Wednesday Open Thread [3.16.16]
The Democratic Primary for President is over. The winner is Hillary Clinton. She will be the nominee.
Remember what I said on Sunday: “[B]est case scenario for Sanders on Tuesday: He wins Ohio, Illinois and Missouri. Those three wins, and the margins he wins them by, would give Sanders the first real momentum of this campaign, and first real panic in the Clinton camp. Worst case scenario: five losses to Clinton, which would end his campaign for the nomination. One win would keep him alive, on life support. Two wins would keep him alive as a competitive challenger, though with Clinton still in control of the race.”
So we have the worst case scenario for Sanders. I’m not going to pile on here, because I know the stages of grief a passionate supporter of a candidate goes through on days like this. I have been one, I am one, and I have been there. So take your time, BernieBros and BernieGals. There will be no demands of loyalty from me today.
And you should be proud of Bernie. You and he confounded expectations, and you took a 73 year old cranky socialist from Vermont and made him lovable, endearing, and most importantly, a credible competitor for the Democratic nomination for President. And you and he did a valuable service: you mainstreamed the left again. You made the Democratic Party proud to be liberal, by showing that’s where the votes are. So this is all great work by you.
What you, and Bernie, should do know is, yes, continue the campaign. BUT! Not for President. Sure, sure, he will still be running for President, his name will still be on the ballot, but the efforts and fundraising should be aimed towards identifying and electing and contributing to Revolution Bringers down the ballot. Bernie should travel the country in the months ahead and campaign with liberal and progressive candidates for the House, Senate and State House and Senate. He needs to take his army of passionate supporters and focus on building up the Democratic Party from the bottom up, rather than the top down. You want to make a President Hillary Clinton do what you want? Force her to by electing Revolution Bringers to Congress.
I did not think Sanders would still be fighting Clinton to close to a draw in states like Illinois. But Clinton will win either 4 of 5 or 5 of 5 states tonight, all big states, three of them major swing states. More importantly, Clinton’s edge in pledged delegates is now close to overwhelming. The Democrats don’t have winner take all primaries. So it’s not possible catch up with wins in a string of big states. Even if Sanders won every remaining state by a narrow margin, he’d probably still lose.
Politico says the odds of a contested convention for the GOP just went way up: “The impact of Rubio’s exit — and Kasich’s sudden rise — creates a mess of unpredictable scenarios that could end in Trump’s coronation, a contested convention or some kind of split decision that sends the GOP’s mid-July convention into fractious anarchy. For starters, it’s unclear where the Florida senator’s voters (15 to 20 percent of the GOP electorate) will go; the conventional wisdom is that Kasich will benefit more than Cruz, but that’s no lock.”
“The next batch of state contests — New Jersey, Arizona, Delaware, South Dakota and Montana — seem to favor Trump, but the race has entered a new volatile stage. And, increasingly, the stage seems set for some kind of showdown on the convention floor (and the streets outside) when the Republicans return to Cleveland.”
“The 2016 Democratic primary effectively ended Tuesday night, with Hillary Clinton as the all-but-certain winner but Bernie Sanders barely acknowledging it,” Politico reports.
“After noting that she now has a 300-delegate lead – which will make it essentially impossible for Sanders to catch up given the rules of the Democratic process — Clinton turned her attention to the front-runner for the Republican nomination.”
New York Times: “With landslide wins in Florida and Ohio, Mrs. Clinton re-established herself as the prohibitive favorite in the Democratic race. Taking Ohio by double digits, she eased fears that Mr. Sanders might become a breakaway favorite across the Midwest after his upset victory in Michigan last week.
Vox’s winners and losers from last night:
Winners–Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump and John Kasich’s campaign consultants
Losers–Marco Rubio and Bernie Sanders
On Hillary:
So Hillary Clinton is going to be the Democratic nominee. Sorry Bernie fans, them’s the breaks. According to estimates by my colleague Andrew Prokop, she’ll only need about 42 percent of the delegates in every contest going forward to get a majority of pledged delegates.
