General US Politics

[Nobody]

I don't trust the American people to vote properly entirely, including or not including superdelegates. I believe 15% of the delegates are classified as superdelegates and so unelected officials are allowed to simply gravitate towards the popular/establishment vote - obviously Hillary in the case of the Democrats who has like 500+ to Bernie's ~42. If anything, they would be fickle enough to abandon Hillary in the case that Bernie would gain the 'popular vote' in the eyes of the media, because that's what they do. It's probably affected previous elections with this system.

it's worth noting that in this particular election, superdelegates aren't making any difference, since Clinton has a lead of 300 pledged delegates on Sanders. Even if supersdelegates didn't exist, it's very unlikely he'd be able to beat her

I do agree the existence of superdelegates is dumb, though.

[Tryhard]

Yes, I was just going off the superdelegate numbers. In this case, they just make Clinton's lead (currently, though I'll be real and say it's unlikely to change despite lots of 'possibilites' I've seen proposed) more of a landslide.

[Phoenix Wright]

Honestly, just because she hasn't been convicted doesn't mean she didn't actually technically commit a crime. If I went and stabbed somebody with a knife right now and it wasn't in self defense, but somehow I didn't get convicted of it, would you really say I didn't commit a crime?

yeah, you committed a crime.

but the question is did she commit a crime? you're assuming already she has. that's a bad justice system (guilty until proven innocent). though ours ain't too good, i'd still prefer what we got over that.

it's worth noting that in this particular election, superdelegates aren't making any difference, since Clinton has a lead of 300 pledged delegates on Sanders. Even if supersdelegates didn't exist, it's very unlikely he'd be able to beat her

I do agree the existence of superdelegates is dumb, though.

call it a hunch, but i think lots of people are voting for clinton for silly reasons (not saying sanders is devoid of that, but clinton is winning), one of those being "sanders is going to lose anyway, he can't win." 300 in the negative vs 800 is a lot. bernie swept 9/10 states not too long ago.

amazingly, from the perspective of liberals, trumps greatest weapon is our greatest weakness. everybody counted trump out, yet here he is. everyone is counting sanders out and the dems are like "yeah ok i guess that's that then." vote for the fucker you want. clinton is doing abysmally in polls against trump. trump is preparing for clinton. sanders is the obvious choice (right now at least) if you want another democratic president. people like trump's style more than clinton's for whatever reason. i guess getting on stage and speaking absolute filth is considered good in today's politics. but whatever, that's the reality.

[Time the Crestfallen]

amazingly, from the perspective of liberals, trumps greatest weapon is our greatest weakness. everybody counted trump out, yet here he is. everyone is counting sanders out and the dems are like "yeah ok i guess that's that then." vote for the fucker you want. clinton is doing abysmally in polls against trump. trump is preparing for clinton. sanders is the obvious choice (right now at least) if you want another democratic president. people like trump's style more than clinton's for whatever reason. i guess getting on stage and speaking absolute filth is considered good in today's politics. but whatever, that's the reality.

It seems like people are voting Trump because they have no faith in the current establishment and think he's gonna go in there and tear it up (the sad thing being that people think what he'll replace it with is any better). Clinton meanwhile, is the ultimate establishment candidate and thus, what many people don't want more of.

[Anacybele]

yeah, you committed a crime.

but the question is did she commit a crime? you're assuming already she has. that's a bad justice system (guilty until proven innocent). though ours ain't too good, i'd still prefer what we got over that.

I'm pretty sure this is where a little word called evidence comes in. When you have evidence that someone committed a crime, then that someone probably committed a crime! I recall there being evidence that Hillary had done so and that's why she's being investigated.

[-Cynthia-]

amazingly, from the perspective of liberals, trumps greatest weapon is our greatest weakness. everybody counted trump out, yet here he is. everyone is counting sanders out and the dems are like "yeah ok i guess that's that then." vote for the fucker you want. clinton is doing abysmally in polls against trump. trump is preparing for clinton. sanders is the obvious choice (right now at least) if you want another democratic president. people like trump's style more than clinton's for whatever reason. i guess getting on stage and speaking absolute filth is considered good in today's politics. but whatever, that's the reality.

Clinton is beating Trump nationally in every poll except Rasmussen. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_clinton-5491.html

Electorally, Clinton also currently holds advantages in key states. http://electiongraphs.com/2016ec/

'Abysmally' does not seem like an accurate statement.

