Election 2020

[The Feral Slasher]

How did better than trump work in 2016 ?

Everybody is better than trump. How does that even come into the discussion?

[Sour Masher]

I am so tired of the "better than trump" discussion. It is not even worth talking about. 8 years of Obama and he didnt do enough for people to show up against an orange clown. Maybe the.dems need to actually have some polices people will vote for

Obama won both terms he was able to run. I do not think HRC's failure to beat Trump was an indictment of voters' opinion on him as much it was with her own failures.

[Sour Masher]

What the heck was up with Bloomber's campaign tweeting out absurd jokes during the debate rather than anything at all substantive? I don't get the play there.

[The Feral Slasher]

Obama won both terms he was able to run. I do not think HRC's failure to beat Trump was an indictment of voters' opinion on him as much it was with her own failures.

Sure. What u are saying is that althougj they promoted the same policies that they were not good enough to win without obama's personality. Which is also the case with biden

[The Feral Slasher]

Sure. What u are saying is that althougj they promoted the same policies that they were not good enough to win without obama's personality. Which is also the case with biden

We all heard a million reasons why hilary lost, but of course its not possible that obama's and her policies just didnt really help people

[The Feral Slasher]

I suspect that Biden will be the candidate and when he loses no one will understand why he loses

[Sour Masher]

We all heard a million reasons why hilary lost, but of course its not possible that obama's and her policies just didnt really help people

If Obama could run again right now, he would beat Trump.

[The Feral Slasher]

If Obama could run again right now, he would beat Trump.

You missed the point completely

[The Feral Slasher]

You missed the point completely

Without obamas personality and charisma there is no real policy to.appeal to voters

[The Feral Slasher]

Obama's policy without his personality is going to lose.

[The Feral Slasher]

Obama's policy without his personality is going to lose.

I am even depressing myself sourmasher. I have joined you in the worrying

[Teenwolf]

Polling for Sanders looks better all of the time.

Yesterday, Sanders hit 23% in the weekly morning consult poll for the first time this campaign (trailing Biden's 31%, 8 pt gap is also the smallest of the cycle). [...]

My optimism comes from Sanders' strategy of targeting unlikely voters to expand the electorate, as well as the 2018 midterms, where nearly every progressive candidate outperformed polling. A lot will depend on Warren. If she drops out to endorse Sanders before super Tuesday, (I can't see her finishing higher than 3rd in any of the first 4 states), that would be huge for him. I go back and forth on whether I want Warren carrying delegates to form a unity ticket with Sanders, or I want her to fall off completely and support Sanders. I wonder if B-Fly will get to vote for Warren after all.

Wow, lots changes from when I posted this a week ago.

First, Morning Consult has such insanely robust polling, I love seeing Bernie continue to close the gap. They do over 5K polls per day, collected 41K polls in the last week, including 17K from Democrats, giving it a sub 1% margin of error. 8 pt Biden lead Jan. 7th was the smallest of the cycle, this week Sanders stayed at 23%, Biden fell from 31% to 29%, new smallest gap of the cycle. It's both the lowest vote share for Biden, and the highest vote share for Sanders, since each entered the race.

If you're into polls, you should be following this one. Here's a link to the latest:

morning consult 2020 democratic primary poll - Jan 14

They also have an early state polls section, where Biden is up 27% to Sanders' 19%. Those numbers are skewed a bit by Bidens huge SC lead.

So funny that I had come around to supporting this imaginary Sanders-Warren non-aggression pact, with the idea that Warren could possibly form a unity ticket with Sanders. If only someone could have warned me that she was a dishonest faux progressive riding Bernie's coattails... like myself 3 months earlier.... wow, almost drank the kool-aid there.

I believe this debacle will backfire for her. It hits at her core weakness, her dishonesty. Which is the exact reason she started plummeting in the polls 3 months ago, when she switched away from supporting M4A. Joe Biden got a small bump when Trump was pushing the Hunter Biden stuff, as Joe was viewed as unjustly attacked. Bernie should get the same small bump here from those disgusted by the dirty politics, regarding an issue nobody will ultimately care much about. It reinforces Sanders' honesty, as much as MSM and The View and trash media will continue to call him a sexist and racist, while he campaigns with Tlaib, Omar, AOC, Cruz, Nina Turner, on and on. I've seen many takes now and most mention Warren looking "desperate".

