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 whembly wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
The Cuban people weren't "free" under Batista, either.

At least now they're literate, numerate and have healthcare whilst not being "free". They've moved up under communism.

Meanwhile in the US people are burdened by huge debts thanks to your education and healthcare systems. Is that not affecting their freedom?

No... it is not.

Wanna know why?

We can vote our political figures out of office.

We can protest...

We can write/speak against out political figures to our heart's content.

Try doing that in Havanna.

In a couple of months you'll get to vote for either Clinton or whichever Republican technocrat is given the nomination. Let's see how much that changes the student debt industry, the collapse of public education, the lack of universal healthcare, wars or for that matter the ongoing voter disenfranchisement. Sanders represents one of the biggest differences in actual policy and the Democratic Party is doing everything it can to give Clinton the nomination instead.

Ok, so you'll protest. How much did that help against the invasion of Iraq? How much did that help against the bank bailouts? Mass protests have happened very recently and people were jailed and abused for it. Speaking out is harmless when armies of cops stand by to make sure that it never leads to real action.

 whembly wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 whembly wrote:
Bottom line... Trump and his ilk has been flatly unprepared to do the hard work and they have only themselves to blame.

Well, sort of. No argument at all that Trump has failed to get organised as well as he should, and it's cost him delegates and it will almost certainly cost him the second round ballot (which was a stretch anyway).

But that doesn't mean the system is okay. It shouldn't ever be okay that people turn up to vote for a candidate but end up with a delegate who may hate that delegate, but is required to represent him through one round of voting. That's a crazy system. There are better ways to produce a more democratic system, and better ways to allow the party to 'massage' the result towards their preferred candidate.

Sure... but that's the way it's been since day one.

Don't lose sight to the fact that it's a National Party, plus 50 state party rules.

'Tis why we have caucuses/primary/open primary/closed primary/proportional delegates/winners-takes-all/WTA by district/etc...

IF Trump can't get to a majority, then all bets are off. That's a feature, not a bug in a Constitutional Republic.

What I'd like to see on Primary voting day, is to have a hierarchy voting, where you list out your preference in order. For instance:
-Candidate Z is your first choice
-Candidate X is your second
-and so forth.

That way, when a candidate drops out, the heirachy get recalibrated. But the only that something like that can happen, is if EACH of the 50 state's party agrees to do that.

Why not just go all the way and do instant runoff. That gets rid of the spoiler affects of smaller candidates as well.


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Some final results from the NYT.
http://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/new-york




Wow, did Trump have a total wipe, only one district lost and claimed by Kasich by all people.

Pretty much what I thought on the democratic side, The more urban areas for Clinton, while the others for Bernie, although I'm surprised he got Albany.

Edit: And pretty much confirmed what I thought of my county (Ulster), pro Bernie and Trump, as it's the extremes who get out to vote in primaries around here. We tend to be pretty moderate up here, pretty much exemplifed by out current representative, a moderate R.

 dogma wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
We would rather crash and burn the American Way(tm) than dare do something that works for the rest of the world.

Which is funny, considering the Constitution is grounded in European thought.

That sounds like socialist talk!

Every American knows that the founding fathers invented the Constitution and America to get away from the evil British monarchy, which Americans hated (all Americans- there is no way like 1/3-2/3 opposed this or where indifferent and considered themselves British). Also, America has been right on everything since then, won 2 World Wars, and saved Europe, which they wasted by turning socialist and going bankrupt. It is the job creators that create prosperity!



Seriously though, it amazes me how strong an anti-worker element we have in the US despite US workers being some of the most productive in the world and yet seeing no real wage growth for decades. And that same element pushes for increasing deregulation and lower taxes for the same corporate "job creators" that have largely dismantled the US skilled labor base, exported, and outsourced a huge chunk of the job base. All of this resulting in tidy growth for the wealthiest while the middle class collapses, higher level educational costs spiral out of control, etc.

It's also why talk of candidates like HRC being "to the left" is nonsense. The "right" has just stridently pulled further to the extremes and ignored the "leftist" Democrats taking up the slack in the middle and figured out how to make a broader pitch. The Republicans have becomes so beholden to the wealthy elite that they overlooked their populist base. HRC is firmly entrenched in the existing power structure and there is no indication that she will do anything to upset the current trends. Just like the current president, who saw huge gains for the wealthy and not so much for anyone else, she will give lip service to popular issues, but keep things on track for the top. And the middle class will continue to evaporate. Which fuels reactionaries like Trump and dogmatic manipulators like Cruz. Neither of whom offer any better solutions.

