If Biden does not pick an AA VP pick, he loses in November. I think its simple as that. Want to depress turnout? Tell the AA community, who essentially gave you the nomination, that despite relying on their vote they dont get a spot on the ticket.
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If Biden does not pick an AA VP pick, he loses in November. I think its simple as that. Want to depress turnout? Tell the AA community, who essentially gave you the nomination, that despite relying on their vote they dont get a spot on the ticket.
Off topic but related to the age thing.
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Update: Harris has endorsed Biden and the latest polling indicates Sanders will be thrashed tomorrow (i.e. lucky to receive a third of delegates). His campaign has maybe not pivoted after all, although it's hard to tell what they're even trying to do past the *panicked flailing*.
Sad that it comes to this, but if he's going to flop then better that the axe should fall as fast and decisively as possible to dispel any illusions.
Mar 10 delegates: 350
Mar 17: 577, including Florida
Late March: 156 (Georgia and Puerto Rico)
Early April: 194
April 28: 683
--- ~2000
On his current trajectory Biden could have a majority by that point (if he wins 2/3 of delegates along the way).
According to 538 she had one of the most Trump-aligned voting records of the Democratic House caucus in her first term, though that changed last year. She your rep?Quote:
Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh
I think you overestimate the effect a VP pick can have (unless it's an actively bad one).Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
Didnt know alcholics anonymous had that big a vote share.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
This was the case in 2016. Tim Kaine was a terrible pick for VP. I do not think that Biden would pick another white male, but you never know. I sincerely hope he doesnt. At the very least I think it should be a woman. I also think there is a slight chance that Trump dumps Pence and brings in Nikki Haley (perhaps as a sacrifice for the current pandemic response debacle?), so having a woman on the ticket would help counter that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
To your earlier comments about Bernie's campaign flailing, I kinda think this was expected since it seemed like their strategy was to only get 30% of the vote anyways:
Link
He was counting on a divided field, and he profited from that in Iowa, NH, and Nevada. So as soon as the moderates started consolidating, I think Sanders was doomed as they had to toss their whole strategy but dont know what to replace it with. So what we are seeing now is his campaign yelling about the establishment to no effect.Quote:
He’s counting on winning Iowa and New Hampshire, where he was already surprisingly strong in 2016, and hoping that Cory Booker and Kamala Harris will split the black electorate in South Carolina and give him a path to slip through there, too. And then, Sanders aides believe, he’ll easily win enough delegates to put him into contention at the convention. They say they don’t need him to get more than 30 percent to make that happen.
:laugh4:Quote:
Originally Posted by Greyblades
Re: Kaine, Democrats are historically-inclined to balance tickets with a Southerner (whereas you almost never see Southerners on Republican tickets). Deep history. Hopefully we discard this tradition, at least as its own substantive factor.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
I mean, I wasn't expecting consolidation (before Super Tuesday) myself. Every major candidate kind of hopes for a runaway victory on Super Tuesday to propel them through any field. That's what Biden is doing, technically. The main flaw in Sanders' strategy - conceptually, the main flaw - was that it relied on multiple strong opponents remaining in contention, whereas once people looked around at the end of February and saw that Biden was the only available anti-Sanders candidate - it all snowballed from there. That arrangement was contingent.Quote:
He was counting on a divided field, and he profited from that in Iowa, NH, and Nevada. So as soon as the moderates started consolidating, I think Sanders was doomed as they had to toss their whole strategy but dont know what to replace it with. So what we are seeing now is his campaign yelling about the establishment to no effect.
Practically, Sanders screwed up in not using his ample opportunities to fortify himself from all angles and cement his frontrunner position. Warren had a day as frontrunner before she began to plummet. Sanders had weeks, a higher ceiling, and constant upward momentum. He squandered the single best opportunity for American leftists in generations.
That the most salient reaction to these setbacks was pouting that politicians aren't allowed to compete against Sanders, and that it's unfair if they support anyone other than Sanders, is shameful.
Sanders' working-class movement was allegedly so broad and powerful that it could coerce Mitch McConnell into passing Medicare for All. This was a major selling point! Yet it wasn't able to mobilize the working-class to deliver the mortal blow to a broke, frozen Joe Biden, the milquetoast candidate known for being notoriously-bad at national politics.
So Im curious, if you were in charge of Sander's campaign, how would you have cemented his frontrunner position?Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
I think Warren's campaign is one of the big tragedies of this primary. Im a huge fan of her and I think she would have made an incredible president. But I did feel that her campaign didnt really know what it wanted to be. To me it felt like the bridge between the moderates and the progressives, but for some reason that never really took off.
