US Elections 2016 Part I: The Debates & Primaries/Caucus

[solomon]

Originally I said it was Hilary EASY.

But this email thing is really dogging her.

Then again, most average Joe Blows who will be voting in the election aren't paying attention yet.

While it could very well be a close election, my gut tells me that somehow Hilary overcomes the email controversy and wins. I just have a lot of trouble seeing any GOP candidate winning a considerable amount of Moderates, or the youth vote. That's to say nothing of very low minority support.

Key is whether or not Hilary can attract the same amount of turnout that Obama did with previously underrepresented voters.

[Ithekro]

Also it is over a year until the election. The US attention span for these things is usually, at best, six months.

[risingstar3110]

I thought the primaries will start at February? Which is just 6 months from now?

[solomon]

Well thanks to the unseemly amounts of money required to run for office and the bottom less pit like appetite for ANYTHING from cable news, there is tons of non news making news.

It's true most people aside from hard core partisans and political nerds aren't paying real attention and likely wont until nominations occur.

[risingstar3110]

Many have probably seen, but this is probably the reason why I seriously would like Bernie Sanders to be a serious challenger on the race.

I means the guy has been so consistent in the past 3 decades or so in pretty much every issues. And has slowly stepped up from town mayor, to the senator, still got majorly supported of his supporters in all these times. I guess from an outsiders perspective, it will be more interesting to see him step up onto a grander stage and test out his principles

[james0246]

Lindsey Graham may be borderline incoherent at time, but damn if he isn't heads and tails above the other "lesser" candidates if for no other reason than he seems to actually speak from experience and with some knowledge. He could be Trump's Vice Presidential candidate .

[james0246]

No matter his cabbage-patch like features or his grating voice, Cruz definitely studied at the feet of George W. and Reagan in how he addresses his audience.

[Vallen Chaos Valiant]

I am starting to realise that Iran is a perfectly ordinary nation compared to the United States. The debate that is going on with the GOP candidates are just as if not more extreme than anything the ayatollah came up with.

[james0246]

Did Ben Carson just come up with an immigration plan that is just one or two steps away from slavery (or st least a semi indentured servitude)? He's allowing some illegals to stay, but only if they are forced to work on farms with limited personal rights? Maybe I didn't understand the point he was trying to make...

[Vallen Chaos Valiant]

Originally Posted by james0246

Did Ben Carson just come up with an immigration plan that is just one or two steps away from slavery? He's allowing some illegals to stay, but only if they are forced to work on farms with limited personal rights? Maybe I didn't understand the point he was trying to make...

You understood him perfectly. He wants slavery back. Is that so hard to believe?
Let's put it another way. It is well established that most slaves want to be free, but surprisingly few of the slaves wanted to abolish slavery. It makes no sense, but that what we are dealing with. Humans are strange.

[Esclair]

I feel like there was a whole Trump/Carson vibe going on there, especially towards the end when CNN set up Carson to attack Trump via the whole vaccine thing and Carson sort of made it a friendly conversation instead.

Carly Fiorina came off strong but is a complete warmonger.

Anyways, aside from the crazy wall and deportation thing Trump's policies are actually reasonable and sane compared to the rest of the established GOP field.

[KiraYamatoFan]

Some of those guys really deserve to be arrested for the crap they preach, which goes totally against what so many people have fought and died to build a society that acknowledges freedom and equality.

[IceHism]

Jeb even or slightly down
trump even or slightly down
Fiorina up
Rand Paul up
Chris Christie down
Ben Carson down
ted cruz is the anti christ
Marco rubio up

Well that's what i think for the polls, i'm not a GOP voter so i don't really care but it's fun to watch

Anyways, this went exactly how i thought it would be. Basically if a bunch of housewives had a family reunion. Show was hilarious and everyone was just trying to appeal to the republican base rather than have a debate. Then again, 11 people is too much and the CNN moderator was more concerned with pitting the candidates against each other with shade rather than discuss policy. So CNN screwed up pretty badly here.