In other words, Bernie Sanders would need to beat her by 16-plus percent, on average, in upcoming delegate splits. He’d need to start demolishing her — and not just in races where he’s likely to do well (like the causes in Washington, Hawaii, Alaska, and Idaho), but in Clinton’s home state of New York, in Connecticut, among the heavily black primary electorate of Maryland. There’s just no sign he has anywhere near the amount of support to make that happen.
On Sanders:
Sanders lost for all the reasons Clinton won, more or less. He now faces an almost impossibly hard road to the nomination, entailing landslide victories in unfavorable states like New York. The main question he has to answer is how to keep his grassroots engaged after he loses.
But the specifics of tonight’s loss also served to debunk a favorite Sanders supporter talking point: that while Clinton does well in Republican-leaning states, Sanders wins blue states. The implicit argument was about electability: if Democrats in blue states like Sanders, they’ll turn out in bigger numbers for him than for Clinton, whereas Democratic turnout in, say, Mississippi, basically doesn’t matter for the presidential race.
Well, Clinton won Ohio and Florida, the two swingiest of swing states. Under the logic of the red state/blue state pro-Sanders argument, this would suggest that Clinton, not Sanders, is the candidate best positioned to win purple states.
Nate Silver says Hillary is following Obama’s path to the nomination:
I’m intrigued by the parallels to the 2008 campaign perhaps because it’s where FiveThirtyEight cut its teeth. I spent a lot of time in the spring of 2008 arguing that Obama’s lead in elected delegates would be hard for Clinton to overcome. But Clinton’s lead over Sanders is much larger than Obama’s was over Clinton at a comparable stage of the race. At the end of February 2008, after a favorable run of states for Obama, he led Clinton by approximately 100 elected delegates. Clinton’s lead is much larger this year.1 Clinton entered Tuesday’s contests ahead of Sanders by approximately 220 elected delegates. But she’ll net approximately 70 delegates from Florida, 20 from Ohio, 15 from North Carolina and a handful from Illinois and Missouri. That will expand her advantage to something like 325 elected delegates.
Sanders will need to win about 58 percent of the remaining 2,000 or so elected delegates to tie Clinton. Since the Democrats allot delegates proportionally, that means he’d need to win about 58 percent of the vote in the average remaining state to Clinton’s 42 percent, meaning he’d need to beat Clinton by around 16 points the rest of the way. […]
We’re fond of sports metaphors here at FiveThirtyEight. If the Republican race is Calvinball, with everyone making up the rules as they go along, the Democratic race is more like — zzzzzzz — golf. Clinton entered Tuesday night with the equivalent of a four-stroke lead with four holes to play. Then on the 15th hole, when Sanders already needed a minor miracle, she birdied while Sanders bogied. It’s not that it’s mathematically impossible for Sanders to win; Clinton could have some sort of epic meltdown. But she controls her own fate while Sanders doesn’t really control his, and she has quite a lot of tolerance for error.
Sanders has run a good campaign, and the fact that he ran competitively with Clinton in diverse states such as Michigan, Missouri and Illinois is more impressive in many ways than his early successes in Iowa and New Hampshire. But around 15 million Democrats have voted and, simply put, more of them seem to want Clinton as their nominee.
Jeet Heer has a reason for Bernie Sanders to stay in the race, besides mine:
Sanders’s greatest impact on the Democratic primary has been to tug Clinton to the left on economic issues. He likely won Michigan by hammering home his opposition to free-trade agreements, and Clinton seems to have picked up the message: In Tuesday night’s speech, she said that no one “takes advantage of us—not China, not Wall Street,” words that echoed both Sanders and Trump’s rhetoric on trade and the outsized influence of corporate America.
Trump’s likely nomination gives Sanders a strong incentive to continue in the race— not only to pull Clinton to the left on economic issues, but to argue that her pursuit of well-to-do Republicans is a mistake. This strategy would essentially cede the white working class to Trump, which is risky not only in immediate electoral terms but fraught with danger for the country. If Democrats don’t make a pitch to win back the white working class, they will become ever more alienated and susceptible to the next Trump-style demagogue who comes around. Sanders-style economic populism offers a chance to peel away these voters from Trump, dooming any chance he has of defeating Clinton in November.
