Renzatic on 20/2/2020 at 08:47
So I've heard. I actually expected him to do better, even with the gang up, considering he has previous political experience. From what I gather, even when they were discussing straight policy, he came across as flat and listless.
catbarf on 20/2/2020 at 13:52
Quote Posted by Starker
Sufficient numbers of Bernie voters switched to Lord Dampnut in 2016 to give him the edge of winning.
That's only relevant if you assume that those were left-wingers so dedicated to Bernie that they would hack off their nose to spite their face, rather than populists looking for an outside-the-establishment candidate. I haven't seen any polling to indicate that it was actual Democrats/liberals switching to Trump; Bernie had a lot of support from independents.
Anecdotally I know several people in rural areas of NY who were in for both Bernie and Trump- I can only assume they weren't paying any attention to the candidates' stances on the issues, but they exist.
JarlFrank on 20/2/2020 at 14:05
Quote Posted by lowenz
He's a troll. Or a madman from Tea Party european equivalents (and believe me, they're simple crazy isolated strange people - not necessary bad, but crazy and I'm totally NO pro-state - oh the joke! )
The Europe reality is this:
I'm from Germany, the land of Merkel, where they are constantly trying to restrict freedom of speech even further, people have been fined for sharing right wing meme videos (just sharing, not even creating them!) while being a radical antifa activist is somehow okay, every political party including the conservatives refuse to work together with the AfD which are referred to as "far right" when all their positions would have been considered dead center 30 years ago, and the green party with its obsession about restrictive regulations is growing ever more powerful.
The reality in Germany is that leftism has become mainstream, and even holding positions that would have been considered reasonably conservative 30 years ago makes you a "right-winger" today.
The growth of the right which you perceive is merely a reaction to the mainstream going ever more left with each passing year. Not just here, but in the US too: you can't possibly claim that everything is moving further to the right when your mainstream media constantly uses left-wing talking points, keeps bashing the president for being too right wing, and SJWism is spreading widely through universities and big cities.
Nicker on 20/2/2020 at 14:09
(
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51567971) If only those pesky leftists and SJWs weren't so persistent, I wouldn't have to shoot brown people!
You are going to have to try a lot fucking harder, Earl. Or try a softer target.
demagogue on 20/2/2020 at 14:24
"Mainstream" is probably not a useful metric. E.g. transgenderism is becoming more mainstreamed, but it's still a miniscule minority and a vastly bigger issue in rhetoric and people's ideas of what's happening in society (they're everywhere and changing everything) than actual political or social influence. It's better just to simply ask what is the spectrum of influences for left and right in different dimensions, and if you did that you'd get a really complicated mix of influential in some contexts and besieged in others at the same time.
To take just one dimension, there's a generation gap. The older generation has shifted right and active, and the younger generation left and inchoate. The left is influential in colleges and among certain elites, but college societies and elites themselves are not all that influential in vast stretches of middle America.
The thing I've learned researching lots of social issues is that it's almost always a mixed bag with pros and cons for each side. And if one thinks a situation is a simple one-sided story, that's typically my go-to hint that I don't understand the issue well enough, because reality is very often never that simple. Or rather, individual pieces can be pretty simple, but there are usually countless pieces that cross cut in countless directions.
lowenz on 20/2/2020 at 14:34
Quote Posted by JarlFrank
I'm from Germany, the land of Merkel, where they are constantly trying to restrict freedom of speech even further, people have been fined for sharing right wing meme videos (just sharing, not even creating them!) while being a radical antifa activist is somehow okay, every political party including the conservatives refuse to work together with the AfD which are referred to as "far right" when all their positions would have been considered dead center 30 years ago, and the green party with its obsession about restrictive regulations is growing ever more powerful.
The reality in Germany is that leftism has become mainstream, and even holding positions that would have been considered reasonably conservative 30 years ago makes you a "right-winger" today.
The growth of the right which you perceive is merely a reaction to the mainstream going ever more left with each passing year. Not just here, but in the US too: you can't possibly claim that everything is moving further to the right when your mainstream media constantly uses left-wing talking points, keeps bashing the president for being too right wing, and SJWism is spreading widely through universities and big cities.
Perfect example of victimhood complex.
