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On May 26 2016 20:26 kwizach wrote:
Sanders is really going out of his way to help the Republicans in this election. It's fascinating (and saddening) to see what a combination of egotism and of delusion about his own chances has done to him.
While I agree it's unfortunate, keep in mind that the DNC, closed primaries, and other political machines have really screwed Bernie over hard during the primary.
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Haha i love this. Hillary can't really say anything about this at this point. Just reinforces the narrative that she is a liar and will say anything. "I will debate anyone at anytime". Trump is making her look like a cowardly snake. Time for trump to snatch up some of the bernie supporters
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What's really baffling here is why Sanders is doing this. It does nothing but help Trump-Sanders can't be nominated bar a seismic political event, which this is not. He spent months vilifying Trump and at Democratic debates repeated pointedly that everyone on the stage was a better nominee than anyone the Republicans had to offer. Has he really gone from "I don't care about her damn emails" to "gotta sink Clinton no matter what" like so many of his supporters?
Chalk up more lying (or at best just crippling naivete) to Sanders I guess alongside the bizarre superdelegate 180.
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On May 26 2016 20:42 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On May 26 2016 20:26 kwizach wrote:
Sanders is really going out of his way to help the Republicans in this election. It's fascinating (and saddening) to see what a combination of egotism and of delusion about his own chances has done to him. While I agree it's unfortunate, keep in mind that the DNC, closed primaries, and other political machines have really screwed Bernie over hard during the primary.
I disagree. Sanders actually benefited substantially from the format of the primaries. The first two states were very unrepresentative of the Democratic (and US) electorate in terms of demographics, and favorable to Sanders in that regard, giving his campaign a boost. When it comes to open contests, if you take away caucuses, Clinton has won thirteen open primaries to Sanders' six. The only type of format which actually benefited Sanders by a sizeable margin was the open caucuses, which is actually the kind of format which disenfranchises voters the most.
See for example the caucuses in Nebraska and Washington -- Sanders won the two caucuses 57,1% to 42,9% and 72,7% to 27,1%, respectively. Yet those two states also held primaries (which didn't award delegates, however), in which a lot more people participated, and Clinton won both contests: 53% to 47% in Nebraska, and 53% to 47% as well in Washington. About 230,000 people voted in the Washington caucuses, while more than 719,000 people voted in the states primary -- more than three times as much. The same is true of the attendance of the Nebraska contests. Sanders was therefore in reality incredibly favored by the existence of caucuses. See this map:
538 have actually just released an analysis of this exact matter: see here. I'll quote them:
Sanders fans have claimed that because caucuses have lower turnout the current national caucus and primary vote underrates how well Sanders is doing. In fact, the opposite is true. When we switch all caucuses over to primaries, Sanders actually does worse. Clinton’s lead in the popular vote would grow from 2.9 to 3.3 million votes. Moreover, her edge in elected delegates would expand significantly. Instead of her current lead of 272 elected delegates, Clinton would be ahead by 424. Some states that were won by Sanders in caucuses, including Colorado and Minnesota, would be won by Clinton in primaries, according to our calculations.[...]
In fact, if all states held primaries open to independents — instead of closed primaries, or caucuses of any kind — Clinton might have a larger lead in elected delegates than she does now. The model indicates that Clinton would have a lead of 294 elected delegates, compared with the 272 she holds now. [...] Realistically, if you throw everything together, the math suggests that Sanders doesn’t have much to complain about. If the Democratic nomination were open to as many Democrats as possible — through closed primaries — Clinton would be dominating Sanders. And if the nomination were open to as many voters as possible — through open primaries — she’d still be winning.
Another important point to take into account to examine who the system benefited is the ratio of votes received to the ratio of delegates received. Sanders has received around 43% of the vote so far, yet he has received about 46% of delegates. And if the Democrats were using the same rules as the Republicans in terms of delegate allocation, Clinton would have won the nomination a long time ago. Sanders is getting the best possible system to help him remain competitive.
"What about superdelegates?", you ask? Well, despite Clinton having an overwhelming majority of superdelegates in her camp, superdelegates have never flipped a nomination against the candidate who had won the most pledged delegates, and there's nothing that indicates they would have done so if Sanders had been in Clinton's position with a majority of pledged delegates and a huge advantage in the popular vote -- in fact, many have said that they would follow the will of the voters even if they initially announced they were supporting another candidate. What matters is therefore who is getting a majority of pledged delegates, and that's Clinton by a sizeable margin, not Sanders. He's the one who's trying to get the superdelegates to overturn the will of the voters, not Clinton.
