View Topic

I agree, thank you for the very thought-provoking debate. Definitely learned a lot from all the research I had to do and different perspectives you presented, and I refined my views on some issues as well.

Just a couple final responses:

On government reimbursement of political donations: That is a good point. I seem to be mixing two different versions of publicly-funded elections (a voucher system and a government donation-matching system for candidates who opt-in), but either way, it would lead to citizens getting more involved in politics and help those who cannot afford to donate to do so. The way I laid out might not be the most practical way, though, so I'll need to look further into it.

On union partisanship: I do think that unions should not be able to donate to candidates/parties (if other PACs are banned as well) or lobby (well, drastically regulate lobbying for both unions and corporations), so I think that'd help with that.

Michael Bennet, Democratic Senator from Colorado, just announced as well.

It looks like the Governor of Montana, Steve Bullock, is also going to announce he is standing.

Yup, Bullock's in.

And New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio has announced his candidacy as well.

23 with 1 more, Stacey Abrams, quite possibly jumping in. This is no longer a clown car primary, this is a Clown Tug Boat primary.

With so many candidates, some may be tempted to say/do bolder things to stand out from the pack. Bolder can be good. Bolder can also be bad.

The other risk is that decent candidates with less name recognition or demographic appeal will get lost in the shuffle.

Interesting race.

I would like to point out that even though many people do not like Joe Biden as he doesn't really represent the Democratic Party's more newly progressive outlooks, many older voters have said that Biden is the "only" candidate that can stand out to Trump. They point out how Trump has responded quite actively to Biden as soon as he announced his candidacy. Though I don't agree with this, as many other candidates have great chances, does anyone else believe Biden is the chance the Democrats have? If so why, and If not why? Thank you very much

I would like to point out that even though many people do not like Joe Biden as he doesn't really represent the Democratic Party's more newly progressive outlooks, many older voters have said that Biden is the "only" candidate that can stand out to Trump. They point out how Trump has responded quite actively to Biden as soon as he announced his candidacy. Though I don't agree with this, as many other candidates have great chances, does anyone else believe Biden is the chance the Democrats have? If so why, and If not why? Thank you very much

I think democrats overestimate how progressive Americans really are, and how much they'd be able to stomach an actual progressive. We want free shit, and not the pesky social activism that comes with it. Biden is a nice, safe old man who unlike Hillary wasn't a particularly controversial figure prior to the election (Benghazi.jpg). A 60 something folksy slickster who's from Delaware, a state that's prosperous but not too prosperous, used to be southern but still not entirely northern. The perfect mid-atlantic middle of the road guy. If 2016 taught us anything it's that America is not very enthusiastic about New Yorkers of any kind, whether born in that state or adoptive of it, so anyone from New York automatically gets the axe if you ask me. Another thing that those rust belt states that won Trump his first term despise if Californians, god do we middle americans fucking despise California. Anyone from the west coast, (including Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who btw is a hindu and therefore will never win any national election) is automatically disqualified as well. I mean hell, at least Bernie is only a Jew, which is about on par with a Catholic in the eyes of evangelicals. What you will never ever see is a properly atheistic or pagan president in the next 20 years at least, if ever, and that's assuming the nukes don't fly before that. We need strong family values too, so all the unmarried candidates can just forfeit right now. Joe Biden is quite frankly the most "normal" candidate on this ballot, and he's basically acting as a juicy piece of bait for all the Republicans who ended up disliking Trump but still hate anything that even remotely resembles socialism with a burning passion. He's a greasy little morsel, fat and plump and sweetened with honey. The Democrats are fishing for GOP votes, and Bernie's the plumpest worm they ever saw. A real 6 inch long nightcrawler. You can almost taste it right now, like the fishes do. The glimmer of the hook buried in that folksy down to earth demeanor. It'd be like 1992 all over again. After the progressives finally think they've wrangled the DNC, in comes ol' Billy Clinton here to fuck Jerry Brown in the ass raw as the day he was born. Course, now that we've already elected Trump it'll take more than a few blowjobs under the Resolute desk to ruin his political career. Maybe an underaged prostitute? Oh, but I'm getting ahead of myself, I'm not quite sure if he's the best choice or not but he's certainly got potential. Like I said, fat and plump.

