nixluva wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:

nixluva wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:

nixluva wrote:I hope these Bernie voters are happy now. Looks like about 20% didn't vote for Clinton and about 12% voted for Trump!!!

Tweet was deleted or there was problem with the URL:

https://twitter.com/b_schaffner/status/900123391155482624

Tweet was deleted or there was problem with the URL:

https://twitter.com/b_schaffner/status/900375362604892160

These guys and those Jill Stein voters should be really proud and happy with how there votes helped elect Trump!

What percent of the total electorate did these there categories combined make up in your opinion? Do you have any idea if it would have made a significant difference or not if they all voted for Hillary state by state ? Or are you going to keep bashing these people based on incomplete data?

You are really coming off as a hater here. I asked you multiple times, how you expect people to hold their politicians accountable other than by not voting for them and I get crickets.

The predominant story is people should vote for HRC to avoid Trump, Obama to about Romney and before him McCain/Palin, Clinton to avoid Bush. You see the problem with this right? There's always the big bad wolf out there and we need to vote for worthless centrist policies (that coddle the 1%-ers) to keep them at bay.

It's time moderates and centrists wake up and realize we don't give a **** about NAFTA and big banks, instead we care about our pocket books. You don't have to like it, but keep pushing this nonsense and you lose all credibility.

We do know how many votes Jill Stein got and if you were to combine those votes with the Bernie Defectors and no Votes, I have no doubt that it would've made a difference. Not to mention the fact that there were Voter Purges of AA's which shaved a few more votes. It's not just one thing but a combination.

I bring this up as a lesson to those who think it was worth it to make a statement instead of uniting behind Hillary and at least then Bernie and his voters would have a voice and a say in what is going on. Bernie had already managed to pull Hillary to the left which you seem to have forgotten. He would've had leverage to do even more with Hillary and the Dems in charge. You see these voters that wanted to make a statement and show the Moderate and Centrist Dems, only served to give total power to the Republicans. How does that help the Progressive cause??? It doesn't! So as i've said before that strategy was STUPID!

The votes mattered cuz the gap wasn't that big in the key states that put Trump over the top!!!

The most important states, though, were Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Trump won those states by 0.2, 0.7 and 0.8 percentage points, respectively — and by 10,704, 46,765 and 22,177 votes. Those three wins gave him 46 electoral votes; if Clinton had done one point better in each state, she'd have won the electoral vote, too.

Knowing how many people voted for Jill Stein isn't helpful in itself. You still need to know how many of those wouldn't have voted for Jill Stein if the Democrats had filed an appropriate candidate.

I think the fact that moderates are still stewing over this, shows the strategy to send a message actually worked and the message was received. Whether they have what it takes to now take accountability for the last 45 years of BS and do something to earn our trust back is up to them.

Nah! What they did was stupid as F cuz now Bernie has almost zero ability to enact a progressive agenda whereas he would've been able to get his ideas heard and many put forth if the Dems were in charge.

You guys are the proof of the folli of letting the Perfect be the enemy of the Good! Taking a smaller victory is much better than a TOTAL LOSS! Now what little gains had been made are being rolled back. If Trump wasn't such a screw up, the Republicans would've already erased most of the progress that had been made. Perhaps you are so caught up in your self righteousness that you haven't been paying attention to what Trump and the Republicans have been doing.

That's not how I see it at all.
This isn't about Bernie and while I would have preferred him over HRC, I know fully well progressives will never have enough of a majority by themselves to affect policy change.

So what we are trying to do is move the party back to the left. It's hard because the CENTRISTS have convinced rank and file Democratic voters that them not being in power is a TOTAL LOSS scenario. This could not be further from the truth. Policies created and approved by centrist Democrats have done incalculable damage to the middle class. We don't think Trump coddling white supremacists is that much worse than Clinton coddling Wall Street. White supremacists deciding the future of the country and Wall Street deciding it leads to equally bad outcomes for me. I don't want bWgite supremacy in the US, I also don't want the US to turn into a large Enron.

While we are liberal on social issues, at the end of the day just about everyone votes based on their pocket book and not their moral compass. (I use "we" loosely, I can only speak for myself.)

So to quote someone you may be familiar with: It's the economy, stupid.

meloshouldgo wrote:So what we are trying to do is move the party back to the left. It's hard because the CENTRISTS have convinced rank and file Democratic voters that them not being in power is a TOTAL LOSS scenario. This could not be further from the truth. Policies created and approved by centrist Democrats have done incalculable damage to the middle class. We don't think Trump coddling white supremacists is that much worse than Clinton coddling Wall Street. White supremacists deciding the future of the country and Wall Street deciding it leads to equally bad outcomes for me. I don't want bWgite supremacy in the US, I also don't want the US to turn into a large Enron.

