Wednesday Open Thread [4.6.16]
PENNSYLVANIA—Harper–Clinton 55, Sanders 33
PENNSYLVANIA–U.S. SENATE—Harper–Sestak 41, McGinty 31, Fetterman 9
MARYLAND–U.S. SENATE—Wash Post/Univ. of Maryland–Edwards 44, Van Hollen 40
PENNSYLVANIA—Quinnipiac–Trump 39, Cruz 30, Kasich 24
PENNSYLVANIA—Quinnipiac–Clinton 50, Sanders 44
Bernie won Wisconsin last night as expected, but by not as healthy margin as he needs. Don’t get me wrong, a 56-43 result, and thus a 13 point win is great, and it keeps him going. But in terms of making up delegate ground, it doesn’t move the needle that much. As you can see, he wins 45 delegates to Clinton’s 36, a net gain of 9 delegates. Clinton now leads Sanders 1280 to 1025, a difference of 255 still. If Bernie had won 70-30 say, he would have won 57 delegates to Clinton’s 24, a net gain of 25 delegates.
And now the roads gets tougher for Bernie. New York, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Connecticut, Rhode Island. To put himself on target of winning the nomination, Bernie must sweep all of these states by the 70-30 margin I talked about.
A Bernie campaign talking point is that they have now 6 states in a row (and it will be 7 after they win the Wyoming caucus on Saturday), and how great and unprecedented that is for a frontrunner like Clinton to lose states late in the process. You know, I am constantly amazed at how horrible people’s memories are. I mean, I can’t be that much smarter than everyone, right? 😉 For example, I got into a Facebook comment war yesterday with a gentlemen who INSISTED to his dying breath that President Clinton never went through an impeachment trial. I mean, he had to have lived through that, right? How could he not remember the Impeachment trial in the Senate in the winter of 1999?? Anywho…
Let’s flash back to 2008, shall we?
Notice that Hillary Clinton, then in the Bernie Sanders role, won plenty of contests down the stretch. Big important contests too. Ohio. Texas. Pennsylvania. She won 9 out of the last 15 contests. But it didn’t matter, because 1) she was only winning those states by margins that did not garner her enough delegates to catch up because 2) Obama had won a string of states in February by huge margins that gave him an insurmountable delegate lead.
It is amazing and ironic that history is repeating itself again, but this time Hillary is Obama and Sanders is Hillary. I will also point out that the final pledged delegate tally for 2007 was 1766.5 for Obama and 1639.5 for Hillary, a margin of 127. A much closer result that our current reality.
Bernie Sanders does have momentum. But that momentum is about to hit the buzz saw that is the New York primary. Mr. Sanders did not impress New Yorkers with his interview with the New York Daily News Editorial Board, where he failed to offer specifics on his plans or display knowledge of the actual subject matter of the issues facing our nation.
This New York Daily News interview was pretty close to a disaster for Bernie Sanders https://t.co/3MG3y6Ifyi
— Erik Raser-Schramm (@eraserschramm) April 6, 2016
Good lord this Sanders interview is a god damned train wreck/the Hindenburg/Exxon Valdez all in one.https://t.co/WwD1zFnmfh
— John Cole (@Johngcole) April 6, 2016
New @CNN: Sanders feeling heat after New York Daily News editorial board interview https://t.co/5QdDBk4vjN pic.twitter.com/bYxAQ6hX2r
— Dylan Byers (@DylanByers) April 5, 2016
The @NYDailyNews interview w/Sander is a revelatory moment. It shows that he doesn't know what he's talking about https://t.co/dTPAUq7fIs
— Michael Cohen (@speechboy71) April 5, 2016
This is the NY Daily News cover page today:
Tomorrow's Daily News front-page: NY it's been waiting for you! pic.twitter.com/PBMITByJLt
— Daniel Aubry (@Aubs89) April 6, 2016
While Wisconsin wasn’t really game-changing for the Democrats, it might be for the Republicans. Nate Silver says Cruz’s win hurts Trump:
“Clearly tonight’s results were problematic for Trump in terms of his delegate math. A few weeks ago, we’d projected Trump to win 25 delegates in Wisconsin. It looks like he’ll only get 3 to 6 instead. After also accounting for Trump’s failure to get any delegates in Utah last month, our estimate would now project him to get 1,179 to 1,182 delegates total, or somewhere between 55 and 58 short of the 1,237 he’d need to clinch the nomination. Trump could potentially make up the difference by persuading uncommitted delegates to vote for him, although given how poorly Trump’s doing in the delegate-wrangling business, that might not be easy.”