Another argument coming from the Sanders camp is that he would win if the voting started now, since voters have gotten to know him better, but that's just as fallacious. First, if he needed more time, perhaps he could have joined the Democratic party and started campaigning earlier -- that's on him. Second, he has been lagging behind Clinton throughout the primaries, and the closest he came to her was an average of a five percentage point difference in polls. That difference is now of almost ten percentage points.
I'll close by mentioning the debates -- the DNC did try to limit the number of unsanctioned debates in this election, just like the RNC did, because the main takeaway from the 2012 Republican primary was that too many debates could seriously hurt the eventual nominee. This would have made Sanders' task of introducing himself to the electorate slightly more difficult, if they hadn't ended up scheduling more debates anyway. Sanders had every opportunity to present himself to the electorate, and spent even more money than Hillary's campaign throughout the primaries -- with the advantage of not having a history (and a present!) of being attacked by the Republicans due to being their biggest threat in the general election. As I showed, he has still remained behind Clinton in polls throughout the primaries.
In short, the actual process never substantially disadvantaged Sanders, and he's the one who actually benefited from it, most importantly through the caucuses which disenfranchised Clinton voters by huge margins.
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On May 26 2016 21:24 TheTenthDoc wrote:
What's really baffling here is why Sanders is doing this. It does nothing but help Trump-Sanders can't be nominated bar a seismic political event, which this is not. He spent months vilifying Trump and at Democratic debates repeated pointedly that everyone on the stage was a better nominee than anyone the Republicans had to offer. Has he really gone from "I don't care about her damn emails" to "gotta sink Clinton no matter what" like so many of his supporters?
Chalk up more lying (or at best just crippling naivete) to Sanders I guess alongside the bizarre superdelegate 180.
I think Sanders sees Hillary as a bigger threat than Trump even though he might not say publicly. She represents everything that he despises and is against. Hillary is Wall Street.
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On May 26 2016 21:24 TheTenthDoc wrote:
What's really baffling here is why Sanders is doing this. It does nothing but help Trump-Sanders can't be nominated bar a seismic political event, which this is not. He spent months vilifying Trump and at Democratic debates repeated pointedly that everyone on the stage was a better nominee than anyone the Republicans had to offer. Has he really gone from "I don't care about her damn emails" to "gotta sink Clinton no matter what" like so many of his supporters?
Chalk up more lying (or at best just crippling naivete) to Sanders I guess alongside the bizarre superdelegate 180.
I think a desperation to get media attention is the main reason.
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This debate will have little to no impact on both the end of the primaries and the general. If anything, it'll be a nice preview for when Sanders campaigns against Trump later on. Folks are practically in hysteria over this and it's silly, to be frank.
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On May 26 2016 21:52 farvacola wrote:
This debate will have little to no impact on both the end of the primaries and the general. If anything, it'll be a nice preview for when Sanders campaigns against Drumpf later on. Folks are practically in hysteria over this and it's silly, to be frank.
Yeah, I think it's a bit early for Hillary supporters to be freaking out. I believe Sanders when he says he believes anything would be better than a Trump presidency, and I think he probably intends to hurt Trump with the debate. If he goes full attack mode against Trump, and favorably mentions Hillary during the debate it might help her a little.
If nothing else, it will be nice if Trump is forced to talk about substantive policy issues rather than his dick size for once during the debate. I doubt he will do as well in such a format.
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Nice quote fix 
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Here's my illuminati perspective:
We all know Bernie has been talking with DNC leadership about how he has lost at this point. Bernie is poised to get what he wants out of some deals with them. But they now have an elaborate scheme where they are able to trick Trump into debating against what is essentially a suicide bomber. Bernie could probably punch Trump without much backlash. He's the perfect anti-Trump attack dog.
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On May 26 2016 22:38 Mohdoo wrote:
Here's my illuminati perspective:
We all know Bernie has been talking with DNC leadership about how he has lost at this point. Bernie is poised to get what he wants out of some deals with them. But they now have an elaborate scheme where they are able to trick Trump into debating against what is essentially a suicide bomber. Bernie could probably punch Trump without much backlash. He's the perfect anti-Trump attack dog.
And what effect do you imagine these attacks will have? Every other attack against him has already failed more of less.
Those who support Trump do so in the face of overwhelming evidence that he doesnt know what he is doing.
