The voters who turned out for Jill Stein were people who would have (and essentially did) vote for anyone else than Clinton. They did so knowing that Stein could not win, and despite the fact that Jill Stein is no more informed than Trump on many issues that she supports, such as quantitative easing . Arguing that third candidates are “spoiling” an election ignores the fact that people who vote for those candidates are essentially refusing to vote for a main party candidate because their values or practices are so far away from what they can even turn their nose and vote for. Given the paltry number of votes that Stein got, it shouldn’t have even been a rounding error into the margin a candidate like Clinton should have carried against an obtuse oaf like Trump.
And I don’t know how many more ways this can be stated, but Hillary Clinton was a historically disliked candidate (only eclipsed by Trump) and started the campaign with a net negative voter approval. In other words, she was already in competition with her main component on just getting less people to dislike her. If you want to blame anyone for Clinton having performed so poorly, the first finger should be pointed back at Clinton and the party who promoted her despite the obvious public sentiment about her, regardless of her qualifications or the legitimacy of the alleged scandals.
Interesting that yet another political thread has been diverted to talk about GUNS!!, and the God-given Second Commandment that makes the U.S.A. such a very very special snowflake.
I’m no gun-grabber — in fact I warned Hillary (right here on this very board!) not to emphasize gun control. But it continues to amaze that of all the important issues at stake in national elections, so many Americans make it all about GUNS!!.
The President has huge power over
the risk of foreign wars
peace in the Middle East and elsewhere
economic decisions that could affect millions of jobs
judge appointments that will affect the course of civil rights and politics for decades to come
the environment
education
Yet a huge number of Americans focus on one issue which has little to do with the Presidential duties: GUNS!! They pull the R lever for no other reason than their perceptions about GUNS!!. Four years from now, no matter how the economy is faring, no matter what the state of civil rights in America, or cop killings, or the direction of environmental solutions, or global financial, political or military crises, they will go into the polling booth and once again base their vote almost entirely on their maniacal obsessions for GUNS!!
Has there ever been (in modern times) a presidential candidate, not a president up for re-election, who went into the primaries in such a fashion as HRC did? That is, with everyone assuming the nomination was hers for the taking? The only other person I can think of is-- HRC in 2008 when Obama came out of “nowhere” just like Bernie did in 2016. I have to think that part of the reason people disliked her was the sense of entitlement. But when it comes down to it, was that her fault or the party’s fault? I don’t think HRC campaigned very well, but it was the party that put her up on a pedestal in the first place, no?
People used to say that the Republicans always gave the nomination to whoever’s “turn” it was, but there was always a tough fight from the beginning, regardless. Republicans fall in line, Democrats fall in love. Disliked as she was, the party faithful loved her at the start like no one else!
I quoted from Ted Rall’s site before, and yet again, from the comments in Why Trump Won: I have never seen the American ruling class as united as they were in telling us to vote for Hillary.
I have a theory that this itself defeated Hillary, in that voters got suspicious of unanimity from those preachers, just as they would of all the rich and powerful insisting to them Flint’s Water was therapeutic.
The entire media was in the bag for Hillary, warning against Trump — he got no or few endorsements from even Republican publications — the Kochs preferred her; she courted, and boasted of her friendship with, Henry Kissinger, and other relics of the Nixon era.
and more: The DNC has sat there watching incrementalism burn away the middle class for 35 years. Jobs have disappeared. People have lost everything. We still don’t have universal healthcare. College tuition has gone into orbit. Young people who have done everything by the book are having to move back in with mom and dad–instead of “Friends” it’s “The Waltons”–and the DNC and the rest of the Democratic leadership are honestly confounded as to why any of these things are problems. Sure, none of them have these problems, but why can’t people just understand that 35 years of middle-of-the-roadism is going to eventually pay off? Just take a few more pay cuts. Maybe another job loss or two. Perhaps your kid can accept going to community college for two years and then going to a state school for 18 months of concentrated study, because, sure, that isn’t how the DNCer’s kid is going to college, but you need to understand that not everyone can have nice things.
So, Trump’s regime will make these sad people happy again? He’ll make college affordable, institute universal healthcare & magically cause excellent jobs to appear for all high school grads?
The Democratic party hasn’t been perfect but the gullible fools who expect Strong Man Trump the save them will be disappointed.
Other people have different priorities than you do. It’s really as simple as that, and your (and the Democrat’s) tendency to try to insult people into voting for your candidate has never worked. “I think that this issue that’s important to you is SO STUPID that I have to use ***THREE TAGS AND TWO EXCLAMATION POINTS!!***to mock its importance to you, which means that you’re going to ignore your own priorities and OBVIOUSLY!! will now vote for who I want you to”.