“But the more immediate question — the one I’m not quite ready to answer — is what tonight tells us about how Trump might perform in subsequent states.”
AP’s Chad Day and Emily Swanson share some results from AP/Edison Research exit polling in Wisconsin:
On the Democratic side, voters chose Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who they saw as the more exciting, inspiring and honest candidate, according to early results of exit polls conducted for The Associated Press and television networks by Edison Research…But even then, more voters view former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as the candidate most likely to beat Trump, who has been the Republican front-runner throughout the primaries.
…Nearly 60 percent say Sanders inspires them more about the future of the country…Democratic voters were more likely to describe Sanders than Clinton as honest. About nine in 10 say so of Sanders, while about 6 in 10 say so of Clinton… But more than half also say Clinton is the candidate best suited to beat Trump. Three-quarters say Clinton has realistic policies, more than the two-thirds who say that of Sanders.
Dan Balz says the GOP race moves to the Trench Warfare phase: “After Sen. Ted Cruz’s big victory in the Wisconsin primary, Republicans enter a new and critical phase in their volatile nomination battle, with Donald Trump’s rivals and those in the party establishment who are determined to stop him sharing a single objective: to keep the GOP front-runner as far short of a first-ballot convention victory as possible.”
“The Wisconsin race represents a potentially important turning point in the Republican contest, one that will embolden Trump’s opponents. A contested convention has become more probable. Whether that comes to pass will be determined by what takes place in the trench warfare that will play out over the next three months.”
That trench warfare being rules debates for the convention, and the actual selection of delegate slates, which a more organized campaign like Cruz can take advantage of and install his supporters as Trump delegates who will defect to him on the second ballot.
“Donald Trump’s campaign is facing new internal discord over who is advising the candidate and whether his current team must expand if he is to make good on his quest for his party’s presidential nomination,” sources within the team told NBC News.
“The dissent comes at a pivotal moment for a campaign team coming off a significant loss in Wisconsin. It has maintained a slender footprint even as Trump has soared in the polls and outpaced his Republican competitors in primary races. But after several tough weeks, peppered by charges against Trump’s campaign manager for misdemeanor battery, and then comments from the candidate that infuriated all sides of the abortion debate, some within the Trump team said it was time for changes.”
Excellent. I love campaign in disarray stories when they are not about Democrats.
Stunning WI exit polls: 35 percent of GOP voters said they would feel “scared” if Trump became president. Another 20 pct expressed concern.
— Philip Rucker (@PhilipRucker) April 6, 2016
Exit polls in Wisconsin show as many GOP voters (40%) would support Hillary or 3rd party if either Trump or Cruz are the nominee.
— Matthew Dowd (@matthewjdowd) April 6, 2016
The New York Times has some great interactive graphics on what voters want on sides of the aisle:
Mrs. Clinton does best with voters who want the next president to continue President Obama’s policies, while Mr. Sanders is favored by people who think the next president should be more liberal than Mr. Obama has been.
A reader shoots down the theory that Bernie Sanders is hampered by the Democratic party’s proportional award of delegates. While it’s true that the current rules make it harder for Sanders to catch Hillary Clinton, her lead would actually be much greater if there was a winner-take-all system.
In fact, simple math suggests Clinton would actually have about 300 more delegates now if the primaries and caucuses were winner-take-all. That means Clinton would be position to wrap up the nomination in just a few weeks.
Instead, the Democratic primary is likely to grind on until June even though Sanders can’t win.
Ignore the anti-Hillary slant of the writing and look at the poll: 64 percent polled say the country needs “radical change.” That position is backed by a majority of supporters of every candidate save one: Hillary Clinton.
http://www.salon.com/2016/04/06/most_americans_want_radical_change_its_socialism_or_barbarism_and_clinton_would_only_mean_more_of_the_latter/
This is why so many people are chafing at her likely presidency: They want change and they don’t think she’ll give it to them.
I read the NY Daily News transcript yesterday. If you haven’t read it, you should. It probably deserves its own post. Today’s headline on Sandy Hook isn’t the real story in that interview.
Just for a bit of balance, Ryan Grim at Huffington Post, who has plenty of (very fair) critical things to say about Mr Sanders, claims that the idea that the NY Daily News interview was a disaster for Mr Sanders is way overblown. Editors didn’t even understand the difference between the Federal Reserve and the Department of Treasury.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-daily-news_us_5704779ce4b0a506064d8df5
But who cares, right?
