Board 8 > Politics Containment Topic 130: Playing the Victims

(+) Yeah! (+)

xp1337 posted...

So, what I'm getting here is that the Democratic party should have ignored the will of its own members in favor of the will of another group (independents) and that Clinton should have stepped aside? (But I thought a common criticism of Clinton/the DNC was that everyone had stepped aside for her!)

This feels a bit more negative than I like, but if you check the topics around the later stages of the primary you'll see I grew increasingly disappointed and uncomfortable with the rhetoric from the hardline Sanders supporters and the way this topic has gone is kind of a rehash of that.

FWIW, I don't think Sanders himself really partook in it or anything, but it really started souring me on the whole thing.

No, I think that closed primaries/caucuses are bad for the general though. I think that if you have the entire DNC basically coronate you despite you being the weakest candidate, you take responsibility yourself and stop blaming other people for your narrow loss to a huge moron reality show rapist.

Closed primaries prevent shit like Republican voters (who are going to vote Republican no matter what) voting to sabotage what they believe to be the stronger candidate at the time.
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As a former Virginian I see that one as a pretty possible loss. Clinton racked up a ton of votes in NoVA which mainly consists of moderate voters, many of whom work for either the government, the military, or government contractors. It is very much not the type of place where an anti-establishment message works well (and indeed, Clinton crushed Bernie there and Trump got third to Rubio/Kasich in Fairfax). Clinton ended up beating Trump in NoVA by over 30 points, compared to Obama beating Romney by like 20 there. Sanders likely still wins NoVA comfortably, but not by 30 points and likely with depressed turnout. I'm not sure if that would be a five point swing that would cause him to lose the state, but it's definitely a possibility.
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that is a potentially valid point in election years where there is no republican primary (and where they would actually be voting against the stronger candidate...not the case this time)

that is a completely wrong point in the 16 election

but the primaries are how you determine the most popular candidate!

Opinion polling is done to generate predictions for the elections! If you're going to say the polling is what counts more why even hold the elections? If you want to argue against closed primaries, fine. But they were closed (mostly, this is state-by-state, IIRC) and Sanders would know that going in.

Why is Clinton 100% at fault for losing to Trump but Sanders isn't 100% at fault for losing to Clinton?
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velocycloraptor posted...

that is a potentially valid point in election years where there is no republican primary (and where they would actually be voting against the stronger candidate...not the case this time)

that is a completely wrong point in the 16 election

I'm not saying Hillary WAS the stronger candidate. I'm saying the PERCEPTION was that she was the stronger candidate (mostly because no one took Bernie seriously).
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I'll jump in to remind everyone that primaries themselves are often a sham and that the party system is a corrupt joke at this juncture.

Bernie Sanders continues to get my support as a person because he is one of the few people I've seen talk who realizes this isn't about him. He's too old to really change America in his lifetime, he is just planting the seed for it.

I am hopeful that a time will come in my lifetime when we've abandoned the two party system for the toxic, horrific structure that it is.
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primaries are not how you determine the most popular general election candidate if they are closed.

opinion polling shows the most popular candidate in the general (it was bernie)

not saying sanders didn't know that going in. he never said he was screwed, and I don't think he was screwed, but I do think he was fighting an uphill battle that he would have won if it was not set up to benefit hillary to begin with.

I never said Clinton was 100% at fault for losing to Trump, in fact, I said Trump voters share the most of the blame. However, she and her campaign are definitely second most to blame.

Yeah, Virginia was what I was thinking the most likely possibility was too

Paratroopa1 posted...

Kenri posted...

are the two really not synonymous in basketball's case

It's like when your aunt calls your Playstation a "Nintendo"

yikes

though now i'm gonna do this all the time just to make people wince
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velocycloraptor posted...

primaries are not how you determine the most popular general election candidate if they are closed.

opinion polling shows the most popular candidate in the general (it was bernie)

not saying sanders didn't know that going in. he never said he was screwed, and I don't think he was screwed, but I do think he was fighting an uphill battle that he would have won if it was not set up to benefit hillary to begin with.

I never said Clinton was 100% at fault for losing to Trump, in fact, I said Trump voters share the most of the blame. However, she and her campaign are definitely second most to blame.

Barack Obama overcame the same Hillary Clinton machine in 2008. Just sayin'.
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barack obama had the support of a vastly more significant part of the DNC and media

and I never said bernie was screwed?

KamikazePotato posted...

The vast majority of the blame is on the American public for voting this way.

