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O'Malley would've been crushed, Sanders would have been tarred and feathered mercilessly as a communist. Clinton was the best available candidate in the Democratic Primary in terms of ability to win.

No doubt someone like Bill Gates would have crushed the field, but as it stands our best and brightest do not run for President.

squidhills wrote:

 whembly wrote:


Can you image a top ticket of O'Malley or Warren or Sanders? Trump would be KO'ed by now...

I don't know about O'Malley beating Trump. I live in Maryland and my roommate had no idea he was even running, and didn't recognize his name when I brought it up. The man was our governor as recently as *last year*. If he doesn't have instant recognition in his own state, hoe the feth is he supposed to win anywhere else?

squiddie... a GENERIC democrat would fething curb stomp Trump in the General Election.

Martin O'Malley fits that description to the "T".

Likewise, a GENERIC republican would curb stomp Clinton in the General Election.

'Tis why the DNC schemed to raise Trump's stature in the background during the primary... as the Clinton's were terrified of the likes of Rubio or Kasich.

Good job GOP Primary voters... good job!



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 jasper76 wrote:
O'Malley would've been crushed, Sanders would have been tarred and feathered mercilessly as a communist. Clinton was the best available candidate in the Democratic Primary in terms of ability to win.

I disagree whole heartedly. HRC is damaged goods, and it's only because of her that Trump has an iota chance to win. Anyone else would've destroyed Trump.

I mean, the only other candidate that could do worse than Clinton is possibly Harry Reid.... if that.

No doubt someone like Bill Gates would have crushed the field, but as it stands our best and brightest do not run for President.

I'd vote for Bill Gates in a heart beat.

I think you are giving O'Malley far too much credit. He seemed like a simpleton in the primaries. I don't think he would have survived the scorched earth tactics of the Trump campaign.

Sanders I don't think ever had much of a chance in a general election. It would be far too easy to just say, "we can't elect a communist" and let the spectre of the USSR do the rest.

But I don't claim any special knowledge here, perhaps either would have faired better than I think they would have.


I'd have voted for Bill Gates in a heartbeat as well, FWIW.

 jasper76 wrote:
O'Malley would've been crushed, Sanders would have been tarred and feathered mercilessly as a communist. Clinton was the best available candidate in the Democratic Primary in terms of ability to win.

No doubt someone like Bill Gates would have crushed the field, but as it stands our best and brightest do not run for President.

I was rather under the impression that Sanders consistently polled better against Trump than Clinton did.

Rosebuddy wrote:

 jasper76 wrote:
O'Malley would've been crushed, Sanders would have been tarred and feathered mercilessly as a communist. Clinton was the best available candidate in the Democratic Primary in terms of ability to win.

No doubt someone like Bill Gates would have crushed the field, but as it stands our best and brightest do not run for President.

I was rather under the impression that Sanders consistently polled better against Trump than Clinton did.

That's possible... but, I couldn't find any polls that supports that.

Keep in mind that in the Democratic primaries, it was mostly between Clinton vs. Sanders.

In the Republican primaries, they started with 17... which took awhile to whittle down to Trump.

 jasper76 wrote:
I think you are giving O'Malley far too much credit. He seemed like a simpleton in the primaries. I don't think he would have survived the scorched earth tactics of the Trump campaign.

Sanders I don't think ever had much of a chance in a general election. It would be far too easy to just say, "we can't elect a communist" and let the spectre of the USSR do the rest.

But I don't claim any special knowledge here, perhaps either would have faired better than I think they would have.


I'd have voted for Bill Gates in a heartbeat as well, FWIW.

The red scare only works on the democats, apparently trump being in puttins pocket just gets the *shrug* and *meh*

the good thing is the far right who drinks that stuff in like cool aid are a dying breed, america is becoming a liberal nation and starting to realize that's a good thing.

so a true progressive would easily win against any conservative.

But Rubio beating clinton? I doubt that, I just can't see the republicans rallying around a cuban.