Anyways, some notes i have
Fiorina is totally fucking crazy. Not talking to russia and then setting up so much offensive maneuvers is just totally war hawk. She must be inspired to cause WW3. Also, i laugh at how she props up her business when she basically ran HP into a disaster. She has 0 foreign policy experience and it's sad that she is the most articulate and elaborative with her policies but my god are they terrible

Rand Paul had the most substance, but that's exactly the reason why he isn't gonna gain much votes. He's pretty conservative outside of the marijuana issue.

Ben Carson acted like a pussy and wouldn't educate trump. When trump said "They were giving vaccines to the baby as if it was for a horse. and then boom, a week later, Autism!" was really LOL. But Carson just couldn't speak. He may be more genuine but that ain't going to appeal to the republican voters.

Huckabee is in the Fiorina camp with how crazy he is. He basically just talked about abortions. "Everyone die, except for babies!"
Also, when he talked about everyone living the american dream... except for muslims and gays. There was just a kid recently who got arrested because he was muslim. That's not gonna bode well.

Donald Trump was a lot more quiet this time around. I find it interesting that he didn't really give off any sort of impression here. His wall of mexico thing does not make any sense with the logistics or cost of deporting 11-12 million illegals. His vaccines and Autism thing was pretty hilarious but that's not really a serious issue in this country. only with the republicans really. His progressive tax policies is very good though.

Chris Christie.... i'm not sure if anyone likes the guy... He kind of got trapped by Jeb and then got beaten down.

Ted Cruz talked like a robot

The Ronald Reagan dicksucking was probably the funniest thing to me though. He screwed up so many non-white's lives, introduced trickle-down economics which was always bullshit and doesn't work and loads of other problems. I can't believe the party would actually look up to him.

Overall, if i had to choose IMO, it would be between Rand Paul or Trump here.

Anyways, i don't think the democrat debate will go anywhere near as hilarious as this but i'm really hoping Sanders can pull off something good there.

[justinstrife]

Cruz is my top choice, followed by Fiorina. The ones I'm most interested in voting for this time around. Bush needs to go away. Forever.

Cruz is the smartest one in the room, and the smartest of all the candidates on both sides.

[SeijiSensei]

Having watched a good hour or two of post-mortems on MSNBC, it sounds like Scott Walker has fallen off everyone's radar. I don't think he was mentioned once in the coverage I watched. Walker was polling in double figures only a few months ago and leading in Iowa; now he's in the 4-5% range.

The other candidate with problems is Mike Huckabee. Standing hand-in-hand with Kim Davis, the Kentucky county official who refused to sign same-sex marriage certificates, was perhaps his last gasp at rallying his troops. I think his time, and Rick Santorum's, has come and gone. Ben Carson is new the darling of the religious conservatives, and I expect Carson to do well in Iowa and later on in South. There is a solid bloc of religious voters among Iowa Republicans, and the caucus structure rewards the well-organized. The last two caucuses were won by religious conservatives -- Santorum in 2012, and Huckabee in 2008.

[ChainLegacy]

Is anyone else genuinely concerned about the rise of dynastic political families in the US? They've always existed throughout our history, of course, but it's never been so blatant and unapologetic as it is now with Jeb and Hillary. I mean, even some neocons were willing to admit George W. Bush was a terrible president a few years ago, what happened?

[GDB]

Originally Posted by Esclair

Anyways, aside from the crazy wall and deportation thing Trump's policies are actually reasonable and sane compared to the rest of the established GOP field.

Still pretty sure his "foreign policy" and general attitude would end up causing World War III within a year of his inauguration.

[james0246]

Originally Posted by justinstrife

Cruz is my top choice, followed by Fiorina. The ones I'm most interested in voting for this time around. Bush needs to go away. Forever.

Cruz is the smartest one in the room, and the smartest of all the candidates on both sides.