Please take this question literally and on the surface.

Does a trump presidency not combine the threat of White supremacists and Wall Street, yes or no?

And what is the endgame here? Do you genuinely feel that moving further to the left is the best counter to the populist resentment movement Trump embodies?

nixluva wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:

nixluva wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:

nixluva wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:

nixluva wrote:I hope these Bernie voters are happy now. Looks like about 20% didn't vote for Clinton and about 12% voted for Trump!!!

Tweet was deleted or there was problem with the URL:

https://twitter.com/b_schaffner/status/900123391155482624

Tweet was deleted or there was problem with the URL:

https://twitter.com/b_schaffner/status/900375362604892160

These guys and those Jill Stein voters should be really proud and happy with how there votes helped elect Trump!

What percent of the total electorate did these there categories combined make up in your opinion? Do you have any idea if it would have made a significant difference or not if they all voted for Hillary state by state ? Or are you going to keep bashing these people based on incomplete data?

You are really coming off as a hater here. I asked you multiple times, how you expect people to hold their politicians accountable other than by not voting for them and I get crickets.

The predominant story is people should vote for HRC to avoid Trump, Obama to about Romney and before him McCain/Palin, Clinton to avoid Bush. You see the problem with this right? There's always the big bad wolf out there and we need to vote for worthless centrist policies (that coddle the 1%-ers) to keep them at bay.

It's time moderates and centrists wake up and realize we don't give a **** about NAFTA and big banks, instead we care about our pocket books. You don't have to like it, but keep pushing this nonsense and you lose all credibility.

We do know how many votes Jill Stein got and if you were to combine those votes with the Bernie Defectors and no Votes, I have no doubt that it would've made a difference. Not to mention the fact that there were Voter Purges of AA's which shaved a few more votes. It's not just one thing but a combination.

I bring this up as a lesson to those who think it was worth it to make a statement instead of uniting behind Hillary and at least then Bernie and his voters would have a voice and a say in what is going on. Bernie had already managed to pull Hillary to the left which you seem to have forgotten. He would've had leverage to do even more with Hillary and the Dems in charge. You see these voters that wanted to make a statement and show the Moderate and Centrist Dems, only served to give total power to the Republicans. How does that help the Progressive cause??? It doesn't! So as i've said before that strategy was STUPID!

The votes mattered cuz the gap wasn't that big in the key states that put Trump over the top!!!

The most important states, though, were Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Trump won those states by 0.2, 0.7 and 0.8 percentage points, respectively — and by 10,704, 46,765 and 22,177 votes. Those three wins gave him 46 electoral votes; if Clinton had done one point better in each state, she'd have won the electoral vote, too.

Knowing how many people voted for Jill Stein isn't helpful in itself. You still need to know how many of those wouldn't have voted for Jill Stein if the Democrats had filed an appropriate candidate.

I think the fact that moderates are still stewing over this, shows the strategy to send a message actually worked and the message was received. Whether they have what it takes to now take accountability for the last 45 years of BS and do something to earn our trust back is up to them.

Nah! What they did was stupid as F cuz now Bernie has almost zero ability to enact a progressive agenda whereas he would've been able to get his ideas heard and many put forth if the Dems were in charge.

You guys are the proof of the folli of letting the Perfect be the enemy of the Good! Taking a smaller victory is much better than a TOTAL LOSS! Now what little gains had been made are being rolled back. If Trump wasn't such a screw up, the Republicans would've already erased most of the progress that had been made. Perhaps you are so caught up in your self righteousness that you haven't been paying attention to what Trump and the Republicans have been doing.

That's not how I see it at all.
This isn't about Bernie and while I would have preferred him over HRC, I know fully well progressives will never have enough of a majority by themselves to affect policy change.

So what we are trying to do is move the party back to the left. It's hard because the CENTRISTS have convinced rank and file Democratic voters that them not being in power is a TOTAL LOSS scenario. This could not be further from the truth. Policies created and approved by centrist Democrats have done incalculable damage to the middle class. We don't think Trump coddling white supremacists is that much worse than Clinton coddling Wall Street. White supremacists deciding the future of the country and Wall Street deciding it leads to equally bad outcomes for me. I don't want bWgite supremacy in the US, I also don't want the US to turn into a large Enron.

While we are liberal on social issues, at the end of the day just about everyone votes based on their pocket book and not their moral compass. (I use "we" loosely, I can only speak for myself.)

So to quote someone you may be familiar with: It's the economy, stupid.

