The 2016 Presidential Candidates Thread

[Gunky]

Yes I think it is scorched earth when you impugn a candidate's integrity and suggest that they are bribed by energy or wall street or whatever contributors. If that is really true how are you going to support this candidate when nominated (and she does have a couple million more votes so far than Bernie)? This is sounding suspiciously like the repub campaign - candidates saying they'll support the eventual nominee but meanwhile making accusations which if true are disqualifying. Yep, Bernie and his camp have gone negative. And if the true believer Bernie camp on this board is representative, very negative.

And some of the Bern thing is ridiculous cult of personality, like that hagiographic drawing of Bernie with the sparrow. It looks like those comic book heroic poses you see picturing dictators and glorious sunbeams. Give me a break! Perhaps he should run for saint rather than prez. (And when I watched the vid, the spell was broken when he forgot the bird was there and waved his arm, then tried to make some facile comparison of a real finch to an abstract dove of peace.) People are swooning over Bernie's uncompromising far left crankery, as though jeering from the sidelines in Congress for decades is a record of accomplishment. The Peter Principle candidate: he hasn't done well in congress so let's make him president! A left-wing Ted Cruz. Plus it's all so one-dimensional. Single theme and everything else is vague. Nearly as canned and memorized as Rubio.

 

[His_Highness]

Yes I think it is scorched earth when you impugn a candidate's integrity and suggest that they are bribed by energy or wall street or whatever contributors. If that is really true how are you going to support this candidate when nominated (and she does have a couple million more votes so far than Bernie)? This is sounding suspiciously like the repub campaign - candidates saying they'll support the eventual nominee but meanwhile making accusations which if true are disqualifying. Yep, Bernie and his camp have gone negative. And if the true believer Bernie camp on this board is representative, very negative.

The idea behind a campaign is to highlight the differences among the candidates. Pointing out that your opponent takes money from the corporations they are admonishing and have said she will reign in WHILE YOU ARE NOT TAKING MONEY FROM THEM and WOULD NOT TAKE MONEY FROM THEM.... is not negative unless you add 'She is bought and paid for'.

This is an important difference. It should be known. It's not negative campaigning anymore than pointing out the difference between their healthcare approaches are. It just happens that the difference is a negative for Hillary and because Bernie is taking the high road.

 

[cybrguy]

Positive campaigning is touting your own bona fides, qualities, and plans. Tearing down your opponent is negative campaigning. It is that simple. Some things ARE black and white.

I am not suggesting how campaigns should be run, I am merely defining the words we are using.

 

[Magic9]

"Hillary Clinton's campaign and the Super PAC supporting her have received more than $4.5 million from the fossil fuel industry." -Greenpeace

Is that a true statement?

“The fact of the matter is Secretary Clinton has taken significant money from the fossil fuel industry. She raises her money with a ‘super PAC,’” Mr. Sanders said. “She gets a lot of money from Wall Street, from the drug companies and fossil fuel industry.”

Is that a true statement?

http://www.salon.com/2016/04/01/hil...after_she_shouts_down_environmental_activist/

“Secretary Clinton is conflating Greenpeace with the Sanders campaign, but we are an independent organization, and our research team has assessed the contributions to all Presidential candidates.”

 

[grokit]

Sanders only receives capped individual donations, that's why it's so much less. Some of the donations are from individuals that work for big energy. Hillary receives cap-free bundled pac donations; these are very different because they are larger, with institutional goals in mind, and with no individual accountability.

 

[His_Highness]

So any difference that is pointed out that would paint your opponent in a bad light when the difference factually raised is negative campaigning? Every single difference between opponents will be a negative to one or the other. It's what makes horse racing, the stock market and politics work. On that basis I would have to agree with you @cybrguy and @Gunky. Pointing out that difference is a definite negative for Hillary and therefore, in a black and white world, could be defined as negative campaigning.

I also think there is another standard for negative campaigning that differs from the black and white. If you define negative campaigning using political campaign standards as the guideline I would have to disagree. You gotta move that negative needle way more for that definition to hold up.

Here's the issue and the reason why I don't see it as negative campaigning:
- Both candidates talk about campaign finance reform. Only one of them is walking the walk during the campaign.
- Both candidates talk about 'too big to fail' and Wall Street. Only one of them is taking money from these same institutions.

