Board 8 > Politics Containment Topic 268: Hope & Change

(+) Yeah! (+)

Suprak the Stud posted...

LotM, I say this in all kindness: what is wrong with you?

I don't know :(

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KamikazePotato posted...

https://mobile.twitter.com/deep_beige/status/1228119011973586944

Read the comment chain.

This was done in 2016. I mean Trump and Bernie share a lot of positions. As do the American people!

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https://twitter.com/billhumphreyma/status/1228044112567455744?s=21

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Ok last random tweet for the night lmao

https://twitter.com/pixelatedboat/status/1228201735966953473?s=21

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i mean, i agree with the second.
but think that second is a LOT of people and there's no way to convince them otherwise. bloomberg doesn't even need to win, he just needs to make sure bernie doesn't.

from there hey, if bernie can't even get 30% of all voters, why should he get the nom when 60% can agree to come together to fight trump?

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If Bernies clearly leading going into the convention and hes not the nominee, it would look extremely bad for the democratic party. They would lose the election by turning off their own supporters, and frankly they would deserve to.

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counterargument is that if the people in the party really wanted him he'd be winning and that it's his job as a leader to figure out how to get the numbers. if he can't even do that, why expect him to be able to run the country?

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Texas Tribune Poll (held online, so take this with whatever size grain of salt you want):

https://twitter.com/USA_Polling/status/1228198412614373381?s=19

Sanders: 24% (+12)
Biden: 22% (-1)
Warren: 15% (-3)
Bloomberg: 10% (+10)
Buttigieg: 7% (+1)
Klobuchar: 3% (+1)
Steyer: 3% (+2)
Gabbard: 3% (+1)

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Wanglicious posted...

counterargument is that if the people in the party really wanted him he'd be winning and that it's his job as a leader to figure out how to get the numbers. if he can't even do that, why expect him to be able to run the country?

But he is winning, thats the point. In a somewhat proportional system with numerous options, its difficult to get a majority.

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"We asked 100 people their favourite restaurants and no restaurant got over 50% of the vote, clearly all these restaurants suck at providing good meals that people want to eat."

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right, winning. as in, not won yet and still competing.
why should it be easy to be president? his job is going to involve getting people of different opinions to ultimately compromise to what he wants to do - this is no different. if a candidate cannot get the majority it says he's failed at his job as a nominee because when you break it down, that's what the entire campaign comes to. the clearest marker of who should lead the party is the guy who managed to get over half of it, clearest market of somebody who shouldn't is all others who failed to do so. if it's a heavily divided field then it's even more important that a candidate prove they can reach that point as it's the clearest evidence of their ability skills at politics and negotiations, exactly what you're looking for in a president.

the argument's sound. the specifics can make or break it though. either way, that's going to be what you hear and there's not much to counter it since that's what they're all trying to do.

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A brokered convention is a mess because it turns what should be a moment of unity and a formal transition into putting all the base and party's energy behind "We're ready to take on Trump/[Insert incumbent here for generic case]" into the literal opposite of unity as it becomes a heated battle within to acquire the necessary delegates and there will necessarily be hurt feelings from the losing sides... all with media gleefully fanning the flames because it'll make great spectacle.

I don't think it necessarily reflects as a failure of the eventual nominee (heck you can argue the trial by fire of securing the needed delegates as the first real test of coalition building and working with opposing parties though this is totally not the prevailing narrative that would emerge)... although it certainly could depending on the specific situation. Not willing to generalize it for all cases because I don't think that's accurate.

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FWIW I don't think that a small lead in plurality considerably below 50% (say a 32 to 30 lead or something) means that someone should clearly be the nominee. It's ambiguous at that point, and there's a good argument that delegates for the other candidates should have a say.

If it's 35 to 20 or something that's another story. I don't know where the line is, though.

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oh definitely a mess of a spectacle, so you'll end up getting two clear camps: plurality vs. majority. pretty sure i laid out the bulk of majority arguments there and... it's pretty solid. if you can't get any other support, you aren't representative of anything but your own base.

the specifics though totally make everything. if it's something like one nominee with 40% and six with 10% each eventually unite, pretty scummy and doesn't come off as a better take. on the other hand, if it's something like one nominee with 30%, two candidates with 25% and another with 10% who joins them, that's totally fair. it all depends on the gap going in.

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Thread:

https://twitter.com/blakezeff/status/1227976156936171520?s=21

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quick skim, sounds about right. covering how he's paying other officials off is definitely an important element, he's quite used to that. especially when it involves him in power. one thing i don't think he covered well is that this funding also ties back to his power over the press since it makes it a lot more difficult for the press to hold him accountable too when he's going to indirectly pay them or be the reason why there's an increase in salary, much in the way he described some of the ad stuff. you ultimately get a guy who buys his way into the executive, buys the legislature, buys various other positions, and buys the press. by far the worst option out of anyone.

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LordoftheMorons posted...

FWIW I don't think that a small lead in plurality considerably below 50% (say a 32 to 30 lead or something) means that someone should clearly be the nominee. It's ambiguous at that point, and there's a good argument that delegates for the other candidates should have a say.