Rosebuddy wrote:

 jasper76 wrote:
O'Malley would've been crushed, Sanders would have been tarred and feathered mercilessly as a communist. Clinton was the best available candidate in the Democratic Primary in terms of ability to win.

No doubt someone like Bill Gates would have crushed the field, but as it stands our best and brightest do not run for President.

I was rather under the impression that Sanders consistently polled better against Trump than Clinton did.

Sanders was never put under the microscope of the Republican hit machine.

Rosebuddy wrote:

 jasper76 wrote:
O'Malley would've been crushed, Sanders would have been tarred and feathered mercilessly as a communist. Clinton was the best available candidate in the Democratic Primary in terms of ability to win.

I was rather under the impression that Sanders consistently polled better against Trump than Clinton did.

Hypothetical horse race polls done prior to the conventions are notoriously unreliable. Sanders would have energized more younger voters, more true liberals, and possibly competed with Trump for the outsider voter. OTOH, he wouldn't have been as popular as HRC with black voters. To give you an idea, HRC is actually polling better with black voters than Obama did in 2012! Some of that is no doubt due to Trump, of course. But if you look at the electoral college, North Carolina is light blue due mainly to HRC's appeal to the very voters Sanders never quite reached: minorities and well educated whites.

I think one thing to keep in mind is that one of Trump's major issues is terrorism/security, which is an area of strength for HRC, beyond most recent Dems. Few other democrats could go toe-to-toe with Trump on that issue.

Still, the democrats pulled a trick out of the GOP playbook, and came into the election with the support and the money behind one candidate. There's virtually no way, other than the email scandal breaking both bigger and earlier, that HRC doesn't get the nomination.

OTOH, Jeb!, Cruz, and Rubio all have to be looking at this election wondering what the hell went wrong. Meanwhile, due to some bizarre doggedness and refusal to drop out, Kasich is probably now the establishment front runner for 2016.



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sirlynchmob wrote:
But Rubio beating clinton? I doubt that, I just can't see the republicans rallying around a cuban.

I don't think that'd be a big problem. The problem is that Rubio was a candidate made by committee, with a little Tea Party, some hard line social conservatism, a touch of bipartisan cred with the immigration bill, the possiblily of some outreach to Latinos (even though most Mexicans and central Americans don't really relate to Cubans), oh, and he's popular in a large swing state... which would have made him a really strong general election candidate. The problem was that he didn't have a natural base. Jeb had the money and the machine, Cruz snapped up the conservative votes, Kasich and Christie got the moderates, and that didn't leave much for Rubio.

Rubio might come back in 2016, but the party can't have him and Cruz go deep into the primaries again.

 Polonius wrote:


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sirlynchmob wrote:
But Rubio beating clinton? I doubt that, I just can't see the republicans rallying around a cuban.

I don't think that'd be a big problem. The problem is that Rubio was a candidate made by committee, with a little Tea Party, some hard line social conservatism, a touch of bipartisan cred with the immigration bill, the possiblily of some outreach to Latinos (even though most Mexicans and central Americans don't really relate to Cubans), oh, and he's popular in a large swing state... which would have made him a really strong general election candidate. The problem was that he didn't have a natural base. Jeb had the money and the machine, Cruz snapped up the conservative votes, Kasich and Christie got the moderates, and that didn't leave much for Rubio.

Rubio might come back in 2016, but the party can't have him and Cruz go deep into the primaries again.

Exactly. Rubio was the perfect candidate against Clinton.

Cruz is done imo... the Senate seat will be forever his peak.

It's worth noting that Rubio couldn't even carry his own state in the primary.

 jasper76 wrote:
It's worth noting that Rubio couldn't even carry his own state in the primary.

Sure... and who brought him down?

 whembly wrote:

 jasper76 wrote:
It's worth noting that Rubio couldn't even carry his own state in the primary.

Sure... and who brought him down?

Spoiler:

Jeb!

I'm trying to follow the reasoning here.

If Jeb is strong enough to deny Rubio his own state, what chance would he have had against Hillary?

Also, Didn't Rubio get done in parroting lame prepared speeches that didn't actually answer the questions in the debates?