Yes, as I am in Seminole county she is my rep. My wife voted for her the first time, we both did the second.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
Just read her bio, and she is foreign born (ooops, I missed that) so it will not be possible for her to veep. Oh well. As Dems go she seems pretty solid to me. Reasonably conservative on fopo and economy, reasonably practical on social issues. She is not in the AOC side of the party, but she is certainly not a Trump fan by any means.
By acting like a frontrunner rather than an insurgent. He should immediately (if not a month or two earlier) have tacked to reassuring messaging for moderates and senior citizens, downplaying the "radical" and "revolutionary" flavor of his platform while emphasizing those policies most popular with the mentioned demographics (such as augmenting Social Security payouts).Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
He should have called for unity against Trump and sopped to bringing all stakeholders into the coalition, emphasizing his own electability arguments and the benefits for the party at large.
Also, it was a big mistake (in retrospect) to pour all resources into Texas and California at the expense of South Carolina. On one hand it's hard to blame any candidate for prioritizing what should be bang for the buck in terms of delegates, but a hardnosed analysis of the field in February may have revealed the continuing vulnerability of the lower-tier candidates. Personally I was already feeling some alarm just before the SC debate when I saw the latest polling showing a Biden rebound (not just in SC but everywhere). It seemed paradoxical following Nevada, but now we know it was the rumblings of the imminent collapse of the wide field. That canary in the mine was ignored by a complacent Sanders team. Still, here I'm tentative, because I can't really say even a competent observer should have been able to predict that a Biden win in SC would be such a breakthrough. All the same, someone paying attention should have realized that the order of operations in dampening Biden's SC performance would compound into the Super Tuesday results. Truly a historic, pivotal moment regardless.
She surged too early. Every candidate who rose in the polls did so first and foremost on the backs of more moderate respondents. The problem with squishy moderates is - well, they're squishy. Once negative media attention comes pouring in, they revert to undecided and look for the next phenomenon.Quote:
I think Warren's campaign is one of the big tragedies of this primary. Im a huge fan of her and I think she would have made an incredible president. But I did feel that her campaign didnt really know what it wanted to be. To me it felt like the bridge between the moderates and the progressives, but for some reason that never really took off.
She was never positioned to take advantage of the early primaries. Buttigieg was because of his investments and voter demographics; the Warren alternate, the choice of college-educated women above 40, shifted to the still-under-radar Klobuchar. With Sanders the frontrunner and Klobuchar and Buttigieg scooping the crumbs of Biden's fall, Warren was shut out.
But she probably couldn't break through from the beginning. Her ideology and voter demographics precluded any real establishment consolidation around her as a "unity" candidate.
Yes that would have been a sound strategy. However, an honest question: do you think that Sanders supporters would have gone along with it? I kinda feel like the die-hard fans would accuse Sanders of selling out or something like that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
The shift would have been salient to a very small proportion of Sanders supporters, and most of them wouldn't have had trouble rationalizing it as savvy "normie"-appeasement.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
We had a test case when Sanders surrogates, including AOC, backed down a little on Medicare for All in the face of the Nevada Culinary Union's opposition. They pointed out that any Medicare for All agenda would follow a long, involved legislative process in which every stakeholder's concerns would be hammered out, and that Sanders had already added an adjustment for unions in which legacy negotiated health benefits would transfer as cash compensation or other benefits for union members. Sanders brushed this tactic off, remarking that his model bill was "already, in a sense, a compromise." The object should have been to mollify the primary electorate, smother the other candidates for just a few weeks, and negate such fair and balanced media coverage as:
https://i.imgur.com/hIHuprI.jpg
Before Nevada the non-Biden, non-Sanders candidates were polling about 50% of the vote, with the rest divided between Sanders and Biden. The actual vote come primary day was less than 1/3 for that group, with Biden just short of 50%. What needed to happen was for that ~15% to either drift to Sanders rather than reverting to Biden, or remain discouraged enough about Biden to remain apportioned among the lower tier. A modest Biden victory, say 1/3 of the vote, would have been widely considered priced-in and would not have opened the gates.
It should be noted that Sanders won the union rank & file in the caucus.
I mean...he believes in what he is saying. He wants a political revolution. Why anyone would anyone think he would shift as a matter of "good politics"?Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
Too principled to get to the next level in politics, that's Sanders. We knew the only way he could win was if somehow he convinced more people or if the Dems played a repeat of GOP 2016 primaries.
What they are leaning on now is simply trying to convince more people that democratic socialism is the way to go. And he will continue doing that all the way until Biden gets a majority.
As far as VP, I have said it a million times. Pick someone who does well in the demographic you are weak in.