Bernie must make these differences known to the public...it goes to a fundamental difference between him and Hillary. It's the correct thing to do. The only reason this is an issue for Hillary and her supporters is because it makes her look disingenuous to talk about the above reforms while taking their money.

 

[cybrguy]

The Red/Blue State Divide Continues to Widen

When we talk about the red/blue state divide, it is usually in reference to things like the electoral college or the party that controls governorships and state legislatures. But increasingly, we are seeing that divide widen in terms of how policy differences impact the residents of different states.

For example, much has been made of the economic mess created in red states like Kansas and Louisiana. When the Supreme Court allowed states the option to chose whether or not to expand Medicaid under Obamacare, the gap widened in terms of the number of people who are uninsured. Again, as a result of a Supreme Court decision, red states are passing laws that impede the right to vote. They are attempting to defund Planned Parenthood and restrict a woman’s right to chose. In trying to pass laws that allow people to discriminate against LGBT Americans, they are continuing to run into trouble with businesses and sports/entertainment industries. But I suspect they’ll keep trying.

Meanwhile, we can make comparisons like the one I did about how a Democratic-run state like Minnesota is out-performing a Republican-run state like Wisconsin - even though they share a lot in common. It turns out that doing things like improving educational opportunities, providing health insurance for those who can’t afford it, giving women access to reproductive health services, enhancing citizen’s access to voting, and supporting equal rights for everyone doesn’t create a socialist dystopia - but environments where people tend to thrive.

Now we’re watching some of the divide widen even more. For example, look what’s happening with the minimum wage lately.

Seattle’s minimum wage is now rising toward fifteen dollars per hour (for some workers, it is already at thirteen dollars), and during this election season the Fight for 15 has suddenly become not a fringe movement but a mainstream one…In December, Rahm Emanuel, the embattled Chicago mayor, signed a law that will push the minimum wage to thirteen dollars per hour by 2019. And yesterday, California lawmakers passed a measure that will lift the state’s minimum wage to fifteen dollars an hour by 2022. Hours later, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and state legislators announced that they had reached a deal to get to fifteen dollars an hour, and by as soon as 2018 in New York City. Combined, the New York State and California labor forces are roughly as large as France’s.
Here is what Rebecca Traister reports on paid family leave.

You say you want a revolution? A political, social, economic policy upheaval that will dramatically alter the playing field for millions of Americans by significantly reducing economic and gender inequality? Don’t look to the presidential campaign. Look closer to home. On the last day of March, the New York State legislature finalized a budget deal that included not only a promise to raise the minimum wage to $15, but also the nation’s newest — and by far its strongest and most comprehensive — bill mandating paid-family-leave time for most employees. That means that New York has just become the fifth state — after California, which passed its family-leave insurance program in 2002 and implemented it in 2004, New Jersey (2009), Rhode Island (2014) and Washington (which passed its measure in 2007 but has not yet put it into effect) — to mandate paid leave. And compared to its progressive predecessors, New York’s bill is startlingly robust.
One way to look at all of this is to worry about the growing divide these kinds of developments suggest. But it is possible that - as we’re beginning to see with Medicaid expansion - it will grow increasingly difficult to stop the long slow march of progress in red states. We’ll have to see how that one plays out.

 

[grokit]

^ Did somebody mention the rise in partisanship?

Summary:
Political Polarization in the U.S. Congress has been a topic of much discussion recently. We show the party polarization of the House of Representatives through time, with a focus on which members continue to participate across party lines (such as southern Democrats from Alabama, Mississippi, Texas and Louisiana cooperating with many Republican voters in the late 1990's and 2000's).

"detailed networks 1949 -2013:

• 1949
• 1953
• 1957
• 1961
• 1965
• 1969
• 1973
• 1977
• 1981
• 1985
• 1989
• 1993
• 1997
• 2001
• 2005
• 2009
• 2011

Description:
Each member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1949 - 2012 is drawn as a single node. Republican (R) representatives are in red and Democrat (D) representatives are in blue, party affiliation changes are not reflected. Edges between nodes are drawn if each member agrees with another member more often than the "threshold value" of votes specific to that particular Congress. The threshold value is the number of agreements where any pair exhibiting this number of agreements is equally likely to comprised of two members of the same party (e.g. D-D or R-R), or a cross-party pair (e.g. D-R). (Methodology and mathematical descriptions available in our paper). Each node is made bigger or smaller based on the number of connections it has. Edges are thicker if the pair agrees on more votes. The starting year of each 2-year Congress is written above the network. The network is drawn using a linear-attraction linear-repulsion model with Barnes Hut optimization.