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Polonius wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
Yeah, that may be what he's thinking at this point. He's a buffoon, but can't be so much of a dolt for him to think he can win after this spectacular implosion.

By all accounts, presidential campaigns never really consider that they might lose. You hear stories of Romney not even having a concession speech, when he was consistently 3-4 points down in all the polls.

It's a real bunker mentality.

The republican party of the last decade or so has been living in an otherworld echo chamber. When all the polls showed them behind, they made their own polls that fit their narrative, and then were flabbergasted they turned out not to reflect reality. Anyone remember Karl Rove melting down on Fox when he just would not accept the return results?

Romney's camp thought they could win because the polls were generally tighter than that. Per FiveThirtyEight, the average of 12 national polls had Obama up by 1.6% on Monday. And while that actually represented a very late slide for Romney, it's still striking distance given margins for error, etc. .

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nov-5-late-poll-gains-for-obama-leave-romney-with-longer-odds/

If you believe, as the Romney camp did, that Dem turnout was going to be lighter compared to 2008, then stuff could certainly happen. Of course, they underestimated the effectiveness and calculated nature of the Obama team's ground game. And still remember that Obama only won by 2.3% of the popular vote...it was the electoral math where he crushed it. I don't think Romney, his team, and the people assisting them were true believers who only wanted to feed the echo chamber. They were professionals trying to win an election and got outclassed. Rove -- who wasn't involved in the campaign, note -- was confused because the science behind that stuff had changed so dramatically since 2004.

Anyway, what's going on now with Trump is much, much different (I think the spread looks like about 6.5% on 538?), and has a chance to drag down a lot of GOP candidates in congressional races. I read that one Clinton-affiliated PAC is looking to shift some money toward helping Dem congressional candidates. And you can bet they're going to hang Trump around the GOP candidates' necks in the advertising. He has the loser stench about him now. Romney never really had that until it was over.

Kronk beat me to every rebuttal I had.


Have we already forgotten Marcobot?

 kronk wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 jasper76 wrote:
It's worth noting that Rubio couldn't even carry his own state in the primary.

Sure... and who brought him down?

Spoiler:

Jeb!

I'm trying to follow the reasoning here.

If Jeb is strong enough to deny Rubio his own state, what chance would he have had against Hillary?

Also, Didn't Rubio get done in parroting lame prepared speeches that didn't actually answer the questions in the debates?

Jeb had the largest warchest of the primary and spent it on him. Rubio received probably the most negative attacks/press of all the candidates.

Rubio can campaign, he got caught between Jeb's warchest and Trump's sucking out the oxygen in the primary.

IMO, he'd be leading HRC now by 10+ percentage-wise right now.

I'll give you this: Rubio would probably be doing better than Trump right now, because there is no evidence that Rubio is a sexual predator.

Or wants to feth his own daughter.

Or did coke.

Or wants to arrest his competition.

Otherwise, nah. He doomed himself in the debates, IMHO OMG BBQ!

Transsexuals in bathrooms were their biggest fear, but a good old fashioned normal sexual predator is good for their vote.

 Polonius wrote:

 curran12 wrote:
Needless to say, I'm not going to be comfortable that Trump is in the margins until HRC hits 270.

I wouldn't get too panicked. There simply seems to be a ceiling to his popularity, in about the mid 40s. He's losing some of that even with the video and the debates (especially the first). We're also running out of undecided voters, and the third party folks were more HRC than Trump. I know that 3-4 percentage points doesn't sound like a lot, but it involves either winning over a huge percentage of the undecideds, or swaying people back from HRC, which seems unlikely at this point.

People kept talking about ceiling in preliminies as well. Didn't come up. Polling indicated no Brexit. What happened?

Until votes are cast it's never 100% sure. Especially as there's still stuff that can happen like major terrorism attack(been surprisingly quiet on that front. Maybe US agencies dealing with those have been doing good job!)