Here, then, is Sanders’s new mission: to be the spokesman for the Democratic Party’s alternative to Trumpism. That’s reason enough to stay in the race.
So long as he does so with an eye on combating Trump rather than Clinton. If Bernie continues a negative campaign against our nominee, then I will require his absence from the campaign trail.
Hillary’s HQ early this morning:
Meanwhile at @HillaryClinton HQ… #ImWithHer pic.twitter.com/7k237mLMAU
— John Buysse (@JohnBuysse) March 16, 2016
Tuesday night could not have gone much better for Hillary Clinton. The results on the Democratic side moved her closer to winning the nomination. The results on the Republican side pushed the G.O.P. even closer toward nominating a candidate who would be at a serious disadvantage in the general election.
None of this means the primary season will end soon. The Democratic contest could go all the way until the California primary June 7. The Republican contest could last all the way to the convention.
But the Democratic contest now looks like a foregone conclusion. Mrs. Clinton significantly added to her delegate lead with a 30-plus-point win in Florida and a comfortable margin of victory in North Carolina and Ohio.
Cruz welcomes Rubio supporters into the fold pic.twitter.com/5a1KjIYCxn
— Eliot Nelson (@eliotnelson) March 16, 2016
Top Republicans are looking beyond Tuesday’s make-or-break primaries and preparing for a nasty nomination fight that could push all the way to this summer’s GOP convention in Cleveland.
The planning, detailed in conversations with nearly a dozen party officials and strategists, is stretching from Ted Cruz campaign headquarters in Houston to the Republican National Committee’s offices on Capitol Hill. And this week, following Tuesday’s primaries, wealthy GOP donors — many of whom have directed millions of dollars toward defeating Donald Trump — will gather in Florida to discuss what the party’s path forward looks like.
The modern Republican Party is an awkward contraption that harnesses a politics of white ethno-nationalism to a policy agenda dominated by Ayn Rand–inflected anti-statism. Donald Trump has exploited the wedge between the party’s voters and the ideologists of its master class, placing the latter in an awkward spot. In the face of this threat, there are many possible responses for an advocate of traditional Goldwater-Reagan conservatism to make. The most bracingly honest may come fromNational Review’s Kevin Williamson, whose antipathy for Trump has expanded to include Trump’s white working-class supporters.
Williamson’s latest column, which his NR colleague David French enthusiastically endorses, has attracted some notoriety for its display of contempt (rendered in Williamson’s florid, trademark-infringing imitation Buckley prose) for low-income white voters who make up a major share of Trump’s base. They are losers, druggies, layabouts, and so on. The solution Williamson offers them is to move out of their pathetic dying towns. (“The truth about these dysfunctional, downscale communities is that they deserve to die. Economically, they are negative assets.” Etc.)
There are Republican traditionalists rooting for Trump over Cruz, and the thinking of some goes like this: Neither candidate can win the presidency. But while Cruz has almost no crossover appeal beyond committed Republicans, Trump might draw enough independents, blue-collar Democrats and new voters in states like Ohio and Pennsylvania to buoy Republicans in tight Senate races there.
Besides which, he scrambles all rules and all precedents so thoroughly that you never know. Victory isn’t unthinkable, and better a Republican who’s allergic to caution, oblivious to actual information and altogether dangerous than a Democrat who’ll dole out all the plum administration jobs to her own party.
Republican traditionalists who prefer Cruz are no more ebullient in their outlooks.
“Cruz is a disaster for the party,” one of them told me. “Trump is a disaster for the country.”“If Cruz is the nominee, we get wiped out,” he added, with a resigned voice. “And we rebuild.” The party needs that anyway.
In fact, a few Republican traditionalists have insisted to me that a Cruz nomination and subsequent defeat would have a long-term upside. It would put to rest the stubborn argument, promoted by Cruz and others on the party’s far right, that the G.O.P. has lost presidential elections over recent decades because its nominees weren’t conservative enough.
