House and Urban Development secretary for Clinton's VP. With substantially lesser amounts of money betting on popular Democratic senators like Time Kaine and Cory Booker.

Julian Castro is the former mayor of San Antonio, and people seem to like him a lot. But why him, as opposed to any other hispanic in government is a little bit opaque to me. I don't usually know the name of the HUD secretary, it's not normally a high profile position. I mean, he was on The Colbert Report, which is better than most mayors did. And he acquitted himself well there, which is better than most guests did.

But seriously, why him? As far as I can tell, he's the youngest, sexiest Latino who happens to hold a federal office. But is that really enough to get people taking him seriously for Vice President? He's currently PredictIted at 30%, which seems awfully high for a guy whose credentials have "is Latino" and "has great hair" as two of his top three.

-Username17

Eikre · Post by **Eikre** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 11:32 pm

What are people supposed to look for in a Veep? Security of the successon? lol, the last time we had to switch out the president for his spare was 41 years ago and we didn't even elect that dude to begin with. And if any modern president was gonna get himself killed outta office, it was obviously gonna be the black dude, but it looks like we're pretty much out of the woods on that one. Why would people hold a vice presidential candidate seriously when they don't even take the office seriously?

That's the perspective, I suspect. And from that point of view, Castro seems to fulfil all the qualities necessary to contrast Clinton. Young guy, clean record, probably won't bother many people when he's made the mouthpiece for invective that Hillary's image is too conservative for. The notion that a minority candidate will fetch back "his people" is patronizing, but the left bleeds from the Hispanic block more to social conservationism than anything else and genuine Latin Catholicism arms him with presumptive approval that won't ablate, even if he is down with the gays, unless his opponents put in effort well above the average to paint him as a degenerate. Threading the needle isn't even hard; dude could hang hella tite with the Pope Fran ouvre, and that shit is hot right now.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Tue Dec 15, 2015 11:48 pm

Security of the succession is one thing, yeah. Presidents don't die in office very often, but it does happen and is really the only way the office of VP actually matters. Well, that and being temp president while the actual president is having surgery or otherwise unable to be president for a few hours. Mostly in case things go a very specific level of wrong, because if the president winds up in a coma without having officially made the VP temp president there's paperwork.

The Vice President also has various degrees of informal powers and jobs, ranging from Dick Cheney is basically another president to Joe Biden spends a lot of time at symbolic meetings as far away from the White House as Obama can contrive.