It really is quite a mess.

 sebster wrote:


Sanders will stay in, but I wonder if he'll finally switch from hoping for a miracle win, and instead go back to building a socialist base within the party. Hopefully.

I hope this is what he does.... but I don't think he will.

He is pretty much laying the foundation for a Elizabeth Warren run in the next 4 or 8 years to be honest.

I know I I'm gushing a little, but I would just like to post this little thing that my representative (Chris Gibson, R-NY) did on the radio yesterday. Right at 2:25 (the whole thing is only 8:44) talking about he Supreme Court stuff.

http://wamc.org/post/congressional-corner-chris-gibson-46

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
I know I I'm gushing a little, but I would just like to post this little thing that my representative (Chris Gibson, R-NY) did on the radio yesterday. Right at 2:25 (the whole thing is only 8:44) talking about he Supreme Court stuff.

http://wamc.org/post/congressional-corner-chris-gibson-46

Dammit... I thought we're at a stand still...

Today, there was a 6-2 ruling:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/20/politics/supreme-court-rules-in-favor-of-terror-victims/

The interesting thing here is that it wasn't split on ideological lines...

Justice Roberts was snarky in dissent:

Roberts, who cares about the institution of the court perhaps more than any other justice wrote, “I readily concede, without embarrassment, that it can sometimes be difficult to draw the line between legislative and judicial power.”

He said, however, “the entire constitutional enterprise depends on their being such a line.”

 Ustrello wrote:
He is pretty much laying the foundation for a Elizabeth Warren run in the next 4 or 8 years to be honest.

Then he needs to be stumping less and building infrastructure more. He should take a page from good ol' Al Franken and what he did before his Senate run in MN.

SO Trump dominated in New York, rebuffing Cruz with Kasich (surprisingly) coming in second. Next up is PA, RI, MD, CT, and DE. That is 172 delegates. I don't see Cruz faring much better in these, but Kasich could continue to grab a few votes. Does the narrative that it is now mathematically impossible for Cruz or Kasich to win the nomination outside of a contested convention push these contests towards Trump? Does Trump end the month breaking 1000 delegates?

Is anyone really surprised that Trump won his home state or that Clinton won the state she moved to for political expediency?

 Ahtman wrote:
Is anyone really surprised that Trump won his home state or that Clinton won the state she moved to for political expediency?

Well, technically Bernie is from New York too, so......

NY county maps are a fun read. Clinton took most of the urban areas, while the rest of the state went Bernie. Fun with population density!

Kinda wondering why Albany didn’t get the memo...

Albany is famously more conservative than much of the rest of New York. Really, the further away from New York City you get, the less Democratic the state becomes.

Yup. NYC holds most of the D voters (and most of the population) .

 LordofHats wrote:
Albany is famously more conservative than much of the rest of New York. Really, the further away from New York City you get, the less Democratic the state becomes.

That seems to be how many states are. In IA, Des Moines and Iowa City are pretty Dem heavy voting....but the rest of the mainly rural state usually goes pretty heavy Republican.

Not always...but most of the time.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presidential_election_results_by_state

In Indiana the capitol city is fairly Democratic but as you get further out into rural areas it becomes more and more Republican.

I wonder if Kasich can win Indiana... Or do you think it's between Trump and Cruz?

I think we can all agree that as a general rule, large cities tend to run Democratic, rural areas tend to run Republican, and Suburbs are the meeting place where the sacrifices are handed assault rifles and told to kill the other side

 Ustrello wrote:
He is pretty much laying the foundation for a Elizabeth Warren run in the next 4 or 8 years to be honest.

It needs more than a plan to set someone else up 4 or 8 years from now. Look at movement conservatism as the classic example of how to take over a political party from the inside. From the initial conceptual foundations to Reagan’s win was about 30 years of work. But by the time of Reagan’s win they weren’t just the most powerful faction within the Republican party, they’d set themselves up to be increasingly dominant in every election cycle for decades to come.

I’m not saying that Sanders’ democratic socialism needs to set its sights on 2046 Most of the conceptual work has been done, and has an inherent appeal that Sanders has capitalised on. What’s needed now is to build lasting grass roots organisations that can be counted on to deliver votes in every election, not just in presidential elections but in every election, especially every primary election.

 sebster wrote:

I’m not saying that Sanders’ democratic socialism needs to set its sights on 2046 Most of the conceptual work has been done, and has an inherent appeal that Sanders has capitalised on. What’s needed now is to build lasting grass roots organisations that can be counted on to deliver votes in every election, not just in presidential elections but in every election, especially every primary election.