This is Cruz-serving hogwash: If anything, those nominees weren’t sufficiently moderate. A Cruz wipeout would prove as much.
Stop it with this crap. Just stop it.
“Politico says the odds of a contested convention for the GOP just went way up: “The impact of Rubio’s exit — and Kasich’s sudden rise — creates a mess…”
No. Wrong. Just stop it.
Trump won. He’ll be nominated on the first or second ballot. The GOP “establishment” (and “movement conservatives” who claim that Trump is some kind of affront to their pristine values) will come down with a huge case of amnesia, Republicans will vote for him. All of them.
The race is now 45% for Trump and 45% for Clinton. The 10% aren’t “in the middle” (as Chris Matthews would have you think). The 10% are dumbasses who will sway in the wind and come election day they’ll vote for the person that they think is the eventual “winner”
And if you don’t think he GOP nominating contest is over, Trump just threatened the Republican intelligentsia with significant bodily harm should they try anything:
How do you think establishment types like Charlie Copeland will respond to that threat? If you said “meekly” you are on the right track.
I’m with Jason. They’ll fall in line because:
A contested convention = a guaranteed loss, while Trump = a very slim chance of winning.
Know why the other GOP candidates couldn’t take down Trump? They agree with him, just not the way he says it. And the reason they didn’t attack Trump’s policies (I’m using that word loosely) is because Rubio’s, Jeb’s, Kasich’s, Cruz, etc. policies are the same, or just as bad, as Trump’s. Take on Trump’s policies and they’d have to discuss their own. No way were they doing that.
As long as Clinton can focus on trying out messaging against Trump in the general – “that’s not strong, that’s just wrong”. Things that will resonate with people who live in a 140 character or less world and of course those who can’t comprehend any more than a 140 characters.
And yes I have no respect for most voters regardless of party.
Once the other contenders are out of the picture, the Trump vs. Clinton head-to-head polling will become increasingly meaningful and will bring things into better focus.
Political observers who think the “center” is occupied by thoughtful people who wrestle with issues, and who hold some liberal views and some conservative views are either idiots or are selling something. “Thoughtful” might describe 1% of the center.
For the most part, the political center is occupied by bandwagon jumpers. That is why Trump has worried me from the start. They are exactly the kind of empty-headed dolts Trump appeals to.
I can’t help but think that there will be some conservatives somewhere who will follow Matthew’s logic that the stability of Clinton is better than the insanity a Trump candidacy would bring to our world standing and economy. They will run a third party challenge, if for no other reason than to split votes and help Hillary without actually helping Hillary.
Trump could come out for a $15 minimum wage and walk into the White House.
Trump has now threatened violence if he doesnt get the nomination. Republicans, spineless swine that they are, will fall in line.
Wanna bet the ante will be upped for the General?
My worry is that if/when Trump wins the nomination, he doesn’t move center. He moves left. I can easily see him saying, “Wall? No, I don’t want to build a wall anymore. It is not economically sound.” Or, “I think Medicare for all would be the most cost effective solution for healthcare as it takes the burden off the businesses.” His followers are so entrenched in their belief that everything he says and does is correct and righteous that they will ignore contradictions and shifts in position. In turn, I am afraid, he picks up the vast number of independents and Democrats who are starf***ers (and we do have them) with his rhetoric. There are plenty on the left that can be swayed by a message that appeals to their base fears and insecurities.
Again, that is my apocalyptic worst case scenario. However, everyday I see the nightmare come closer to fruition and wonder when I will wake up!
“Donald Trump can’t be trusted” will be the Democratic campaign slogan. Even Republicans who hate Hillary and don’t trust her either will trust that she won’t run us into the ground in a blaze of stupidity.