PLEASE! Stop with the BS! This White Supremacist crap is the least of the problem with Trump and Republican Control and you know it.

You are seriously flawed in your thinking IMO. PROGRESSIVES would've had substantially greater say in affairs with Hillary as President as opposed to Trump. In fact you know damned well that Hillary was pulled much further left because of Bernie and that was at least going to help get the right policies on the table. Exactly how does Trump and the Republicans being in control further any of the things you say you stand for? They are in complete opposition to most of what you claim to stand for.

You can keep on lying to yourself about this but you know that this was a BIG mistake and real damage is being done and will continue to be done if Trump and the Republicans stay in charge.

I have been a progressive for a long time. I don't remember having a say in anything over the last 40 something years. So maybe you need to stop with the BS. NOTHING about Hillary being pulled left by Bernie would have translated to policy. And I am perfectly fine with not voting for either loser and it doesn't require me to lie to myself. If it happens again, I will do it again.

meloshouldgo wrote:What exactly is the biggest problem with Trump and Republican control?

If you're a progressive, altering and potentially significantly altering the make-up the Supreme Court for a generation is likely a legitimate issue.

What according to you have Democrats done to save the economy? What did Obama and Democrats do different from what Bush, his appointees did and proposed? Care to lay it out?

I'm going to assume you're politically savvy enough to realize 240 years of bureaucracy has rendered the federal government incapable Of doing anything revolutionary or quickly, at least from an immediate results standpoint.

I do know you're savvy enough to know that passing a comprehensive healthcare act was actually an extraordinary political accomplishment. Whether the ACA has been effective is a legitimate question, and it certainly has not "saved the economy." But what we see more more evidence of is that it made healthcare a permanent law of the land. It may take the next democratically-controlled legislative and executive branches of government to vastly improve the ACA or move on to the next iteration of healthcare. It may take two. It may a generation, it may take several. But the biggest hurdle has been met - getting it passed and getting the premise embedded.

Healthcare, of course, is a huge economic issue.

Knickoftime wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:What exactly is the biggest problem with Trump and Republican control?

If you're a progressive, altering and potentially significantly altering the make-up the Supreme Court for a generation is likely a legitimate issue.

What according to you have Democrats done to save the economy? What did Obama and Democrats do different from what Bush, his appointees did and proposed? Care to lay it out?

This was the only issue that made me reconsider my position several times but in the end Clinton baggage outweighed the possibility of suffering through yet another Merrick Garland type situation.
I did however, vote to change the balance of power in the Senate in favor of Democrats.

I'm going to assume you're politically savvy enough to realize 240 years of bureaucracy has rendered the federal government incapable Of doing anything revolutionary or quickly, at least from an immediate results standpoint.

I do know you're savvy enough to know that passing a comprehensive healthcare act was actually an extraordinary political accomplishment. Whether the ACA has been effective is a legitimate question, and it certainly has not "saved the economy." But what we see more more evidence of is that it made healthcare a permanent law of the land. It may take the next democratically-controlled legislative and executive branches of government to vastly improve the ACA or move on to the next iteration of healthcare. It may take two. It may a generation, it may take several. But the biggest hurdle has been met - getting it passed and getting the premise embedded.

Healthcare, of course, is a huge economic issue.

You are right it didn't make the economy better and it doesn't make up for 45 years of Centrist **** we have put up with. When it becomes something useful, more like IF - we can discuss it's merits.

I have never bashed any centrist for anything other than economic policy and that is what Nix and I were discussing, since he was challenging my position in doing so. He has said many times that Obama fixed the economy. Which is flat out wrong.

meloshouldgo wrote:

Knickoftime wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:So what we are trying to do is move the party back to the left. It's hard because the CENTRISTS have convinced rank and file Democratic voters that them not being in power is a TOTAL LOSS scenario. This could not be further from the truth. Policies created and approved by centrist Democrats have done incalculable damage to the middle class. We don't think Trump coddling white supremacists is that much worse than Clinton coddling Wall Street. White supremacists deciding the future of the country and Wall Street deciding it leads to equally bad outcomes for me. I don't want bWgite supremacy in the US, I also don't want the US to turn into a large Enron.

Please take this question literally and on the surface.

Does a trump presidency not combine the threat of White supremacists and Wall Street, yes or no?

And what is the endgame here? Do you genuinely feel that moving further to the left is the best counter to the populist resentment movement Trump embodies?

I didn't vote for Trump and I am not responsible for what it represents. You are trying to create a false equivalency.

Not trying to at all, you're being unnecessarily presumptive and defensive. I don't care how you voted, I was responding to what you wrote.