IMO, the number of people that are 18-26 or so (the major Bernie demo) are a decent start for that grass roots movement you describe. As they age and get into more facets of politics, they will inevitably shift the politics.

 Nevelon wrote:
NY county maps are a fun read. Clinton took most of the urban areas, while the rest of the state went Bernie. Fun with population density!

The other electoral patterns held strong as well - with minority votes breaking heavily for Clinton over Sanders. Clinton tied the white vote, but won 75% of the black vote and 63% of the hispanic vote. This helps explain why Clinton did better in NY, and Sanders did better upstate.

And it's also why all the excitement about Sanders recent string of wins was way more hype than reality. Those were states with demographics that overwhelmingly favoured Sanders already, he wasn't 'gaining momentum' by winning them, his wins there was just enough to keep him in the race, in many cases he needed to be winning those states by a lot more than he was, because the campaign was soon going to switch back to territory that's a lot more favourable to Clinton. Which it did, with New York, and the result was as expected, really.


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 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
IMO, the number of people that are 18-26 or so (the major Bernie demo) are a decent start for that grass roots movement you describe. As they age and get into more facets of politics, they will inevitably shift the politics.

Yep. The foundations are there, in demographics, and also in having a message that has a clear and simple appeal to voters. But those things don't just turn in to wins, there needs to be real effort to turn it in to infrastructure that will deliver votes and wins in primary and general elections in the years to come.

Sorry to keep banging this drum, but Obama arrives in the UK today to issue warnings and dire predictions should we in the UK vote to leave the European Union

In the spirit of things, here's 4 questions I would like American dakka members to answer:

1) How would you like open borders between the USA, Canada, and Mexico, with people having the right to live and work anywhere in the USA/Canada/Mexico for as long as they wanted?

2) What would the American reaction be if the highest legal authority in North America was a court in Canada or a court in Mexico, with legal powers over American citizens?

3) Would you be happy if our Prime Minister visited the USA in November and told people not to vote for Clinton or Trump, as it would damage world markets?

4) If political union between nations is so good, then why did you guys break away from Britain in 1776?

You realise you're asking this about a federation of states, right?

I mean the scales that we're talking about are staggeringly different.

The distance between the houses of parliament and the EU in Brussels is about 199 miles.
The distance between San Francisco and the US Capitol Building is 2440 miles.

Your first question would be more akin to "How would you like open borders between California, Nevade and Oregon?"

Your second question ignores the fact that whilst the geographical position is in Canada or Mexico, the US would supply their own delegates to attend and vote on issues on their behalf.

Can't comment as I'm not from the US. I wouldn't like it, but that's because I feel uncomfortable being in the same country as Cameron.

Because Taxation without representation. Representation that we have in the EU.

Also, this is off-topic.

 Goliath wrote:
You realise you're asking this about a federation of states, right?

I mean the scales that we're talking about are staggeringly different.

The distance between the houses of parliament and the EU in Brussels is about 199 miles.
The distance between San Francisco and the US Capitol Building is 2440 miles.

Your first question would be more akin to "How would you like open borders between California, Nevade and Oregon?"

Your second question ignores the fact that whilst the geographical position is in Canada or Mexico, the US would supply their own delegates to attend and vote on issues on their behalf.

Can't comment as I'm not from the US. I wouldn't like it, but that's because I feel uncomfortable being in the same country as Cameron.

Because Taxation without representation. Representation that we have in the EU.

Also, this is off-topic.

It's not off topic. This is a American politics threads, and a number of high ranking American politicians past and present, including the current president, and a former president (Bill Clinton) have expressed a view on Britain's place in the EU.

I'm curious to know what American think about this.

As far as the PM advising us who to vote for, sure, why not? It is important to realize that America does not exist in a vacuum, we share this planet with quite a lot of other people, and it is important to be informed on how our actions might affect the rest of the world.

Because I think it's becoming more apparent that the rest of the world can probably survive quite well without the US, but the US can't survive without the rest of the world.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:



It's not off topic.

Yes it is.

If people want to comment about that they can do so in the relevant thread elsewhere on the board.

 whembly wrote:
I wonder if Kasich can win Indiana... Or do you think it's between Trump and Cruz?