3 million more people voted for Clinton than for Trump, but because of the idiotic way the Constitution was written and the fact that they lived in the wrong arbitrary divisions of land their votes counted less.
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I don't think Bernie would have won the primary even without interference from the Democratic Party. If anything their interference probably made him MORE popular. And in fact if he HAD won the primary, that may have helped him as the underdog, and filled a message of being against the system. Obviously that wasn't their intent--and the DNC needs to get their act together and do away with Super Delegates at the very least.
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Bernie didn't come anywhere close to winning the primaries
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velocycloraptor posted...

bernie is more popular currently with minority voters than white voters

minority voters went with the person they knew, who their community leaders supported, etc. in the primaries. it does not reflect the current opinion. give bernie and extra couple months to campaign before the primaries start and he wins.

Bernie Sanders was not the single most visible woman in the world for 8 years, did not endure a Republican mudslinging campaign for 25 years, and did not have all the crap the GOP could possibly find to discredit, incriminate, and villify him constantly dumped onto Fox News for 6 months straight. Bernie's popularity is a result of his largely being out of the limelight. If he runs for president again you will not see him with the same sort of popularity numbers that he enjoys right now.
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DoomTheGyarados posted...

I am hopeful that a time will come in my lifetime when we've abandoned the two party system for the toxic, horrific structure that it is.

You'd have to change the voting system away from First Past the Post to accomplish that.

good luck

(Seriously, good luck. It's a terrible system, I just can't imagine such a systemic change happening any time soon)
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velocycloraptor posted...

I never said Clinton was 100% at fault for losing to Trump, in fact, I said Trump voters share the most of the blame. However, she and her campaign are definitely second most to blame.

and yet

velocycloraptor posted...

I think that if you have the entire DNC basically coronate you despite you being the weakest candidate, you take responsibility yourself and stop blaming other people for your narrow loss

she has said she made mistakes. why are you allowed to blame other people but she can't also note that other factors contributed beyond her own mistakes?
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bernie is currently the most popular politician so the idea that his popularity comes from being out of the limelight is nonsense. the idea that hillary being hated after DECADES of attacks is why bernie would have somehow become less popular in mere MONTHS of attacks is also nonsense.

she has said she made mistakes. why are you allowed to blame other people but she can't also note that other factors contributed beyond her own mistakes?


when did I say that she cannot name other factors? I said she/her campaign was the second most likely factor, not that there were no other factors.

Everyone becomes less popular when they're actually running!
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Bernie was more popular when he was actually running?

how hard is it to accept that someone people like is more likely to resonate than someone people have hated for decades?

velocycloraptor posted...

she has said she made mistakes. why are you allowed to blame other people but she can't also note that other factors contributed beyond her own mistakes?


when did I say that she cannot name other factors? I said she/her campaign was the second most likely factor, not that there were no other factors.

velocycloraptor posted...

I think that if you have the entire DNC basically coronate you despite you being the weakest candidate, you take responsibility yourself and stop blaming other people for your narrow loss

Given that she has admitted it was her fault for mistakes made by her campaign what other interpretation am I to take from the bolded part of this quote?
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velocycloraptor posted...

bernie is currently the most popular politician so the idea that his popularity comes from being out of the limelight is nonsense. the idea that hillary being hated after DECADES of attacks is why bernie would have somehow become less popular in mere MONTHS of attacks is also nonsense.

Whenever I see an article saying this it's basing the claim on Bernie doing the best out of a set of like 10 politicians that they poll
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The literal interpretation

velocycloraptor posted...

are you guys seriously going to pretend that the democratic primary voters are the same thing as the general election voters? all opinion polls showed that bernie did better among ind voters than clinton and did better against trump in the general. hes rn by far the most popular politician in the country. whatever you think of him, all the actual evidence points towards him being more likely to win.
.

They also showed that John Kasich would have delivered an unworldly godstomp on Hillary and we all know that to very likely not be true.

Why are bad facts only good when they support YOUR fringe candidate.
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LordoftheMorons posted...

velocycloraptor posted...

bernie is currently the most popular politician so the idea that his popularity comes from being out of the limelight is nonsense. the idea that hillary being hated after DECADES of attacks is why bernie would have somehow become less popular in mere MONTHS of attacks is also nonsense.

Whenever I see an article saying this it's basing the claim on Bernie doing the best out of a set of like 10 politicians that they poll

Do you think most Americans know more than 10 politicians? Because they definitely don't

Eddv posted...

velocycloraptor posted...

are you guys seriously going to pretend that the democratic primary voters are the same thing as the general election voters? all opinion polls showed that bernie did better among ind voters than clinton and did better against trump in the general. hes rn by far the most popular politician in the country. whatever you think of him, all the actual evidence points towards him being more likely to win.
.

They also showed that John Kasich would have delivered an unworldly godstomp on Hillary and we all know that to very likely not be true.

Why are bad facts only good when they support YOUR fringe candidate.