I would like to point out that even though many people do not like Joe Biden as he doesn't really represent the Democratic Party's more newly progressive outlooks, many older voters have said that Biden is the "only" candidate that can stand out to Trump. They point out how Trump has responded quite actively to Biden as soon as he announced his candidacy. Though I don't agree with this, as many other candidates have great chances, does anyone else believe Biden is the chance the Democrats have? If so why, and If not why? Thank you very much

I think democrats overestimate how progressive Americans really are, and how much they'd be able to stomach an actual progressive. We want free shit, and not the pesky social activism that comes with it. Biden is a nice, safe old man who unlike Hillary wasn't a particularly controversial figure prior to the election (Benghazi.jpg). A 60 something folksy slickster who's from Delaware, a state that's prosperous but not too prosperous, used to be southern but still not entirely northern. The perfect mid-atlantic middle of the road guy. If 2016 taught us anything it's that America is not very enthusiastic about New Yorkers of any kind, whether born in that state or adoptive of it, so anyone from New York automatically gets the axe if you ask me. Another thing that those rust belt states that won Trump his first term despise if Californians, god do we middle americans fucking despise California. Anyone from the west coast, (including Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who btw is a hindu and therefore will never win any national election) is automatically disqualified as well. I mean hell, at least Bernie is only a Jew, which is about on par with a Catholic in the eyes of evangelicals. What you will never ever see is a properly atheistic or pagan president in the next 20 years at least, if ever, and that's assuming the nukes don't fly before that. We need strong family values too, so all the unmarried candidates can just forfeit right now. Joe Biden is quite frankly the most "normal" candidate on this ballot, and he's basically acting as a juicy piece of bait for all the Republicans who ended up disliking Trump but still hate anything that even remotely resembles socialism with a burning passion. He's a greasy little morsel, fat and plump and sweetened with honey. The Democrats are fishing for GOP votes, and Bernie's the plumpest worm they ever saw. A real 6 inch long nightcrawler. You can almost taste it right now, like the fishes do. The glimmer of the hook buried in that folksy down to earth demeanor. It'd be like 1992 all over again. After the progressives finally think they've wrangled the DNC, in comes ol' Billy Clinton here to fuck Jerry Brown in the ass raw as the day he was born. Course, now that we've already elected Trump it'll take more than a few blowjobs under the Resolute desk to ruin his political career. Maybe an underaged prostitute? Oh, but I'm getting ahead of myself, I'm not quite sure if he's the best choice or not but he's certainly got potential. Like I said, fat and plump.

Thank you for that 

Resurrecting this in anticipation of the debates on the 26/27th...

Who do you think will give Warren the biggest run for her money in the first half of the debates?  To me she seems like the only candidate in that debate with a real shot.  I'd probably say Booker or Gabbard would probably be the most loud/vocal, but I'm not sure who is most likely to steal the spotlight.  Thoughts/predictions/suggestions?

In the first debate she will probably triumph. No one else on the first day has the popular support she does or, really, the drive to challenge her ideas which is a shame. I would have liked to have seen real, significant and well considered opposition to the bad ideas she puts out.

Tim Ryan has been slowly edging up the polls (consistently ~1%), so I suspect he'll be really going for it. But, yeah, I also expect Gabbard, Booker, and maybe O'Rourke to be quite vocal.

I'm not really sure how I feel about the random drawing of names for the debates. On the one hand, it's fair in that the debates certainly weren't stacked in favor of certain candidates; but on the other hand, you can get really uneven debates like this one. But I suppose it won't really matter for much longer as I suspect by debate 3 in August that there won't be more than 10 candidates who qualify.

Wonder how they'll situate them on the debate stage -- higher polling candidates in the middle or random?

For some reason, we have a new candidate: Joe Sestak, former Congressman from Pennsylvania announced on Saturday that he's running. No one asked, but he answered.

"No one asked, but he answered" could be the campaign slogan for more than half the candidates, really.

Anyone watching the debates?