At this point, I don't see Kasich winning any state. But he does seem to be spoilering Trump to a limited degree in the areas states where Trump is strongest and Cruz tends to flounder. So that is probably why he is staying in- he may be able to keep Trump from hitting the magic number if he can siphon off just enough delegates in the next few states like PA and Indiana.

On the Dem side, I would expect that Sanders tones it down now and starts to reconcile with Clinton and start the consolidation. The Dems look like they will have their candidate much earlier than the Repubs, which will be a significant advantage. Not to mention nationally Clinton seems to be polling much better than both of the GOP frontrunners (Kasich is the only one beating her in the national polls), for whatever that is worth.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Sorry to keep banging this drum, but Obama arrives in the UK today to issue warnings and dire predictions should we in the UK vote to leave the European Union

In the spirit of things, here's 4 questions I would like American dakka members to answer:

1) How would you like open borders between the USA, Canada, and Mexico, with people having the right to live and work anywhere in the USA/Canada/Mexico for as long as they wanted?

Personally, I wouldn't mind this, provided we establish a system of taxing any and all income made in the US (ie, a person can live in Mexico, but work in San Diego, paying San Diego taxes on the income they earn, etc)

2) What would the American reaction be if the highest legal authority in North America was a court in Canada or a court in Mexico, with legal powers over American citizens?

I would only be Ok with this IF that court applied only to matters that cross borders. (Kind of similar to how our state courts answer to a circuit court, which answers to our SCOTUS)

3) Would you be happy if our Prime Minister visited the USA in November and told people not to vote for Clinton or Trump, as it would damage world markets?

If he said that about Clinton, I'd probably laugh him off, because he's full of it... If he said that about Trump I'd probably do my best Baptist Church impression: "Thank you Jesus! Amen! Preach it brotha!"

4) If political union between nations is so good, then why did you guys break away from Britain in 1776?

Well, it was kind of a dick move..... but Canada has so much maple syrup, and you know how our capitalism rolls: we just want in on that action.

Call me biased, or whatever, but I would be ok with an open border with Canada but not so much with Mexico.

My biggest reason: the crime and cartels in Mexico are horrible. Allowing an open border with them would, I feel, increase some crimes in the US.

I feel too that it would also hurt the US economy having a far more open border policy *if* corporations are also more free to move. I am sure that there will always be some businesses that are looking for the right opportunity to cut labor costs...and if given an opening to do so, would move to a lower cost country.

Canada has a far more stable economy, government, and legal system. It is widely known Mexico has a tremendous problem with corruption within all three.

As far as the SCOTUS and other judicial bodies goes: I believe that every country in the UN (whixh the US is) can be subject to the World Court authority.

Granted, the country *does* have the ability/right to withhold their consent to be jusged...but I don't believe that UN members tend to go against the World Court rulings because of potential negatives that UN membership can apply.

I get why the World Court exists, but I don't necessarily see them as superior to the SCOTUS....nor should they ever be when it comes to internal matters of any sovereign nation (UN member or not).

World leaders can (and do) offer their opinions on what other countries should (or should not) do all the time.


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As far as independence goes: the US was not the only colony to ever fight against British rule.

 jmurph wrote:

 whembly wrote:
I wonder if Kasich can win Indiana... Or do you think it's between Trump and Cruz?

At this point, I don't see Kasich winning any state. But he does seem to be spoilering Trump to a limited degree in the areas states where Trump is strongest and Cruz tends to flounder. So that is probably why he is staying in- he may be able to keep Trump from hitting the magic number if he can siphon off just enough delegates in the next few states like PA and Indiana.

On the Dem side, I would expect that Sanders tones it down now and starts to reconcile with Clinton and start the consolidation. The Dems look like they will have their candidate much earlier than the Repubs, which will be a significant advantage. Not to mention nationally Clinton seems to be polling much better than both of the GOP frontrunners (Kasich is the only one beating her in the national polls), for whatever that is worth.

I also hope he tones it down and let's her pivot towards the general while not completely jettisoning the Left-wing talking points she adopted in the Primary.

Sebs is completely right about building the movement. He needs to stop stumping just for himself now, and start finding the candidates that are aligned or sympathetic to his view, and go stump with them in their states, provide donations from his backers, and start recommending these campaigns to his voters to support as well. He essentially needs to start sharing the spotlight with down ticket candidates that are his allies.