[B-Fly]

I'm worrying as well. Trump has real strengths in the devotion of his support and his demographic appeal as aligned with the math of the Electoral College. He could lose the popular vote by 7 million and still win re-election.

Pete's inability to crack even a sliver of African-American support even as he has gained press coverage and name recognition is absolutely a red flag. No reason to back a candidate with such limited experience if the skills he's bringing to the table, which are mostly a super-sharp mind and a gift for rhetoric, aren't connecting with critical constituencies. At this rate, I see him finishing no better than third in Iowa and no better than fourth in New Hampshire, and then getting crushed in South Carolina. He should drop out if he doesn't win Iowa outright.

I think Klobuchar maybe deserved more of a look than she got, but I've thought that of a lot of candidates, most notably Booker, Castro and Bennett. If she can't crack 15% in Iowa, she should probably drop out, too.

Yang is refreshing in a lot of ways, but doesn't have a presidential resume, in my opinion, and hasn't broken through enough to have any reasonable path forward.

Steyer and Bloomberg will probably both stay around through Super Tuesday because of their ability to self-fund and to self-fund extravagantly. Steyer doesn't have a presidential resume, though. Bloomberg arguably does because of his 12-years of executive experience in NYC. But if he doesn't have a reasonable path to the nomination after Super Tuesday, he should drop out and fulfill his promise to devote his energies to helping the nominee defeat Trump. (If the nominee is Sanders, does Bloomberg's commitment waver? Does Sanders accept the support? Those will be interesting questions. And a Sanders general election campaign bolstered by massive Bloomberg investment (1) potentially hurts Sanders' brand, and (2) oy, the anti-Semitism will be out of f-ing control.)

So this probably comes down to Biden, Sanders or Warren. Warren has the least first-choice support of the three, so will probably need to ensure that she becomes the second choice for the lion's share of the folks whose first choice is someone else. If the Buttigieg people and the Yang people and the Klobuchar people, etc, shift to Warren as their first choices drop out, she still has a real path to the nomination. But if Biden, Sanders and Warren all remain viable through Super Tuesday (and if Bloomberg and or Steyer have picked up delegates along the way), then I do think we could have a contested convention, which could be disastrous, particularly if Sanders goes in with a delegate lead and comes out without the nomination.

[Teenwolf]

Obviously Bloomberg will stick around through super Tuesday. He's not on the ballot until super Tuesday, planning on stepping in after a Biden collapse. It seems smart to get some delegates, and some leverage at a brokered convention. But Bloomberg couldn't be dumb enough to think he can win after skipping the first 4 states (could he?). Just wants chips at the table. He's spending like a drunken fool, not just on ads, but organizers and staffers across super Tuesday and beyond as well, said to have more staff than any campaign. Sure looks the Democrats look corrupt, being willfully held hostage by a billionaire they let in through the front door.

B-Fly, aside from the political repercussions, how did Warren's leaking of these obviously politically motivated smears against Sanders make you feel about her? Does it give you any pause on her problem with authenticity? Remind you of the DNA test reveal all over again?

[GwynnInTheHall]

Most of what I would say has been said.

The things I took away from this debate personally are:

Warren was my back up to Sanders--No Longer. She's playing dirty now. I know--that's politics, but I HATE that shit. Her, Bernie and 2 aides in a private/secret meeting and some how THIS comes out NOW? Bernie denies it, She validates it--I believe Bernie. She's making the I am Woman thing the issue rather than her platform, she's waffling on positions moving closer to center again, to try and salvage her floundering campaign (it might work) I have lost a lot of respect for her.

CNN--FUCK THOSE PEOPLE> What a set up-- to ASK Bernie if he said it and then CLARIFY it by saying--So you're saying you never said that--Bernie says Correct and then to IMMEDIATELY ask Warren so how did you feel WQHEN BERNIE SAID THAT is a fucking bunch of bullshit. They essentially called Bernie a liar and gave Warren a platform to go into an obviously prepared monologue. Again what a bunch of horsecrap. Can Al Jazerra or the BBC PLEASE host a debate so we get some unbiased moderators who'll focus on the Truth?

The rest? I'd rather see Yang up there or Gabbard.

I'm calling it now (OK I've already called it before) if the press/Warren railroads Sanders like the DNC/HRC did last time--Get ready for 4 more years of Asshat.