Not to mention that kind of "it's done" attitude is precisely what allows junk candinates to win in the first place by people not voting or throwing votes away.

 d-usa wrote:
Transsexuals in bathrooms were their biggest fear, but a good old fashioned normal sexual predator is good for their vote.

It certainly shows the state of affairs that this election has devolved into. The Trump campaign played it smart by bringing in Bill Clinton's past and casting Hillary as an enabler. Sure Trump is uncouth as any inbred but the Clintons have actual victims of sexual assault that can be brought out and paraded in front of the public. Pick your poison.

 Breotan wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Transsexuals in bathrooms were their biggest fear, but a good old fashioned normal sexual predator is good for their vote.

It certainly shows the state of affairs that this election has devolved into. The Trump campaign played it smart by bringing in Bill Clinton's past and casting Hillary as an enabler. Sure Trump is uncouth as any inbred but the Clintons have actual victims of sexual assault that can be brought out and paraded in front of the public. Pick your poison.

So does trump, a whole lot more victims including a 13 year old he raped. But like anything said against trump, his cult followers don't care.

 whembly wrote:

 BigWaaagh wrote:

 curran12 wrote:
Needless to say, I'm not going to be comfortable that Trump is in the margins until HRC hits 270.

THAT!!!!!!!! Don't, for even a second, think this is over or in the bag for HRC.

I remember that Al Gore was 10 points, or so, ahead going into October and he lost to dubya. Nobody can be complacent about Trump and his chances. This thing isn't over. Get out and vote and send this asshat back to the cave he knuckle-dragged himself out of.

Nah... Trump's toast.

But, if ya'll are that worried... that tells ya how bad of a candidate truly is...

Can you image a top ticket of O'Malley or Warren or Sanders? Trump would be KO'ed by now...

You and false equivalency...leave the lies to Fox News, they've got the franchise rights.
I'm worried because with the ignorance and culpability of his base, they could be hit over the head with a bag of truth bricks and they'd still believe his fear mongering gak. I'm worried that after all the absolutely fethed up things that spew from his mouth, there's actually undecided voters out there. I'm worried that polls, as I referenced above with Gore and the BREXIT result, which I've referenced previously in this thread, are nothing more than snapshots and not always that accurate. I'm worried about complacency from the HRC crowd and stupidity, borne from the same false equivalency duping that been going on for years, causing the disenfranchised crowd to think, well, I'll burn a vote on a third party out of protest, which I wouldn't object to if, A) There was an intelligent choice available and B) Trump wasn't an actual POTUS candidate. This is a binary race at this point and there's only one choice.

 whembly wrote:
I'd vote for Bill Gates in a heart beat.

TFW you hate Obama and Hillary for Common Core, but would unhesitatingly vote for the guy who was most central to actually making it happen

All joking aside, I like Bill Gates a great deal. He's a generous philanthropist and a software visionary... but what about him would make a successful politician? Pivoting to a more general stance here, I'm not sure a successful businessman would have the right mindset to being the head of the US government, which most certainly is not a business... IMO the only people whose job experience really gears them to the job are VPs, and than state governors.

 whembly wrote:
squiddie... a GENERIC democrat would fething curb stomp Trump in the General Election

We used to have the argument back in... 2012, I want to say. The argument was that a generic republican would beat Obama in a general election at whatever point we were discussing that. The problem with that metric is, well, there is no such thing as a generic candidate. "Generic Republican" essentially allows the respondent to imagine a perfect candidate, representing all their stances and without any baggage. Of course, in that election and ever other, there is no such creature. You can only look at the actual candidates at that level, and every single one will almost always have some significant issue because you can't get to that level of government and stay 100% clean and pure ideologically.

 Ouze wrote:

 whembly wrote:
I'd vote for Bill Gates in a heart beat.

TFW you hate Obama and Hillary for Common Core, but would unhesitatingly vote for the guy who was most central to actually making it happen

All joking aside, I like Bill Gates a great deal. He's a generous philanthropist and a software visionary... but what about him would make a successful politician? Pivoting to a more general stance here, I'm not sure a successful businessman would have the right mindset to being the head of the US government, which most certainly is not a business... IMO the only people whose job experience really gears them to the job are VPs, and than state governors.