As written, it reads to me like a false contrast - white supremacists (representing Trump) vs. Wall Street (representing Clinton). I read your graph and immediately thought 'Doesn't trump represent both?', the combination of rather than the lesser of two evils?

This is so obvious to me I wanted to know perhaps if you have a different view of trump's economic worldview than I.

That said, from what I gather this is a conversation about principle versus pragmatism. Who are president is as a binary question. That's just a fact, so it's a legitimate argument.

I understand people think Bernie Sanders would've beat Trump, and that's entirely possible. But we also can't forget that the reason Trump won was because Clinton was a historically bad candidate. But if Sanders won you could've said the same about Trump.

The point is I don't see any evidence the country as a whole is truly ready for a progressive agenda. Sanders would've been blocked by the House at minimum, if not by members of his own party.

You've already seen what's happened with redistricting. I think there's a legitimate question that can be asked if moving the democratic party much farther to the left is political suicide.

Knickoftime wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:

Knickoftime wrote:

meloshouldgo wrote:So what we are trying to do is move the party back to the left. It's hard because the CENTRISTS have convinced rank and file Democratic voters that them not being in power is a TOTAL LOSS scenario. This could not be further from the truth. Policies created and approved by centrist Democrats have done incalculable damage to the middle class. We don't think Trump coddling white supremacists is that much worse than Clinton coddling Wall Street. White supremacists deciding the future of the country and Wall Street deciding it leads to equally bad outcomes for me. I don't want bWgite supremacy in the US, I also don't want the US to turn into a large Enron.

Please take this question literally and on the surface.

Does a trump presidency not combine the threat of White supremacists and Wall Street, yes or no?

And what is the endgame here? Do you genuinely feel that moving further to the left is the best counter to the populist resentment movement Trump embodies?

I didn't vote for Trump and I am not responsible for what it represents. You are trying to create a false equivalency.

Not trying to at all, you're being unnecessarily presumptive and defensive. I don't care how you voted, I was responding to what you wrote.

As written, it reads to me like a false contrast - white supremacists (representing Trump) vs. Wall Street (representing Clinton). I read your graph and immediately thought 'Doesn't trump represent both?', the combination of rather than the lesser of two evils?

This is so obvious to me I wanted to know perhaps if you have a different view of trump's economic worldview than I.

That said, from what I gather this is a conversation about principle versus pragmatism. Who are president is as a binary question. That's just a fact, so it's a legitimate argument.

I understand people think Bernie Sanders would've beat Trump, and that's entirely possible. But we also can't forget that the reason Trump won was because Clinton was a historically bad candidate. But if Sanders won you could've said the same about Trump.

The point is I don't see any evidence the country as a whole is truly ready for a progressive agenda. Sanders would've been blocked by the House at minimum, if not by members of his own party.

You've already seen what's happened with redistricting. I think there's a legitimate question that can be asked if moving the democratic party much farther to the left is political suicide.

It's not defensive to point out the fallacy which is what it was. The choice in Not binary and two negatives don't make a positive. Real life is not algebra. And no it's Not a legitimate argument.

meloshouldgo wrote:

Knickoftime wrote:
Getting legislation passed, which involves two branches of government, is often the only metric we have to assess term-limited administrations during and immediately following.

Clearly you have a much lower bar for accomplishment than I do. I care more about what problem a piece of legislation fixed or in some cases created thank on whether somebody "accomplished" the feat of passing a law.

Perhaps. But in this polarized political climate, the fact that the bill is relatively popular demonstrates it is doing something positive for enough people to make it relatively popular. For one example, it clearly has been a difference in the lives of people with pre-existing conditions or family members with pre-existing conditions.

As a progressive, who perhaps (?) believes in the single-payer/Medicare-for-all system, you might agree getting a national healthcare system passed at all is a step in that direction, a few of the roadblocks hurtled for the next progressive to pick up the baton.

Maybe 'zero straight to single-payer' was the expectation of some progressives, though in my opinion that seems naïve.

In the last seven years the needle has been moved from 'national healthcare is a progressive, socialist tax-and-spend non-starter' to 'repeal and REPLACE.' The reality of universal healthcare has been changed. Medicare for all sometime in our lifetimes is no longer a pipe dream.

I do consider that to be an accomplishment in both senses, but as you say maybe my bar is lower, and I don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

nixluva wrote:

gunsnewing wrote:How's that Russian investigation and recount going?

The Russia Investigation is going well as far as I can tell. Closing in on Trump and his people so it's only a matter of time

Another 3 years and they will have something to show for it... and after another 4 they will have a definitive conclusion.