“when Trump wins the nomination, he doesn’t move center. He moves left…”
Trump will attack from the left and the right simultaneously on whatever issue he can gain an advantage with. Treating this like a left vs. right election is fighting the last war. One of Hillary’s virtues is her ability to withstand attacks from the right. But she is like a turtle – hard shell on one side, vulnerable on the other. The primary didn’t firm her up on the left at all. Bernie challenged but didn’t attack his fellow Senator. Trump will not be so cordial.
mikem2784, I’m not so sure about that. I have friends who are lifelong Dems that have surprised me by doing the “well, Trump does say some things that are right, and he is something different than the usual politicians.” That is what the issue is. It is the “outsider” myth. An outsider can never truly make a difference in a system because change happens from within. Think of it like an antibiotic vs. a witch doctor. No amount of hand waiving and chanting will cure an internal problem.
They also think that D.C. is corrupt. They don’t seem to realize that they keep it that way by voting the same folks in all the time. The other myth is the “everyone is bad in Washington…except my guy.” Someone like Trump seems to be able to infiltrate that thought process and post himself as the guy who can change that. I have never been able to figure out how people believe these myths and make such poor decisions.
My hope is that Bernie becomes just as much a part of Hillary’s general campaign as Obama will be. He’ll need to compromise his integrity to do it… that is , convince his largest voting block (youngeons) that Hillary will represent them, but in order to stop someone like Trump, sacrifices need to be made.
My hope is that Hillary reaches out to capture Bernie voters by moving in a concrete manner toward some of Bernie’s positions on issues.
I do too…. but without Sanders backing her up (and honestly, even with his support) people will have a hard time believing her. There will be no way of knowing if she is pandering or serious until after she is elected….. when she will face a wall of GOP obstruction that wont let anything substantial happen anyway. Her entire first 2 years (and longer, unless Dems get off their asses and vote in the mid-terms) will be filled with bullshit “impeachment” hearings and show investigations to generate Fox ratings.
I’m sure her handlers, advisers, and most pundits will say that keeping Bill as a spokesperson is good, but don’t hint that he will be involved in governing. I’ve seen that in multiple sources. My question is, why? He was extremely popular and quality of life was much higher in the 90’s than at any time in the past 16 years. I say start the “Clinton BOGO” bumper stickers rolling off the assembly line!
“Her entire first 2 years (and longer, unless Dems get off their asses and vote in the mid-terms) will be filled with bullshit “impeachment” hearings and show investigations to generate Fox ratings.” I completely agree and it is exhausting to think about. But it is what we have to put up with to keep the things moving forward. I hope something fundamentally changes withing America’s need for reality TV sensationalism soon. I doubt it, though.
Similarly, the Republicans have been gentle with Trump. Have you seen the ad of women reading Trump’s quotes about women? Endless ads like that can be made…Trump arguing with himself, Trump advocating violence, etc. That will kill the illusion of “well, he makes sense on some issues” for most Democrats and hopefully reasonable Republicans and independents.
You are counting on a reasonable electorate. That is a big expectation.
Fair enough. The Dems need to punch him in the nose and hold him accountable, always, outloud, and aggressively. The few “swing” voters are naive and vote on impulse…was must turn any impulse for him into repulsiveness for the things he has said.
Perhaps mass hypnosis that makes the mere mention of Trump, or the site of his name cause a physical reaction, like nausea or vomiting?
My hope is that Clinton reaches out to the 42% Independent voters who can put her in the White House. While they generally lean Democratic, they are centrist (or is that corporatist? It’s hard to keep up with the latest meme).
Sanders needs to figure out if he can help, or rather how he can best help, which might be just fading away for awhile. If Trump is permitted to capture the indies, then Clinton is toast. Remember Trump may be a disaster but he is not a “real” conservative, so the indies don’t turn up their noses as readily as others have.
I don’t see where Clinton moving towards Sanders positions is a valid strategic move that contributes to the desired outcome, regardless of how good it would make people feel.
Dave is right people trudge to the polls out of a sense of civic responsibility. Voters eschew excitement. It sounds counter-intuitive, but look at history as a guide. Gore took Dave’s plodding path and he won “the middle” and became President! Oh wait. That was John Kerry who wowed the centrist and defeated George Bush!!