But hey, Hanau killer is surely a damn leftist SJW! :) (and speaks like you?)
I'll tell you, "alt-right" is OF COURSE "pseudoleft" since its birth -> (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Strasser)
Today conservative people (GOP and friends) simply use the alt-right "left" rhetoric and it's the exact reason why the alt-right is keep alive.
This is not "leftism", this is a simple yet high-manipulative political strategy.
Thirith on 20/2/2020 at 14:36
Yeah, JarlFrank, I'm going to read that as complete bullshit when recent political murders in Germany were very clearly done by right-wingers and when several of the AfD's main exponents are explicitly anti-democratic. It also shows that you have a highly selective view of what is and what isn't left-wing.
lowenz on 20/2/2020 at 15:16
Quote Posted by Thirith
Yeah, JarlFrank, I'm going to read that as complete bullshit when recent political murders in Germany were very clearly done by right-wingers and when several of the AfD's main exponents are explicitly anti-democratic. It also shows that you have a highly selective view of what is and what isn't left-wing.
Here in Italy some right wingers have already said that the murder was a Merkel "secret staff" tool perfectly organised and timed :)
Inline Image:
https://static.nexilia.it/nextquotidiano/2020/02/gervasoni-hanau-merkel-2.pngHe's a university professor and a journalist.
No, there's no space for conspiracy here,
the man killed his mother too.
A deranged right-winger with the mind totally burned out (thanks to politically-driven paranoia spreading)
See the post-truth world? Beautifully mad and totally brain-dead (I repeat, the man killed his mother too)
Some SJW are a pain in the ass, but the right wingers are playing with fire (they daily feed fools like Hanau killer), 'cause they're damn dangerous morons.
Give "freedom" to this kind of people (politicians and journalists spreading social paranoia), please go ahead.....in the funeral.
heywood on 20/2/2020 at 17:57
Quote Posted by Starker
Yeah, it looks like there were a not insignificant number of people who cast a protest vote or just wanted to make some sort of a statement. And only a bit more than 1/10 of Bernie voters switched their vote to Lord Dampnut nationally (though it was closer to 1/5 in some states). But there were still enough of them that if half of them had stayed home in crucial swing states, Clinton would have won.
Scroll down to the third bar chart:
(
https://www.npr.org/2017/08/24/545812242/1-in-10-sanders-primary-voters-ended-up-supporting-trump-survey-finds) https://www.npr.org/2017/08/24/545812242/1-in-10-sanders-primary-voters-ended-up-supporting-trump-survey-finds
It appears that more Republican voters turned out for Sanders in the primary than the number who switched back to Trump in the general election. Those voters weren't looking for another center-right stooge of the investment banking industry to deliver four more years of stock market expansion, record corporate profits, trade liberalization, and manufacturing job loss.
So what's your strategy for getting these people to vote Democrat in 2020? Offer the same deal again, only worse this time, and hope that four years has made them hate Trump as much as you do? That's probably not a winning strategy. Wouldn't it make more sense to nominate someone who's actually demonstrated the ability to get some people to cross party lines in a Presidential election?
Quote Posted by Starker
So, what's the deal with Tom Steyer? Looks like he's another filthy rich guy throwing money around in the race. If he should win the nomination, are the more progressive people going to stay home in disgust like they say they will with that Bloomberg guy?
As Pyrian said, he's not a serious candidate. He's using this run to introduce himself, and will probably run for Governor of California.
Besides that, he's a different guy, with a different record, different campaign approach, and different goals. He is another filthy rich guy throwing money around, but that's where the comparison ends.
He blanketed us with TV and YouTube ads for three straight months, but wasted most of it repeating the same introductory ads over and over. I'm Tom Steyer, I left big business to become an activist, and I can beat Donald Trump. That's all he ever really said in ads. I went to one of his campaign events so my daughter could meet him. She was taken by his ads, lol. I have nothing memorable to report. Just another politician.
Starker on 20/2/2020 at 18:08
Roger Stone just got off with a 40-month sentence, less than half of the originally recommended 7-9 years in accordance with federal sentencing guidelines. Well, I don't know enough about the judge or US law to say otherwise, so I assume she knew what she was doing.
Anyone want to bet whether the pardon is coming before or after the election?