http://www.mamartino.com/projects/rise_of_partisanship/

 

[cybrguy]

I am perfectly happy with the idea of campaign finance reform. I think citizens united is probably the worst thing that ever happened to political campaigns and the idea that speech = money is ridiculous. Unlimited money in campaigning can do nothing but invite corruption and encourage unreasonable and unfair influence from moneyed interests. It is nothing but a downside for honest politics and it is CRAZY to allow it.

However, it IS the law of the land. I expect half a Billion dollars to be spent against Hillary in the coming election. Do you REALLY think it would be wise for her to unilaterally disarm and allow the Republicans to completely overwhelm her advertising so she can claim to have "done the right thing?". Is that really what you advise?

If Bernie were the only competition I think it would just fine to "do the right thing". But he's not, and if you think the Republicans are going to "do the right thing", you are stupid.

 

[His_Highness]

I expect half a Billion dollars to be spent against Hillary in the coming election. Do you REALLY think it would be wise for her to unilaterally disarm and allow the Republicans to completely overwhelm her advertising so she can claim to have "done the right thing?". Is that really what you advise?

If Bernie were the only competition I think it would just fine to "do the right thing". But he's not, and if you think the Republicans are going to "do the right thing", you are stupid.

Got it....Hillary's not 'doing the right thing'.... but Bernie is. Thank you for making my point and why it's necessary to get that difference noted during the campaign.

Is the excuse for not doing the right thing because the republicans won't? This ass-u-mes she would have done the right thing if not for the republicans. So ...doing the right thing....maybe next election? Oh wait...there may still be republicans out there.

I was going to add that doing the right thing shouldn't be based on whether it's politically expedient or not but I'm already voting for Bernie and it's one of the reasons why so that would be redundant. I'd be better off pointing out that doing the right thing only when it's politically advantageous would add to the already established feeling that she isn't trustworthy.

In case the distinction wasn't clear earlier....everything I just said would truly fit the definition of a negative campaign and Bernie isn't even coming close to the level I've just set.

 

[Gunky]

Same absolutist bs as Ted Cruz. In a political system which involves campaign contributions, suddenly the candidates are subjected to Bernie's litmus test, under which you can take 50K from fossil fuel industry employees, but not 300K (that would be unconscionable!). The 50K need not be returned, but the 300k must be returned and an apology tendered. Teachers union? OK. A bank? No! Maybe we need a complete list of organizations and individuals who are politically correct sources of campaign donations.

Look if Bernie can take 50K then Clinton can take 300K. If he is practically unable to refuse them, how is she supposed to? It's a matter of degree only. So in regard to individual contributions from fossil fuel industry employees, both take donations therefore they are identical and it's a non-issue.

Superpac money. Hillary is not allowed legally to coordinate with super pacs. If she told them not to take such and such Bernie true believers would say she is a scoff-law. If it is illegal for her to get involved, refuse or accept, this is a non-issue.

What is left to object to: 1 million in lobbyist or lobbyist bundled donations. This amounts to less than one percent of her donations. Eh. BFD

 

[cybrguy]

I expect Hillary to do whatever she can from the White House to kill Citizens United and enact campaign reform that dramatically reduces the money in politics that the Supreme Court has allowed. But you need to remember that congress has control of that, not the President. It is up to congress to pass laws that outlaw unlimited money in politics, and in such a way that the Supreme Court will leave it intact. Having a couple more left leaning jurists on that court won't hurt either.
I would be perfectly happy to go back to a time that presidential candidates get X number of $ from the Fed to run their campaigns and that is all they can spend, but good luck getting that passed. If you want this to happen, it is up to YOU to elect people to congress that will go along. Are you gonna do that?
Either way, this election goes along with the laws that exist today and not the laws that you would LIKE to be in effect. But if we elect people who want what WE want, there is at least a possibility for change. Whining won't help, however...

 

[grokit]

Hilary calling anybody a liar is the proverbial pot calling the kettle black
People trust bernie, and they know he's not accepting any pac $.