It makes about as much sense as a conservative coming onto the board and claiming that Trump opposers voting against him because GAYS!! are being silly and should worry about real issues instead of getting all agitated about TWO GUYS MARRYING!!.
Clinton voted for the Iraq War to happen as a Senator and during the campaign supported setting up no-fly zones that would require shooting down a nuclear power’s planes if they contested it, she’s not a peace candidate regardless of what people on this board like to say. So if someone believes that these are priority points and guns are unimportant, then they were definitely right not to vote for Clinton, because one thing she has made abundantly clear is that she actively seeks out and supports foreign wars.
If you’re going to argue ‘these things are more important, you should vote based on them’, make sure that they’re not issues your candidate is bad on.
People voting against (or not for) Clinton for her gun control position are explicitly taking into account her judicial appointments and how they will affect the course of civil rights and politics for decades to come. That’s an explicit worry that has been mentioned multiple times in this thread, and saying ‘gosh, why are you so worried about this one category of civil rights, don’t you know that the president affects civil rights for decades to come’ isn’t really a coherent argument.
It’s called a typo, they began back when people first started typing and the concept goes back to when writing was invented, and are not uncommon when one is quickly writing a post on a message board instead of proofreading a formal paper. If it was a deliberate style choice then I’d write that way consistently, but there are other similar sentences on here from me where I didn’t leave off a the word.
And saying that you’re not attacking the poster when derailing the discussion by making a big deal out of a poster’s typo is… rather dubious.
No doubt, but the screams that these fools will be disappointed of their hopes in Trump — ‘They may ring their bells now, before long they will be wringing their hands.’ in utter condescension — not only supposes they actually have confiding hopes in him, but that the establishment still hasn’t learnt the lesson of the election.
Not that they preferred Trump, but they are so sick of being played by the great and good — and there never will be more establishment figures than the hapless boobs Hillary and Jeb! ---- they would select Satan just to stick it to the masters.
And Hillary wouldn’t have done any of those things either.
No, I really want to know, because I have seen the exact thing elsewhere, and as I said, I make typing mistakes myself.
Or maybe many of the “gullible fools” who expected JugearS Obama to save them were disappointed and didn’t bother to vote for a third term of Obama without Obama at the helm?
Jill Stein, and the Green Party, really helped kick Hillary’s ass to the curb.
[QUOTE=Me, parodying septimus]
Interesting that yet another political thread has been diverted to talk about SPEECH!!, and the God-given First Commandment that makes the U.S.A. such a very very special snowflake.
I’m no press-grabber — in fact I warned Hillary (right here on this very board!) not to emphasize speech control. But it continues to amaze that of all the important issues at stake in national elections, so many Americans make it all about SPEECH!!.
The President has huge power over
the risk of foreign wars
peace in the Middle East and elsewhere
economic decisions that could affect millions of jobs
judge appointments that will affect the course of civil rights and politics for decades to come
the environment
education
Yet a huge number of Americans focus on one issue which has little to do with the Presidential duties: SPEECH!! They pull the R lever for no other reason than their perceptions about SPEECH!!. Four years from now, no matter how the economy is faring, no matter what the state of civil rights in America, or cop killings, or the direction of environmental solutions, or global financial, political or military crises, they will go into the polling booth and once again base their vote almost entirely on their maniacal obsessions for SPEECH!!
Jesus weeps.
[/QUOTE]
Everything you said is true. Now imagine the person saying this is defending a candidate who openly calls the First Amendment “anachronistic” and says that they want to pack the Supreme Court with Justices who agree that the First Amendment should be repealed. A candidate who points to the UK’s strict libel laws, Ireland’s or the Netherlands’ blasphemy laws and German laws against swastikas as admirable, and “worth looking into”.
If Trump had said all this would you be saying, “well, the president doesn’t really have anything to do with censorship laws anyway”? No. A president who denies basic freedoms and wants to repeal part of the Bill of Rights is fucking scary.
You say Hillary shouldn’t have chosen to “emphasize” gun control.
Why – if what you say in big capital letters is true – should it be an issue at all?
Why make it a question of emphasis? Why not just give up that issue, the better to champion all the other stuff you’re on about?
You say we should focus on war and peace and the economy and the environment and civil rights and education, and that plenty of voters shy away from the Dems in order to “base their vote almost entirely on” this one issue; why not just accept that, okay, fine, this one we shouldn’t de-emphasize; this one we should just drop?
It’s a different issue what influence the NRA has on the GOP (or some elected Democrats for that matter). But in terms of votes, the NRA claims to have 5 million members, and my unscientific experience says a fair % of them think it’s too extreme on gun control politics. But it’s estimated, if more roughly, at least 10 times that many Americans own guns.