[Ansem]

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_sanders-5565.html

he meant that sanders has a higher chance of winning. i think that lead she has over him might go down over time knowing trump. he'll appeal to more people and clinton being the ultimate establishment politician is bound to hurt her. also im p sure he gave money to the clintons for them to come to his wedding

https://gyazo.com/c926f2b8081c6647649352b813d670bd

so he can easily bring up how she is easily bought. because she is. there is less dirt on sanders because no one knew him until 2 years ago.

i dont see sanders winning the nomination tho, and if trump wins i feel that the superdelegate system will be tossed aside because it contributed to the loss. but we'll see

[Tryhard]

I wouldn't call it abysmal, but Sanders seems to have better results against Trump over Clinton in some polls at least, which goes against what you said earlier.

https://morningconsult.com/2016/05/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-general-election-polling/

Clinton 44% vs Trump 38% | Sanders 51% vs Trump 36%

http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/polls/yougov-economist-24478

Clinton 42% vs Trump 40% | Sanders 48% vs Trump 39%

so he can easily bring up how she is easily bought. because she is. there is less dirt on sanders because no one knew him until 2 years ago.

i dont see sanders winning the nomination tho, and if trump wins i feel that the superdelegate system will be tossed aside because it contributed to the loss. but we'll see

to be fair, if Trump has this air of "authenticity" (which I don't think is really that true as people say) that people seem to lap up, Sanders is more so because he's actually been saying and doing the same things for years holding strong convictions.

while I would want him to win I also don't think it's happening.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Tryhard

[CyborgZeta]

Probably referring to polls like these:

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-poll-idUSKCN0Y21TN

http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/10/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-poll-ohio-florida-pennsylvania/index.html

[Ansem]

to be fair, if Trump has this air of "authenticity" that people seem to lap up, Sanders is more so because he's actually been saying and doing the same things for years holding strong convictions.

while I would want him to win I also don't think it's happening.

you're overestimating the intelligence of the american people lmao. ofc sanders is the most consistent of them all since clinton and trump are flip flopping like fish out of water, but that seems to mean nothing to a lot of voters.

and i know its wrong to condescendingly look down on masses like this, and some of you are trump/clinton supporters and i mean no offense to you guys, but i really want to know the mentality behind supporting someone who changed their mind on a topic once they came into the political limelight. sure we tune out the things we dont want to believe but i cant imagine anyone's cognitive dissonance being this strong.

Probably referring to polls like these:

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-poll-idUSKCN0Y21TN

http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/10/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-poll-ohio-florida-pennsylvania/index.html

if people in this topic are getting away with "librul media bias hurr!" im also gonna use this. the librul establishment is controlling media and wants to brainwash the public into supporting clinton

Edited May 12, 2016 by Sparks

[-Cynthia-]

I wouldn't call it abysmal, but Sanders seems to have better results against Trump over Clinton in some polls at least, which goes against what you said earlier.

Clinton beating Trump by a small to moderate margin in polls is definitely not 'abysmal', that's just a straight up lie no matter how you try to spin it. I didn't make any statements about possible Sanders vs. Trump.

[Tryhard]

Clinton beating Trump by a small to moderate margin in polls is definitely not 'abysmal', that's just a straight up lie no matter how you try to spin it. I didn't make any statements about possible Sanders vs. Trump.

Sorry, when you were saying "Clinton has the advantage", I thought you were attributing it to that.

[Nobody]

I'm not following the election that closely since I'm an outsider and don't follow american media, but has Trump (or the republicans in general) even attacked Sanders? Like, has even Hillary done that?

I imagine if republicans attacked his policies, particularly his tax brackets, he'd lose a lot of potential, undecided support. Like, in order to archive what he proposes, Sanders would have to introduce massive tax hikes, and the republicans surely would use that to their advantage. I mean, Sanders would argue that his policies would be good and worth the tax hikes, but the population in general despise taxes, and it wouldn't be easy to convince them, considering that, yeah, the raise would be very substantial. I honestly don't think he'd have that much of an easy time on the general. I mean, he'd probably win against Trump, but I honestly don't see him faring well against someone like Kasich or even Rubio (which tbh is irrelevant now, but still).

Hillary, on the other hand, has been attacked by the opposition for a long time, and also by the more leftist people since the start of the primaries. I don't see she losing much more support than she already has.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Nobody

[Phoenix Wright]

I'm pretty sure this is where a little word called evidence comes in. When you have evidence that someone committed a crime, then that someone probably committed a crime! I recall there being evidence that Hillary had done so and that's why she's being investigated.

you really should stop being condescending when you don't know what you're talking about. it's not illegal to use a private email account, the question is did she send confidential information over it. clinton camp claims that those confidential emails we know of today were retroactively deemed confidential, but weren't at the time. this, then, wouldn't be illegal. the investigation is to find something that was considered confidential at the time. who knows if this is true? this is what the investigation is for.

so yeah, obviously evidence is what comes in. but we're not sure if that evidence exists.

with regards to clinton doing "abysmally," perhaps the word was a little strong, but i wasn't trying to be intentional in deception (ie, i wasn't trying to lie). she is certainly doing poor--+/-5% is nowhere near good enough. not to mention those are the margins of error, so it could end up being much closer than that. not to mention sanders is basically crushing trump, and has been for most of the duration of his campaign.

i can see why people want clinton over trump/kasich/cruz, despite her lies, deception, etc., but i can't see why clinton over sanders.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Phoenix Wright

[Tryhard]

I'm not following the election that closely since I'm an outsider and don't follow american media, but has Trump (or the republicans in general) even attacked Sanders? Like, has even Hillary done that?