You cannot beat Trump by running against Trump. Marco Rubio has the footprint up his own backside in his own state to prove it.
You beat Trump by making Hillary the first choice of the electorate, not the default choice to stop Trump.
Given how much even Democrats have trust issues with Hillary, and how she suddenly seems to have come down with Reaganitis (the last two weeks: Nancy Reagan and AIDs, Where was Bernie, and then “nobody died in Benghazie”), this would be a tall order against a sane GOP candidate like Kasich.
But the fact is, people en masse vote for, not against, and everything Trump does is motivated by the idea (however twisted) of getting people to vote for him, and it’s worked.
… which is not to say that PAC money should not be employed in negative advertising against Trump …
But Hillary the candidate must be seen as running on her merits, not his lack of them.
If Trump keeps talking about bringing back jobs and Clinton avoids the issue, she could well lose the election
“Hillary the candidate must be seen as running on her merits”
And Clinton has plenty of merits. Regardless, there no silver bullet for this election and the Trump is not the usual werewolf. So yeah, Clinton on her merits, finding opportunities to use Trumps words against him (America is still strong, but we need to get it working again), using Obama’s popularity, standing up to Congress (the establishment) to work for the people. Things that might resonate for the likely voter who has a job and is pretty disgusted with the antics from Congress and the GOP primary. Make this about competence and not testosterone or how big someone’s hands are like they GOP primary. In fact the GOP is the poster child for what is wrong with America. So use it.
If Trump talks about bring back jobs, Clinton needs to seize the issue and remind people that those jobs are never coming back and that we need new jobs different jobs that there are opportunities in health care, innovation, the new Facebook, the new Google and those jobs wont be outsourced to H1B Visa holders. Trump is selling the good old days when we were manufacturing engine of the world and we have the pollution to prove it. Why would we want those days back?
“and those jobs wont be outsourced to H1B Visa holders.”
Hillary has in no way come out for limiting H1B employment, and she won’t. Hillary is for “comprehensive immigration reform” which includes increasing the number of H1B and other skilled workers. That’s what makes it “comprehensive.” you can look it up.
Telling people those jobs aren’t coming back is no way to get them to vote for you.
She should run on “bring the jobs home now” and say Trump can start by bringing his clothing manufacturing jobs from China and Mexico right now.
Trump, on the other hand, vows to eliminate the H1B visa program. He will clean Hillary’s clock with that issue alone if it occurs to him, and it will.
I don’t know how much effect any mention of H1B will have except in major metropolitan areas for those who are more professional fields. Most people have little knowledge of what it is, how it works,etc. Of course Trump could make it into a boogeyman and then they don’t have to know. They just have to be afraid of it.
Nuance is not a strong suit for the masses. H1B provides advantages for American businesses, but it can be and has been abused. One of the biggest abusers? Sallie Mae.
Yeah, the idea that Ds and Rs understand H1B visas is laughable – including commenters on this thread.
All Trump needs to explain is that H1B visas go to foreign nationals who take good American jobs and drive down wages overall. What could Hillary say in rebuttal?
If I were Trump I would come out in favor of the Supreme Court nominee, tell the GOP that’s why he’s the necessary man because he understands how to make deals, and that they need to realize President Hillary will nominate somebody far worse. He can look at them and say, “C’mon, you guys already said you liked this guy. He’s fine.”
And then he personally takes the entire issue off the presidential election table and screws the GOP leadership yet again, and his followers simply will not care.
I can’t wait to see Hillary led off in handcuffs.
I think I have figured it out. Tom Kline is not even a real troll, just a Tea Party random sentence generator.
I think you’ve cracked it.
@j “Republicans will vote for him. All of them.”
How will the GOP elite reclaim their party if Trump doesn’t fail spectacularly?
And do you really think that Wall Street and other moneyed interests will prefer Trump over Hillary??
My guess is that the GOP elite will actually give up on 2016 and try to grab it from Hillary in 2020.