It’s reasonable to say that specifically and openly aiming to please the NRA is unlikely to yield net votes for the Democrats. It’s head in the sand to say gun control doesn’t lose a significant number of gross votes for the Democrats, when their position is like Hillary’s. It’s obviously cost them over the years in the House and state legislatures.
I don’t think guns is a smart thing to focus on because I don’t think it’s the major reason the Dems have lost so much of the non-urban vote, but I’d say it’s probably smart policy for the DNC to push gun control as a state issue. That way Ohio Democrats can come out hard for gun freedoms and California ones can come out hard for gun control, making it a Federal issue is a mistake, not only strategically but also from a matter of good policy. I don’t think we need Federal gun laws because the cultural and practical realities of guns in society are just vastly different in Tennessee than in New Jersey.
Certainly not for the DNC, and I can’t think of a GOP candidate who was not a sitting President or Vice-President who was assured of the nomination; even with Reagan, who ultimately swept both the primary and main election, was at first seriously contested by George H.W. Bush (who actually was slightly ahead in early straw polls) despite strong party support.
Part of the problem was no doubt the perception that progressive Democrats (with whom Clinton elected to brand herself with despite being fairly politically middle of the road and late to the table for many progressive causes like same sex marriage) were more interested in the needs of minorities and marginalized groups than middle class working Americans, and so a lot of the support for Trump was based on a rejection of perceived “political correctness” was clearly an emotional appeal for attention, which the Clinton campaign didn’t help by essentially ignoring many working class states that are historically assumed to vote Democratic, which she also failed to appeal to the “Bernie” liberals who were legitimately concerned about corporate influence in government because of her own fundraising and personal connections to Wall Street banks. She ran assuming her suburban and urban base would be sufficient to carry her without even shooting for a national “mandate” by all voters in what at least appeared to be a sense of entitlement and/or disconnection from the concerns of working class voters.
Clinton was legitimately more experienced in governance (regardless of your estimation of her performance) than anyone else running from any party, and at least would have been a competent administrator (she’d certainly be taking security briefings and consulting with the State Department before taking calls from foreign leaders), but she was at best marginally appealing to the American public, and not with sufficient broad appeal to carry the Electoral College distribution. No matter what you personally think of Hillary Clinton’s performance, politics, or proposed policies, she was just a terrible candidate to present given public perception, and it is the public that (effectively) elects the President, even if not by direct public vote.
Yes, I know, single issue voters both amaze and disgust me.
What amazes me is that i know two guys, who love guns but were very liberal. After hanging out with various other “gun nuts” and belonging to the NRA, they both turned reactionary, recently forwarding the worst kind of Roveian lies about Hillary, and of course “Obama is gonna come for our guns” etc.
These guys are Pro-choice, against tax cuts for the wealthy, know that Human caused Global warming is a fact, etc- but vote straight GOP and hate Hillary and Obama with a white hot hatred. :eek:
Again, guns had nothing to do with her losing. The pro-gun side was gonna vote GOP in any case. And if she abandoned the anti-gun 50%, they would have run to Stein in greater numbers.
I dont like Hillary’s anti-gun stance, but it’s mild and it had nothing whatsoever to do with her loss.
So, yes, Clinton took some money form Goldman Sachs and gave some speeches.
Trump is appointing two GS executives to high positions.
Clinton, along with most of the House and Senate, voted for the Iraq War.
Trump said he supported that, and is the candidate of the party* that started that war*.** Started, mostly, to enrich GOP cronies. ** It was a GOP war.
So, if you wanted the peace candidate, you’d vote for Clinton as the lesser of two evils. By overwhelming choice.
So yeah "* ‘these things are more important, you should vote based on them’*, so I voted for Clinton.
You do realize that Trump basically did do all that? He said he was going to be “opening up the libel laws” so that he could sue the press. He has no love of the first amendment, and is the first to criticize it, anytime anyone criticizes him.
And to that point, there are more restrictions on the first amendment than there are on the second. You can’t yell fire in a theater, but you can bring your gun.
It may have gotten her more pro-gun votes if she had softened her stance on guns, but most likely, those single issue voters wouldn’t have believed her. You note how many times we have been warned that obama’s gonna take our guns? How many times has that happened. So, no matter what stance she took on guns, it wouldn’t have made a difference to the single issue pro-gun voter.
It would have made a difference, however, to her democratic base, as she has quite a number of anti-gun voters. This is actually one of the things that I think bernie would have been up against, as his stance on guns is very out of line with the democratic party’s.