On a more interesting topic involving gross speculation and far-fetched hypotheticals:
So when the approximately 35% of GOP primary votes who supported Trump in Ohio and surrounding states like Kentucky and Michigan (or the 1/3 who likely will support Mr Trump in upcoming contests in Indiana and PA) all turn up to Cleveland this summer to protest nomination of Ryan or Romney or Kasich or even Cruz by party apparatchiks, how bad will it get? Riots? Police? National Guard? Curfews? What?
I care. His answers in that interview were not good, and I’d bet we’ll see these interview questions asked in the next debate.
And yeah, I think Cleveland will get ugly.
Wouldn’t it be nice if at the next Democratic debate, the moderators asked questions similar to what the NY Daily News did in that interview/transcript… Asked them of both candidates…
Sure would be great to have actual, useful information about the specific ways in which each candidate intends to go about accomplishing their goals instead of the usual “student council stump speech” bullshit about soda machines in the cafeteria and rock bands every Friday (yeah, that makes me sound old)…
I just read it. I don’t see anything disastrous.
I see a guy who, in contrast to Hillary, doesn’t support Israel’s current government. That’s worth more to me than anything else in the interview.
The gun angle was ridiculously overblown. I don’t support suing gun manufacturers for the fact that people misuse their product, either — not until we can sue car manufacturers when we’re hit by a drunk driver.
I meant who cares because of “the math.” His answers were fine. But it’s the story of the day so have at it. I’ll take a nap and get back to you all in a week or so. I’m sure we’ll have many new sensational stories to misinterpret.
By the way, since this is the open thread, may I recommend the new HBO documentary on Robert Mapplethorpe called, “Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures.”
Watched it with the missus last night. It’s excellent if you are into that kind of thing. (The thing being art.)
From the transcript: “If you are a corporation and the only damn thing you are concerned about is your profits.”
I’d like to imagine and live in a world where everyone, from the people of low SES and the richest of the rich conducted every facet of their existence from a moral compass starting point… Their actions guided by the principle of “How will this benefit all of mankind?” and not “Does this make my life better?”… I want to believe that people will move towards the concept that looking after the common good, the greater good, in turn benefits them…
But WTF isn’t the point of businesses, be they small-medium-large, to make a profit on what they produce? Does he mean company profits should be capped and then anything above that cap gets dispersed?
I got it… Does Bernie think that private industry in America, whether we’re talking about JPMC or Costco, should operate like Major League Baseball teams do when it comes to revenue sharing? Anything above a certain amount gets shared with the lesser-haves?
Before I’m branded as anti-Bernie, let me be clear… The themes he articulates are what I want in America. Where I struggle mightily is in seeing how those themes can be put on a path to fruition… Give me a plan for f***’s sake, even if you may not follow through on it if/when you are in office!
It’s early… Haven’t had coffee… Cranky… Please excuse my rambling & blathering…
Here’s the point: If the editors didn’t even understand the difference between the Federal Reserve and the Department of Treasury, Bernie should have. He should have schooled that reporter. It is his signature issue.
I just want to point something out…. Aside from the fact that when all the voting is done, Clinton will have won more states, but Sanders’ point will be well-and-truly made..
He doesnt HAVE TO WIN every single contest by those huge margins. He probably has to win all the rest of the primaries to win the nomination (which he wont). But your math, DD, relies on Super delegates voting against their constituency. Yes, Sanders needs all those pledged delegates to overcome SDs who have already said whom they are voting for. Those people can switch sides. They will if the voters force them to.
Prop – the notion that the point of a business, above all other considerations, is to make profits is a new and pernicious idea.
See: “Origin of the world’s dumbest idea”
I also want to point out that Clinton questioning whether or not Sanders “is even a democrat” makes me like him more. You shouldn’t have to qualify for one of 2 powerful, barely accountable clubs to be president. People who are loyal to the Party first…. like Clinton suggests she is with that comment… are a huge part of whats wrong with this country.
This isn’t a state race, Ben. I keep stressing that because it’s important. When you look at what the GOP is threatening to do at their convention it is 100% in line with their nominating rules. Trump and Cruz supporters will flip, but it won’t be because the GOP did something against the rules.
As far as super delegates… they won’t come into play until after the primaries and the pledged delegate count. If Bernie were to win the upcoming states and come close to Clinton’s pledged delegate count things would get very interesting, very fast. We aren’t close to that scenario yet.