Adding more isnt going to help at this point.
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Remember that debates are less about the people who are already a fan of a particular candidate and more about those who are undecided. In that sense, Bernie does have the ability to do some good work come debate time.
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Hilarious but totally not serious thought: Sanders is an independent, how would a Trump/Sanders ticket hold up against Hillary? In my opinion both are popular because they are anti-establishment. Like I said, not being serious, but it is funny to think about, and looking at this cycle, crazier things have happened.
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On May 26 2016 22:44 farvacola wrote:
Remember that debates are less about the people who are already a fan of a particular candidate and more about those who are undecided. In that sense, Bernie does have the ability to do some good work come debate time.
Anyone undecided about Trump is living under a rock.
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On May 26 2016 22:38 Mohdoo wrote:
Here's my illuminati perspective:
We all know Bernie has been talking with DNC leadership about how he has lost at this point. Bernie is poised to get what he wants out of some deals with them. But they now have an elaborate scheme where they are able to trick Trump into debating against what is essentially a suicide bomber. Bernie could probably punch Trump without much backlash. He's the perfect anti-Trump attack dog.
He's making a play for California and New York in the general election and he needs the anti-establishment Democrat voters, just look at the change in numbers over the last 2 months:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/L1w3Zud.png)
Trump is at 10 points difference in California, basically 18 points he's closed in over the last 2 months... but he needs Sanders voters to make it over the finish line. And Sanders needs to beat Hillary in the California primary to stand a chance, I don't think they are going to be attacking each other.
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On May 26 2016 22:28 farvacola wrote:Nice quote fix
Heh, sorry. I still have the Last Week Tonight Trump => Drumpf plug in going : )
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On May 26 2016 22:50 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On May 26 2016 22:44 farvacola wrote:
Remember that debates are less about the people who are already a fan of a particular candidate and more about those who are undecided. In that sense, Bernie does have the ability to do some good work come debate time. Anyone undecided about Trump is living under a rock. While I agree that there are likely few undecideds as compared with prior, recent election cycles, I still think there are enough fence sitters to justify the utility of this last primary debate.
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On May 26 2016 21:52 farvacola wrote:
This debate will have little to no impact on both the end of the primaries and the general. If anything, it'll be a nice preview for when Sanders campaigns against Trump later on. Folks are practically in hysteria over this and it's silly, to be frank.
It will change few minds and just makes Sanders seem petty. People play it up like its this brilliant move, but it just look like he will go to any lengths to hurt Hillary.
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On May 26 2016 20:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On May 26 2016 19:26 Gorsameth wrote:On May 26 2016 19:22 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:
If Trump and Bernie end up agreeing on a lot of anti-establishment issues (which they do)... If Trump and Bernie start attacking Hillary/ DNC (which they have)... when Trump wins the Republican nomination and Bernie loses the Democratic nomination (which will happen)... then A TON of Bernie supporters are going to be moving into the Trump camp and not voting for Hillary.
Quite frankly, this debate could be one of the first nails in the coffin for Hillary's general election, and could basically give Trump the presidency. The general election is to far away, once the convention is over, when Bernie has finally been forced to give up and Hillary and Trump are fighting it out people will have long since forgotten about this debate. Hopefully, although I think it's really easy for Trump to pick up some leftover supporters from Bernie's campaign by just doing this after every debate question: Moderator: Senator Sanders, what do you think about X? Bernie: My stance on X is Y. Trump: That sounds good. I agree. And you know who doesn't agree with Senator Sanders? Hillary Clinton. All he has to do is pretty much agree with everything Bernie says (and Trump is more than capable of backtracking and lying and making shit up all the time, so it's not like he has to be telling the truth), and then occasionally bring up his "agreements with Bernie" during general election debates vs. Hillary.
Then Hilary goes on TV and says "I have 3 million more votes than Senator Sanders, and after watching last night's debates with him and Trump agreeing on everything, I guess it shows that the democrats want an actual progressive in the white house."
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On May 26 2016 22:49 Saryph wrote:
Hilarious but totally not serious thought: Sanders is an independent, how would a Trump/Sanders ticket hold up against Hillary? In my opinion both are popular because they are anti-establishment. Like I said, not being serious, but it is funny to think about, and looking at this cycle, crazier things have happened.
It has already been said many times on this thread that both Bernie and trumps policies and supporters are frighteningly similar already. This debate will just solidify that truism.
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EPT