I don't know. Cruz is just too much of a politician (similar to Christie and a few others), who seems to just fundamentally not know how to connect with other human beings: His sincerity always appears false to me. I can't say he necessarily had a bad night, but, much like Walker and earlier Santorum, Jindal and Pataki, his presence was seldom actually felt.

Fiorina did have a nice night, though. Many of her answers were simplistic, even a little ludicrous, but she can sell herself decently. Admittedly, in politics women who sell themselves as stern and powerful (and hawkish) can often be seen negatively, but considering that we are finally moving past the Sarah Palin style representations, maybe the American voters are finally more willing to look at a Carly Fiorina style politician (which means they are also finally more willing to look at a Hilary Clinton).

---

That being said, Carson and Trump continue to sell their brand quite well, though I don't think Carson did a particularly good job expanding his brand (he came across as winsome, but not particularly presidential, and his inability to actually confront several of the issues he was challenged with was borderline silly), whereas Trump did a solid job continuing his roguish quality in the face of ever increasing scorn and derision (it did help that he didn't completely fall apart like he did in the first debate).

Fiorina had a damn good night, imho. While not necessarily knowledgeable about much (which obviously is not a deterrent to being elected any more ), and her answers about her record were simply awful defenses (and that's not even accoutning for her past inability to be elected for anything), she has a commanding presence that rises above most on the stage.

Christie, Paul, Santorum, Jindal, Pataki and Walker should retire - there performance was lackluster and borderline comedy, especially Christie, Jindal and the ever smirking Pataki. Jeb! was serviceable, but he seldom spoke with any real authority.

Huckabee, as always, was well spoken, but had little to no actual input on anything of importance (the whole Kim Davis thing is an absolutely ludicrous rallying cry). Graham had an okay night, but that was mainly because he could turn ever question toward ISIS or the military ; he's probably too hawkish for any general election, but he could be someone's vice presidential candidate.

Rubio also had an okay night, but that was primarily because he didn't cause any waves or pick any fights he couldn't handle. He is still the leading vice presidential choice in my opinion. Cruz, on the other hand, was often just kind of there - he can't sell religion like Huckabee or Carson; he can't sell war like Graham or even Fiorina; he can''t sell immigration reform like Trump or Rubio, etc. There wasn't a single thing he said that actually mattered beyond his useless desire to close the government for, frankly, stupid reasons. Despite that, Cruz does have an actual presence on the stage, he's learned quite well from Reagan and George W. (and his father).

And last, but not least, Kasich continues to sell himself quite well. His was the only service that hasn't really been called into question, and his ability to sell himself while not really attacking others is quite strong. I seriously doubt he will get anywhere in the primaries (though I do think he is an overall better candidate than most of the frontrunners).

As always, the economy is the major concern of the election, and as always it was firmly glossed over in these debates, and when mentioned was woefully inadequate described. No matter how much Fox and the Conservative machine want to harp on "Islamic Fundamentalist Terrorist" (or whatever) and Iran (and to a lesser extent Putin and all the supposed issues of "strength" that plague the Republican talking points), when it comes down to it I seriously doubt the vast majority is going to vote primarily based on the nebulous threats of the Middle East. If anything, I think we are all fatigued by our constant presence over there, and wish to focus primarily on local problems for the next 4 years. (Obviously that doesn't mean these foreign problems are not important, I just do not think they necessarily matter quite as much to the next election.)

[Esclair]

Originally Posted by GDB

Still pretty sure his "foreign policy" and general attitude would end up causing World War III within a year of his inauguration.

That doesn't seem to be the case though. Every other candidate aside from Rand Paul wanted to be 'tough' on Russia and China, with Fiorina and Rubio seemingly calling for restarting the Cold War.

Trump's only specific was that he'd talk to Putin and he says they'd 'get along' and work something out.

[GDB]

I meant more along the lines of his seemingly xenophobic statements and general blow-hardiness.