It's much more than just the pac $ anyways;

"...the Clinton campaign has at least 40 registered lobbyists that have that have worked against climate change regulations, or advocated for similar anti-environment projects such as offshore drilling. We’re not sure what Clinton was getting out when she said she was sick of the Sanders campaign lying, but we think her track record speaks for itself. You can watch the video of Hillary’s response [below]."

http://www.nationofchange.org/news/2016/04/01/hillary-clinton-sick-sanders-campaign-lying/

 

[CarolKing]

Maybe something can get changed with all this controversy about big money in presidential elections. It seems to be something that is important among the American people. I thank Bernie for shedding more light on this even if he doesn't get the nomination.

Bernie has lots of money so there's no reason for him to get out. He will probably stay in until summer or the convention.

Edit
I think what really appeals to me is Bernie's stance on not policing the world. It's not our job.

 

[Magic9]

Clinton can keep the $4.5 million her campaign and superPACs have accepted from the fossil fuel industry.

She owes Sanders an apology for saying she's so sick of the Sanders campaign lying about her after a Greenpeace activist asked her a question.

Where is the lie?

Edit*

I'm calling it now. She's laying the groundwork this week to go negative soon. Depending on how much she loses WI by and how much ground Sanders makes up in NY polling.

 

[grokit]

For me it's all about yemen atm. Just like libya, syria, iraq, afghanistan, pakistan etc. before it, these are countries that have been mercilessly attacked by the neo-con/lib kissenger/nwo war machine.

“The suffering is staggering”: 6 Yemeni children killed or wounded daily in U.S.-backed Saudi war; millions face catastrophe

UN report warns the violence and torment Yemen's youth endure amid 1 year of Saudi bombing "shatters their world"

For children in Yemen, “even playing or sleeping has become dangerous”

The U.S. and U.K. have sold the Saudi dictatorship tens of billions of dollars worth of weapons in recent years. The countries also provide intelligence to the Saudi regime, and American and British military officials are even physically in the room with Saudi bombers.

Human rights organizations say the billions of dollars of weapons the U.S. and the U.K. have sold to the Saudi regime have been used to commit war crimes.

“Attacks on schools and hospitals and the denial of humanitarian assistance to children continue to occur,” the U.N. agency said.

more:
https://www.salon.com/2016/03/31/th..._millions_face_catastrophe/?source=newsletter

 

[Magic9]

^ To add to that.

http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/article/msf-supported-hospital-bombed-northern-yemen

“All warring parties, including the Saudi-led coalition, are regularly informed of the GPS coordinates of the medical sites where MSF works, and we are in constant dialogue with them to ensure that they understand the severity of the humanitarian consequences of the conflict and the need to respect the provision of medical services,” said Raquel Ayora, MSF director of operations.

“There is no way that anyone with the capacity to carry out an airstrike or launch a rocket would not have known that the Shiara Hospital was a functioning health facility providing critical services and supported by MSF. We reiterate to all parties to the conflict that patients and medical facilities must be respected and that bombing hospitals is a violation of international humanitarian law.”

 

[Gunky]

Clinton left office as secretary of state in Feb 2013. The Yemen civil war began in 2015. At least get the facts straight. True believers!

Paul Krugman on the successes of the Obama administration:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/01/opinion/learning-from-obama.html

 

[macbill]

We Democrat and Independent folks disagree on which individual has the fewer sins. But if you are like me, whomever makes the cut has my vote.

Not too many folks here seem to be out-of-the-closet Trumpians or Tedsters. I think this would be a hard crowd to come out Trumply.

 

[Farid]

Clinton left office as secretary of state in Feb 2013. The Yemen civil war began in 2015. At least get the facts straight. True believers!

Clinton is way too cozy with the Saudis. While she was in office she supported policies that led to major deals with the Saudi military. Using American tax dollars, Saudi Arabia unleashed all hell on the people of Yemen instead of against ISIS.

 

[grokit]

edit: from the huffington post, a well-known conservative mouthpiece

Saudi’s Exploding Christmas Gifts From Hillary Clinton

As Hillary Clinton emerges as the front-runner for the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate, she is receiving increased scrutiny for her years as Secretary of State. Many are criticizing her hawkish foreign policy, which is the best indication of what President Hillary’s foreign policy would be, with many focusing on her long relationship with Saudi Arabia.