The “gun” question sequence in the transcript… I guess I’ll have to dig deeper into the Daily News issue to see if there’s an explanation for what exactly Bernie said that is so horrible… Everything, to me at least, was entirely reasonable and pragmatic regarding possible ways to curtail some of the gun violence…
If Clinton really were wrapping this thing up, her wins should get more consistent, and her margins should be getting bigger. That isnt happening and I think that means quite a lot.
I think she is a terrible campaigner… at least based on her 2 runs for president. She will make a great executive and no doubt will be able to keep her party in line as it’s leader. The longer this goes on, the worse she looks…. That is not a good indicator for a general election. I think that is why the DNC wanted Sanders to drop out a few weeks ago. Perhaps she will do better against a Republican. I have a feeling she is holding back on burying Sanders out of a desire to stay on good terms with, what is now almost half the party. Let’s hope she doesn’t have any misconceptions about “staying friendly” with republicans (like Obama did)
Ben,
My math (I love that term, as if my math is different from your math) does not include super delegates at all. I am only talking about pledged delegates. Under the rules, which are the only thing that matter in this contest, super delegates are free to endorse and vote for whomever they want. They do not have to take how their states voted into consideration. So it matters not that you think they should. Your implication that they are required to vote how their states voted is false.
My math leaves out super delegates because at this stage of the contest they are irrelevant. In the end, after the last primary, the vast majority of super delegates will vote for and endorse the winner of the pledged delegate race, just like in 2008. I find it ironic that the man of the people you support wants these super delegates to overturn the votes of the people and vote for him over the winner of the Democratic primary, Hillary Clinton. How undemocratic of you Sanderistas.
“I have a feeling she is holding back on burying Sanders out of a desire to stay on good terms with, what is now almost half the party.”
That, plus she knows negative campaigning will only drive her own likability ratings even further down.
Always good to hear from my favorite (really, I mean it) Democrat, Erik Raser-Schramm…despite his Hillary love.
So, Erik, let me share with you one more time your fave tune from 2008:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FvyGydc8no
“I think she is a terrible campaigner… She will make a great executive and … will be able to keep her party in line… The longer this goes on, the worse she looks…. That is not a good indicator for a general election. I think that is why the DNC wanted Sanders to drop out a few weeks ago.”
Yep, and if we wind up with a Trump or Cruz, much of the blame will fall squarely on those who ignorantly and unrealistically decided to make the this election about some idealistic utopian dream which, as is evident from the Sanders NY Daily News interview, will never come to pass instead of the boring cementing of hard won gains and incremental progress.
Critical thinking is obviously a commodity in short supply.
Dave, Trump is making this about an idealistic utopian dream. His dream is popular and is winning him contest after contest. Let’s just hope Clinton doesn’t try that “pragmatic incrementalism” approach to reversing discriminatory state laws, or the assault on women’s bodies, or rising sea levels, or lead in children’s drinking water…(notice how I didn’t mention getting free college… or whatever you HillaryHacks like to reduce half your parties voters too?). Our problems don’t need and cant wait for small gains got through political brinkmanship. They need to be fixed right the hell now.
We have just as much chance of winding up with Cruz (Trump is finished, by his own hand; if his campaign isn’t dead yet he’ll kill it some more next week) if Hillary is the Democratic nominee. Either the US will vote for a theocratic loon or it won’t; the Democrat will reap the likely benefit of everyone’s hatred of Cruz.
And whatever Hillary will bring, I wouldn’t call it “progress,” at least not on the collapse-of-capitalism front.
We continue to await Sanders’ proposals to regulate shadow banking, the industry which directly caused the collapse.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/01/19/weakened-at-bernies/
Three months since this nudge and we still hear nothing but promises of soda machines in the cafeteria.
[Great image! In his first presidential campaign, Nixon supported allowing dancing at Whittier College.]
I’m all for polite political disagreement, but this made me smile a little:
http://gawker.com/florida-governor-rick-scott-cant-even-get-a-cup-of-coff-1769294087
We have yet to adopt the metric system, but there is other “progress” to cement. For instance, we now view not allowing multi-national corporations to buy US elections as Utopian dreaming. Time to lock that one in.
LG – thanks for that link. Awesome.
LG, I watched that this morning. It was a thing of beauty.
That heckler had done her homework. That, plus the power of caffeine.