No Idea what you are talking about. Kasich probably would have beaten her. Trump beat her. I don't see your argument. Also Bernie is not fringe his positions are more popular than any candidate running. I think Bernie sucks tbh he's the most conservative guy I'd vote for

I mean, maybe they don't, but it also makes the claim absolutely pointless

Also from what I can tell based on a few minutes of googling Obama has a higher approval rating than Sanders (low 60s vs high 50s).
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velocycloraptor posted...

Eddv posted...

velocycloraptor posted...

are you guys seriously going to pretend that the democratic primary voters are the same thing as the general election voters? all opinion polls showed that bernie did better among ind voters than clinton and did better against trump in the general. hes rn by far the most popular politician in the country. whatever you think of him, all the actual evidence points towards him being more likely to win.
.

They also showed that John Kasich would have delivered an unworldly godstomp on Hillary and we all know that to very likely not be true.

Why are bad facts only good when they support YOUR fringe candidate.

No Idea what you are talking about. Kasich probably would have beaten her. Trump beat her. I don't see your argument. Also Bernie is not fringe his positions are more popular than any candidate running. I think Bernie sucks tbh he's the most conservative guy I'd vote for

You live in the wrong country.
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I don't know why we keep getting into these same stupid ass argument on the primaries
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velocycloraptor posted...

The literal interpretation

Okay. Sure. Let's roll with that.

1. You claim that the group at most fault are Trump voters.
1a. Trump voters are people
Therefore, with respect to Clinton, the group most at fault for her loss are other people. (Discarding the exception that she is somehow part of the subset of Trump voters.)

2. You say Clinton should stop blaming other people

But we've just established that your claim is that other people are actually the ones most responsible for her loss.