Watch the money… Does money from typical GOP sources start flowing to Trump’s campaign? It hasn’t happened yet. That’s the key indicator to watch for.
The GOP elite (think President Coriolanus Snow) needs the world to see Trump fall flat on his face. This quote from Hunger Games explains what I mean:
President Snow: Hope, it is the only thing stronger than fear. A little hope is effective, a lot of hope is dangerous. A spark is fine, as long as it’s contained.
Seneca Crane: So…
President Snow: So, contain it!
And do you really think that Wall Street and other moneyed interests will prefer Trump over Hillary??
Why wouldn’t they? He is more one of their own than she is. If Trump does win, does anyone think he is going to do anything to seriously damage the 1%? Trump is just not playing by the rules, I don’t imagine he is going to degrade the fortunes of his friends.
The GOP elite ? I think you are giving a loose collection of greedy dimwits and their handful of courtesans on TV far too much credit.
I’m not trying to start a big thing here. I just don’t care enough to sit here an argue back and forth all day. It’s awful for my health… but this is very important.
For the record, just so everyone really thinks about this and considers the issue very seriously, Cassandra’s comment above is incredibly naïve and dangerous and wrong. Clinton is a Wall Street insider. I’ve worked for large banks since the middle 90s (20+ years) and I can assure you Trump is an outsider playing an insider on TV. He’s a celebrity tycoon not a banking insider.
The senior managers and directors of the big firms and the managing partners at the large brokerage houses absolutely prefer Clinton over Trump. There is zero question or controversy about this. Trump is not “one of their own.” On finance Clinton is Bloomberg in blue pumps. Actually I’d argue Michael Bloomberg is more liberal overall than Hillary Clinton.
Believe whatever you want to believe, but I’m telling you (more like warning you). This is not speculative.
Dangerous? In what way? I don’t think it is a secret that Clinton is the pick of the Financial Industry. Bill Clinton moved the Democratic Party into the orbit of the banks 20 years ago (Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999) . It isn’t some sort of closely kept secret.
Maybe there is some wishful thinking expressed by Cassandra, but this is an established fact. That’s why I think she has to pick Bernie as a running mate. She has no standing to debate Trump on the banking otherwise.
And Dorian’s comment is incredibly stupid.
Of course Trump isn’t a banker. No one said he was a banker. By the same condescending criteria used for Trump, neither is Hillary. And Wall Street is not just banking. But in the vernacular used, it is about the broader financial industry, an industry that a high-stakes developer like Trump is pretty firmly a part of (at least as a client, but he makes plenty of money for these people). Those buildings don’t finance themselves, and Trump doesn’t have that kind of money to self-finance those buildings. The Wall Street insiders have issues with Trump because 1) they don’t know yet if he means what he says and 2) he really is a policy blank slate to them.
Which doesn’t gainsay my own expectation that a President Trump will pretty much do stuff that won’t hurt the 1% much — because he isn’t going to shoot himself or his own fortunes in order genuinely help some angry white guys itching to beat up colored people.
The danger is that people do not comprehend at all how the economy works and who’s pulling the strings. Thinking Trump is a banking insider because he’s wealthy is indicative of a grossly misinformed person.
Also, and more importantly, there is no comprehension of the consequences of making this mistake. The real danger of a idea like this is that is shows a significant misunderstanding of the actual existential threat to the country. It’s economic more that anything else. What to you think is more of a threat to the US and its citizens, ISIL or overly leveraged firms creating special investment instruments to take large positions in under regulated bond markets?
You’re fantastically incorrect. You said Trump is one of them. He isn’t. You said “they” would prefer him as president. They don’t.
You don’t understand this at all and I haven’t the time or patience to explain it to you.
He certainly is one of them. One of the 1% and in a business inextricably tied to them.
And I did not say that they would prefer them. I *asked* why they wouldn’t prefer him.
If I were you, I’d stop telling people what they do or don’t understand until you get your own grasp of any knowledge whatsoever down pat.
I’d like you to point out where I told people what to do beyond considering the issue very seriously.
