Omnibus Politics Thread: Campaign 2016 EditionFollow

Rand Paul is dropping out of the race. Santorum is expected to (he's suspending operations in S. Carolina and if Mr. Religion is giving up there...)

Aw, cripes, we're gonna end up with President Cruz, aren't we. ****.

Well, women's rights would still go into the crapper, but we wouldn't necessarily be pushed to a 20% sales tax to save the rich. So that's nice.

You mean Women's Entitlements.

I'd rather have Donald Trump, honestly. At least he doesn't represent the Tea Party. At least all the incredibly stupid things Trump says are to garner attention from the stupid crowd and not actually a moron like Ted Cruz. If he would break his promise not to run as a third party candidate it would essentially make him a ******* hero for destroying the chances of whoever the Republican front-runner ends up being. I would name my next son after him. I am dead serious.

Santorum is out. Time to launder the sheets.

So, can anyone who's kind of not-crazy explain why Trump is alleging voter fraud, other than the fact that he lost? I know Cruz's campaign sent out questionable fliers, but what are the accusations against Microsoft about?

Because Cruzers told CNN that CNN that Carson was exiting the race and that his voters should caucus for him because Carson was no longer viable based on Iowa's whack rules. Cruz apparently also mailed out violation notifications that looked official to likely supporters to try to get them to vote.

Mostly he is mad though. Mad because bad.

Potentially, Trump could be setting up for a third party run. Which he said he wouldn't do if the GOP "was fair" to him. So start laying groundwork for how you got cheated and there ya go.

I'm not advocating that this is the case. Just rollin' out conspiracy theories.

Edited, Feb 3rd 2016 2:15pm by Jophiel

Jeb Bush should run as a third party candidate so he can get rejected by the American people all over again.

She is in a lose-lose situation. When she had a huge lead at the start, people complained that we weren't being democratic for supporting one person. Furthermore, she should have a tough primary to prepare her for the general election. Then when she gets a tough election, then she's not a strong candidate.

I don't see Sanders dropping out prior to Super Tuesday, even if he lost NH, SC and NV.

Um... Sure. But young voters who don't think the same way people just 10 years their senior do, account for a pretty small percentage of voters (primary or otherwise). They can't possibly account for the general election polling we're seeing. It's far more likely that's being driven by a largish percentage of those polled not knowing anything about Sanders. Unknowns always poll well in the "if the election were held today" match ups. Because we are always looking hopefully to the new guy to be better than the guy we know about. But once we learn about the new guy, he never matches up to the perfect hoped for alternative and then falls a bit. And in the case of Sanders, what's unknown about him is a huge deal breaker for most voters.



Having more information doesn't equate to being more informed. Just saying. Young people are just as easily manipulated today as they were in past generations. There's just a lot more sources of potential manipulation available.



Yes. Because young people are dumb and can't see past next week. That's not new. Most people outgrow the "magic fairies will save us and it wont cost us anything" ideas about politics (which is basically what socialism is) by the time they get into their late 20s or early 30s. They learn that everything that appears to be "free" actually has a cost, and start looking for that cost. And they learn not to buy the snake oil that someone's trying to sell them.

Bernie's support is bolstered by the fact that Clinton is such an unlikable candidate that people are desperately looking for *anyone* else to support. But for many people right now, it's literally "he's not Clinton". That's it. Now maybe he's able to carry that through the primary process. I doubt it. I think at some point, even Democrat voters will have enough sanity to realize he's a really bad idea. But even if somehow he manages to win the Dem nomination, he simply can't win the general. I mean, maybe if Trump wins the GOP nomination. Maybe. Probably not even then though. And anyone other than Trump will look like a font of sanity and stability next to Bernie Sanders.

He's a crazy old socialist. Period. He's not even a hip happening, hide-my-socialism-behind-clever-language guy like Obama. Oddly, I actually somewhat respect Sanders for at least being honest about his ideas. But that's why he's not a viable national candidate and never has been. The only reason he's doing remotely well is because people are so anti-Clinton, and there's literally no one else in the Democratic party to go to. He got into the race because he was not supposed to be a threat to Clinton. Everyone who "ran" on the Dem side was there solely to make it not quite so obvious that Clinton was to be the anointed candidate this time and no one was to take it away from her. They needed warm but not threatening bodies to prop up at podiums to pretend to debate Clinton and make her (hopefully) look good in comparison. Which is why the only people who ran other than Clinton was a list of perennial "also-rans". The shocking thing is that he's somehow actually doing well against her. But his popularity is not because he or his platform is popular, but because she's so incredibly unpopular.


Again though, his odds of doing more than being an annoyance to Clinton in the primary is very very low. He wins Iowa and NH, and almost certainly loses everywhere else (except Vermont presumably). Maybe he does well in Maine or some other small nutty-left commune like state, but his delegate count will be super low. Again though, what he's really showing us is not his strength, but her weakness.