Telling Biden that he needs a black VP when he is the only Dem the AA's are voting for in the primary is a good way to pigeonhole yourself.
Run a damn unity ticket. Put Warren on the ticket, she will make short work of Pence at the VP debate.
I've never heard of a principle that precludes shifting emphases for political advantage. Such behavior is not unknown to Sanders, who adopted a more liberal immigration policy in response to criticism, who developed a foreign policy to fill the gaps in his 2016 run, who leaned into more biographical messaging upon advisement.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
What happened to the Sanders who acquiesced to Obama in 2016 and kept quiet about his opposition to the TPP?
Unless she's going to run the show behind the scenes, VP is a waste of Warren's policy aspirations. Additionally, taking her off the bench temporarily weakens the 2021 Senate Democrats; same as in Vermont's case, a GOP governor will appoint a Republican replacement before a special election is called. And what's worse, Massachusetts is notorious for electing Republicans to the Senate (see: Scott Brown, 2010), so there's a relatively high risk of losing that Senate seat altogether in the short term.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Same guy, but now he doesn't have an incumbent Democratic president with political clout telling him to shut up anymore.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
Scott Brown is the only Republican Senator from Massachusetts since 1978. Literally a 2010 Tea Party upset that says nothing about the state.Quote:
Unless she's going to run the show behind the scenes, VP is a waste of Warren's policy aspirations. Additionally, taking her off the bench temporarily weakens the 2021 Senate Democrats; same as in Vermont's case, a GOP governor will appoint a Republican replacement before a special election is called. And what's worse, Massachusetts is notorious for electing Republicans to the Senate (see: Scott Brown, 2010), so there's a relatively high risk of losing that Senate seat altogether in the short term.
John Kerry's open seat was handily won by Dem.
As VP she is still heavily involved in the Senate and has a chance of being a tie breaker. If Biden says the main goal is to remove Trump, then lets shut the fuck up about policy and get a ticket that will motivate as many demographics as possible to vote for a blue POTUS. I think you are heavily miscalculating this one.
I think there are two schools of thought: either pick a VP in the demo you are weak in or pick a VP who will galvanize the base. Biden's weakest demo is white men. I dont think there is any VP pick that can help with that. He is also weak with Hispanics. But here is the thing though. In the battleground states in the north such as Pennsylvania and Michigan, there are far more AA's than there are Hispanics, and Hispanics are surprisingly right wing, with almost 30% voting for Trump in 2016. Strategically it might be the smarter move to focus on pushing AA turnout as it worked great in 2008 and 2012. Combine that with a female VP pick, that may increase the woman vote.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
My personal pick would be Harris, although I acknowledge that I am likely biased as Harris was my first pick. However, I dont think that Biden's wife is a big fan of Harris after what happened in the first debate, as she said it was like being punched in the gut. I saw somewhere on Twitter that Biden was down to choosing from Harris, Booker, and Klobuchar but its twitter so who knows if that is true. What I am fairly certain of is that he likely wont announce until his path to the nomination is clear, which we will find out after tomorrow if he sweeps the primaries as predicted.
I don't think that he would pick Warren. If I am remembering correctly when she dropped out he said something about how she will do great work in the Senate so theres that.
As for Sanders, it seems like he wants a female VP but also one that aligns with him so Im trying to think of who that could be. Perhaps Warren but Im not sure Warren would be so inclined.
I think you're crediting African-Americans with too little practicality and too much tribalism. When Trump replaced Obama African-Americans were forced to confront the reality that White Americans are still intensely uncomfortable with authentic African-American identity, especially in proximity to power. So, as much as I'm sure many African-Americans would love to seen someone "like them" as VP the fact is Obama won not because of an authentic African-American identity but for the lack of it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
African-Americans want Biden to beat Trump, so long as it's not two crusty white men on the ticket I think they'll come out. If he picks a Latino who's highly electable I think the African-Americans will recognise that as a smart tactical choice, so long as the person is also credible, and they will see it as a sign Biden is serious about winning.
As opposed to Bernie, who is serious about socialism and revolution (which will be bad for African-Americans) and less serious about winning.
My wife believes that Biden will pick Harris.
What about Brenda Lawrence from MI or Fettermen from PA?
Perhaps, but representation is important. The AA vote has been so crucial for Joe Biden. It just seems like madness to me to not pick a VP candidate who is AA.Quote:
Originally Posted by Philippus Flavius Homovallumus
The problem with this kind of thinking is that it feels like a series of checkmarks rather than tapping into any real energy.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
We put ourselves into a corner here:
1. No sitting senators
2. Must be black or a woman
3. Has to align with Biden on issues
4. Be from a state that will be contested
Ok so what we just open up the list of members for the Blue Dogs or the New Democrats in the House and pick one that isn't a 2018 newbie?