If it's 35 to 20 or something that's another story. I don't know where the line is, though.

Intellectually, I agree with you. But no no no you can't do this in a convention it would destroy the party.

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both destroy the party. in his example of 32% to 30%, if the 30% candidate manages to get the support of a 25% candidate in the form of being their running mate, there's nothing saying the guy with 32% should win. the ticket has the majority. not picking it would destroy the party even more as it would be removing the will of the majority at that point.

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Neither is ideal! That's why a brokered convention is a guaranteed disaster! It's also why the superdelegate system was implemented in the first place in order to provide a failsafe to avoid one.

But in a 32-30-25 situation where 30+25 team up. You can very plainly argue if the voters who picked the 25% candidate wanted the candidate with 30 they would have voted for them. (Of course the simplest counter-argument is that in choosing the 25% person they're deferring to their judgment... assuming they endorse the 30% and this isn't the unbound delegates making their own decision)

But put names to these numbers:

Sanders - 32%
Biden - 30%
Buttigieg - 25%

You gonna tell me that a Sanders nomination on the basis that he had the most pledged delegates is more destructive to the party than a Biden+Buttigieg teamup? Sure you can make the argument that the moderate candidates had 55% there - I would understand your case! - but I would laugh you out of the room if you told me that that outcome is less destructive to the party then a Sanders win. If you put Biden at 32 and Sanders/Warren as the teamup then the damage and frustration would be real but I still think you go Biden there as much as I'd rather see the dream team.

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It depends on what you value, xp1337. Some people in the democratic party think what really makes it the democratic party dies if Sanders is the nominee.

You have someone in this thread who would vote for a Republican, who endorsed George W. Bush, over Sanders. These people are the problem.

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Wanglicious posted...

counterargument is that if the people in the party really wanted him he'd be winning and that it's his job as a leader to figure out how to get the numbers. if he can't even do that, why expect him to be able to run the country?

That's the same argument against everyone below him but worse?

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I know one thing, if they give the nomination to someone other than the highest vote getter, they better stop all their nonsense about the electoral college.

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Corrik7 posted...

I know one thing, if they give the nomination to someone other than the highest vote getter, they better stop all their nonsense about the electoral college.

The man's not wrong tbh

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Clinton won the popular vote* over Obama in 2008!

*Kinda. IIRC, Obama stopped really campaigning once he mathematically won plus that year Michigan and Florida were penalized for messing with the primary calendar so I think their vote totals were excluded officially and if you put them back in Obama would have won.

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Corrik7 posted...

I know one thing, if they give the nomination to someone other than the highest vote getter, they better stop all their nonsense about the electoral college.

More like it means we need ranked choice voting. This is on a different axis than electoral vs popular

Popular + ranked choice is the way to go imho.

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Would be willing to compromise on ranked choice if each state is turned into a mini-Electoral College based on counties, with the state winner getting all of its national EVs.

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https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1228311415192215553

What was I saying last night? Called it!

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https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/02/trump-finally-admits-to-sending-rudy-giuliani-to-ukraine.html

It's wrapped around to just bring funny. Sad and funny, don't get me wrong, but funny nonetheless.

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Wanglicious posted...

both destroy the party. in his example of 32% to 30%, if the 30% candidate manages to get the support of a 25% candidate in the form of being their running mate, there's nothing saying the guy with 32% should win. the ticket has the majority. not picking it would destroy the party even more as it would be removing the will of the majority at that point.

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There is no winning in this scenario.

If Sanders has 30% of delegates, Biden has 25%, Buttigieg has 20%, and Klobuchar has 20%, then what even is fair? It is very clear the boring moderate lane got the most votes and their voters just split on the exact choice. Sanders might have a slight overall lead but the goal isnt to have a slight overall lead but to get the majority of delegates.

The good news is this means every primary is actually important this year and you really will need to vote! The bad news is 538 currently predicts the most likely outcome is DISASTER and some chunk of the base will be mad and Trump cruises to an easy re-election.

fun

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xp1337 posted...

Clinton won the popular vote* over Obama in 2008!

*Kinda. IIRC, Obama stopped really campaigning once he mathematically won plus that year Michigan and Florida were penalized for messing with the primary calendar so I think their vote totals were excluded officially and if you put them back in Obama would have won.

Also true!

Weird that Clinton is one of the biggest electoral failures of all time but actually got more votes than Obama and Trump.

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The DNC should have a nationwide run-off between the top two candidates in order to settle it. At the very least they could argue the voters have settled it.

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Suprak the Stud posted...

^

There is no winning in this scenario.

If Sanders has 30% of delegates, Biden has 25%, Buttigieg has 20%, and Klobuchar has 20%, then what even is fair? It is very clear the boring moderate lane got the most votes and their voters just split on the exact choice. Sanders might have a slight overall lead but the goal isnt to have a slight overall lead but to get the majority of delegates.