I agree that the Presidency is geared towards VPs and State Governors....

With respect to Gates... he's probably one of the fewest guys on the planet who could try to do his best for altruistic reasons.

However, he probably wouldn't survive a primary... have you see his interviews?

He doesn't "do public appearance" really wall.

 Breotan wrote:

 BigWaaagh wrote:
No more Kool-Aid for you, you've had enough, methinks.

No more Kool-Aid? Well, since you don't like the pragmatic side of my mind how about the emotional side?

Spoiler:

As I said much earlier in the thread, Trump will find himself severely constrained as President. He's done so much to alienate the Republicans that it will be tough to get anything he wants done. No one in Congress seems to actually like the guy so there really won't be much of a "honeymoon" period. Oh, and Pence isn't entirely unappealing as VP.

If Clinton is elected and can get the Senate back, she'll work tirelessly to move SCOTUS hard left for at least the next two generations. I can see why that's appealing to liberals but it's a big NOPE for me. Then there are the scandals. Ngggggh... I vividly remember Bill's administration. I'm not looking forward to a repeat.

As for my actual political leanings, I'll invite you to go way back and you'll see I was a Marco Rubio supporter. Apparently the only one, but still. Of course by the time Washington's primary rolled around everything had been decided to I voted for Sanders in protest.

2016 was the Republicans' election to lose and by God they pulled it off. Again.

No thank you, I am also voting Hillary for SCotUS. I would rather not a Scallia pick that dictates law from religion. Separation of Church and state please.


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 Breotan wrote:
but the Clintons have actual victims of sexual assault that can be brought out and paraded in front of the public. Pick your poison.

And so does trump
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-rape-claims-sexual-assault-women-accusers-republican-candidate-abuse-accusations-a7355031.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-sexual-harassment-trump-organisation-lawsuits-a7354871.html

http://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-words-echo-womans-allegations-507763

 whembly wrote:

He doesn't "do public appearance" really wall.

I mean, he's a massive nerd. What do you expect.

 Ouze wrote:

 whembly wrote:
I'd vote for Bill Gates in a heart beat.

TFW you hate Obama and Hillary for Common Core, but would unhesitatingly vote for the guy who was most central to actually making it happen

If it's any consolation, I'd be very much against Bill Gates, not because of anything specific during his tenure at Microsoft, but because of the local legislative initiatives he's supported in Washington State, gun control and income tax being two of the standouts. Bill has fairly standard Democrat leanings but he's far more competent than most in the Democrat party which actually makes him dangerous if he ever decides to run for office. Then again, Gates was a big supporter of Common Core so that might work against him.

One hurdle Gates might have a hard time overcoming is that he's an atheist. If opinion polls are to be believed, atheists are always among the least trusted demographic in the US.

How much the US has evolved beyond the Presidential religious litmus test, or not, is an open question.

 jasper76 wrote:
One hurdle Gates might have a hard time overcoming is that he's an atheist. If opinion polls are to be believed, atheists are always the least trusted demographic.

How much the US has evolved beyond the Presidential religious litmus test is an open question.

It is used against Athiest in all branches and levels of Government. Hell, down south a lot of us don't want to let it known we are Atheists because we could lose out jobs.

 Vash108 wrote:
And so does trump
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-rape-claims-sexual-assault-women-accusers-republican-candidate-abuse-accusations-a7355031.html

I stopped reading at "Gloria Allred". It's not that I believe Trump's protestations, I have no opinion either way, it's that Allred's presence indicates a win at any cost political angle and not a justice for the victim angle. Still, we'll have to see how these allegations are handled in court. Are they thrown out? Settled out of court? Is a verdict rendered? Are the accusations proven or shown to be false? Is Trump wrongly accused because of politics or is he truly worse than Bill Cosby? We'll have to keep our eyes on this and see. Just remember that whatever Trump winds up being proven to be, Bill Clinton was also a friend of that rich pedo and Hillary is a proven enabler of his proclivities.