Warren has energy and again if Biden is saying that he wants someone willing to bend the knee on his policies it's another early sign we have lost already.
Obama ran on a very progressive campaign and he was willing to pick one of the most centrist Democrats to run with him.
Obama ended up running the country as a centrist though, so maybe Biden is just worried he may actually have to do something for people with a progressive in his ear.
Really? You know better than that Greyblades. I know you are a RAC man like me, but still. America has a lot of roads often in the middle of no where. Recovery is a big political issue.Quote:
Originally Posted by Greyblades
Point 1: I never said it cant be a sitting senator. If its a sitting senator, the governor will appoint someone to fill in for them until a special election. That's actually why I don't think Warren should be picked since the governor of Massachusetts is a Republican.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Point 2: I think the ticket in the future needs to be diverse as a reflection of the party, but I think for this election, Biden needs to pick an AA woman.
Point 3: 100% alignment is usually never the case, but is it so unreasonable that the ticket should be two people who are on the same page? A lack of agreement on crucial issues can cause problems down the line. Like if there is a tie in the Senate, the VP doesnt have to vote as POTUS wishes him to, as the VP doesn't serve at the pleasure of the president. I don't see the alignment point as a liability.
Point 4: This one is up for debate, but I'm not sure that the data really supports the theory.
Wasn't so much towards you specifically but about what people are saying/thinking in general. Monty is very adamant about not picking a sitting senator.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
All the Dem candidates are on 'the same page' as far as I am concerned for a VP pick. Realistically the VP would be breaking ties between Dems and Reps, not between factions of Dems. Doesn't matter if they are centrist or progressive, they will push through democratic legislation which has to be favorable to all the democratic senators in the first place.
Hooah, to the extent that one believes elections are decided by structural factors, then we don't even need to debate what goes into conscious voter behaviors - a VP pick just won't be electorally significant either way.
Sanders is a flexible guy when he wants to be, throughout his career and this primary season and not just when Obama asks.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Attachment 23356Quote:
Scott Brown is the only Republican Senator from Massachusetts since 1978. Literally a 2010 Tea Party upset that says nothing about the state.
John Kerry's open seat was handily won by Dem.
Massachussets is weird that way. Federal positions are more vulnerable than baseline partisanship would indicate. Look at Senator vote shares in past elections. There is more risk to a Senate special election there than meets the eye, particularly when set against Warren's putative value-over-replacement as a VP.
She'll almost certainly be limited in her legislative ambitions and power compared to remaining as a Senator coming off a decent showing in the presidential primary. I think Warren has the same calculation. We'll find out.Quote:
As VP she is still heavily involved in the Senate and has a chance of being a tie breaker. If Biden says the main goal is to remove Trump, then lets shut the fuck up about policy and get a ticket that will motivate as many demographics as possible to vote for a blue POTUS. I think you are heavily miscalculating this one.
I wasn't politically aware in 2008, but all the accounts I've read point out that Obama ran on a centrist platform and people just read in what they wanted to see.Quote:
Obama ran on a very progressive campaign and he was willing to pick one of the most centrist Democrats to run with him.
Obama ended up running the country as a centrist though, so maybe Biden is just worried he may actually have to do something for people with a progressive in his ear.
Apparently pundits love to fantasize about "Team of Rivals" arrangements.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
No, some specific Senators. Kamala Harris, for example, would be fine as a Senator who will definitely be replaced by a Democrat. Although others would deprecate a Harris VP from the perspective that it would be career-limiting for her. But that's a different kind of consideration.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
If you're implying that Vice President's push through legislation on their own initiative, then I'd have to ask for historical examples.Quote:
they will push through democratic legislation which has to be favorable to all the democratic senators in the first place.
But again, the most recent example of Kerry's open spot was in an off year with a Republican governor and the D candidate still won by 10 points. Are you concerned that voter turnout will be low in MA?Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
I remember him saying that he would bring back all the troops, close G Bay, bring universal health care, end torture, create 5 million green energy jobs, give illegal immigrants amnesty[1] and reduce emissions by 80% by 2050.Quote:
I wasn't politically aware in 2008, but all the accounts I've read point out that Obama ran on a centrist platform and people just read in what they wanted to see.
For 2008 that was quite progressive.
[1] He didn't use the word amnesty but something about paying a fine, be in good standing and you can live here legally with a low priority for government services. It was as close to amnesty you could get.