I imagine if republicans attacked his policies, particularly his tax brackets, he'd lose a lot of potential, undecided support. Like, in order to archive what he proposes, Sanders would have to introduce massive tax hikes, and the republicans surely would use that to their advantage. I mean, Sanders would argue that his policies would be good and worth the tax hikes, but the population in general despise taxes, and it wouldn't be easy to convince them, considering that, yeah, the raise would be very substantial. I honestly don't think he'd have that much of an easy time on the general. I mean, he'd probably win against Trump, but I honestly don't see him faring well against someone like Kasich or even Rubio (which tbh is irrelevant now, but still).

Hillary, on the other hand, has been attacked by the opposition for a long time, and also by the more leftist people since the start of the primaries. I don't see she losing much more support than she already has.

I'm pretty sure Clinton has basically stated that "he doesn't even seem like a democrat" and other such things, which is true because he is a democratic socialist not often seen in America with any support.

There's a site dedicated to explaining the proposed tax raise: http://www.bernietax.com/. I'm sure they would attack them over the fact that they are raising the tax rate on people that have incomes over $250K, but of course they would. The richest people could be taxed up to 90% and barely feel it compared to the working and middle class.

America's population definitely is afraid to even consider tax raises... even though it would not affect anyone below the upper class income brackets. Paying extra for social policies is required, they are not magically constructed. An actual working national healthcare and tuition fees are benefits I receive from being in my country and admittedly having to pay a value added tax. I think it's worth it. Maybe even raising the minimum wage so people can actually afford to live on it. But if I do need a major operation I'm not so far in debt I can't see my way out if I don't have money to throw around. In my opinion, being humane is far more important than being fiscally conservative. But yes, they would probably want to play on those fears.

Edited May 12, 2016 by Tryhard

[XeKr]

Poll aggregates are better than citing individual polls. There’s always ways to cherrypick particular single ones. Like the Quinnipiac ones oversampled the white vote relative to 2012 (given the nature of the election and changing demographics, that seems unlikely), and Qpiac polls also have the worst predictive value so far this cycle. No one else follows the stats people? >_>

A more cynical/conspiratorial view might be, the media wants a horse race for ratings, candidates want to scare donors into action, etc.

One reason why Trump vs. Clinton polls may be accurate is both candidates are already relatively well known. Though in this case the parties are both internally divided atm, so imo that may still contribute to some uncertainty at this time.

Overall, Clinton has barely attacked Sanders, because she still needs to unify the party. I think it requires substantial confidence in the electorate that once Republicans tie Sanders to the Soviet Union (socialism), and raising taxes (undeniably true, and requires nuance to rationalize), he would still be leading. And have some real Sanders quotes:

"I don't believe in charities".

"It’s funny, sometimes American journalists talk about how bad a country is, [because] people are lining up for food. That is a good thing!"

"A man goes home and masturbates his typical fantasy. A woman on her knees, a woman tied up, a woman abused. A woman enjoys intercourse with her man — as she fantasizes being raped by 3 men simultaneously."

"Everybody was totally convinced that Castro was the worst guy in the world. All the Cuban people were going to rise up in rebellion against Fidel Castro. They had forgot that he educated their kids, gave them health care, totally transformed the society."

“I believe that, in the long run, major industries in this state and nation should be publicly owned and controlled by the workers themselves.”

"Nobody should earn more than $1 million.”

"The revolution comes when two strangers smile at each other, when a father refuses to send his child to school because schools destroy children, when a commune is started and people begin to trust each other, when a young man refuses to go to war, and when a girl pushes aside all that her mother has 'taught' her and accepts her boyfriend's love."

It doesn’t matter what the actual points in context are, the optics are terrible. There's currently none of this in the mainstream, but once the TV markets are blanketed with a billion dollars in these ads his numbers won’t go down?