The good news is this means every primary is actually important this year and you really will need to vote! The bad news is 538 currently predicts the most likely outcome is DISASTER and some chunk of the base will be mad and Trump cruises to an easy re-election.

fun

This could easily be solved by making each state winner take all. Then most likely Sanders would have a clean majority of the delegates. Alternately, it's possible 1 or 2 of the moderates would have dropped out early when they weren't actually getting any delegates from coming in third or fourth and Biden or Buttigieg would have a majority (as well as being the national popular vote winner).

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Suprak the Stud posted...

Also true!

Weird that Clinton is one of the biggest electoral failures of all time but actually got more votes than Obama and Trump.

I mean, that's why she's a big electoral failure, right? It's not remarkable to lose elections by getting fewer votes than your opponent. To get more votes than your opponent and still lose - that's failure!

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red sox 777 posted...

To get more votes than your opponent and still lose - that's failure!

Gore and Hillary both... Bill must have monkey's pawed at some point.

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charmander6000 posted...

The DNC should have a nationwide run-off between the top two candidates in order to settle it. At the very least they could argue the voters have settled it.

I feel like the logistics of that are almost impossible to coordinate in a reasonable time frame and would eat into valuable time that would be needed to focus on the general election.

We just need to make sure Sanders picks up big enough wins so theres no 32-30% nonsense.

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I am keenly interested to see how Bernie does in California. Some polls have him crushing there.

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DoomTheGyarados posted...

The man's not wrong tbh

Well it's not exactly right either. If there were three candidates for president and it shakes out 35/30/30 with 5 for "other" I'm not going to say Candidate 35% is definitively the people's choice. Honestly, even though it's almost certainly going to be used to fuck my favored candidate over, delegates teaming up for a majority is still more democratic than "most votes lol." This is different from the EC - that is not even remotely proportional.

Anyways this is why we need ranked choice with instant runoff.

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Well let me look. There are roughly 4000 delegates.

Bernie wins an average of 1547 atm

So right this second Bernie is averaging About 39% in projections.

If that stays true (and argument's sake sure) I'd say 40% in a multi person race is a pretty strong plurality all told

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You aren't going to make everyone happy. I mean, Clinton had a clear majority in 2016 (even ignoring super delegates) and people were still unhappy. The idea is to piss off the least amount of people. Of course that's not possible in a close brokered convention whether it's the plurality winner or the candidate that's 2% behind that gets the nomination.

The best way to avoid this would be to both break 40% and be at least 10 points ahead of the competition. If not then I imagine people will begin pushing the "split-vote" angle which will involve attacking other candidates for staying in the race. Super Tuesday will give us a clearer picture on whether that will happen...

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DoomTheGyarados posted...

Well let me look. There are roughly 4000 delegates.

Bernie wins an average of 1547 atm

So right this second Bernie is averaging About 39% in projections.

If that stays true (and argument's sake sure) I'd say 40% in a multi person race is a pretty strong plurality all told

Yeah and hopefully people take that into account when building coalitions - but they dont have to. In theory, having 40% of the delegates gives Bernie a HUGE advantage in building a majority coalition. What actually sucks here is the specific party politics against him, and that without runoff the will of the original votes becomes abstract.

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Maybe Bernie should threaten to run as an independent if he really does end up with 40% of the delegates and no one else is close. I think the Democratic Party would probably buckle under and fold if he sounded serious about that.

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https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1228318916918812673?s=19

I chuckled

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red sox 777 posted...

Maybe Bernie should threaten to run as an independent if he really does end up with 40% of the delegates and no one else is close. I think the Democratic Party would probably buckle under and fold if he sounded serious about that.

What if the Dem threatened this also?

Bernie threatens to run 3rd party. Biden threatens to run 3rd party. What ya gonna do.

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https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/second-tax-cut-september-larry-kudlow

Let's gooo

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You know, in the UK leadership contests for most parties they just do ranked choice voting in multiple rounds, eliminating the lowest ranked until somebody breaks 50%. That makes a lot more sense imho.

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Corrik7 posted...

What if the Dem threatened this also?

Bernie threatens to run 3rd party. Biden threatens to run 3rd party. What ya gonna do.

Put it this way - if this happened in the Republican Party, there is no way they would end up running 2 candidates. For the same reason, the Republican Party is better at governing.

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red sox 777 posted...

Put it this way - if this happened in the Republican Party, there is no way they would end up running 2 candidates. For the same reason, the Republican Party is better at governing.

Trump threatened this in just 2016.

They all had to sign that document that they wouldn't run 3rd party lol

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Corrik7 posted...

Trump threatened this in just 2016.

They all had to sign that document that they wouldn't run 3rd party lol

I don't think Trump signed, did he? In any case, I think my point is proven. One person doesn't have to sign. If two people don't you have a problem.

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red sox 777 posted...

I don't think Trump signed, did he? In any case, I think my point is proven. One person doesn't have to sign. If two people don't you have a problem.

I think he did but said if they screwed him he wouldn't honor it.

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Yeah I think Trump signed

It was entirely intended to get Trump to agree to not run against them after they beat him lol
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