Who else beside Harris is viable pick from the Senate?Quote:
No, some specific Senators. Kamala Harris, for example, would be fine as a Senator who will definitely be replaced by a Democrat. Although others would deprecate a Harris VP from the perspective that it would be career-limiting for her. But that's a different kind of consideration.
I'm saying the opposite. You cut off the front part of the statement. If we have a 50-50 senate, then the VP will be deciding a lot of bills. I'm saying it actually doesn't matter if the the VP is progressive or center. Whoever the VP is will always push through democratic bills during Senate ties, however left or center the specific bill may be. That's why I am saying all the candidates are equally on the same page. If Biden picked Amy as his VP it wouldn't be any different than if he picked Warren, both would be breaking ties in favor of the party.Quote:
If you're implying that Vice President's push through legislation on their own initiative, then I'd have to ask for historical examples.
Biden getting spicy.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1237387463246708736
Good article about the increasing value of a Sanders nomination.
Quote:
The same CNN poll that shows Democratic voters favoring Biden over Bernie by 16 points also finds blue America saying that the Vermont senator better represents their issue preferences than the former vice-president by a six-point margin, and better understands their problems by a nine-point one. Which is to say: Democratic voters appear to favor Sanders’s agenda, but fear that he will be unequal to the task of defeating Donald Trump or managing the Executive branch in a moment of crisis.
And yet, every day that the coronavirus spreads and markets tank, the (supposed) electoral risk of nominating Sanders shrinks, while the policy rewards of his election grow.
Admittedly the story is more plausible in the event of a Sanders presidency, since in that case Massachusetts voters might be even more prone to punishing or restraining higher-level Democrats than under Biden.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Well, my recollection is he tried on Guantanamo Bay, but the Congressional Dems shut him down. Ending torture isn't a particularly progressive position. Wasn't Al Gore's green stimulus plan similar to more aggressive? Universal coverage is what he built into the ACA, except it's not really universal. But did he campaign on anything more? Obama's version of sub-amnesty for immigrants was close to the bipartisan consensus until the Bush era, so it wasn't very progressive even for the time. Remember that he was on the verge of passing the DREAM Act until the Republican leadership whipped their people into line.Quote:
I remember him saying that he would bring back all the troops, close G Bay, bring universal health care, end torture, create 5 million green energy jobs, give illegal immigrants amnesty[1] and reduce emissions by 80% by 2050.
For 2008 that was quite progressive.
[1] He didn't use the word amnesty but something about paying a fine, be in good standing and you can live here legally with a low priority for government services. It was as close to amnesty you could get.
Here,
It was really just his unique charisma that made progressives think he aligned with them, despite his actual plans and record.Quote:
Obama positioned himself to the right of the Democratic primary pack on virtually every issue except Iraq. On health care, he was attacked for not having a single-payer plan that covered every American. While Clinton proposed a 90-day moratorium on foreclosures and a five-year freeze on interest rates, Obama’s instincts were comparatively free-market, less command and control.
Contrary to the stereotype of liberals stridently insisting on secularism, Obama is the first Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter to make his Christian faith a cornerstone of his political appeal. He has been courting the evangelical center since the primaries. More recently, Jesse Jackson threatened to “cut his nuts off” because Obama’s focus on responsible inner-city fatherhood departed from the root-cause playbook of liberal victimhood. Even the founder of the centrist (and historically Clinton-boosting) DLC, Al From, now sees a kindred spirit: “This general election, more than most we have seen, is going to be a battle for the center. ... The more we learn about Sen. Obama's policies, the more we will see some of the policies the DLC has championed for years.”
I'm the wrong person to ask, since I don't care to be so deep in the inside baseball on this topic. One name that I've heard a lot is Catherine Cortez-Masto (Gov. Sisolak is Dem).Quote:
Who else beside Harris is viable pick from the Senate?
Both Biden and Bernie have cancelled their rallies in Cleveland due to public health concerns. So now I'm wondering what this pandemic might have in terms of the impact on the election in November. Or at the very least the primary. Michigan is reporting something like 800,000 absentee ballots cast for the primary so the results might be delayed. Perhaps the pandemic will go away by November, but if not I think it could have a serious impact.
Attachment 23360
*shakes fist*
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ESyWWV1U...jpg&name=large
...if it holds up after the dust settles, yikes.
Michigan isnt looking good for Bernie either. However with the number of absentee ballots needing to be counted it probably wont be called tonight.
NBC has called Michigan for Biden. I think its premature, but if it holds up, this primary is over. Something which Ive noticed is that Biden is winning the rural vote, which Bernie won in 2016. So I think it was more of a vote against Clinton in 2016 than actually for Bernie.