I may largely agree with Sanders' current platform in principle, if not necessarily in approach, but there’s no chance his big proposals get through Congress so it doesn’t really matter. Clinton won’t get much done either, but the nomination is essentially wrapped up. At this point, Sanders needs to win Cali by like 40% (maybe underestimating, as stuff like NJ is currently polling as a blowout for Clinton) for the pledged majority, and he is down in polls by 9% in aggregate. Superdelegates are a non-story; they’ve never gone against the popular vote let’s see if they’re so bad once Kanye leads the D primaries in 2020/2024. Also Sanders is the one trying to appeal to them to undemocratically switch to him right now, despite the massive pledged delegate and popular vote margin.

So the argument goes, let’s just beat Trump and have the opportunity for 5-4/6-3 scotus, plz? (Sanders should stay in until the convention for the optics)

edit: Oh and that someone with the toxicity of Trump doesn't get in the White House might be a good reason too.

edit2: some clarity issues

Edited May 12, 2016 by XeKr

[Skynstein]

Clinton is beating Trump nationally in every poll except Rasmussen. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_clinton-5491.html

Electorally, Clinton also currently holds advantages in key states. http://electiongraphs.com/2016ec/

'Abysmally' does not seem like an accurate statement.

There is fresh poll that shows Clinton and Trump evenly matched.

[XeKr]

And there were polls in the week before the 2012 election that showed Romney winning or tied. Obama won with a 20% margin in the Electoral College.

Not to say the aggregate polling margin won't tighten this cycle, or maybe even Trump leads for a time, but trying to have ostensibly "Serious Discussion" with individual polls is not very useful. Unless specifically talking about quirks for said polls, for which we need the crosstabs and such.

For example, if we want to cherrypick single polls. In exit polls of WV, 39% of Sanders voters would vote for Trump over Sanders in the general election. Yeah you read it right.

Edited May 12, 2016 by XeKr

[tuvarkz]

Indeed, the US election system means that full-country polls aren't necessarily accurate. Hopefully come July there will be per-state polls that can show how the whole thing's actually heading.

[blah the Prussian]

Its absolutely premature to rely on polls now because Clinton and Trump haven't turned on each other in earnest. We'll see how things look after the first debate.

[tuvarkz]

You know, it's already easy to see how Hillary will lose:

https://twitter.com/HillaryClinton/status/731107990514880512

This could easily be read as a pro-Trump tweet: Equal pay for equal work. Nice and simple.

EDIT: Also, on average, it seems like Trump's supporters aren't exactly the poor, uneducated people they are painted often as:

http://qz.com/679589/trump-voters-earn-more-and-are-better-educated-than-the-typical-american/

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-mythology-of-trumps-working-class-support/?ex_cid=story-twitter

Edited May 13, 2016 by tuvarkz

[Alertcircuit]

The numbers don't debunk that narrative.

According to that fivethirtyeight article, Trump supporters are poorer than Cruz and Kasich supporters. When looking at Trump vs. the Democratic candidates there are more variables that come into play.. Democrats usually directly benefit poorer people, while Republicans the richer, so it makes sense that those demographics would vote accordingly. Age is another thing to be looked at. Young people tend to be liberal, and young people also tend to make less money than older people, since more experience usually equals more money. Trump seems to do significantly better with older people than younger. So with the older = wealthier thing, shouldn't that mean Trump supporters' income should be higher than Cruz/Kasich's, or at least somewhere near Kasich's?

The data also shows that Trump does do better with the less-educated.

http://www.cbsnews.com/elections/2016/primaries/republican/illinois/exit/

http://www.cbsnews.com/elections/2016/primaries/republican/alabama/exit/

http://www.cbsnews.com/elections/2016/primaries/republican/michigan/exit/

http://www.cbsnews.com/elections/2016/primaries/republican/nevada/exit/

http://www.cbsnews.com/elections/2016/primaries/republican/massachusetts/exit/

http://www.cbsnews.com/elections/2016/primaries/republican/north-carolina/exit/

[Phoenix Wright]

does it matter if his voter base is "educated" lol

[Skynstein]

does it matter if his voter base is "educated" lol

The bane of the intellectual's existence is that his vote is worth the same as the vote of the lowly, uneducated peasant. :D

[Ansem]

megabump

Why are democrats comparing Clinton to Trump in terms of how terrible they are? I hear this mostly from independents and Sander's supporters. I didn't vote for Clinton in the primary, but the only crime Clinton has committed is being an establishment politician and taking money from superpacs and wallstreets. Trump inciting violence against different ethnic groups and the poor judge borders on prosecutable, but the American justice system doesn't pursue affluent white Americans. He also has many other skeletons in his closets that are probably illegal. Clinton had a committee grill her about her emails which was bullshit, and Kevin Mcarthy even admitted the committee was set up to undermine her run for president, so there really is no "email scandal."

Also my question is directed at liberals/democrats that are not exactly fond of Clinton. Trump supporters can respond to my question but I probably won't respond to them.