POTUS Election thread

[Gilrandir]

So because everyone knows how much of a joke the 2016 election is, a third party candidate named Deez Nuts is polling in North Carolina at 9%. Shame the guy behind it is only in high school.

I dont know whether to laugh or to cry at this point.

You guys in America are falling behind the world trend setters if such people are runnung for an office only now:

http://europe.newsweek.com/darth-vad...a-putin-279629

[Hooahguy]

Kanye 2020

[Idaho]

Surely Trump is a joke candidate? Someone tell me that it's just the die-hard lunatics who would even consider him for a moment? I suppose you went for two terms with Reagan and Bush, maybe nothing is beyond you.

[Greyblades]

Remember the "American Presidential Dynasties" rhetoric a few months ago?

It's kinda backfired.

[Husar]

I will just hope that Joe Biden runs and wins.

[Hooahguy]

As I said before, I still think he's sort of a Democratic plant in the GOP to make them look bad. I mean I think it was just yesterday that he let a guy stand up and say that he wanted Trump to kick out all the Muslims. And that Obama is a Muslim born in Kenya. And Trump didn't bother to correct him like McCain did before the 2008 election. The difference of quality in candidates then and now is vastly apparent.

[a completely inoffensive name]

NBC post debate poll shows trump at 29% support, which is up from 22% in late August.


CANT STUMP THE TRUMP

[Hooahguy]

I suspect that once people start dropping out then the margins wont be so wide. Right now Trump is attracting all the nativists while the rest of the group is split up among the rest of the candidates.

Though due to Carson's rather controversial statement that Muslims shouldnt be allowed to be president, I dont see him as a viable candidate so if the GOP wants to pick an anti-establishment candidate then I think Fiorina will be the best pick, despite her dubious business record she has a solid debate presence and doesnt come off as a total bigot.

[a completely inoffensive name]

According to that same poll I mentioned, 30% of those polled believe trump to be the eventual nominee. Maybe the overlap is 100% with trump fans, but its interesting.

[Hooahguy]

So Walker is going to be the second to drop out. Which is a tad surprising as I was expecting Santorum or Jindal to go before Walker, but either way I can't say that I'm going to miss the guy much.

[a completely inoffensive name]

CNN runs with the one poll they have that show Trump losing percentage points and ignore the NBC poll that gives Trump a huge jump over where he was at the end of August. The extreme media bias against Trump makes me scared that all the conservatives here were right about the media carrying Obama in 2008/2012...

[Hooahguy]

Nonsense, in 2008 Obama won by being not Bush, and in 2012 he won because Romney was terrible. The GOP doesnt know how to pick good candidates because the base is full of hard-liners who dont appeal to the middle guys.

[CrossLOPER]

extreme media bias

The extensive media bias that will not stop giving attention to a man that realized that, sometimes, women menstruate.

[a completely inoffensive name]

The extensive media bias that will not stop giving attention to a man that realized that, sometimes, women menstruate.

Carly Fiorini accused planned parenthood of selling baby organs from aborted fetuses or some nonsense. Carson says Muslims cannot be president, that the Quran is incompatible with the constitution. Donald is not the craziest, yet they treat him like he is.

[GeneralHankerchief]

If Trump more or less maintains his current positioning, and assuming the rest of the establishment party is still dead-set against him, we could potentially see an actual meaningful convention for the first time in decades as they try to block his nomination. That would be interesting, just to be a break from the established pattern of "four days of bloviating from gradually more important people."

[Hooahguy]

When the field is narrowed to 3-4 candidates we will have a real view at who is winning in the GOP race. Until then this whole polling deal is basically meaningless as the base is fractured among the 15 candidates.

[a completely inoffensive name]

The problem with your analysis is that the top three candidates are all outsiders. If you add up Trump, Carson and Fiorini, you get about 50% of voters. Half of the party is essentially rejecting the establishment and many more are still undecided/not participating. The holy establishment Trinity of rubio, bush and walker was shown today to be dead on arrival. I don't care if there are still 15 candidates, no one likes pataki, no one likes Cruz, no one likes santorum. And no amount of name recognition will bring these campaigns back from the dead. There is a whole lot to learn here and bush better hope his advisors are worth the money.

[Hooahguy]

And two of your three top candidates are totally unelectable. Fiorina is the only one of the three who could possibly be electable (even though she is shooting herself in the foot as the moment with the Planned Parenthood fiasco), but perhaps as VP not the big dog. My guess? Rubio, with Fiorina as VP to try to lasso in those anti-establishment voters.

[a completely inoffensive name]

The voters don't care if someone is unelectable. Like what GH said, the party would have to force their candidate down the voters at the convention to prevent someone like trump or Carson from winning the nomination. That is assuming if trump is able to ride his momentum that long.

[Hooahguy]

Voters being the GOP base, I assume you mean. The base in most cases will vote for their party regardless of the candidate. Its the people in the middle who you need to capture. And saying things like "Mexican immigrants are rapists" and "Muslims shouldnt be allowed to be president" doesnt really inspire those in the middle to look favorably on the candidate.

[Montmorency]

Do people still imagine that Trump is popular because of some position or other (e.g. nativism, protectionism), which would not hold up under the scrutiny of the larger base?

If so, they are quite confused. Remember Huey Long.

[Montmorency]

A couple of hints to make it clearer:

1. Much of Trump's support comes from the "Tea Party" membership, and most of the Tea Party membership in turn likes Trump.

2. The Tea Party has never been about libertarianism.

[Idaho]

The tea party is about getting really stupid people to give mass support for benevolent corporations to harvest our organs and render us down for tallow so their boards can live longer and have access to high quality soaps and cosmetics.

[Hooahguy]

No the Tea Party in its earliest strains was an actual grassroots movement with libertarian ideas. Then it became an astroturf movement once corporations started getting in the game.

[Hooahguy]

So it looks like Trump and Carson are almost tied in the polls.

[a completely inoffensive name]

So it looks like Trump and Carson are almost tied in the polls.

Poll has an error of +/- 6%. Why bother posting it? More accurate polls show trump in the high twenties. Carson is far behind trump.

[Hooahguy]

I actually did not see that part, my bad. But regardless, Carson is coming in not that far behind Trump.

[Hooahguy]

So Carson, who said after the recent shooting at the college that he would charge the shooter and try to take him out, in a recent interview he told a story when he was held up at gunpoint:

I have had a gun held on me when I was in a Popeyes [in Baltimore]. … A guy comes in, puts the gun in my ribs, and I just said, "I believe that you want the guy behind the counter." … He said, "Oh, okay."

Normally this wouldn't be a huge deal because when you have a gun pointed at you its pretty difficult to tell how you will react. But to imply that victims of mass shootings were cowards, then admit that when a gun was pointed at you, you cowered and directed the gun at someone else, that's pretty despicable.

[Montmorency]

Carson is a real alpha, none of that pussy-ass BS.

We don't need more gun ownership to stop crime - we need more Ben Carson.

[Hooahguy]

The Democratic debate is actually pretty good I think. Much less of a circus than the GOP one was.

Hilariously enough, Trump went on twitter and called it "This is one of the most dysfunctional debates I've seen in my lifetime."