The “why wouldn’t they” was a rhetorical device to state what you personally believe.
You’re a fucking arrogant liar and an incredible bore. You do stay on message though. Good for you.
Trump would be terrible for Wall-Street. He is clearly very bad at finance. The economy under his stewardship (best brain that has ever brained) would crumble. His entire career is bankruptcy after bankruptcy, all the while using other people’s money. He proudly talks about how he never risks anything, but gets all the reward. I even doubt he is in the 1%. His refusal to show any tax returns or financial records means there is something he is trying to hide…. that thing could be that he isnt a billionaire… possibly not even close. He’s mentioned many times that he includes what his “Brand” is worth in his estimations of his own wealth. Id he says his “name” is worth 9.9Billion, that get’s added to whatever money he actually has.
He will also drive business away from the US and cause a huge loss of faith in our credit. For that reason, Wall-street will be opposed to him. They are much more likely to get behind Hillary. At least she will keep things “on course”
He would be terrible in a much different way than…. yes, Sanders. Where Sanders singles out the malpractice, Trump would just institute WWE/reality show policy and destroy the faith and credit. The people who “run the show” know this. It wouldnt be a restructuring and/or redistribution, so much as an evaporation of wealth and EVERYONE would suffer for it. That is problem they would have with him. And when they start pulling for Clinton over Trump…….. I dont think the average voter is smart enough to differentiate.
@DG “You’re fantastically incorrect. You said Trump is one of them. He isn’t.”
I think you’re right on this, but instead of arguing about it, just follow the money.
If you’re right, the big GOP donors will not be donating to a Trump campaign, and if you’re wrong, they will be.
The “why wouldn’t they” was a rhetorical device to state what you personally believe.
Is that meant to be a question, you moron? Because telling me what I mean is not working out for you.
Because “why wouldn’t they” is a rhetorical device to challenge the assumptions made by the original poster.
Stop proving that not only can you NOT read above a 5th grade level, but that you have no intentions of reading a damn thing I write as long as you see an opportunity to lecture me about *more* stuff you haven’t a clue about.
Drumpf’s Inner 1%er Speaks:
As he “moves to the middle” there will be more of this — not less.
telling middle-class workers that they make too much money wont sit too well…. he’s more likely to say “they” make too much money, and campaign on a wage-cut for “them”.
Not exactly a 1% story, but a damned fun one: Keith Richards Makes Sure Trump Is Fired
Keith Richards for VP!
Trump doesn’t owe anything to the Establishment, to the 1%, or to Wall Street. They are actively donating and campaigning against him. Therefore, he will say anything it takes from the left or from the right if it helps him become President, with or without the approval of Wall Street/Establishment/1% etc. Whatever Trump “clarified” about minimum wage is certainly not his final word.
“Whatever Trump “clarified” about minimum wage is certainly not his final word.”
Which is Cassandra’s point, no? She said, “The Wall Street insiders have issues with Trump because 1) they don’t know yet if he means what he says and 2) he really is a policy blank slate to them.”
Trump is a loose cannon, far more likely to target his policies at people who have personally offended him – which means the banker, CEO, Wall Streeter, etc. who Trump likes today would benefit (altho he may not like them tomorrow) and the banker, CEO, Wall Streeter, etc. who Trump doesn’t like would expect policy punishment. Kiss his ring or pay the price.
But I’d bet money that his stance on minimum wage is going to be how he’d govern. Because minimum wage is certainly good for his businesses and low wages is why he makes his crappy clothes in China, yes? If he was interested in a populist message, you’d think he would have rearranged his businesses to operate more in favor of the people who work for them. But he isn’t interested in that. He is interested in pushing the buttons of people who have been accustomed to having those buttons pushed sine Reagan. The biggest differences here are that Trump doesn’t need a dog whistle and he is out and out lying to people about making any changes that will improve their lives. In this, he is much like most of the Trickle Downers. Except that he is making specific promises that not only can’t he keep, but are specifically not in his own business interests to keep. And he is expecting that these same people he is lying to to just accept that.