Jason, figure it out. Corporations and conservatives are allowed to make huge strides and dramatic changes. Peons and progressives must subsist on crumbs and make compromises. Like how Democrats wanted to expand health care to everyone and cover all necessary aspects of health care…. but we compromised and now, for-profit insurance companies have 300 million mandatory customers and women in most states cant get mammograms because old men think they are too “liberated”. But let’s keep hoping level-headedness can beat these guys.
It’s also not like she is speaking to a human. Rick Scott is a reptilian lab experiment created by Koch Industries…. he’s also has a severe ibogaine addiction. (worth a shot)
Rick Scott is governor of Florida as part of his sentence for ripping off Medicare. Let the punishment fit the crime. Of course, by that standard, Mike Purzycki should be mayor of Wilmington, because he’s been instrumental in cannibalizing the rest of the city to build the riverfront.
The fact that Sanders is a lousy candidate does not make Hillary a better one. She’s still a lousy candidate, too. The question isn’t which one is bringing the ice cream and balloons. It’s which one’s flaws can you stand.
It helps to have someone who’s done her homework before coming to class.
I had never thought of Sanders as an empty suit, but when pressed, he really comes off like Rubio.
THIS:
Here’s the point: If the editors didn’t even understand the difference between the Federal Reserve and the Department of Treasury, Bernie should have. He should have schooled that reporter. It is his signature issue.
And I’ll add, that when I read that interview, I was yelling at my screen GLASS-STEAGALL! JUST SAY GLASS-STEAGALL! Sheesh. He was a co-sponsor of the bill Senator Warren introduced about a year ago. (And that bill had bi-partisan support) Glass-Steagall (if passed without grandfathering) would make banks go back to the boring part of banking, so they’d have to deaccession the riskier bits. It doesn’t need Treasury or the Federal reserve — just bring Glass-Steagall back.
AND I will say, that if Hillary had given that interview, she’d be toast. Rightly so, but Sanders is being given a pass here that Clinton would *never* get.
“If Clinton really were wrapping this thing up, her wins should get more consistent, and her margins should be getting bigger. That isnt happening and I think that means quite a lot.”
Yea.. It means she isn’t attacking him. And no need to… She’s already wrapped this thing up.
She probably wants to tap him to be her running mate. Attacking him would defeat that plan (in more than one way).
Obama feeling the Bern:
Amusing tweets about Bernie: http://www.buzzfeed.com/alexnaidus/just-bernie-tweets?utm_term=.sryKGJ8dLV#.sryKGJ8dLV
#10 is my favorite
” They need to be fixed right the hell now.”
@Ben,
You bet they do. Can you name anything in the last 5,000 years that got fixed “right the hell now?”
Everybody wants something done “right now.” I want poverty to end right now. I want world peace right now. I want income equality right now. I want to end the rampant gun culture right now.
Sheesh!!! Where have you been all your life? Nothing happens right now! AND nothing happens all at once! Rising sea levels!!!??? Explain how anyone, including Super Sanders is going to fix that “right the hell now”
Your ideals are admirable, your realism leaves much to be desired.
40% plus percent of the country is collecting one form or another of a government hand out. It’s no surprise Bernie is so popular.
“Can you name anything in the last 5,000 years that got fixed “right the hell now?”
George W. Bush signed his signature tax cuts less than six months after he took office.
Leaving the actual policies of the candidates aside, and looking only at temperament, experience, and actual accomplishments, the fact that Clinton, Sanders, Trump, and Cruz are now the four-person pool from which the next President of the United States can effectively be drawn (with a nod toward Sander’s mathematical near elimination) …
Doesn’t it strike anybody as the “trump of doom” for the United States that this group is what we’ve come down to for the next “leader of the free world”? Ironically, Hillary DOES look like the best bet, but only because she’s a person of slightly less than average height (and accomplishment, and morality) standing in a field surrounded by smurfs.
We’re doomed.
“40% plus percent of the country is collecting one form or another of a government hand out. It’s no surprise Bernie is so popular.”
You’re a moron. The actual number is over 49%, but it doesn’t include children, and we all know those little parasites rarely pay their own way.
If you were any stupider, we’d have to take turns fertilizing you.
“she’s a person of slightly less than average height (and accomplishment, and morality) standing in a field surrounded by smurfs.
We’re doomed.”
Speak for yourself. Those of us who have held our breath long enough to turn blue have been waiting a long time for this.
//Those of us who have held our breath long enough to turn blue have been waiting a long time for this.//
What’s “this”? For the entire process to implode?