3. You say she should take responsibility for losing

She has. Or what else do you want her to do?

~~~

If you can blame other people why can't she? Or is she allowed to blame things just not people, because I am to take this literally? If so, why is she not allowed to blame the one factor that you say is most at fault?
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CelesMyUserName posted...

I don't know why we keep getting into these same stupid ass argument on the primaries

I can't help myself. It irritates me quite a bit personally.

Like I said, if you were to go back to topics from over a year ago, you can watch as I grow more unsettled by this. It's probably not constructive to re-litigate the primaries but I just can't help myself from thinking that, in theory, it's a subset of people who I think can be won over or reasoned with.

I mean, this is going to sound super condescending and I feel terrible about that, but the vibe I got during the primaries (and I don't mean to say this about anyone in this topic or anything, just a general public type of deal) was that Sanders was kind of an intro to politics for a lot of people who never paid attention to it before. But when they found that, hey, not everyone agrees with their way of thinking and that Sanders lost via the mechanisms that were in place and known by both sides all along, they threw a tantrum and wanted to tear the whole thing down or engage in conspiracies theories or what-not. If I wanted to get all hipster about it it irritates me because I'm willing to bet I've supported Sanders for years, if not a decade, before a lot of these people even heard of him, but I recognize that for better or worse these systems are in place and you have to work within them. And their attacks on them, even when they have a point, haven't been constructive at all.
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DoomTheGyarados posted...

velocycloraptor posted...

Eddv posted...

velocycloraptor posted...

are you guys seriously going to pretend that the democratic primary voters are the same thing as the general election voters? all opinion polls showed that bernie did better among ind voters than clinton and did better against trump in the general. hes rn by far the most popular politician in the country. whatever you think of him, all the actual evidence points towards him being more likely to win.
.

They also showed that John Kasich would have delivered an unworldly godstomp on Hillary and we all know that to very likely not be true.

Why are bad facts only good when they support YOUR fringe candidate.

No Idea what you are talking about. Kasich probably would have beaten her. Trump beat her. I don't see your argument. Also Bernie is not fringe his positions are more popular than any candidate running. I think Bernie sucks tbh he's the most conservative guy I'd vote for

You live in the wrong country.

I mean, nobody gets to pick where they live...

Paratroopa1 posted...

I think there's a good chance that Bernie receives fewer votes overall but carries more states - there's reason to believe that he can carry MI, WI, and PA and I don't know which states he loses that Clinton won

What needs to be taken into account is that Bernie was never gonna win Florida in a million years.

Clinton legitimately had a solid shot at Ohio Florida and North Carolina and lost because, ironically, she took a hard stand on abortion during the debates when she didn't have to. That's what she should be most embarassed about. She bet the farm on winning ANY ONE of those three states and lost them all.

Sanders, I think, has a legitimate shot at still losing Pennsylvania Ohio Florida and North Carolina while almost assuredly losing Virginia and Nevada.

He probably picks up 1 EV in Maine plus Wisconsin and Michigan though.

I also think that the myth that Trump was a 'historically weak candidate' needs to go away. He got out the vote HARD using voters who don't normally vote which is the hardest trick in politics. Popularity polls may have shown he was unpopular but not enough of the people who hate him the most (18-24 age bracket) voted - and they never really do outside of 2008 Obama.
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Yeah, I'm convinced by the argument that Bernie would lose Virginia

Honestly though, the more I think about the Democrats the more I am convinced they are really missing the boat on not harnessing the resentment employees feel for their employers to run on a platform of comprehensive Labor and Employment reform.

Like Fight for 15/Minimum Wage is like what they always go to when they want to win midterms but I feel like fighting for the rights of employees would be really huge.

I realize defending the ACA is the more immediate issue but voters are always more likely to vote for some sort of positive change vs the status quo. And in its own way the ACA IS a big employee right - no longer being beholden to your employer for your healthcare if you dont want to be is HUGE especially as the labor market becomes more and more contractor filled and corporations are seeking to shed overhead like pensions, 401ks, and healthcare.
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Democratic politicians ARE employers. They're not gonna harness their base against themselves (uh, except unintentionally).
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It's insane to me that people like LotM and Inviso can in one breath say "Sexism is why Hillary lost"(I agree it was a factor, continue reading), but in the next breath say "The most popular male politician in the country would have lost".

"He didn't get attacked by the GOP" is a joke of a reason. He literally did.

"He's a Socialist", "He has three houses/lakehouse", "He wrote an article about sex fantasies", and "He's never had a real job".

Those were brought up constantly by Republicans, and it has done fuckall to hurt his popularity.
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I don't think Bernie would have definitely lost, but I don't think he'd clearly win either.

In any case, I also think Clinton would have beaten Bernie by a decent amount more if it wasn't for sexism (not saying that that's the reason most people supported Bernie, but there definitely were a group of people that wanted anyone but Clinton and her gender is part of that).

I do think Biden would have most likely won had he been the nominee.
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LordoftheMorons posted...

I don't think Bernie would have definitely lost, but I don't think he'd clearly win either.

In any case, I also think Clinton would have beaten Bernie by a decent amount more if it wasn't for sexism (not saying that that's the reason most people supported Bernie, but there definitely were a group of people that wanted anyone but Clinton and her gender is part of that).

I do think Biden would have most likely won had he been the nominee.

I agree with all of this, but part of it is because Bernie's support came in the Independents and Left-leaning folks who refused to partake in the Democratic Primary.

Bernie had record-breaking crowds. He energized people like 08' Obama did.

Unfortunately, enough of those crowds were people ineligible to vote when he needed it.
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Us: "Guys isn't it hilarious that Trump can't let go of the election and has to keep talking about Hillary?"

Also us: *multi-hour discussion about the election and Hillary*
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TheRock1525 posted...

Us: "Guys isn't it hilarious that Trump can't let go of the election and has to keep talking about Hillary?"

Also us: *multi-hour discussion about the election and Hillary*

Well someone mentioned Hillary's book and certain people just couldn't resist the urge to personally attack her over half a page of said book taken out of context.

but her book!
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Also think this needs repeating again...

KamikazePotato posted...

KamikazePotato posted...

The vast majority of the blame is on the American public for voting this way.

Going to repeat this because the kind of discussion going on right now shifts the point away from what it should be. You can treat elections like games and "but she would have won if she..." but then you're putting the onus on the politicians to run better elections, instead of the American people to make better decisions.

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Blaming the American people is the most insanely privileged way of looking at it that I could possibly think of. Nobody likes our system and the choices it brings and the majority of people don't have the time or energy to do anything about it. Studies show that regular people have no say in what the government does. The only real objective place to lay the blame is at the donor class who controls the politicians. Regular people said the entire time they hated Trump and Hillary and somehow they were the only choices, and despite voting Hillary she lost. How are regular people at fault?

TheRock1525 posted...

Us: "Guys isn't it hilarious that Trump can't let go of the election and has to keep talking about Hillary?"

Also us: *multi-hour discussion about the election and Hillary*

we haven't discussed the election and hillary in ages and we're only doing so now because of hillary's book. trump, on the other hand, still brings up the election and hillary regularly.
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we're only doing so now because of hillary's book.

So what??

"But her book!"
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https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/905038986883850240

Trying to bully Congress again
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It didn't really work last time, did it?
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Jakyl25 posted...

Corrik posted...

She lost cuz she was horrible. Any decent democrat wins.

Why didn't a decent Republican win?

A decent republican didn't win because of a muddled field which allowed a candidate with cult support to win.

Hillary has no excuse in their basically 1v1 showdown. Any decent democrat beats trump.

Biden does.
Sanders does.
Bloomberg does.
Etc

Democrats used the media and the muddled field to get their candidate they wanted to face because they knew their nominee was terrible and still couldn't beat their preferred choice.
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