On Christmas Eve in 2011, Hillary Clinton and her closest aides celebrated a $29.4 billion sale of over 80 F-15 fighter jets, manufactured by U.S.-based Boeing Corporation, to Saudi Arabia. In a chain of enthusiastic emails, an aide exclaimed that it was “not a bad Christmas present.”

These are the very fighter jets the Saudis have been using to intervene in the internal affairs of Yemen since March 2015. A year later, at least 2,800 Yemeni civilians have been killed, mostly by airstrikes—and there is no end in sight...

more:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/medea-benjamin/hillary-clinton-saudi-arabia_b_9374490.html

 

[Gunky]

How dare Ms. Clinton not know back in 2011 that the planes she (and Obama) allowed to be sold to Saudi Arabia to counter-balance an increasingly aggressive Iran (a policy which has gone on for decades) would years later when she was out of office be used to bomb Yemen? I think I just caught the scent of some dumbass anti-Clinton talking points from some internet tool. Ms. Clinton was secretary of state for a few years ergo she is now and forever responsible for anything that goes wrong anywhere. Welcome to the world of Clinton haters. Ignore list is expanding.

 

[Magic9]

Clinton refuses to apologize for saying the Sanders campaign is "lying about her" when asked a question (unrelated to Sanders, it was Greenpeace data) by a Greenpeace activist (unrelated to Sanders campaign).

If anyone can link to where Sanders lied about this, please post it. I can only find variations of the following quote;

"The fact of the matter is Secretary Clinton has taken significant money from the fossil fuel industry. She raises her money with a ‘super PAC,’” Mr. Sanders said. “She gets a lot of money from Wall Street, from the drug companies and fossil fuel industry."

Funniest part of the whole thing?

http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/01/politics/hillary-clinton-oil-gas-donations-obama/index.html

---

I hope no one takes anything too personal here. I enjoy this thread and hope it remains civil.

 

[Gunky]

The Sanders campaign is exaggerating the contributions that Clinton has received from the oil and gas industry. In the context of her overall campaign, the contributions are hardly significant. It’s especially misleading to count all of the funds raised by lobbyists with multiple clients as money “given” by the fossil-fuel industry.


Three Pinocchios

 

[Farid]

How dare Ms. Clinton not know back in 2011 that the planes she (and Obama) allowed to be sold to Saudi Arabia to counter-balance an increasingly aggressive Iran (a policy which has gone on for decades) would years later when she was out of office be used to bomb Yemen? I think I just caught the scent of some dumbass anti-Clinton talking points from some internet tool. Ms. Clinton was secretary of state for a few years ergo she is now and forever responsible for anything that goes wrong anywhere. Welcome to the world of Clinton haters. Ignore list is expanding.

Give me a break, we didn't support Saudi Arabia to counterbalance Iran. The United States has been supporting Saudi Arabia for decades. The Gulf war was about largely about protecting Saudi Arabia from an unpredictable Saddam. If we thought Iran was a threat that needed to be counterbalanced, we wouldn't have invaded Iraq and basically handed the country to Iran on a silver platter. The events which have transpired over the past five years which have helped Iran wouldn't have happened without poor decision making on the side of the Coalition and the Saudis.

The Saudi and American narrative is just not appealing to the people of the ME. Saudi Arabia projects its influence through sectarianism. They encourage schools of Islam like Wahhabism which are takfiri, meaning they consider all other schools of Islam as illegitimate.

Iran on the other hand has been successful in recent times by focusing on unity. Even if Iran is a Shia dominant country, the leaders of Iran know that the wars in Iraq and Syria cannot be won if the fault lines are by religious sect. That's why many of the Shia militias in Iraq started accepting Christians and Sunnis.

In fact the only country which proposed a good solution to the problem of the Afghan government was Iran. The United States was set on Hamid Karzai, but the Iranians wanted to hold elections. They feared that if the Coalition picked the leader then they would pick a puppet, which is exactly what happened.

I think the reason Iran treats the nature of the conflict differently is because the conflict is right in their back yard. Their Iraq and Afghanistan policy must take into account the fact that those countries are neighbors, versus the American and Saudi policy of treating everybody else like they are below you.